Transactions, june 20, 2014

     For the third time in the past year, Chinese investors have purchased a golf property on the Grand Strand. Shi Lin Zou and Chun Lan Li, a married couple from Nanjing, reportedly paid $1.5 million for Black Bear Golf Club, a 24-year-old venue outside Myrtle Beach. The club features an 18-hole, Tom Jackson-designed golf course. “We love the trees and vegetation and surroundings -- the blue sky and sunshine, the clear water,” Li told the Myrtle Beach Sun News through an interpreter. “It’s hard to see that in China.” Neither of the new owners plays golf, although they both plan to learn. They bought the 186-acre property from a local investment group led by Robbie Byers and Ed Jerdon of Classic Golf Group. In recent months, Chinese buyers have also acquired Crown Park Golf Club in Longs, South Carolina and Sea Trail Golf Resort in Sunset Beach, North Carolina.

     Just weeks after an expected sale failed to materialize, a financially distressed private club in Monroe, Michigan has found new owners. Monroe Golf & Country Club, which features an 18-hole, Donald Ross-designed golf course, has been sold to an LLC led by Gary Campbell and Robert “R. J.” Regan. “We are really excited about the future here,” Campbell told the Monroe News. “We’re excited about the possibilities.” Campbell also owns Walnut Hills Country Club in East Lansing, Michigan. He hasn’t revealed what he paid for the club in Monroe, but the News has suggested that the 175-acre property was worth between $1 million and $1.5 million. In March, Monroe’s stockholders had agreed to sell the club to Allen DuPuy’s Commonwealth Golf Group, whose holdings include a Ross-designed course at LuLu Country Club in suburban Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

     A struggling golf property in Fairborn, Ohio has assumed a new identity. Earlier this year, Zachary Fink acquired Greene Country Club, which he now calls Gem City Golf Club. The club, established in 1958, features a Bill Diddel-designed golf course. “I felt like I got the club at a good price, and it has great potential to stay a private club and be a viable business,” Fink told the Dayton Business Journal. Fink, who’s set out to rebuild the club’s membership, also owns a miniature golf course in nearby Centerville and an 18-hole, par-3 track at Rollandia Golf Center in Dayton.

     Blum Investment Group Golf LLC, an entity based in Arizona, has agreed to buy a semiprivate golf course in Shallotte, North Carolina. Blum hasn’t disclosed what it’ll pay for Brierwood Country Club, but the 160-acre property had been listed for $1.25 million. The transaction is expected to close next month. So far, Blum has been unwilling to discuss its plans for Brierwood, but a real estate agent involved in the sale told the Greater Wilmington Business Journal that the property would be maintained as a golf course. Brierwood, which the Journal describes as “one of Brunswick County’s oldest golf courses,” opened in the late 1960s.

     A bank in Minnesota has sold a nine-hole, executive-length track in Dayton, reportedly for $2.6 million. French Lake Open Golf Course, which opened in 1985, was purchased by an entity called French Lake GC Partnership LLC, whose intentions are unknown. “It’s unclear what the new owner plans to do with the property,” writes the Minneapolis Star Tribune. The course had been owned by Mark and Debbie Regan, who presumably lost it to Premier Bank in Maplewood.

     A golf pro from Alaska has acquired Prairie Falls Golf Course, an 18-hole track in Post Falls, Idaho. “I came down here in November, took a look at the golf course, and just kind of fell in love with it,” Billy Bomar told KXLY-TV. Prairie Falls features a Mark Rathert-designed layout that opened in 1998.

     The city of Edinburg, Texas has paid $4.25 million for Ebony Hills Golf Course, a nine-hole track that dates from the late 1920s. The course occupies 60 acres owned by the city, which views the purchase as an opportunity to preserve open space. According to the Brownsville Herald, the course’s shareholders had been trying to sell their assets to the city for at least 16 years.

     Fulfilling a dream he’s had since he was 13 years old, Paul Pawlowski has purchased Cedars Golf Course in Cutchogue, New York. “We plan to make some improvements, but we want to keep Cedars the gem that it is and as everyone knows it, affordable and unassuming,” he told the Riverhead News-Review. Pawlowski bought the nine-hole, 50-year-old track with Tim McManus. The seller was a group led by John Dennison.

     An 18-hole golf course in greater Rochester, New York will celebrate its 50th anniversary by transitioning to farmland. In March, Lynn-Ette & Sons Farm paid an undisclosed price for Harbour Pointe Country Club, which opened in 1964 as Oak Orchard Country Club. “There has been a drop off in golf play,” said Joe Cardone, one of the sellers. “It’s also an indication of the economic times in Orleans County.” The Cardone family had owned the property, in the Town of Carlton, since 1981.