The Village Latch Inn Hotel, one of the highest profile East End hotels, hit the market this week with an asking price of $24.9 million, a cost slightly more than its listing last winter.
For sale are the signature “Great Gatsby Estate” main building and the “sister buildings” known as the Terry Cottage, Homestead East and Homestead West, which sit on approximately 5 ½ acres on Hill Street in Southampton Village. The property also includes a swimming pool and tennis court.
“You have such a picturesque setting, but really the key here is that it really offers an unprecedented development opportunity. And you know this is just what our foreign investors look for, but nothing’s to say that it can’t be someone locally,” said Faith Hope Consolo, chairman of Prudential Douglas Elliman’s retail group, on Friday morning. “You can have a reuse, but keep the flavor,” she said, referring to the inn’s prized architecture. She said the neighboring Whitefield Condominiums could be a model for the hotel’s new direction.
Ms. Consolo and Joseph Aquino, executive vice president of the retail group, are marketing the sale.
The current owners, the husband-wife duo of Marta and Martin White, have run the hotel for more than three decades, but have said they are ready to sell.
The property was on the market in January 2009 with Corcoran Group Real Estate at $24.75 million.
“Before, it was being presented in a more residential light,” said Ms. Consolo. “And that’s not it’s full potential.”
The hotel has been involved in unresolved legal issues with the village spanning several decades.
This past summer, the village Building Department was drafting a report outlining a number of possible village code and fire code violations at the hotel, including allegations that it has more than twice the number of units it has permission for.
Southampton Village Mayor Mark Epley said the report has been delayed, but had not discussed it with Building Inspector Jonathan Foster since November. Mr. Foster did not return a call for comment on Friday.