About a year after announcing intentions to shutter and sell its “last-chosen and first-transferred-from” Mayflower Residence Hall, the University of Iowa has taken it off the market — citing “immense interest from returning and prospective students” to live on campus.
“The University of Iowa is not actively marketing Mayflower Hall for sale,” UI Assistant Vice President for Student Life and Senior Director of University Housing and Dining Von Stange said Wednesday. “Based on the future goals for occupancy of the residence hall system by first-year and returning students, we will continue to use Mayflower for student housing.”
A year after listing the 326,000-square-foot property along N. Dubuque Street for $45 million — without landing a buyer — the university in February provided an update on plans to continue using Mayflower for the 2024-25 academic year.
Although the UI in February 2023 suggested Mayflower could close as early as the end of this spring semester, officials also told the Board of Regents at that time that the 2024-25 academic term would be its “final year.”
According to those original plans, selling Mayflower would eliminate maintenance costs and bring in money to help build a new 250- to 400-bed hall for returning students. However, the 56-year-old Mayflower is among the university’s largest halls — housing 1,032 students — and eliminating it from the residence hall rotation would have handicapped the campus’ housing capacity as demand grows.
Although the campus at that time didn’t disclose plans to keep Mayflower in the rotation longer-term — with UI officials telling The Gazette it still planned to sell it — a recent five-year regents report showed expectations UI’s housing capacity would stay level at 6,465 beds between the 2025 and 2029 budget years.
That number is down 88 beds from the 6,553 available in the year that just ended, a result of this summer’s permanent closure of Parklawn Hall — the smallest on campus, featuring suite-style spaces near Hancher Auditorium.
“Parklawn is not highly desired by students and lacks Cambus and food services,” UI officials said. “Since Parklawn Hall is not highly desired by new or returning students and lacks Cambus or food service, UI intends to close it at the conclusion of the current academic year.”
Among the reasons Mayflower — a former apartment complex turned dorm featuring suite-style double rooms that share a kitchen and bathroom — has been less attractive to students is its distance from the main campus and other residence halls. In hopes of increasing its popularity, the UI is adding study spaces and more single rooms, while promoting its privacy for students wanting more independence and its Cambus access.
“Campus leaders are working with students to determine what additional supports and amenities may be offered,” officials said in February.
The university also is cutting the cost to live there.
Instead of the $8,633 charged last year for the standard double with kitchen, bath and air conditioning, the university next year will shave off $560 and charge $8,073 — putting it in line with the standard “double with air” rooms across campus.
“Historically, some students who were assigned there in previous years expressed concern about the cost differential,” Stange said. “This allows all students not to worry about the additional cost of attendance while living in a double room in Mayflower.”
A real estate flyer shows a room inside the Mayflower Residence Hall. The University of Iowa had listed the property for sale at $45 million. (Photo from Lepic-Kroeger, Realtors brochure)
Though the UI has reported an uptick in returning students interested in on-campus living, it didn’t include in its recent five-year residence system report any plans to build that new returning-student hall it proposed last year for the east side of campus, with cost projections between $40 and $60 million.
“The university is always proactively evaluating its housing and dining systems to best serve students who choose to live on campus,” Stange said. “There’s no update to share at this time regarding a new residence hall.”
Mayflower — sitting on 4.1 acres overlooking the Iowa River — is the first thing many UI visitors see as they exit Interstate 80 onto Dubuque Street. Once site of the Mayflower Inn in the 1940s — featuring a popular Mayflower Nite Club — the hangout was razed in the 1960s and replaced in 1968 with the eight-story Mayflower Apartments.
The university started leasing portions of the apartment building in 1979 due to student-housing crowding and bought the building outright in 1983 for a “bargain sale price of $6.5 million.” Mayflower underwent major renovations in 1999 and in again in 2009 after massive flood damage in 2008.
