No deal has closed, but Triple Five Nevada Development Corp. is under contract to acquire the 6-acre site of the former La Concha Motel at 2955 Las Vegas Blvd. South for $32 million an acre, said John Knott, who heads the Global Gaming Group with CB Richard Ellis.

In addition, Triple Five is acquiring 11 to 12 acres behind the Strip and adjacent to the La Concha site from various property owners.

That includes the Villa Roma Inn, 220 Convention Center Drive. The properties behind the Strip will sell for $14 million an acre, Knott said.

The planned resort site is on the east side of Las Vegas Boulevard, south of the Riviera and directly across the Strip from the imploded Stardust.

"That is a fair price for Strip property," Knott said of the $190 million-plus price Triple Five is paying for the La Concha site.

Even better was the price agreed to for the off-Strip land behind the La Concha.

"They got a great deal on the Convention Center Drive property," Knott added.

Elad Group in May made a $1.2 billion deal to buy the 35-acre New Frontier site, more than $34 million per acre. Elad plans to build a resort on the site that would utilize the brand of its famed New York hotel, the Plaza.

In April, MGM Mirage made a deal with the then-owners of the Sahara to buy a vacant 25.8-acre parcel on the west side of Las Vegas Boulevard, just across from the Sahara, for $444 million. The parcel sold for slightly more than $17 million per acre. MGM Mirage is pursuing a joint venture resort development on the site with Kerzner International and Istithmar Hotels.

Knott said he had a client who was bidding on the same property, but the bid was unsuccessful. Knott declined to identify his client.

Triple Five officials declined to comment.

It isn't known whether Triple Five plans to seek an established casino operator for a resort or whether it would attempt to get its own license.

And Triple Five could, of course, try to flip the property to another buyer.

The Canadian-owned developer owned by the Ghermezian brothers had a controversial Spring Valley casino proposal shot down by a state panel in 2000.

Triple Five received Clark County Commission approval to build a locals casino in the southwest valley in a proposed 100-acre shopping center to be developed at Grand Canyon Drive and Flamingo Road, but the state Review Panel of the Gaming Policy Committee voted 5-0 to deny permission for the casino, which would have been operated by Boyd Gaming.

One of the owners of Triple Five, Eskandar Ghermezian, has had his name in number of unfavorable news stories dealing with disgraced former County Commissioner Erin Kenny.

Kenny testified that Triple Five Nevada Development gave her $3,000 monthly from early 2000 to May 2003. Kenny said the payments, which began after she voted in favor of the proposed Spring Valley casino, began as payment for editing company brochures, but she said she continued to collect money after she stopped doing the work for Triple Five.

In her corruption trial Kenny testified that Eskandar Ghermezian said he owed her a "life debt" because of her casino vote and funneled the monthly payments through Don Davidson, then an executive with Triple Five, who was convicted earlier this year of trying to bribe former Las Vegas City Councilman Michael McDonald and was acquitted of trying to bribe Kenny.

Triple Five lawyers denied Kenny's allegations.

Knott said he expects Triple Five to pursue an additional 8.5 acres to the south and southeast to assemble a resort site of 25-plus acres. That would require the acquisition of a Walgreens, Peppermill Restaurant and former proposed high-rise project, the Icon.

"That is one of the last areas along the Strip (for a megaresort)," Knott said.

The owner of some of the property south and southeast, on the site of the long-demolished Silver City casino, is San Francisco real estate developer Luke Brugnara. who was denied a gaming license to operate the Silver City in 2001.

Brugnara said he has no intention of selling his land and plans to develop it himself.

"We are certainly not selling to Triple Five," Brugnara said.

Brian Gordon, principal with research firm Applied Analysis, said it's always challenging to assemble all of the pieces needed for a resort development while paying prices that make a development feasible. Any development would make neighboring properties more valuable, he said.

Triple Five built the Boca Park retail center near Summerlin and has proposed the Great Mall of Las Vegas.

Triple Five Minnesota owns and manages the Mall of America in Minneapolis. In 2005, it proposed expanding the Minnesota mall to include an Indian casino.