Old Course Hotel owner eyes up Hamilton Hall

16 September 2009 by
Old Course Hotel owner eyes up Hamilton Hall

The American magnate owner of the luxury Old Course Hotel is said to be in the market to buy Hamilton Hall for an estimated £14-£15m.

Herb Kohler, who made his fortune in bathroom fittings and owns the £40m luxury Old Course Hotel, which sits at the other end of the famous 18th hole from Hamilton Hall, is understood to be close to tying up a deal, according to The Times.

The 114-year-old listed building, which in its heyday as the Grand Hotel catered to the likes of Edward VIII, George VI and Rudyard Kipling, has been empty since it was sold by the University of St Andrews four years ago to Wasserman Real Estate Capital for about £20m.

Although Wasserman secured planning consent to convert the listed building into 23 luxury timeshare apartments and declared that it had secured project finance from Bank of Scotland totalling £84.3m, the scheme collapsed.

Wasserman's plan was to sell 115 exclusive "resident memberships" for between £750,000 and £1.9m, plus an annual fee. But construction work was put on hold when the property market crashed and the building was put up for sale again in June after Bank of Scotland repossessed it from Wasserman.

Debbie Taylor, managing director of the Old Course Hotel, declined to comment on Kohler Co's plans for Hamilton Hall should it succeed in buying it, but confirmed: "We are an interested party and are still waiting to hear whether our bid has been successful."

Property overlooking St Andrews golf course up for sale >>

Old Course Hotel named Scottish Hotel of the Year >>

Turnberry Golf Resort reopens after £40m revamp >>

By Gemma Sharkey

E-mail your comments to Gemma Sharkey here.

If you have something to say on this story or anything else join the debate at Table Talk - Caterer's new networking forum. Go to www.caterersearch.com/tabletalk

Caterersearch.com jobs
Looking for a new job? Find your next hotel job here with Caterersearch.com jobs

Blogs on Caterersearch.com](http://www.caterersearch.com/blogs) Catch up with more news and gossip on all Caterer's blogs
[Newsletters For the latest hospitality news, sign up for our e-mail newsletters.
The Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email

Start the working day with The Caterer’s free breakfast briefing email

Sign Up and manage your preferences below

Check mark icon
Thank you

You have successfully signed up for the Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email and will hear from us soon!

Jacobs Media is honoured to be the recipient of the 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The highest official awards for UK businesses since being established by royal warrant in 1965. Read more.

close

Ad Blocker detected

We have noticed you are using an adblocker and – although we support freedom of choice – we would like to ask you to enable ads on our site. They are an important revenue source which supports free access of our website's content, especially during the COVID-19 crisis.

trade tracker pixel tracking