ROCKLAND, Maine — A Freeport-based company is negotiating the purchase of one of the city’s largest motels with plans to undertake a complete renovation of the complex.
Maine Course Hospitality Group principal Peter Anastos said Wednesday that a contract to buy the Navigator Motor Inn was signed Tuesday evening.
Anastos said once the sale becomes final, renovations will begin and the motel will be closed for approximately six months. He said he hopes the motel will be open again by June 1, although that was not certain.
He said when Maine Course Hospitality built the Hampton Inn on Route 1 in Thomaston near the town line with Rockland about 12 years ago, he drove through Rockland and saw the Navigator for the first time.
“I said to myself, ‘That’s the spot,’” Anastos said. “In the hospitality business, three most important things are location, location and location, and the Navigator has that.”
He said the aim of the work on the hotel will be to make it “cool and hip,” and a place that will get people’s attention so they will stop and want to stay. He said the restaurant will be removed and a lobby three times the current size created. There will be a place for guests to have breakfast and a fitness center for guests will be included.
The Navigator is owned by Robert and Dorothy Liberty, who bought it in 2000.
The five-story hotel was built in 1971 on Main Street, also known as Route 1, across from the Maine State Ferry Terminal. The facility has 65 rooms and five suites, according to its website.
The building and property are assessed by the city at nearly $1.8 million.
A telephone message left Wednesday morning for Robert Liberty was not immediately returned.