Although the university in 2023 listed the residence hall for $45 million, a recent city property value assessment valued it at $30.7 million.
www.thegazette.com
“The University of Iowa is not actively marketing Mayflower Hall for sale,” UI Assistant Vice President for Student Life and Senior Director of University Housing and Dining Von Stange said Wednesday. “Based on the future goals for occupancy of the residence hall system by first-year and returning students, we will continue to use Mayflower for student housing.”
A year after listing the 326,000-square-foot property along N. Dubuque Street for $45 million — without landing a buyer — the university in February provided an update on plans to continue using Mayflower for the 2024-25 academic year.
Although the UI in February 2023 suggested Mayflower could close as early as the end of this spring semester, officials also told the Board of Regents at that time that the 2024-25 academic term would be its “final year.”
According to those original plans, selling Mayflower would eliminate maintenance costs and bring in money to help build a new 250- to 400-bed hall for returning students. However, the 56-year-old Mayflower is among the university’s largest halls — housing 1,032 students — and eliminating it from the residence hall rotation would have handicapped the campus’ housing capacity as demand grows.
Fall changes
Although the campus at that time didn’t disclose plans to keep Mayflower in the rotation longer-term — with UI officials telling The Gazette it still planned to sell it — a recent five-year regents report showed expectations UI’s housing capacity would stay level at 6,465 beds between the 2025 and 2029 budget years.
That number is down 88 beds from the 6,553 available in the year that just ended, a result of this summer’s permanent closure of Parklawn Hall — the smallest on campus, featuring suite-style spaces near Hancher Auditorium.
“Parklawn is not highly desired by students and lacks Cambus and food services,” UI officials said. “Since Parklawn Hall is not highly desired by new or returning students and lacks Cambus or food service, UI intends to close it at the conclusion of the current academic year.”
Among the reasons Mayflower — a former apartment complex turned dorm featuring suite-style double rooms that share a kitchen and bathroom — has been less attractive to students is its distance from the main campus and other residence halls. In hopes of increasing its popularity, the UI is adding study spaces and more single rooms, while promoting its privacy for students wanting more independence and its Cambus access.
“Campus leaders are working with students to determine what additional supports and amenities may be offered,” officials said in February.
The university also is cutting the cost to live there.
Instead of the $8,633 charged last year for the standard double with kitchen, bath and air conditioning, the university next year will shave off $560 and charge $8,073 — putting it in line with the standard “double with air” rooms across campus.
“Historically, some students who were assigned there in previous years expressed concern about the cost differential,” Stange said. “This allows all students not to worry about the additional cost of attendance while living in a double room in Mayflower.”
‘No update to share’
Though the UI has reported an uptick in returning students interested in on-campus living, it didn’t include in its recent five-year residence system report any plans to build that new returning-student hall it proposed last year for the east side of campus, with cost projections between $40 and $60 million.
“The university is always proactively evaluating its housing and dining systems to best serve students who choose to live on campus,” Stange said. “There’s no update to share at this time regarding a new residence hall.”
Mayflower — sitting on 4.1 acres overlooking the Iowa River — is the first thing many UI visitors see as they exit Interstate 80 onto Dubuque Street. Once site of the Mayflower Inn in the 1940s — featuring a popular Mayflower Nite Club — the hangout was razed in the 1960s and replaced in 1968 with the eight-story Mayflower Apartments.
The university started leasing portions of the apartment building in 1979 due to student-housing crowding and bought the building outright in 1983 for a “bargain sale price of $6.5 million.” Mayflower underwent major renovations in 1999 and in again in 2009 after massive flood damage in 2008.
Although the university in 2023 listed the residence hall for $45 million, a recent city property value assessment valued it at $30.7 million.
UI Mayflower Hall no longer for sale; cost to live there cut
About a year after announcing intentions to shutter and sell its “last-chosen and first-transferred-from” Mayflower Residence Hall, the University of Iowa has taken it off the market — citing “immense interest from returning and prospective students” to live on campus.
www.thegazette.com
