Since last summer, when a religious congregation in Montreal announced its intention to sell the Villa-Maria estate, several potential buyers have expressed their interest in this immense green site, which includes five buildings of rich historical and heritage. The future of this land will, however, only be known at the end of a call for tenders process which will be launched in the coming weeks, we learned. The duty.
The site, which would be worth several hundred million dollars, notably houses the private colleges Villa Maria and Marianopolis, which respectively welcome secondary and college students in heritage-listed buildings. The land, which also includes the Bonsecours residence, a long-term care accommodation center which houses dozens of nuns, as well as the Maison Notre-Dame-du-Sacré-Coeur, where several nuns live, was acquired in 1854 by the congregation of Notre-Dame.
However, the organization announced last June that it will have to put this immense land, which straddles the Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce borough and the city of Westmount, up for sale, because its sisters, including the average age was then 86 years old, were no longer able to maintain it.
An announcement which quickly aroused interest from players in the private and institutional sectors.
“There are a lot of people who have called us. We have buyers interested in our residences and our convent, but nothing formal, and we certainly didn’t want to start having discussions with potential buyers. We wanted it to be fair and equitable for everyone,” underlines in an interview the executive director responsible for finances and administration of the congregation of Notre-Dame, Suzie Prince, who hopes that this sale will result from a process ” transparent “.
A complex move
The religious organization therefore decided to use the services of the commercial real estate brokerage firm Colliers International, we learned. The duty. In the coming weeks, it will launch a call for submissions during which companies and institutions interested in this site will be able to submit their proposal as part of the sale of the land and all the buildings located there.
Once a candidate has been selected by the religious congregation, it will be submitted to the Vatican, which will have to give its agreement for this sale to be concluded, in the coming months or even next year, depending on the processing time. of this file by the Holy See. “It’s at their discretion,” explains Suzie Prince. It is therefore impossible to have a precise idea of when this domain will be sold.
In the meantime, the many religious sisters who still live in this area will have to be relocated to a residence for the elderly offering care for people losing their autonomy. However, such resources are becoming increasingly rare in Quebec, which complicates the task of the congregation of Notre-Dame.
“The sisters have not yet moved from the estate and it is not yet known when they will do so. They are in talks with various private groups that manage seniors’ accommodation centers in Montreal, says Suzie Prince. In this context, Sister Ona Bessette, Superior General of the Sisters of the Congregation of Notre-Dame, wants to be reassuring.
“I think that along the way, it’s important that we walk together and show them that their leadership worked very well to find a place where they can be together,” she emphasizes, in reference to the nuns who live on the site of the Villa-Maria estate.
A college under threat
In anticipation of the sale of this area, Marianopolis College announced last month that it had acquired the building it has occupied on this area since 2007. Its future is thus assured. The congregation of Notre-Dame also ensures that compliance with the lease of the Villa Maria college, which ends in December 2030, will represent an “express condition” of the sale of this site. Thus, all students admitted this year to this educational establishment will be able to complete all their studies there. For the future, however, the future of this college, which has more than 1,600 students, is uncertain and will depend on the aspirations of the future buyer of the estate of which it occupies one of the buildings.
“We must understand that we rent these spaces for very little, it is not at all profitable, so we are well aware that the college is not financially autonomous,” underlines Mme Prince. However, preserving the educational vocation of this site is very important in the eyes of the religious sisters, who have worked there for decades, underlines Ona Bessette.
“We care about the future of the educational vocation of the organization, of the college that is there. The big priority for us in the sale is that the buyer honors the lease and works with the college so it can stay there long term. »
The congregation of Notre-Dame also intends to devote the entire net proceeds from the sale of this estate, excluding costs linked in particular to the relocation of the sisters, to the financing of initiatives intended to help students in difficulty. in primary and secondary schools in the public network. The money resulting from this transaction will thus be paid into a fund created by the congregation of Notre-Dame, managed by the Foundation for Montreal Students, which finances in particular the provision of food aid and school materials to young people in need.
“It is important for us to help those who are disadvantaged,” notes Ona Bessette, who sees this as a legacy in the continuity of the mission of her religious congregation.