Transactions, september 4, 2015

     Fredericksburg, Texas. Boot Ranch, one of the biggest real-estate flops in Texas history, has finally found a new owner. Terra Verde Group LLC and Wheelock Street Capital are plotting a new future for the partially developed, nine-year-old community, which had been seeking a buyer since 2010, when Lehman Brothers foreclosed on the original owners. “The previous developer opened the project at the wrong time in the market,” a principal of Terra Verde told the Dallas Morning News. The 2,052-acre community features a village center, a 55,000-square-foot clubhouse, a recreation area, an 18-hole, Hal Sutton-designed golf course, and a nine-hole, par-3 layout.

     Monument, Colorado. An investment group that includes Armen Suny and Ken Limes has purchased Monument Hill Country Club, and for a reasonable price. Monument Investors LLC reportedly paid $1.25 million for the roughly 50-year-old, Colorado Springs-area club, which features an 18-hole, Press Maxwell-designed golf course. The 151-acre property has had its troubles in recent years -- three foreclosures since 2002 and a brief shut-down in 2013 -- but the Colorado Springs Gazette reports that it “added 200 members in the past 12 months” and “returned to profitability last year.” Suny and Limes worked together at Cherry Hills Country Club in suburban Denver, and Suny did a stint at Shadow Creek Golf Course in Las Vegas, Nevada. “We want to make this a showplace,” Suny wrote in a letter to Monument Hill’s members. “The club needs some love and attention, and we plan to do that.” The new owners also believe it needs a new name, so they’re now calling it Country Club at Woodmoor.

     Mays Landing, New Jersey. Leo Fraser’s children have sold Mays Landing Golf & Country Club, a property they inherited in 1986. Fraser, who was devoted to golf like few others, designed and built the 18-hole layout at Mays Landing in 1962, and he opened it with an exhibition match between Sam Snead and Tony Lema. By then, Fraser had been working in the golf business for decades -- among other things, he also owned Atlantic City Country Club in Absecon, New Jersey -- and by the end of the 1960s he would become a president of the PGA of America. When he died, the Philadelphia Daily News said, “There was perhaps no greater promoter of golf or a more visionary individual in the sport.” His children had considered shrinking the course at Mays Landing to 12 holes, but the property’s new owner, Bill Green of Green Valley Destinations & Resorts, intends to maintain Fraser’s 18-hole design.

     Ahwahnee, California. Less than a year after he almost shut it down, Robert H. Bard, Jr. has found buyers for Sierra Meadows Golf Course. The new owners, Charlie Sheldon and Reid Spice, have promised to keep the 18-hole track open through the end of October, but it may not last long after that. “We are currently in an evaluation period,” Sheldon told the Sierra Star. “From a financial perspective, the course has not done well in recent years, and we hope to turn that around.” In addition to its financial losses, last year Sierra Meadows also began to suffer from another problem: Damage from California’s persistent drought.

     Cottonwood, Arizona. A pair of investors from California has purchased Coyote Trails Golf Course, the centerpiece of a gated, seniors-only community. Bob Baranek and Paul Reichert, the principals of San Diego-based On the Greens, paid an undisclosed price for the nine-hole, par-33 track formerly owned by Roles, Inc. Coyote Trails, which was designed by Jeff Hardin, opened in the mid 1990s, as Pine Shadows Golf Course.

     Flintstone, Maryland. A Las Vegas, Nevada-based gaming company has acquired an interest in the Rocky Gap Casino Resort, which features a 200-room hotel and a Jack Nicklaus “signature” golf course. Sartini Gaming, Inc., which owns more than 700 slots operations in Nevada (most of them in grocery stores, convenience stores, and taverns) has established a presence in the mid Atlantic via a merger with Lakes Entertainment, Inc., Rocky Gap’s owner. The partners, operating as Golden Entertainment, Inc., paid an undisclosed amount for the property. The Associated Press says that Rocky Gap, Maryland’s smallest casino, is the biggest conventional casino in Golden Entertainment’s portfolio.

     State Center, Iowa. Harlan and Jeanette Kloppenborg have given their 18-hole golf course to the town of State Center. Lincoln Valley Golf Course, a Gordon Cunningham design, opened in the late 1970s. The reason for the donation: Harlan Kloppenborg reportedly believes that the course has become “too much for him to handle as he got older.” The transaction didn’t go smoothly, however, and the town’s mayor could lose his job as a result.

     Limestone, Maine. Dean Kimball has assumed the lease on Limestone Country Club, a nine-hole, William Mitchell-designed layout originally created to provide recreation for military personnel at Loring Air Force Base. According to the Bangor Daily News, Kimball has “a three-year plan to restore the club to its original beauty.” For the past 20 years, the course had been operated by Craig Phair, who reportedly had to give up his lease for health reasons. “It has been a great 20 years,” Phair told a local television station. “Love to do it all over again, to tell you the truth.”