Company negotiating with Penn State for campus hotels buys 2 more in Happy Valley
Scholar Hotel Group, which is currently negotiating with Penn State over its two campus hotels, recently purchased two more local hotels — for nearly $25 million — to further expand its footprint in Happy Valley.
The group bought both Residence Inn by Marriott State College (1555 University Drive) for $15.6 million and Courtyard by Marriott State College (1730 University Drive) for $9.1 million, according to public documents filed last month. Apple Hotel LLC was the previous owner and, per a Scholar Hotel official, approached the group about a sale.
Scholar Hotel Group now owns a hotel near Syracuse University, another near West Virginia University and four in the State College area, all within 1.5 miles of the Penn State campus. It is also in talks with the university to purchase and ground-lease the 223-room Nittany Lion Inn and the 300-room Penn Stater Hotel & Conference Center.
“We definitely had a gameplan of adding hotels this year, and it’s just kind of aligned so far that the opportunities we’ve been able to really nail down have been in the State College market,” Ronald Balle, Scholar Hotel Group’s vice president of sales and marketing, told the CDT. “We’re very excited about State College as a market for its continued growth and opportunity.”
According to Balle, Scholar Hotel Group is committed to keeping the recently purchased hotels as Marriott properties. Renovations to Courtyard’s rooms, public spaces, the exterior and the bistro/bar will occur later this year, once the home football slate is over, and renovations will start at Residence Inn either later this year or in 2023.
The company founder and president, Gary Brandeis, is a 1988 Penn State graduate. His Scholar Hotel Group made its State College debut in March 2017, when it opened the 165-room Hyatt Place State College, which serves as the anchor of Fraser Centre. In January 2021, the group opened its second area hotel with the 72-room Scholar Hotel State College, in the downtown’s historic Glennland Building.
Based on a public June meeting by Penn State’s board of trustees, Brandeis’ company is the university’s “preferred partner” for the two campus hotels — the Penn Stater and Nittany Lion Inn — and is in talks to purchase and ground-lease them. The university would continue to own the land the campus hotels sit on, and ownership of the hotels would revert back to the university once the long-term ground lease is finished.
It is not known how long the ground lease might be — they typically range between 50 and 99 years — and it’s also not yet known how much Penn State might receive for the sale.
Ball declined to discuss the two Penn State hotels but, overall, said Scholar Hotel Group has been pleased so far with its business around the area.
“State College has been incredibly good to the Scholar Hotel Group,” he said. “And we just hope to continue to be a good partner in the community and strengthen our relationship with the university, with the businesses and with the local residents.”
