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They didn't have a choice
The university wanted the real estate where their old house stood for a parking garage. Not sure of the financial details, but the University helped finance the house and has an ownership interest therein. Don't know if SMU will ever entirely own their house again.
Universities are exerting greater pressure now to regulate residential living on campus. The upside is that you can sometimes get a nicer facility. The downside is that it may never really be yours again. That is the new reality. Just look at what Colgate did.
40+ years ago a similar thing happened at North Dakota and it worked out very well for both the University and Epsilon-Zeta Zeta. They got the old real estate and we got a new house. We were able to retire the debt and own it free and clear now. It was, perhaps, one of the first creatively financed chapter houses anywhere.
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