Lender Sues to Appoint Receiver for Greenbrier Resort in $360M Debt Dispute

The spokesperson described TRT as a predatory out-of-state company trying to prevent the family from paying off the loans and steal the Greenbrier.

The Rowlings visited the Greenbrier in 2024 as advisors to a private equity group that was thinking about investing. During that visit the Rowlings had access on a confidential basis to Greenbrier financial information. The owners now accuse them of misappropriating trade secrets.

Carter Bank reneged on an alleged 2025 deal that would have allowed the owners to pay everything off for $300 million. The owner claimed he had private equity investors ready to buy a minority stake in the Greenbrier, but that process would have taken another 12 months -- too long for Carter to keep extending forbearance agreements over missed payments.

The complaint references a tentative agreement that would have seen TRT forgive $200 million of the current balance, and release liens on coal mines, in exchange for a 50% stake in the resort plus general partner control. That hypothetical would have valued the entire Greenbrier at a minimum $400 million, or roughly $570,000 per room.

That’s in line with what hotel-owning real estate investment trusts have been paying for hotels recently, according to data from analyst Jonathan Falik. The few higher-valued recent hotel deals include two Four Seasons locations that sold for $1.9 million per room, Turtle Bay Resort in Oahu, for $1.4 million per room, 1 Hotel Central Park at $1.1 million per room, and a couple JW Marriotts for about $800,000 per room.

Most transactions are far lower.

In a separate matter, the Greenbrier Clinic was sued last week in a federal class action case for providing faulty mammograms to more than 1,000 women over two years.

Omni Hotels, part of Robert Rowling’s holdings, has 50 locations with 28 golf courses and 20,000 rooms nationwide -- and it makes up the core of Rowling’s $8.8 billion fortune.