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Deeds and Weeds Courses Blog: golfdigest.com

'It's the end of an era for our family'

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

That's Bill Jones III, scion of the family that has owned and operated the Sea Island Resort for four generations, confirming that the property has been sold. The Wall Street Journal has the story here.

The buyers were Oaktree Captial Management LP of Los Angeles, and Avenue Capital Group of New York, two entities that have been busy during the last year acquiring distressed properties. Reports put the selling price at $197.5 million, and said Sea Island's creditors, including Bank of America and Royal Lloyds Banking Group, are "walking away from" $340 million in debt.

So what's the future for Jones and the Sea Island community? Business as usual, if this passage from the WSJ story is accurate:

"As part of the deal, about 2,500 Sea Island members as well as some 360 members of private Ocean Forest Golf Club will be transitioned to a new membership structure that is similar to the current one. Oaktree and Avenue plan to retain Sea Island's employees and management, including Mr. Jones."

We'll see.

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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Nicklaus and Sorenstam Want to Design Olympic Course

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Before the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro can host the first golf competition in the games in 112 years, the Brazilian capital needs to build a golf course. And Jack Nicklaus knows just who should design that course: the duo of himself and Annika Sorenstam, that's who.

Nicklaus and Sorenstam, who helped spearhead the effort that got their sport voted into the Summer Olympics last year, have made a pitch to co-design the layout where the 72-hole competition would be held.

Doug Ferguson of the Associated Press has the story about the Nicklaus-Sorenstam pairing here. According to the article, "If selected, [Nicklaus] said he and Sorenstam would collaborate on the strategy of each hole -- Nicklaus from championship tees for the men, Sorenstam with women in mind."

Nicklaus has collaborated on courses before, most notably with Arnold Palmer on The King and the Bear at the World Golf Hall of Fame, and with Tom Doak at Sebonac on Long Island.

Competition for the job of designing Brazil's Olympics course is expected to be fierce -- one of the organizers of the 2016 Games recently said that more than a dozen golf architects have expressed interest in the project -- but a Nicklaus/Sorenstam bid will be tough to top.

"I'll be surprised if they don't select us," Nicklaus told Ferguson.

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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The "Instability" of Colorado Golf Club

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Anybody who watched the Senior PGA Championship on TV last weekend had to be impressed with Colorado GC, the Bill Coore/Ben Crenshaw course outside Denver making its debut as a major championship site. Like just about every course that duo designs, the course looked natural, quirky, challenging and fun to play.

Can you sense the "but" coming?

Turns out Colorado GC is in a bit of a tight spot, financially -- which really shouldn't be a big surprise, considering it opened three years ago, just about the time the recession wave began to break over golf's shoreline. In his report from the Senior PGA in this week's issue of Golf World, senior editor Bill Fields talked to Mike McGetrick, founding owner of the upscale private club, who denied rumors the club would close after the tournament.

"No, we're not [closing]," McGetrick told Fields. "We hope in the next 90 days to be recapitalized, and that things are going to be great. We have 308 members, and Colorado GC is going to be here, whether I own it or somebody else does."

In a wrapup story published Tuesday, the Denver Post touched on the "instability" of Colorado GC, and floated the idea that the PGA of America might buy the club in an arrangement similar to its ownership of Kentucky's Valhalla GC. But McGetrick and PGA of America CEO Joe Steranka, while admitting a possible sale has been discussed, didn't sound optimistic that it would happen.

"The talks were never serious, in part because of the uncertainty of what's going on here," Steranka told the Post. "Valhalla is still a Kentucky-run private club; while the PGA owns it, we're very hands-off in the management. In my mind, corporate-run clubs lose their individuality, the personal culture."

You can read the entire Denver Post story here.

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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'The last good year in the golf business was 2001'

Saturday, May 1, 2010

The Legends of Indiana Golf Course, a "highly regarded" upscale 36-hole public facility in suburban Indianapolis, situated next door to the headquarters of the Indiana PGA Section and the Indiana Golf Association, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection this week.

The filing had little in the way of details, with Legend owners claiming debts of between $1 and $10 million, and assets of between $1 and $10 million. Legends general manager Ted Bishop told The Indianapolis Star "It would be business as usual for our customers" while the facility restructures its finances.

You can read The Indianapolis Star story here.

It's a familiar story to anyone who has been following the golf course industry, public or private, the last two years or so. But this sentiment from Ron West, who operates four courses in the Indianapolis area and is a past president of the Indiana Golf Course Owners Association, was rather stark:

"I traveled the state a lot [during 2007 and 2008] and I bet in 2008 that 50 percent [of public courses] were on the verge of foreclosure. The last good year we had in the golf business was 2001, and since that point everybody's seen declines in revenue and rounds. The only courses around making any money all are lucky enough to have no debt service and 10-year-old carts and reasonable maintenance costs."

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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Black Diamond For Sale

Monday, April 26, 2010

Black Diamond Ranch, the Citrus County, Fla., private club whose Quarry Course is one of the most famous designs in Tom Fazio's portfolio, is for sale. The Tampa Tribune has the story here.

