University of Mississippi buys Scruggs home

The University of Mississippi has purchased the former home of Dickie and Diane Scruggs.

Located on Faulkner Woods Place, the 10,176-square-foot home sits on about 9 acres of property on the campus’s border.

The university purchased the home and the surrounding acreage for $10 million. A recent appraisal showed the property being worth more than $17 million.

The Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning approved the purchase and naming of the home, “The Scruggs Home at Ole Miss” during its April meeting.

“This property offers a rare opportunity to acquire nearly 10 acres bordering our campus and the grounds of Rowan Oak,” said Jacob Batte, director of News & Media Relations for the university. “The opportunity became even more attractive when the Scruggs agreed to sell the home to the university for 60 percent of the appraised value, which yielded an in-kind donation of almost $8 million to the university.”

Batte said how the house and property will be used by the university still “remains to be determined.”

According to the information submitted by Ole Miss to the IHL, the university is interested in acquiring properties that support strategic growth – considering factors such as contiguous locations, strategic/mission aligned value, expansion capability, affordability and fit for future use.”

“This property is valuable to the university in that real estate near the campus is in high demand, low in supply, and is generally priced in accordance with such appealing attributes,” the written request to the IHL stated.

Rendering of the proposed new parking garage on campus. Image provided

During the meeting, the IHL also approved the exterior design for a new 1,331-space parking garage on campus.

The garage will be located immediately west of the existing North Parking Garage to service an additional 985 beds being built in three new residential units where the former Kincannon dormitory was located before it was demolished last year.

The new garage has a $50 million budget.

Both requests were part of the consent agenda during the meeting so there was no discussion on either and the entire consent agenda was approved unanimously.

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