Visitor boost leads to major hotel sale in Highland capital

On the back of a tourism boom in Inverness, commercial real estate agent Knight Frank has been appointed to sell the city’s Fairways Travelodge for a price in excess of £4.15 million.

The 79-bedroom hotel, comprising a main building of 59 rooms and an annexe of 20, sits within a 1.2-acre site.

The property is let to Travelodge on a long-term lease up to February 2030, with the landlord having the option to extend the contract up to February 2038.

The sale price of more than £4.15 million reflects a net initial yield of 6.46 per cent, with annual passing rent of over £280,000. Located directly in front of one of the city’s three biggest golf courses, Fairways Golf Course, the property is just minutes’ drive from the city centre and major tourist destination, Loch Ness.

Inverness has seen a significant increase in tourism on the back of the popularity of the TV show Outlander and the nearby North Coast 500 route, more than 500 miles of the best landscape in Scotland.

In December 2016, the city was ranked above Montego Bay in Jamaica and Bologna in Italy in a list of the top 15 destinations for European travellers in 2017. Inverness also welcomed 275,587 visitors in 2015, according to the annual International Passenger Survey – placing it fourth in the UK, behind London, Edinburgh, and Glasgow.

Patrick Ford, partner at Knight Frank, said: “Inverness is going through a tourism boom – it’s seldom been a more attractive location for visitors, with so many hotspots on its doorstep. It’s relatively rare that a hotel opportunity of this size comes onto the market, with secure long-term income and such an attractive yield. There have only been a dozen or so deals for hotels in the area since 1999.

“The majority of interest in the Scottish commercial property market has come from international investors and this asset could be ideal for a currency play. But we expect the property to attract widespread attention, with a number of Scottish and UK property companies looking for investments that match its profile.”

Meanwhile, a Dundee hotel which has welcomed guests including Winston Churchill and Frank Sinatra has also been put on the market with a £2.75 million price tag.

The decision to sell the Best Western Queens Hotel, one of Scotland’s most celebrated hotels, comes as work continues apace on the £1 billion Dundee Waterfront regeneration and V&A Museum projects which are expected to attract hundreds of thousands of visitors to the city.

The property has been owned for the past 20 years by independent hotelier Gordon Sneddon.

Stuart Drysdale, associate director at Christie & Co, which is handling the sale, said: “Dundee has been transformed in recent years with the ongoing Waterfront development which will include the V&A Museum of Design.

“This is expected to bring an additional annual 500,000 visitors to the city and numerous hotels are in the pipeline for development to cater for this projected increase in visitor numbers.”

The 53-bedroom hotel was constructed in 1878.