Transactions, february 8, 2013

     A group of Chinese investors has purchased DarkHorse Golf Club in Auburn, California. The transaction, which was completed earlier this month, includes the club’s Keith Foster-designed golf course and 75 unsold residential lots. The new owner is Asia Pacific Group, an entity based in Irvine, California. The identities of the investors haven’t been revealed, but an official at DarkHorse told me that APG has also recently purchased Sunridge Golf Course in Carson City, Nevada. DarkHorse was launched in 2002 by Ed and Chad Fralick, who went broke and lost it in 2007. The club’s 7,096-yard course is “challenging but playable,” according to the Grass Valley Union, and “affordable for most recreationists.” Next on AGP’s agenda: A clubhouse and possibly a golf academy for DarkHorse, which is being managed by Empire Golf.

     A group led by Sey D. Jung has acquired Vellano Country Club, which is part of a 600-acre community in Chino Hills, California. Vellano features a 47,000-square-foot clubhouse and an 18-hole, Greg Norman-designed course that opened in 2006. The track is now owned by Vellano 2020, Inc., according to the Chino Hills Champion. It had been owned by Oaktree Capital Management. The newspaper doesn’t provide any information about Jung, but a person identified as Sey Jung is said to be the president of Glen Ivy Golf Management. Southland Golf has described Vellano’s golf course as “eclectic” and “one of the most majestic tracks in Southern California.”

     Club at Viniterra in New Kent, Virginia has been sold to an LLC led by one of the best-known developers in the Carolinas. Barton Tuck, the principal of Greenville, South Carolina-based Wingfield Properties, bought Viniterra from Kitty Hawk Land Company. The property features an 18-hole, 7,725-yard, Rees Jones-designed golf course that opened in 2009. At one time or another, Tuck has owned at least 10 golf properties, among them Forest Creek Golf Club in Pinehurst, North Carolina and Bright’s Creek Golf Club in Mill Spring, North Carolina. According to a press release, his company currently manages other golf properties in North Carolina, Virginia, and Mississippi. Kitty Hawk, a subsidiary of Boddie-Noell Enterprises, still owns one other golf property with a Jones-designed course, Currituck Club on North Carolina’s Outer Banks.

     Late last year, in what’s been described as “a discreet transaction,” Peter Nanula’s company purchased an ailing 90-year-old golf club in suburban Washington, DC. Nanula’s Concert Golf Partners bought Country Club at Woodmore in Mitchellville, Maryland, which was founded in 1923 as Beaver Dam Golf & Country Club. Beaver Dam had a Donald Ross-designed golf course. The club relocated and reopened in 1981, with a 7,059-yard golf course that was designed by Arnold Palmer. Concert Golf also owns two golf properties in Florida, Heathrow Country Club in suburban Orlando and Golf Club of Amelia Island in suburban Jacksonville.

     After more than 32 years as the owner of Lake Wales Country Club, Ben Hill Griffin III has sold his property to an LLC led by Richard “Dick” Klaas. The club’s 6,504-yard golf course was designed by Donald Ross and opened in the mid 1920s. A spokesman for GolfVisions Management, which has been hired to operate the club, told the Lakeland Ledger that he “looks forward to finding ways to improve and enhance the golf course and clubhouse.” Griffin didn’t disclose the selling price, but the newspaper says that he paid $80,000 for the property in 1980.

     If my math is correct, the 18-year-old golf community in Blythewood, South Carolina that’s now known as Cobblestone Park has found its sixth owner. D. R. Horton, a big home builder, has purchased the community’s 27-hole, P. B. Dye-designed golf complex and 300 unsold residential lots. To sell the real estate, the State says Horton “will offer lower starting home prices than previous developers” and “turn the golf course’s half-built clubhouse into a premier event venue.” According to the State’s accounting, Cobblestone Park and its P. B. Dye-designed golf course opened in 1995, as University Club. Two years later it was sold to Fripp Company, and in 2004 Fripp sold it to a group led by Bobby Ginn. After a financial flame-out, Ginn’s group sold the community to an affiliate of Linger Longer Development, the company that built Reynolds Plantation in Greensboro, Georgia. Horton bought the community from an entity named LRA-UC Cobblestone LLC. Despite best efforts by all the previous owners, the newspaper says that Cobblestone Park “hasn’t seen much activity since an initial build-out of less than 100 homes.”

     Hales Mills Country Club, which was built upon a dairy farm in Johnstown, New York, is in the process of being sold. Appropriately enough, I suppose, the parties involved in the transaction are dairy farmers. Ray and Roy Dykeman have agreed to buy the club from Larry Hollenbeck, who built the 5,995-yard track in the mid 1990s. The Gloversville Leader-Herald reports that the Dykeman brothers “see a parallel between the dairy and golf industries, with both hurt by changing consumer needs and the economy’s general instability.” The prospective owners plan to make improvements to the course, and Ray Dykeman has promised that “when we get done with it, it’ll be one of the nicest courses in the area.”

     Winchester Country Club has ascended to its second life. The former private club and its accompanying 1,170-acre community in Meadow Vista, California have been sold out of receivership to Real Capital Solutions of Louisville, Colorado, which has vowed to “restore the vision of Winchester as one of the greatest golf communities in Northern California.” The club features a 13-year-old golf course that was co-designed by Robert Trent Jones and Robert Trent Jones, Jr. Real Capital plans to spiff up the property’s clubhouse, in order to improve its chances of selling the community’s 136 unsold lots. The Auburn Journal says that Real Capital is “very bullish” on California’s real estate market and believes that Winchester, which was initiated by C. C. Myers, is “positioned for a comeback.” The new owners may also take the club private again.

     Bob Richards, a pole-vaulter who won gold medals at the Olympic Games of 1952 and 1956, has purchased Lake Waco Golf Club in Waco, Texas. Richards paid $1.4 million for the club, which features an 18-hole, 6,640-yard, anonymously designed golf course. The Waco Tribune reports that the property “fell into disrepair for several years before being foreclosed upon more than a year ago.” Richards, who’s 86, has turned over the club’s operation to two of his sons. One of them told the newspaper that the family believes the course “has tremendous potential” and “will invest whatever is necessary to make it competitive with the other courses in town.” Incidentally, Bob Richards was the first athlete to appear on the front of a Wheaties box.