Oct. 3--Five years ago, facing 50 and feeling feisty, Realtor Alan Lieberman decided to give hospitality a whirl by buying a small hotel, the Shelley on Collins Avenue in Miami Beach. Today, his South Beach Group boasts six inns and an alluring pitch: Anything goes. 

"Last Memorial Day, when other hotels were worrying about security, we threw open our doors and said `Come on in!' " said Chris Rollins, manager of the Chesterfield, one of Lieberman's more raucous hotels. "The word `no' does not exist -- within legal bounds." 

In South Beach's fiercely competitive world of boutique hotels, standing out is no easy feat. So Lieberman dreamed up a fetching combination: Offer debauchery at affordable prices. DJs spin in his lobbies. Celebrities dance on couches. And every weekend morning, housekeepers sweep half a dozen condoms from the hotels' rooftop patios. 

"Things get pretty sexual," Rollins said. "Let's just say that we found out that the Pleasure Emporium (sex shop) delivers." 

Profits are another story: Like most of the area's hotels, Lieberman's room rates are 10 percent to 20 percent lower than what they were last year. Lieberman said his hotels make money in January, February and March, as do most Beach hotels, and try to hang on for the rest of the year. 

"A concept of low prices in South Beach probably would be well received, it's a fairly high-priced market, though I'm not sure you can make any money at it," said Chase Burritt, an analyst with Ernst & Young. "As for debauchery, that's not unfamiliar territory in South Beach." 

Lieberman said his hotel company makes money, but the business is driven by volume rather than prices. The rates, which now hover around $79 a room, keep the hotels sold out most weekends, he said. 

Many of the guests are local: 20-somethings from Kendall, Hialeah and Fort Lauderdale who pack four to a room. For $20 apiece, they get a place to crash, free entry at a South Beach club (a perk most hotels promise), free breakfast and happy-hour drinks. 

Lieberman's first career was in apartment real estate, a business he grew with his wife, Diane, who runs South Beach Investment Realty. Their son, Nathan, 23, is also in the real estate business, and runs an apartment building for models, also on the Beach. 

In 1997, Lieberman bought the Shelley. "I needed a challenge," he said. Then came the Chesterfield, the Lily Guesthouse, the Whitelaw, the Chelsea and the Mercury Resort, considered the most staid and upscale of the bunch. 

The hotels cost "a coupla million" apiece, and Lieberman put another "coupla million" renovating each one. The hotels are small, just 350 rooms combined. Five are on Collins; the Chelsea is on Washington Avenue, along with a seventh hotel, the Angler, whose opening is mired in litigation with previous owners. 

"We don't have the beach or pools or fancy restaurants, but we're priced accordingly," Lieberman said. "And we have parties all the time." 

Celebrities flock as well. The Wayans brothers frequent the Mercury. Last New Year's Eve, Tara Reid kicked it up on the Chesterfield's couch. In August, Anita Marks, the quarterback for the Miami Fury women's pro football team, hosted a party at the Chesterfield celebrating her Playboy spread. 

"The biggest challenge is every day you gotta wake up and sell 350 rooms," Lieberman said. "But it's fun. I live in Aventura. At least now I have somewhere to go." 

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(c) 2002, The Miami Herald. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.