Transactions, august 29, 2014

     Fresh off its blockbuster purchase of CNL Lifestyle Properties’ golf portfolio, Arcis Equity Partners has taken over one of Billy Walters’ golf properties. Arcis, an entity funded by New York City-based Fortress Investment Group, paid an undisclosed amount for the right to operate Desert Pines Golf Club, a 17-year-old layout owned by the city of Las Vegas, Nevada. The 18-hole, Perry Dye-designed track is Arcis’ third golf property in Sin City, joining Las Vegas Golf Club and Painted Desert Golf Club. If Walters’ name rings a bell, it’s probably because he’s being (or was being) investigated by the FBI and the SEC as a result of unusually profitable investments that he and Phil Mickelson made in 2012. Walters hasn’t said why he led Desert Pines go, but, being an expert gambler, he knows how to play the odds.

     Some deep-pocketed investors in Greenwich, Connecticut have given the green light to Heritage Golf Group’s next acquisition. Heritage has agreed to buy Dominion Club, a private venue in suburban Richmond, Virginia that spent parts of 2011 and 2012 operating under bankruptcy protection. The 22-year-old club, the centerpiece of a community of McMansions, features a Curtis Strange “signature” golf course. HHHunt Corporation, the residential developer that owns Dominion and the accompanying community, had originally planned to turn over the club to its members, but Heritage stepped up with a better offer. The acquisition is the first that Heritage has made since Tower Three Partners, an equity investment firm, became its majority owner. “We see multiple characteristics in our read of the industry that now is a good time to be a buyer,” a Heritage official told Richmond BizSense. “We think [Dominion Club] represents an outstanding addition to our portfolio.” Heritage’s portfolio currently consists of two golf properties in Florida, four in South Carolina, and one in Texas. The company expects to close on its purchase of Dominion Club this fall.

     Time is running out on Los Rios Country Club, a 40-year-old venue in Plano, Texas. City officials recently voted to buy the 194-acre property (price: $3.5 million), but not because they believe in the future of golf. Instead, the city aims to transform the Don January-designed track into a park. The city has given Los Rios a temporary stay of execution, however, as it’s leased the course to its current owner, Lyle Addicks of Golf Addicks LLC, for five years.

     After operating for months under the threat of foreclosure, the premier private golf club in Huntsville, Alabama appears to have found its white knight. Riding to the rescue is an LLC consisting of six members who’ve pledged to pay off Huntsville Country Club’s more than $2 million in debt and invest in improvements designed to replenish its membership rolls. “Huntsville Country Club is open, and we are now alive and well,” the club’s new majority shareholder told WHNT-TV. The club, which was founded in 1925, once had more than 500 members, but today it reportedly has just 170. Although dwindling revenues forced it to open its doors to the public earlier this year, it hopes to go private again in the future.

     The financial problems appear to have ended for the oldest golf property in Beloit, Wisconsin. Hendricks Commercial Properties has agreed to purchase and make overdue capital investments at Country Club of Beloit, a venue that can trace its history to 1900. Diane Hendricks, the new owner, hasn’t revealed the sales price, but she believes the club plays a vital role in stitching together the city’s social fabric. “This is a community that has a lot of headquarters and executives who live here,” she told the Beloit Daily News. “You have to take care of the management level and executives as well as everyone and everything else in the community.” Hendricks plans to break ground on a new clubhouse this fall and to eventually turn the club into “a showplace.”

     The future of Calverton Links, a 126-acre spread on New York’s Long Island, is in jeopardy. In May, an investment group led by Parviz Farahzad, a local developer, paid $3.5 million for the property and its 18-hole, Kelly Blake Moran-designed golf course. The 20-year-old track had been owned by Bill Schulman, who closed it in the fall of 2013 and didn’t promise that it would reopen. Farahzad hasn’t announced his intentions, but the handwriting is on the wall.

     The city of Bay Minette, Alabama has decided to get into the golf business. In late February, the city purchased the assets of Holly Hills Country Club, in particular its nearly 50-year-old, nine-hole golf course. “It is a real gem in the rough,” the city’s mayor, a longtime club member, told a local newspaper. “I think we can make it a viable golf and social focal point -- something everyone can be proud of.” The mayor believes the financially struggling course will be close to self-sustaining by the end of the year.

     Before another month passes and the transaction slips completely off the radar, let’s note that Prince George Golf Course, an 18-hole track in suburban Petersburg, Virginia, was sold out of foreclosure during the final days of 2013. The property’s new owner, George Emerson, also owns Highland Country Club in suburban Richmond. A price for Prince George wasn’t announced, but the club’s general manager told the Petersburg Progress-Index that Emerson picked it up “for a very fair market value.” The property had reportedly been assessed at $1.14 million. Before it was claimed by its lender, Prince George had been owned by an LLC led by Ronnie Kelley.