BILLIONAIRE Donald Trump has bought the Turnberry golf resort.
The property tycoon has purchased the entire South Ayrshire complex, including the hotel, from the Dubai-based group Leisurecorp for an
undisclosed sum, but it is believed to be about £35million.
Turnberry is the only course in the Open circuit to be owned privately. The course is operated by Starwood Hotels.
As reported in The Herald earlier this week, the deal markled a U-turn for the businessman.
In February, Mr Trump indicated he had no further plans to invest in Scotland following a long-running dispute over a planned offshore wind farm.
He and his company had consistently opposed the plan, which he claimed would spoil the view from his development
at the Menie Estate, Aberdeenshire.
Mr Trump has indicated he may rename Turnberry after himself and also promised to "bring a new level of luxury" to the golf resort.
The resort includes three links courses, a golf academy and the famous five-star hotel, which dates back to 1906 and has 149 rooms.
It was owned by the Starwood chain from 1997 until 2008, when it was bought over by Leisurecorp, which is a subsidiary of the Dubai government.
Speaking for the first time about the deal, Mr Trump said buying Turnberry was too good an opportunity for him to resist. He described the resort's Ailsa course as "one of the greatest in the world," adding: "It's a special place. It's an important place"
Mr Trump, who owns 16 golf resorts around the globe, promised to bring a "new level of luxury" to the hotel, which he said was in a fabulous location.
When asked whether it would be renamed after the tycoon, Mr Trump replied: "Trump Turnberry has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? We'll make that decision fairly soon - in a couple of days."
He added: "Our aim is to make it the finest golf hotel in the world."
He said Turnberry remained one of the greatest courses in the world and he would do nothing to tamper with it without the approval of the Open organisers, the Royal & Ancient. Turnberry has hosted the Open four times.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article