Deeds and Weeds

Results for September 2009 Back to Deeds and Weeds Index

Jordan's New Home is a Castle

Wednesday, September 30, 2009 Comments
Michael Jordan is building a home on a golf course -- specifically, the Bears Club in Jupiter, Fla. -- and according to this story, it's going to be quite a doozy.

First, the basics: Jordan bought two adjoining lots at the golf club (Jack Nicklaus' most recent south Florida golf project), with a total land space of three acres, last year for $4.8 million. To date (the story says) the basketball legend has paid slightly more than $150,000 in permits and legal fees to get the project started. 

The house will be 37,942 square feet, about 26,000 of it air-conditioned. (It will also have a cottage and a security gate.) Most of the houses in the Bears Club are in the 10,000 square-foot range. Chez Jordan will be two stories, with 11 bedrooms and an as-yet-undetermined number of bathrooms. The approximate construction cost: $7.627 million.

As you might imagine, Jordan's plans are drawing a variety of reactions, not all of them positive.

The story quotes Joane Davis, described as a local "growth management specialist, who asked, "Who needs that kind of a footprint? It’s insane, a waste. ... I can't imagine anyone needing anything like that, except to show off."

To paraphrase Jordan, if you can afford it, it isn't showing off. Or something like that.

--G.R.
Posted by Geoff Russell
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At Doonbeg, Business is Up

Wednesday, September 30, 2009 Comments
Doonbeg is bucking the trend.

In a tough year for the travel industry in general -- and golf resorts in particular -- officials at the luxury golf property in Ireland (which features a much acclaimed Greg Norman-designed golf course) released some very strong business numbers this week: rounds played are up 1,500 in 2009 compared to 2008, and overnight stays have increased between 45 and 50 percent.

How did Doonbeg pull off these kind of improvement in the teeth of a recession? The old-fashioned way: It lowered prices. On room rates. On golf packages. On membership deals.

Ireland's Sunday Business Post has the complete story on Doonbeg's strategy, and its results, here.

"Obviously rates are down, but we are still bringing people into the resort during the recession," Doonbeg's general manager, Joe Russell, told the Post. "The key thing now is value, and we have altered our offering and introduced more offers and more deals. The result is that we have remained very busy, albeit at a reduced margin."

-- G.R.
Posted by Geoff Russell
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The Latest On Laurelmor

Tuesday, September 29, 2009 Comments
85_1.jpgLaurelmor is no more, as a headline writer at the Winston-Salem Journal puts it. The 6,000-acre North Carolina luxury golf community, a project of Florida developer Bobby Ginn, has been renamed Reynolds Blue Ridge and announced a big rollback in lot prices, the paper reports.

Reynolds Capital Group, an Atlanta firm with connections to Georgia's sprawling Reynolds Plantation development, bought Laurelmor around the beginning of this year.

The Journal says Reynolds intends to sell lots for $139,900 to $569,900 in its first phase -- a far cry from the $625,000 average price it was projecting in the boom years. A letter to homeowners obtained by Florida real estate blogger Toby Tobin said Rees Jones  is redesigning a golf course that will use several previously planned holes. Tom Kite was Ginn's choice as a Laurelmor designer.

-- P.F.

Posted by Peter Finch
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The Drama Of Bonita Bay

Thursday, September 24, 2009 Comments
scan.jpgThe Wall Street Journal has a big article on the Bonita Bay Group saga today. Angry residents, the paper reports, have filed more than a dozen lawsuits against the South Florida development company seeking the return of their deposits and accusing the company of civil fraud.

The company says it will have to file for bankruptcy protection if it must refund $245 million in membership fees these folks are seeking.

The  fees at Bonita Bay's seven high-end golf clubs were supposed to be refundable. But the company says its agreement stipulates that the rules "may be amended from time to time,"  allowing it to cancel the refund policy.

The furor is causing some ugly rifts within Bonita Bay neighborhoods. Quoting from the Journal: "At Bonita Bay's Mediterra community, a committee of golf-club members initially proposed pushing nonmembers to join the club on a social basis and pay $2,500 or more to help fund the purchase. They were told if they didn't join, no future buyers of their homes would be allowed to become golf members. A number of residents called the plan extortion, and the committee eventually dropped its demand."

-- P.F.







Posted by Peter Finch
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Couples Sells Home For $9.56 Million

Thursday, September 24, 2009 Comments
Fred Couples has sold his house in Montecito, Calif., which is near Santa Barbara. The selling price for the nine-bedroom, seven-bathroom structure (which also has a 2,300-square-foot guest house) was $9.56 million. It was originally listed at $12.5 million. Details in this story in the Los Angeles Times.

Couples, who lived in the house with his second wife, Thais (now deceased), currently resides in La Quinta, Calif.

-- G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell
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Georgetown Club Closes

Wednesday, September 23, 2009 Comments

hole6.jpgThe Georgetown Club outside Boston closed on Monday, surprising golfers who were looking forward to the fall season and, according to the Boston Globe, a handful of couples about to get married there.

