One of Sligo’s best known hotels has been put up for sale by a receiver.
The Clarion Hotel, which is the biggest hotel in Sligo town, is being offered at a guide price of €7 million.
That’s a lot less than the €35 million it took to transform the landmark building from a psychiatric hospital to a 4 star hotel.
It comes just three weeks after the Diamond Coast Hotel in Enniscrone was offered for sale for €3m and the recent sale of Sligo Retail Park at Carraroe to a US group.
Estate agents Savills, announced yesterday, Wednesday, that they were bringing the Clarion building to the market on behalf of receiver, Aiden Murphy of Crowe Howarth.
The 162 bedroom hotel has being operating since 2005 in a building which dates from the late 1840s.
The Clarion is described as “one of the largest and most profitable hotels in the North-West of Ireland”, by Tom Barrett, Head of Hotels & Leisure at Savills.
“The hotel will attract serious interest from both Irish and international hoteliers. The property is available free from the current management agreement and represents a rare opportunity to acquire a unique landmark property and highly profitable trading hotel”, he said.
The hotel also features a range of food and beverage offerings such as Synergy Restaurant, Kudos Restaurant and Savour Lounge.
It is also a popular wedding venue with capacity for up to 350 guests and features extensive conference facilities.
The health and fitness club, with approximately 800 members, includes a fully equipped gym and a 20m heated indoor swimming pool and spa.
The beautiful cut-stone building was originally known as the Sligo & Leitrim District Lunatic Asylum and later as St. Columba’s Hospital. The foundation stone was laid on November 7, 1847 and the building was completed in 1852 at a cost of £35,199 (the equivalent of around €4.5m today). It opened in 1854 with a capacity for 250 patients and that capacity was increased to near 500 by later extensions.
It closed as a psychiatric hospital in 1992 and was bought by the late former Fine Gael TD Jim White from Ballyshannon with the aim of turning it into a hotel.
However, he later sold it on to Galway based developer Tom Coyle, who developed the building as a hotel and the Clarion Village student accommodation.
