Patton Towers is seen from the Edney Building on Wednesday, April 11, 2018 in Chattanooga, Tenn.In the heart of Chattanooga’s innovation district, an historic high-rise apartment complex has a new owner who plans to both improve the structure and preserve it for affordable housing for low-income, senior and physically or mentally challenged tenants.
A San Francisco-based housing investment company bought the 110-year-old Patten Towers for $14.2 million this month and is preparing to spend millions of dollars to renovate the 11-story former hotel.
“We plan to keep the Patten Towers as an apartment complex with affordable housing (under HUD income guidelines) , but we also believe that just because apartments are affordable, they shouldn’t be any less than the other properties that are being redeveloped and enhanced in this area,” said Louis Harrison, a partner in Belveron Real Estate Partners LLC, which acquired Patten Towers on July 9. “When we are done, we will end up with a property that is safer, cleaner and better. Everything about that property will feel different as we complete this rehabilitation work.”
About the Patten Towers
* Opened as the Hotel Patten in 1908 and included 251 rooms, a billiard room, a bowling alley, a barbershop, a main dining room, a ballroom and orchestra room, men’s café, a bar and a kitchen. The initial hotel rate was $1.50 a night.* The 11-story building was designed by architect W.T. Downing of Atlanta and was Chattanooga’s first sky scraper. At its opening, The Chattanooga Times said the Hotel Patten and the James Building, which also opened in 1908, “mark the transition of the big town to the modern city.”* The Hotel Patten housed Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa during his 1964 federal trial in Chattanooga and evangelist Billy Graham during his 1953 crusade in Chattanooga. Three presidents — William Howard Taft, Warren G. Harding and John F. Kennedy — stayed or spoke at the Hotel Patten before it was ultimately converted into apartments.* The Patten Towers includes 221 rooms designated under its HUD financing agreement to be set aside for low- and moderate-income residents, seniors and physically or mentally challenged persons* Belveren Real Estate Partners bought the Patten Towers for $14.2 million, or $72 per square foot, with plans to spend several million dollars on improvements.* The building is located along 11th Street at the intersection of Market Street — directly across from the hub of the Innovation District in the Edney Building — and was originally built on a large limestone outcropping owned by the Stone Fort Land Co.