Long Wharf Extended Stay Hotel Gets Reboot

A Long Wharf Drive extended stay hotel has a new owner, a new name and a new look.

The new owner, developer Juan Salas-Romer, and Mayor Toni Harp cut the ribbon Thursday on what will now be known as the New Haven Village Suites, a reboot of the city’s 112-unit extended stay hotel.

Nestled behind Jordan’s Furniture (the former New Haven Register building facing I‑95) and the 1 Long Wharf office building (once the home of Seamless Rubber Co.), the former Premier Hotel & Suites has begun a transformation 18 months in the making. It sits amid a hot pocket of development, with new investments taking place or being negotiated for adjoining properties in all directions.

“The hotel we saw 18 months ago had considerable wear and tear after years of deferred maintenance,” Salas-Romser said to a crowd gathered in the parking lot of the hotel. ​“The hotel was ready for a major overhaul.”

The first phase of the overhaul is underway with a new six-foot high fence and landscaping that makes the hotel campus feel less like it’s in an industrial park and more secluded.

In addition to an update of the lobby, which Salas-Romer joked was stuck in the 1980s, the outdoor courtyards have been rehabbed. Additional security features such as better lighting and a boom control gate that can be opened only by guests have been added to the parking lot. An old basketball court on the hotel property was transformed into a grassy picnic and play area complete with a bocce court.

Inside, the suites, which are set up like apartments with fireplaces and full kitchens,will be renovated over the course of the next three years. Other improvements include Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant renovations, fiber optics for better WiFi capabilities and a fenced dog park.

“This is really the only hotel where you can come and light a fire while eating popcorn and watching TV,” Salas-Romer said. ​“How cool is that?”

Known for his success in developing multi-family affordable and market rate housing, Salas-Romer, the principal partner of NHR Properties, said that renovating and rebranding the hotel is a new venture for him and his company.

The company, which has become a go-to for city economic development officials when it comes to riskier affordable and workforce-housing investments in neighborhoods throughout the city, opened the Ashmun Flats complex near Science Park last year. It redeveloped the historic Palladium building on Orange Street.

City economic development chief Matthew Nemerson praised Salas-Romer as the developer whom everyone else follows into a neighborhood after he has demonstrated some success.

“This is the first hotel that we’re getting involved in,“Salas-Romer said. ​“For us to start on the right foot we had the help of a well recognized firm, Paramount Hotel Group, that worked along with us in marrying two worlds — the hospitality world with the multifamily world. This is an important milestone, not only for our company but for the resurgence of Long Wharf.”

Salas-Romer billed the extended-stay hotel as offering a ​“turnkey lifestyle” for a number of different target markets. He said the hotel is for people who want a secluded environment, away from downtown but with easy access to the highway. It’s also for people who need anywhere from 450 square feet, which is the size of a studio suite, to up to 1,200 square feet in a two-bedroom suite.

He plans to market the hotel to those with short-term work engagements with the university or Yale-New Haven Hospital. He also plans to appeal to individuals and families who are in between permanent housing situations, such as those needing a place to stay during home renovations, buying or selling a house, or emergency relocation. He also called it a flexible and mobile housing option for the growing number of millennials not yet ready to sign a long-term lease.

“For all these groups we would be offering turnkey living,” he said. ​“We basically sit at the intersection of the apartment world and the hotel world to offer short-term living arrangements.”

Mayor Harp called the rebooted extended stay hotel yet another positive sign of the continued investment in the city.

“We couldn’t be more pleased,” Harp said. ​“NHR Properties purchased this property in 2015 and immediately began collaborating with Connecticut corporations, medical centers, educational and cultural institutions on plans for the renovation and rebranding of this hotel. This is the first year of planned three-year transformation, and what a difference a year makes.”

Nemerson recalled when the hotel first opened. He said it was an exciting time then because it was the first hotel of its kind in the Greater New Haven region. He said it’s again an exciting time for the city given the investment that has come to the neighborhood.

Next door, 1 Long Wharf was purchased earlier this year by Healthcare Trust of America Holdings for $73 million,while Jordan’s Furniture opened at the end of last year.

Nemerson alluded to the city being in talks with Southern Connecticut State University about development of the former Gateway Community College building across the street at the corner of Long Wharf and Sargent drives.

“It shows the kind of value you can have here,” he said.