The article quotes managing partner Peter Wojtkun as saying the club will be put into foreclosure by Sovereign Bank, holder of a $4.5 million mortgage on the property.

"It will be sold at a foreclosure auction," Wotjkun told the paper. "We had hoped to reorganize, and open again next season" but a last-minute dispute scuttled plans for a loan from Sovereign to keep the club going.

The club had about 100 employees. They got their last paychecks Tuesday.

-- P.F.




Posted by Peter Finch
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Papago: Arizona GA "bit off more than it could chew"

Thursday, September 17, 2009 Comments
Sounds as though what had become a messy situation at Papagp Golf Course in Phoenix is about to boil over. The Arizona Republic has the story here.

To summarize, Papago, one of the better public golf facilities in the country, underwent a big renovation project two years ago. That project was overseen by Arizona Golf Management LLC, which is part of the Arizona Golf Foundation, which is the tax-exempt arm of the Arizona Golf Association. As part of the deal, the AGF took over operation of the facility.

Key parts of the project -- such as the construction of a new clubhouse -- have not taken place. Several longtime Papago employees have been laid off. Revenues at the course are down (not surprising, considering the economy) and payments on the $9 million loan on the project are starting to come due. According to the story, the Arizona GA president, Frank Shipman, said the AGF has begun "the process of withdrawing from day-to-day operation of the course."

From the Arizona Republic story: "Randy Joly, who served as president of the Papago Men's Golf Association in the mid 1990s and is currently on the AGA's board of governors, said he believes the AGA 'bit off more than it could chew. Some poor choices were made in terms of the architect. Poor choices were made by AGA management in terms of what they thought the course could be, and what they thought the city could do.' "

--G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell
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'The Health Of Most Of Our Clubs Is Pretty Good'

Wednesday, September 16, 2009 Comments
2401677703_c23575de62.jpgAn article in today's Fort Myers News-Press reminds readers that not every golf club in southwest Florida is about to file for bankruptcy protection.

The paper quotes Tom Noyes, general manager of the Wildcat Run Golf and Country Club (pictured), as saying: "We've all had to make budget cuts." Noyes, also director of the local region of the Club Managers Association of America, added: "It's probably more competitive than it's ever been in terms of getting members. But I think the health of most of our clubs is pretty good."

Among the moves by some clubs: encouraging more public play, slashing initiation fees by $20,000 or more, creating new non-equity memberships, cutting hours and days of operation,  using part-timers and retirees to help cut payroll costs, and renegotiating vendor contracts.

"We are down slightly, and, yes, you can blame it on the economy," Greg Wetzel, general manager of Gateway Golf & Country Club in Fort Myers, told the paper. "But not injuriously so. "We're doing fine."

-- P.F.

Posted by Peter Finch
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Lehman's Haves and Have-Nots

Tuesday, September 15, 2009 Comments
Thumbnail image for Laurel+Cove.jpgThe Wall Street Journal takes a look at the troubled real estate in Lehman Brothers' $16 billion portfolio today and concludes that the bankruptcy workout process is creating "haves and have-nots."

Among those in the latter camp are the people behind Laurel Cove, a planned high-end community with a Greg Norman-designed golf course near Nashville. Its loan ended up with a Lehman unit in Bermuda and is now being overseen in separate court proceedings, the Journal reports. The golf course project is on hold, with only nine holes completed.

One of the men backing Laurel Cove is Las Vegas developer Kenneth Jowdy. He got some unwelcome publicity in June when a group of investors filed suit in Los Angeles claiming he falsified loan documents on a 36-hole golf-course development in Mexico known as Diamante Cabo San Lucas. There were also allegations he hired porn stars and strippers to attend company functions. A spokesman for Jowdy told the Journal that the Mexico project is on track to open next month and  the lawsuit's allegations "are preposterous, absurd and not based in fact."

-- P.F.


Posted by Peter Finch
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Two Courses For the Bankruptcy Files

Friday, September 11, 2009 Comments
Two new additions to the golf course bankruptcy files:

In Bluffton, S.C., Old Carolina GC, a nine-hole course that used to be an 18-hole layout until nine holes and the driving range were rezoned four years ago so developers could turn them into houses, will be sold at a foreclosure auction Oct. 5. Its owner defaulted on a $1.3 million loan in May. Details here.

And in Palm Desert, Calif., the Palm Desert CC closed Monday, a result of its owners filing for bankruptcy in June. According to this story in Friday's edition of The Desert Sun, city officials say they are monitoring the course to make sure the owners continue to do basic maintenance on the course while it is out of operation so that it does not become a "public health or safety hazard."

Sounds as though it already is. Robert Okren, a Palm Desert resident who lives near the course and complained to city officials, told the newspaper, "All the water [hazards] on the course are stagnant. It stinks."

--G.R.

Posted by Geoff Russell
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