Letter from the Editor: It’s a Golf, Golf, Golf, Golf World
07/02/2004
I am not a golfer, so it would never occur to me to buy a house overlooking a golf course. But, obviously, I don’t appreciate the nuances of golf course life. There are currently 3,416 golf course communities in the United States, and apparently 60 percent of their residents never venture anywhere near the fairways. Colin Hegarty, president of Golf Research Group (www.golf-research.com), who analyzes the facts and stats of golf real estate, offers the following take on the nesting instincts of nongolfers: “People primarily buy into a gated golf community for three reasons: safety and security; lower property insurance; and an upmarket feel—driving up to a guard gate and being waved in is bound to make you feel important.”; function voidFunc() { } voidFunc();)
Six Jack Nicklaus signature courses and six clubhouses set the pace at Desert
Mountain in Scottsdale, Ariz. (Click image to enlarge)The gated community offers more than just guards and golf, of course. Given the option of overlooking undeveloped greenery and trees or a neighbor’s wall, most people opt for the former. Not surprisingly, 95 percent of gated communities enclose homes worth more than $1 million.
But in today’s golf and real estate market, with stiff competition and billions of dollars at stake, developers have to up the ante to attract the discriminating buyer. The most important factor in today’s golf communities is who designed the course. No top developer will build it unless a top-name golf designer comes. Forget for a moment that only a minority of homeowners will venture onto the course, or that a championship course is too challenging for the average duffer. “Residents would much rather live in a prestigious community where the golf course has been designed by one of the leading names in the world of golf, and they are prepared to pay extra for that privilege,” says Hegarty. The more bells and whistles the better, both for the developer, who will sell lots quicker (the average new golf course community takes 15 years to sell out), and the homeowner, who can expect the resale value to soar and the house to sell rapidly. Resale values of homes within gated communities are at a premium: According to Hegarty, the average price of golf real estate appreciated by 62 percent over the past five years.
Leading the pack of golf course designers are Jack Nicklaus, Tom Fazio and the team of Jay Morrish and Tom Weiskopf; over the last 10 years they have accumulated the most money by designing courses and, more importantly, have generated the most real estate dollars for developers. The five most expensive golf communities in the United States are: the Preserve in Carmel, Calif. (Tom Fazio design); Seven Canyons, Sedona, Ariz. (Tom Weiskopf); the Club at Hokulia in Kona, Hawaii, Mayacama in Santa Rosa, Calif., and the Bear’s Club, Jupiter, Fla. (all by Jack Nicklaus).
Florida ranks number one in the United States
for golf course communities, with 514; second is Texas, with 218; third is
California, with 208. But since real estate values in California have far
outstripped the rest of the country, a golf course home in the West is now worth
95 percent above the national average.
“No one understands why golf course
real estate works,” says Hegarty. “It just does.”
Adele Cygelman,
editor
collection@robbreport.com