One of the most recognizable and embattled names on Toronto’s skyline will soon be gone, after the new owners of the Trump International Hotel and Tower reached a deal with the company that bears the U.S. president’s name.

JCF Capital ULC will buy out Trump Hotels’ management contract allowing them to remove the president’s name from the Bay Street tower, a move one Toronto realtor called “long overdue.”

“Trump Tower…is a running joke in real estate, it’s synonymous with probably the biggest real estate failure in the city in recent memory,” said David Fleming, a Toronto realtor with Bosley Real Estate Ltd.

“That building needs a clean start.”

JCF Capital ULC and Trump Hotels, which never owned the building, announced the agreement Tuesday.

“Collectively, Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Eric Danziger and their team have been exceptional partners and we hope to have the pleasure of working with the Trump Organization again in the future,” said Jay Wolf, the president of JCF Capital, in a statement.

Trump Hotels CEO Eric Danziger echoed his comments, saying they “look forward to exploring other opportunities with JCF in the near future.”

The release did not explain why JCF, a joint venture between Juniper Capital Partners and Cowie Capital Partners, decided to buy-out the Trump Hotels management contract. JCF bought the building, which includes 211 hotel units, 74 condos and most of the commercial, retail and amenity space, in March for $298 million.

“Most people would think it’s because of President Donald Trump and his views and the negativity and controversy that surrounds him, but personally I think if you trace this project back to its roots there’s a failure from the beginning,” said Fleming.

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The project has been shrouded in controversy, which include multiple lawsuits, since opening in 2012. In one case, investors won damages after they successfully argued U.S. President Donald Trump and the developer Talon International had misled them into believing their investments would offer significantly higher returns.

Changing the name could help shift the focus to the building’s features, said Marco Chiappetta, a realtor with Sotheby’s International Realty Canada, who has listed one of the building’s one bedroom plus den condos for $1.6 million.

“Right now the building features probably the nicest finishes in the city and not a lot of people know that,” he said.

“A new name will freshen up the brand.”

New name or not, Fleming said it won’t change his mind about the hotel-condo model.

“I don’t like the commercial taxes, I don’t like the higher maintenance fees, I don’t like the potential for the hotel to make decisions that affect the condo. I think it’s incredibly risky and I would never put a buyer into a hotel condo, let alone this one in particular,” he said.

Chiappetta takes a different view. He sees the amenities offered by the hotel condo model, including things like 24-hour concierge service, as an asset.

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Despite the forthcoming branding change, the controversy isn’t over for the 65 storey hotel-condo.

Mitchell Wine, a Toronto lawyer with Levine Sherkin Boussidan, has started a class action law suit against Talon, the hotel condo’s developer. The class action suit, which could include between 100 and 150 people, is seeking the return of deposits paid by people who did not close their transactions to become owners.

With files from the Canadian Press

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