After its closure in May, the campus of Anna Maria College in Paxton has been listed for sale, with Worcester-based Kelleher & Sadowsky Associates selected as the property’s listing broker.
After its closure in May, the campus of Anna Maria College in Paxton has been listed for sale, with Worcester-based Kelleher & Sadowsky Associates selected as the property’s listing broker.Located at 50 Sunset Lane, the campus spans more than 260 acres and features a range of educational buildings, residence halls, and athletic facilities. The campus could support a number of future uses, said Will Kelleher IV, managing partner at Kelleher & Sadowsky Associates. The campus is one of the most sizable development opportunities in Central Massachusetts in recent years, with both residential and commercial uses among the possibilities, Kelleher said. The firm is planning an extensive marketing campaign to make prospective buyers across the region aware of the sale. Among the possible future uses is affordable housing, including a Chapter 40B project, said Kelleher. In Massachusetts, 40B is a statute that lets developers bypass many local zoning restrictions in communities that have not met minimum affordable housing thresholds.“You could look at a 40B type project, which could make a lot of sense in a town that's yet to meet their 40B threshold, but our approach is really going to be to cast as wide a net as we possibly can,” Kelleher said. “We're not going to box ourselves in by thinking this is only going to be a residential development.”The entire campus might be broken into subdivisions, as the athletic facilities on-site may have their own value to a buyer, Kelleher said.Will Kelleher, managing partner at Kelleher & Sadowsky“There is a huge opportunity for someone that's in the sports and recreation sector, because of the fact that you have a gymnasium that would cost millions of dollars to build from the ground up,” he said.The four parcels that make up the campus have a combined 2026 assessed value of $42.03 million, according to Town of Paxton property records. The on-site buildings encompass about 350,000 square feet.The sales price will ultimately be based on the buyer and planned use, Kelleher said. Sales prices are commonly higher than a property’s assessed value.Founded in 1946, Anna Maria College closed after years of financial strain, with Assumption University in Worcester taking over its nursing program and Nichols College in Dudley taking on other academic programs.Kelleher said his firm will work closely with Paxton to determine the best future for the site.“We met with the town administrator last week, and our goal and their goal are similar,” he said. “We want to bring in a developer who can help to bring the property back onto the tax roll.”Sale efforts will be led by Kelleher and Drew Higgins, vice president at the firm. More details on the campus and potential property tours will be released later this summer. Eric Casey is the managing editor at Worcester Business Journal, who primarily covers the real estate and banking & finance industries.
