Opportunity for Golf Course Purchase

[James Trautz]

Good morning, 

I belong to an HOA and have recently found out that the owner of the Golf Course in our community has decided to sell the property. Normally, this is not a problem, however, he has decided to sell the property to a developer who (it appears) has already greased the skids for rezoning the property into Medium Density Housing. We have been successful in the past in temporarily halting the rezoning and the planned development, however the county is pretty insistent on allowing the building to move forth.

In speaking with other homeowners, we feel the quickest and best way to halt this planned development is to "control the property." It would be nice if the HOA could buy the property outright, but time is short, and getting all of the 1452 owners (25% of which are absentee and overseas owners) to agree on a purchase just isn't practical. Our next best hope is to either find an investor who sees the potential for the course, create a REIT, or to have a REIT invest in this property as part of it's portfolio.

Any help from the great people on this site would be greatly appreciated!

[Henry Clark]

@James Trautz

It is a poor investment and a dream for someone to keep a golf course alive.  Your out of time and don't have the money.

Go with the flow.  It will get developed.  Now put your energy to getting the best situation out of it for you.

Power- get a petition together and go to your City Council and Mayor.  Let them worry about the zoning and development groups, they have the power.

Action- Go for a green space or park between the existing houses and the development.  Green areas, landscape, ponds, dry river beds, trails, etc.  Go for big green areas such as Frisbee Golf course, soccer field, dog park, etc.  Is any of the golf course wetlands?  Build that into the mix.  Look at the water flow ingress and egress on the Golf Course and make sure that stays the same.  It will eat up ground.  This will provide a buffer to a degree.  Get the City Council and Mayor to appoint a committee of existing homeowners to be a part of the development planning.  Get with an architect firm and lay out the outskirts of the existing housing and Golf course.  In rough detail outline the above Green space. Help everyone to visualize it.  You can take the lead and spend the $5,000 to develop the drawing.

Who are you?- all intros, letters, documents, etc.  Your are the "Voters of ???? Community"?  Don't threaten them, but make it apparent you are the "Voters" of that community.  This is your power.