The move is apparently inspired by the retirement plans of Black Diamond's 81-year-old developer and owner, Stan Olsen, and not the sluggish economy. According to the report, Olsen wants to sell the entire facility, which includes two 18-hole courses and one nine-hole course (all designed by Fazio), a 28,000-square-foot clubhouse and 550 acres of undeveloped land.

The Tribune story says the real estate firm retained to broker the sale, Plasencia Group, Inc., has not set an asking price.

The Quarry Course, which opened in 1987, has been a mainstay on the Golf Digest list of "America's 100 Greatest Golf Courses" for more than two decades (it currently ranks 89th). It features a three-hole stretch that plays along the edge of, into and then out of an abandoned rock quarry.

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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Ironhorse C.C. Sold for $2.85 Million

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

The Ironhorse Country Club of West Palm Beach, site of an Arthur Hills-designed course, sold Monday at a bankruptcy auction for $2.85 million -- some $3 million less than its appraised value in 2009, the Palm Beach Post is reporting.

The buyer is Thomas O'Malley, chairman of Switzerland-based refiner Petroplus. He recently bought the nearby Evergreen and Palm Cove golf clubs. Also bidding on the Ironhorse property were Professional Golf Acquisition Inc. and a group headed by Glenn Straub, owner of Palm Beach Polo Golf & Country Club.

The 113-acre club, which includes 324 homes, had filed for bankruptcy protection in January. At the time, O'Malley agreed to pay $2.4 million for the property -- a price rejected by lender Wachovia Bank as too low, according to the newspaper.

-- P.F.

Posted by Peter Finch

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Huizenga Sells The Floridian

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Wayne Huizenga has sold The Floridian Golf & Yacht Club, his private golf club in Palm City, Fla. The buyer is Houston businessman Jim Crane. The price? $25.6 million, according to Florida real estate records.

Jose Lambiet has the details here and here.

Huizenga ran The Floridian like a true benevolent dictator. The club's approximately 200 members (who included Jack Welch, Dan Marino and Rush Limbaugh) were hand-picked by the Waste Management billionaire personally, and informed of their annual membership renewal by letter each August (how did you know if your membership was revoked? you didn't get a letter). Of course, the price was right: memberships were free and there were no annual dues.

That will reportedly change under Crane. Existing members (and new ones, since Crane hopes to expand the club) will be asked to pay a $25,000 initiation fee and $12,000 in annual dues.

According to Lambiet, Huizenga paid $750,000 in 1996 for the land on which The Floridian resides. But Huizenga later told Business Week that he spent $75 million developing the club, which includes a clubhouse, three guest cottages, deepwater docks and, of course, its Gary Player-designed golf course.

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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Goldman Wants Sawgrass Foreclosure

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Goldman Sachs, lender to the firm that owns the Sawgrass Marriott Resort in Ponte Vedra, Florida, is pushing for foreclosure on the property, the Wall Street Journal is reporting.

In court papers, the investment bank's mortgage arm says Sawgrass owner RQB Resort now owes Goldman Sachs some $196 million, which is more than the property is worth. Having failed to demonstrate it will pay off its loans, "The debtors have thus failed to show that an effective reorganization is possible within any reasonable period of time," the Journal quotes Goldman Sachs as declaring.

RQP, which bought the resort for $220 million in 2006, hasn't made a payment since last August, according to the paper. It filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in March.

The 65-acre Sawgrass resort overlooks the Pete Dye-desgined TPC Sawgrass Stadium Course, home to the famous island-green 17th hole. Guests can play on six other affiliated area courses.

-- P.F.

Posted by Peter Finch

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New Owner for Monarch Beach

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

The hotel where AIG held its infamous retreat just after its federal bailout, St. Regis Monarch Beach, has a new owner, the Los Angeles Times is reporting.

The buyer is a Seattle investment company called Washington Holdings. It is acquiring the troubled Orange County, Calif., resort and its Monarch Bay Golf Links (pictured) for $235 million in cash and debt, the paper says. That's more than some had expected. A few months ago, the Times says, it had quoted a real estate expert saying the place might change hands for $100 million.

A positive sign for the hospitality industry ... ? Perhaps. Or perhaps not. Craig Wrench, CEO of Washington Holdings, doesn't sound too bullish. "We're still in a troubled economy," he told the paper, "and we need another six to 12 months or maybe 18 months of recovery to be back where we need to be."

-- P.F.

Posted by Peter Finch

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Membership Group Buys Stone Eagle

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Stone Eagle, in Palm Desert, Calif., has been saved. The details are in this story in The Desert Sun.

The private 18-hole club, featuring the only Tom Doak-designed course in the Palm Springs area, has been shut down for about a month, and in foreclosure since the beginning of the year. But 14 people -- seven couples, six of them members at Stone Eagle -- have bought the club for cash. The story doesn't include a price, but recent reports said a larger group of club members was trying to raise $12 million to buy it.

Stone Eagle opened in 2005. Memberships cost $100,000, and the story claims the club had 190 members at the time of the foreclosure. The new ownership group has made no announcement regarding membership structure in the future. But local officials are just pleased the club has a future.

From the story: "The purchase and reopening of the club provides some much-needed good news for golf courses in the valley, which have been hit with dwindling membership and a drop in players as a result of the recession. 'It's terrific for the whole desert,' said Tom Cullinan, general manager at Stone Eagle. 'Golf is our lifeline.' "

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell

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