ATLANTA-Atlanta-based Hotel Equities, which owns, manages and develops hotels, has taken on the management of another property, the Staybridge Suites Hotel in South Bend, IN near the University of Notre Dame. An extended-stay hotel brand, the Staybridge in South Bend, which will have 90 rooms, is under construction and is expected to open in August. “This hotel features extended-stay amenities that appeal to both business and leisure travelers,” says Hotel Equities President and CEO, Fred Cerrone.

The Staybridge in South Bend will feature deluxe studios, one-bedroom and two-bedroom/two-bath suites. All suites will have DVD/CD players, work stations and fully-equipped kitchens. 

Hotel Equities, which presently manages 48 hotels, has two more deals in the works which will be announced by the end of the summer, says Mary Beth Cutshall, director of business development at Hotel Equities. But she declined to say where these properties are or what flags they carry. Hotel Equities currently manages hotels in nine states.

The Staybridge in South Bend is owned by JFK Development, a family-owned company in South Bend, which owns mostly investment-grade properties like Hilton, Marriott and InterContinental  brands, says Cutshall.  Staybridge, which is the equivalent of a Residence Inn at Marriott, is one of the InterContinental Hotels Group brands, she says.

The Staybridge will be the third property Hotel Equities manages in Northern Indiana after a Hilton Garden Inn and a Fairfield Inn in Elkhart and soon, there will be another Indiana hotel which the company will manage, says Cutshall. “Our growth plan is to expand across the country,” she says. “We’ve gone from 14 to 48 properties in the past four and a half years. Five years ago, we were only in Georgia and South Carolina,” she says.

Although the last two properties Hotel Equities has agreed to manage have been in smaller markets—South Bend, and Navarre, Florida earlier this month—Cutshall says that the company is not adverse to working in large urban areas, but that executives at Hotel Equities are going where there are opportunities.

As for South Bend, Cutshall says that the advantage of university towns is that there is a diversity of travelers, those whose stay is related to the university and other, local business travelers.