21c Museum Hotel has sold. What happened to $6M Lexington-backed loan?
The former owners of the 21c Museum Hotel paid off a controversial $6 million loan backed by Lexington’s federal housing money after the sale of the hotel in the fall of 2025, city officials confirmed April 6.
The 21c Museum Hotel was purchased by the Thoroughbred Hospitality Group LLC in October for $14 million, according to the Fayette County Clerk’s office. The same group also bought the 21c Museum Hotel in Cincinnati for $25 million at the same time, according to published reports.
The remainder of the $6 million loan, nearly $4 million, was paid off about three months after the sale, city officials said this week.
The Lockbox, a restaurant and bar inside the 21c Museum Hotel, announced April 2 it would close in May and Mileta, which has a location at the Fayette Mall, would open in its place.
The 21c brand hotel, which opened in 2016 in the 101-year-old McKim, Mead & White-designed National Bank Building on the corner of Main and Upper streets, cost millions in public money to renovate and rebuild. The total price tag for the project was $43 million, substantially more than what the hotel sold for in October.
HUD loan used to pay for hotel renovations
In 2012, the city of Lexington agreed to give 21c a nearly $1 million grant, which did not have to be repaid, and a $6 million loan through a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development program called a 108 loan. In addition to the city loans, the project also applied for $15.7 million in state and federal tax credits, among other publicly-funded incentives.
The hotel qualified for the HUD 108 loan after it pledged to hire 125 low-income employees. But that loan agreement also said if 21c could not make its payments, HUD would take the $6 million from Lexington’s community development block grant money to repay the loan.
At the time many affordable housing advocates expressed concern about putting those dollars, which can be used for a variety of low-income housing projects, in jeopardy.
After the hotel temporarily shuttered in March 2020 during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, HUD agreed to delay repayments on that loan.
The remaining principal payments for the loan increased in 2023 from $353,000 to $441,000 until 2034. The total remaining principal on the loan was $5,294,000, in 2020, according to loan documents.
Those loan documents were signed by Craig Greenberg, then the 21c Museum Hotel CEO, who is now the Louisville mayor.
The 21c group repaid the balance of the loan of more than $3.9 million in December 2025, according to Craig Cammack, a spokesman for the city of Lexington.
This story was originally published April 6, 2026 at 11:20 AM.
