The greatest impediment to the sale of golf community homes in the southeastern U.S. is not an issue of inventory, foreclosures, or even the well-publicized financial difficulties of some former high flying communities, like The Cliffs Communities and Reynolds Plantation.  The biggest obstacle to golf community home sales getting back to where they once belonged has been the inability or unwillingness of northern baby boomers to sell their primary homes and relocate south.

        That may be changing, if the May pending home sales report issued today by the National Association of Realtors is any indication.  Pending sales were up in all regions of the country last month, including in such “feeder” cities as Hartford, Minneapolis and Indianapolis whose retirees have historically relocated south for their retirement years to enjoy the warm weather, golf and other activities.

        I can sense the southward migration picking up steam in my discussions with real estate agents from Virginia to Florida.  “Sorry,” one emailed me today in response to my request for a phone conversation.  “I can’t talk until day after tomorrow” because he was working with customers from the north (one of which I referred to him from upstate New York).  Other agents have frequently used the word “slammed” to communicate how busy they are.

        Prices on properties in nice southern communities have become so

attractive that northern baby boomers have run out of excuses to wait.  There are 76 million baby boomers in the U.S., and at any one moment, hundreds of thousands of them are at or near retirement, which essentially removes them from that category of workers nervous about their employment prospects.  They can finally take a deep breath and scope out the rest of their lives.  They are entering a phase in which their income is pretty much fixed, if lower than in their peak earning years.  At least things are more predictable, financially speaking, and they can make their relocation plans accordingly.  These boomers may have lost some market value in their homes, but if they have lived in one place for more than 10 years, chances are they gained enough value in the early years to more than offset the losses (on paper) since 2007/08.  Most have equity in their homes that they can use to purchase a smaller and, in many cases, much less expensive home in the south.  They are also coming to understand that the cost of living decreases they will enjoy by moving from north to south will quickly (in a year or two, in some cases) make up for what they lost on paper in their homes.

        Living up north is becoming more stressful and unpredictable (and colder; global warming has not reached New England in winter yet).  The cost of living, especially on the tax side of the equation, is increasing in poorly managed, economically fragile states like Connecticut, where your editor lives.  The battles between our governor and the state unions cannot have a happy conclusion; one way or the other, services will be cut and taxes will go up.  The reasons to move south for folks who can afford to do so have never seemed more compelling.

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If you have been thinking about a move to a southern golf community and would like to discuss what areas and specific communities would best suit your requirements, please contact me for a free analysis. 

        It was not surprising that some of the biggest crowds at this weekend’s Travelers Championship near Hartford, CT, gathered around the shortest par 4 on the PGA tour -– and planted themselves there for a few hours.  The make or break 15th hole at TPC of River Highlands demands some patience, from spectators and PGA Tour players alike.

        The tee box of the 15^th sits on a rise almost embedded into the woods, a mere 285 yards from the elevated green.  The hole is so short, in fact, that most players eschew the driver, fearful of rolling their tee shots through the green and into a thick, downhill lie beyond, leaving a second shot with basically two choices –- play short for a difficult downhill 20 foot birdie putt, or try to get your chip close to the front left pin and risk too much over-spin that will carry the ball down the slope in front of the green.  A recess across the middle of the green just makes the chip -– and any putts from the middle -– that much more problematical.

The 285-yard par 4 15th at TPC River Highlands is the shortest on the PGA tour, a hole where dreams live and die.

All photos by L. J. Gavrich

 

        With a stroke average during the tournament of just 3.68, some contending players on Sunday at The Travelers are scared to death they will only make par at the 15^th.  A par can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory for the tournament leader.  (On Sunday, though, eventual victor and front-runner Fredrik Jacobson opted to play for par after a birdie on 14.)

        The vexing issue at #15 is that 3-wood is barely enough to reach the green, even for the long hitters, and the tendency is to over-swing in a vain attempt to run the ball down the fairway far enough to make it up the three-foot-high slope at the front of the green.  A pull hook can easily reach the lake that encroaches just below the left side of the narrow green.  But the water takes a back stage to the trees and tall grasses that line the right side.  Last year, Bill Haas was so deep in the weeds that he accepted an unplayable lie and then walked straight up a hill into a condo owner’s backyard to hit his shot to the green –- a good two stories below.  This year, a similar fate befell no less than veteran Vijay Singh who took a drop from the weeds into less gnarly weeds five feet further away, made a miraculous weed-whacker of a shot that rolled up the side slope and onto the green 20 feet away, and then just barely missed his par putt.

Vijay Singh needed a weed whacker when he missed the 15th green high and right.  He settled for a drop and an eventual bogey on a hole where par loses a fraction of a stroke to the field.

 

        With that large stand of trees covering the entire right side of the hole and the iconic three-acre lake to the left, the wind often blows across the fairway from lake toward trees and then sometimes swirls back toward the tee box.  That might have happened to the long-hitting Bubba Watson, who won his first PGA tournament at The Travelers last year.  On Sunday, the grip-it-and-always-rip-it Watson came up a good 25 yards short, pitched up and over the slope to two feet and made his birdie putt.

         The challenge at the 15^th is really all about that green, which is about 90 feet deep, about 35 feet across and sits on a puckered-up piece of land that makes it look a little like a volcano that blew its top.  Of the hundreds of pros who had a go at the hole over the four-day event, just eight managed eagles -– and 53 left the green with their shoulders sagging under the weight of bogey or double bogey.  You can’t ask for better performance from a par 4 of under 300 yards.

The 15th green at TPC River Highlands is fully elevated.  A tee shot left short or right leaves a tough pitch up to a front pin position.  A tee shot that rolls through the green could leave an impossible one.

 

Last year's Travelers champion Bubba Watson left his tee shot about 25 yards short of the green and chipped (top photo) to within two feet, from where he made his birdie putt.