Paramount will have brokerage services for the buying andselling of hotels and will also have a variety of other services,such as finding hotel sites, asset management, construction anddevelopment consulting, valuations, executive searches and food andbeverage consulting, says principal Philippus Miller. The companyis currently marketing properties in 14 states including Vermont,Pennsylvania, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maine, Illinois,Missouri, Iowa, Michigan, California and Arizona and are alsomarketing properties in seven other countries including Canada,London and elsewhere in Europe. Paramount expects about 15% of thebrokerage volume to initially be international, and to increase thepercentage to 50% within five years.

The group decided to form the company at the NIU HotelInvestment Conference. The bulk of the initial employees are fromNAI Global Hotels. Besides Beider and Miller, Sanjeev Misra andStephen Mills and associates Jared Gibson and Adam Montufarpreviously worked for NAI. NAI is an international company that didnot have "any hotel specific practice" before the group was hiredabout two years ago, Miller says. The group was successful "But, wewere building the NAI brand rather than building a brand of ourown," he says.

Beider says that they had recruited principals Joe Ross andStephen Potel when they were with NAI "and were unsuccessful indoing so." Ross and Potel did not want to work for such a largecompany as NAI but were the first to be added to the newly formedcompany, Beider says. Principal Josh Williams was previously withHilton Hotels and Forte Hotels and Jim Mouzourakis was previouslywith Allied Hotels. Walker Geyer is the founder and owner ofNorthStar Capital Access. The principals have "non-brokerage"experience in the hospitality industry and have been operators,owners and developers of hotels, Beider says. "We know thehospitality industry inside and out," Miller says. The companyexpects to announce soon the hiring on someone to handle theSouthwest and to be located in Phoenix, Beider says.