Sign advertises Hanafin's for-sale status
New London — Hanafin’s Irish Pub, a State Street stalwart known for its authentic décor, now sports a real estate company's sign in a window.
Diarmuid Hanafin, the Dublin-born owner, answered a knock at the locked front door Friday afternoon before opening for business. He declined to discuss what led to the bar’s availability.
“Speaks for itself,” he said, indicating the Connecticut Commercial Realty sign.
Hanafin’s, featuring food and live music, continues to operate at 312 State St., opposite the Garde Arts Center.
William Newman, a Connecticut Commercial Realty broker, said the bar has been listed for sale in real estate publications and on the realty's website for more than a month but that Hanafin had only recently asked that the sign be displayed.
“Normally, we don’t put up a sign until the owner says to do so,” Newman said.
The realty’s website, which lists the asking price as $295,000, describes the property as an “established pub being sold with good will, fixtures, real estate.”
“It’s a good location, right across from the Garde,” Newman said. “He’s always had a good business going there, and this is a good opportunity for an experienced individual. The restaurant-pub-hospitality business is not a beginner’s business. It’s a complex business.”
Newman said the bar-and-restaurant trade on Bank and State streets in the city goes "up and down” and that there may be more of them operating now than previously.
Hanafin’s opened at 310 State St. in 2005 and moved next door into the current, more spacious location in 2010. Later, the Hanafins opened a second location in Glastonbury that has since closed.
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