Thirteen years ago, Donald Trump signed a letter of agreement with Diamondhead Casino Corporation to build a casino on 40 acres between Interstate 10 and the Bay of St. Louis in Mississippi. “Donald loves this property,” Diamondhead President Deborah Vitale said, but Trump pulled out of the project the following year.
Since then the total 400-acre site has not be able to attract a buyer, and it’s now for sale—even though it sits along two miles of Bay shoreline and offers two miles of frontage along Interstate 10, east of the Diamondhead exit. A casino there would be the only one directly on the interstate, 30 minutes closer to Louisiana than the Biloxi casinos. Another plus: a piece of the property won site approval from the Mississippi Gaming Commission in 2014.
In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, Diamondhead said it signed a 6-month agreement, ending on October 31, to sell all or part of the property through Newmark Knight Frank, an American real estate brokerage with international offices. During that time Diamondhead can continue to look for a partner to build a casino, Vitale said. “Our primary focus is to find a joint venture partner,” she said, noting the company would prefer to sell the land in sections rather than the entire 400 acres.
Vitale said Diamondhead did not set a price for the land but will entertain offers. A recent appraisal indicated the land’s value has gone up. “We just need to get a fair price,” she said. She said the land is ideal for a large mixed-use resort with a boardwalk along the water and plenty of room for a variety of amenities. It’s accessible by the airports at Diamondhead, Gulfport and New Orleans.
In 2011, Phoenix Gaming and Entertainment LLC signed a letter of intent to buy 25 acres for $1 million per acre to build a casino. That deal ended the same year when Phoenix was unable to secure financing for the project.
