When Keni Patel was growing up, weekends weren’t for Little League or family outings.
They were for cleaning rooms, checking in guests, mowing the lawn and fixing whatever broke at the 17-room Bethel motel his parents bought after immigrating from India.
“My sister and I lived literally in an apartment behind the front desk,” said Patel, now 44. “I hated the business when I was growing up because it took away my weekends. Summer was the worst because summer is a busy time.”
Patel’s perspective has changed.
In June, he and longtime friend Anand Patel — no relation — paid about $12 million for the 79-room Holiday Inn Express & Suites in Danbury. The acquisition added to Patel’s existing ownership interests in two Bethel hotels and marks the beginning of what the partners hope will become a much larger portfolio.
The Patels are among a growing number of Indian American hotel owners expanding their investments in Connecticut, where the community has become a dominant force in the industry.
A Hartford Business Journal review of CoStar data found at least a dozen hotels changed hands statewide during the first six months of 2026. Buyers in most of those deals were of Indian heritage, including seven purchases by buyers with the last name Patel — one of the most common surnames among people from the western Indian state of Gujarat.
An Oxford Economics study commissioned by the Asian American Hotel Owners Association found its members owned 112 Connecticut hotels in 2022, accounting for about one-third of the state’s hotel inventory. Nationally, AAHOA members owned about 60% of the nation’s hotel stock in 2022, representing roughly 3.2 million guest rooms and employing about 1 million people.
“The success of Indian American hotel owners is one of the great small business stories in America,” said Laura Lee Blake, president and CEO of AAHOA. “What started with a relatively small number of families has grown over several decades into a community that owns a majority of the hotels in the U.S.”
Indian families began buying and leasing U.S. hotels in the early 1940s, often purchasing modest properties they improved through sweat equity while living and working on-site, Blake said. Over time, relatives and friends followed the same path, creating a network that accelerated Indian American ownership throughout the industry.
Now, second- and third-generation owners are taking family businesses in a new direction.
Rather than simply operating small motels, many are acquiring larger branded hotels, raising capital through more formal investment partnerships and using technology and data analytics to grow larger portfolios, industry leaders said.
Family roots
Keni and Anand Patel arrived at the hotel business through different paths, but both were shaped by entrepreneurial families.
After immigrating to Connecticut in 1982, Keni Patel’s parents initially lived with his uncle while helping operate a 50-room motel on Whitney Avenue in Hamden. A few years later, they saved enough to buy a 17-room motel in Bethel that now operates as an Econo Lodge. They have since expanded it to 45 rooms.
Keni and his sister grew up on the property. Back then, he said he couldn’t wait to pursue something else.
“I went off to college and I said, ‘I’m never doing this thing,’” Patel said.
Yet, hospitality had a way of pulling him back.
After earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Boston University, Keni built a career in technology and data science, holding positions at Raytheon, MIT and Boeing before becoming vice president of data science and artificial intelligence at Miami-based hospitality investment firm Driftwood Capital.
Throughout that time, he maintained an ownership stake in his family’s motel.
As Keni started his own family, he began viewing hotels differently. He said he wanted to build a business that could create a lasting legacy for his two daughters, now 7 and 9.
In 2018, Keni joined his father, Manharbhai Patel, and three other relatives in purchasing the 78-room Microtel Inn & Suites by Wyndham in Bethel for about $3.8 million.
Anand Patel’s parents owned a laundromat and convenience store before expanding into gas stations in Norwalk and Stratford.
Anand initially pursued a legal career as a patent attorney before earning an MBA and helping launch a cannabis dispensary business in Massachusetts. After selling his ownership stake in the cannabis company in 2024 amid concerns about market saturation, he partnered with Keni Patel to pursue hotel investments.
Anand said an accountant encouraged him to reinvest in real estate because of its long-term tax advantages.
Data-driven approach
Keni Patel said his generation of Indian American hotel owners is approaching the business differently than their parents did.
The first generation was often content to buy a budget motel, pay off the debt and build long-term financial security for their families. Today, younger owners are applying technological know-how as they invest in higher-tier brands and larger portfolios, he said.
“Hotels are one of the real estate asset classes that are the most rich in data,” he said. “There’s data coming in literally daily. I can compare my performance every week against competitors. I grew up thinking it was a business you operated by gut. In some aspects it is, but it is very, very data driven.”
Keni said that analytical approach helped convince him to pursue the Danbury Holiday Inn Express after spending roughly a year evaluating acquisition opportunities.
The hotel had recently undergone a multimillion-dollar renovation, eliminating the need for major capital improvements. With construction costs elevated, Keni calculated the purchase price was at least 20% below the cost of building a comparable hotel in the area. He also believed more hands-on management could reduce operating expenses while improving guest service.
The generational shift also extends to how acquisitions are financed.
Keni said first-generation Indian American hotel owners often relied on informal loans from relatives and friends to finance deals.
“It was all just handshake loans,” Patel said. “You know that if you don’t pay back your debts, then your name in the community is ruined.”
Today, Keni said he raises equity from family and friends who invest alongside him in hotel acquisitions.
Building a portfolio
The Danbury acquisition is just the beginning of the partners’ long-term plans.
They said they are already searching for additional deals, primarily in Connecticut but potentially elsewhere along the East Coast. They prefer to remain in the Northeast, where they can oversee operations directly, although they are open to using third-party management companies for properties farther away.
Their long-term goal is to own at least 10 hotels.
“We’re trying to build … a proper platform,” Keni Patel said. “Think like a small private equity company.”
Keni said he isn’t sure if his daughters will eventually enter the hotel industry, but he wouldn’t be surprised if they did. After years of insisting he wanted nothing to do with the business, his own return to hospitality came as no shock to his parents.
“My parents said they always knew I would do it,” Keni said.
