The Catalina Motel at the corner of Great Northern Road and Northern Avenue is up for sale.
“We’ve been running the motel for 24 years and we think that this is probably the right time. We live on site so we’re 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. 24 years of having that schedule is a pretty good run. It’s almost a quarter of a century,” said Catalina Motel co-manager Dean Anderson.
The motel is officially owned by Anderson’s in-laws - Elmer and Elizabeth Kars - Dean and wife Susanne are the co-managers.
Elmer Kars's parents owned and operated Parkville Motel and Cabins at 1418 Queen Street East, across from Bellevue Park.
Elmer Kars built the Catalina Motel in 1964.
“There was still an apple orchard here on Great Northern Road. Elmer built it from the ground up, so it’s been in the family throughout its existence,” Anderson said.
Dean and Susanne Anderson became the motel’s co-managers in the late 1990s.
Putting the motel up for sale is bittersweet, Anderson said.
“There have been so many great customers that we’ve had, so many return customers and so many great staff members that we’ve had work with us and who continue to work with us, and that part we definitely will miss.”
“We’ve had customers who know us and we know them on a first name basis. It’s definitely more than just a business. We’re very relational in how we run the business and that makes a big difference.”
“There are definitely aspects of it that we’re not going to miss,” Anderson said.
“Having to tend to people at three or four in the morning, I will not miss that,” he said with a chuckle.
Both the motel and adjacent home where the Andersons live are up for sale, the couple currently renovating a new home locally.
“It backs on to the Soo Pee Wee Arena. A lot of people don’t know it’s there but it’s the one little green space left on Great Northern Road,” Anderson said.
Each of the Catalina Motel’s 17 recently-renovated rooms have large photographs mounted on the walls - the photographs taken by the Andersons themselves - showcasing the natural beauty of the Highway 17 area north of the Sault.
The motel is solid, with a concrete deck on the roof capable of having a second storey built.
While COVID and the demise of the Sault-to-Hearst passenger rail line affected business, the motel has still prospered throughout the years due to returning customers.
Anderson said the realtor in charge of selling the property - Gary Trembinski, EXIT Realty Lake Superior sales representative - indicated there has already been interest expressed in the Catalina Motel because of its location at one of the busiest intersections in the city.
“It definitely has advantages for any one who is going to step into it.”
A career change is another factor in the decision to put the motel up for sale.
“I’m working towards my doctorate degree in Community Care, Counselling and Traumatology online through Liberty University,” Anderson said.
“That’s about trying to make preventative paths of treatment for people. We have the Residential Withdrawal Management site coming, which is great, but my role is more of saying ‘how do we prevent them from actually getting to that point?’”
Anderson’s plan is to stay local but also to be open to whatever opportunities come about in counselling.
While Anderson studies online, wife Susanne will continue to teach piano lessons in the Sault.
His planned transition from motel manager to counselling is not that big a shift as it may seem.
“Sometimes when we check people in we’re almost psychologists. Some people come through for medical visits. I remember one case in particular. It was an unfortunate situation. A customer had three relatives die in the span of six weeks. I had the opportunity to just listen to her, to hear her and let her express herself. In whatever job or vocation you’re in you can still find opportunities to help people.”
“A lot of times we’ll have people coming through because their mother or father passed away, they’ll sit in the office and we’ll lend them an ear. They’re not just a number, or just a customer. There are people who come back and we know them by first name. They come and see us as family because we treat them like family. It’s become a bigger family than just ourselves,” Anderson told SooToday in an earlier interview in 2017.
What will happen to the Catalina’s landmark gazebo, built from scratch by Anderson and his father-in-law?
Will it be relocated to his new home?
“No, I don’t think so. I’ll let that stay there,” Anderson chuckled.