High-end planned golf community developers will be looking toward the Carolina mountains and Cliffs Communities property owners in coming weeks to determine if the path to cheap financing lies within their own communities. Developer Jim Anthony and his group have asked Cliffs property owners to lend him $60 million or more to complete all promised amenities at his latest two communities, Mountain Park and High Carolina, where Tiger Woods is still on tap to design his first American golf course. Anthony has promised interest payments of 7% to the owners for their minimum $100,000 investment each.
In the external markets, The Cliffs would pay interest well into double digits and, in the case of
Some Cliffs owners read this blog. One wrote me yesterday that “the loan request has a good chance” of acceptance at the minimum total level of $60 million. The Cliffs, wisely, has proposed the loan as if it were a regular bond offering in the open market, complete with all the “financials, risk factors and due diligence” of a major bond offering. A final tally is expected in the next few weeks.
“In my opinion,” the Cliffs owner wrote, “it has been a very professional approach, both from the Cliffs and the committee of property owners.”
What happens at The Cliffs won’t stay at The Cliffs. Other high-price-tag golf communities in financial difficulties will follow the results closely and act accordingly. The Cliffs vote may even cause a momentary distraction for a certain golfer turned designer who, reportedly, is getting his game on for the upcoming Masters golf tournament.
