De Vere Group, a hotel and health club business, has put its large UK network of venues up for sale, with early reports indicating a number of unsolicited approaches.

The Group, which is currently part-controlled by Lloyds Banking group, have 30 centres with around 3,000 bedrooms across the Home Counties in the UK.

The sale will help alleviate the pressure from the £1.1 billion of debt owed to Lloyds, after the company sold a stake to the tax-backed bank in 2010 in a ‘debt-for-equity’ arrangement.

Seven properties are run as management contracts, joint ventures and franchises and further 20 are either in the pipeline or under consideration.

With underlying cash generated of £27 million last year, and £28 million anticipated for this year, analysts have estimated a value for the business of between £280 million and £300 million.

This year has seen distressed hotel sales become more and more apparent, with Abu Dhabi Group purchasing 42 Marriott Hotels from RBS in a deal worth well over £600 million earlier in the year.

Private equity buyers are expected to be interested in the conference aspect of the business.

Lloyds have several other hotel chains on its books and has been gradually selling them in attempt to offload the billions of pounds worth of loans accumulated from its HBOS takeover in 2009.

Lloyds also sold off De Vere rival, Principal Hayley last month to Starwood Capital, in a deal worth approximately £360 million.

This marks a revival in the industry which in the second half of the year only managed £300 million worth of deals, compared to the £2.5 billion in the same period last year.

Jones Lang LaSalle’s recent study showed that this year, a total of £1.62 billion has been traded in the UK as a result of administrations and receiverships in the hotel industry.