GOVERNANCE
ESTATES OF PLAY
THE BUSINESS OF GOLF…..
PUTTING TOGETHER THE PIECES
STEENBERG ESTATE
WHILE THE GAME OF GOLF WAS
UNDERGOING THE EVOLUTION THAT
SAW FUNDAMENTAL CHANGES IN
EQUIPMENT, ESPECIALLY WITH
THE GOLF BALL AND CLUB SHAFTS
WHICH MADE THE GAME MORE
AFFORDABLE, OTHER CHANGES
WERE ALSO TAKING PLACE. I use the word “unusual” in that the required To many developers (whose focus is, not
ROIs will generally mean that any land unnaturally, on property sales), a golf
earmarked for a golf estate development course is seen as a very attractive package
will have a significant percentage of the through which to market and sell the
area proclaimed being considered to be development itself.
A full-time professional golf tour had be a prime example and one where a
developed, the club golf professional
became separated into a section distinct
from those professionals who played
tournament golf full time, and then
television turned professional golf into a
largely “useless” for any other purpose.
This renders the argument, from the “green
lobby”, that golf course construction always
consumes prime land quite redundant.
Eagle Canyon in Johannesburg would
developer’s involvement concluded.
the needs of the developer in the sales
golf estate. stages of a project, either through greed,
For many of the original pioneers in these
Shifts in lifestyle expectations, especially
and the advent of the golf estate.
once the stands had been sold out and the
There are too many examples where
group when it came to both purchasing
two cars, the arrival of the shopping mall
course, as an integral part of the estate,
into a successful and vibrant residential developments, the expectation was that
focus, which prompted the “need” to have
legacy aspects of how to sustain the golf
disused quarry was turned from an eyesore major spectator sport.
after World War II, were also coming into
In the past, little thought was given to the
golfers would be a very significant interest
unrealistic expectations and/or poor
financial modelling, have not been in step
with the longer-term needs of the golf
course and its related facilities.
properties and using the facility. This problem was then aggravated by
With the benefits of hindsight, certainly of golfers who would purchase and take
in South Africa, therein lay the seeds to
problems with the provision for maintenance
overoptimistic projections about the number
up residence at the new estates.
What transpired was that a significant
In terms of the latter I am not sure which and upkeep of the golf course that would development can rightfully claim the title come home to roost a few years down of being the first golf estate in the world, the line. at golf estates did not in fact play golf.
Since the middle 1980s there has been borne out by the international average on
but certainly the first of its kind in southern
Africa was Selborne Park in KwaZulu-Natal.
something of a boom in golf-related
majority of the residents and homeowners
This unexpected statistic was subsequently
this ratio, which put the numbers at about
The developments at Selborne were unusual, developments, and one of the key financial as they moved the estate away from its problems that can be faced by estate golf original function as a working dairy farm residents at estates with a golf course as
courses lies in the original structure of the into Denis Barker’s dream of a residential the centrepiece. Added to this generic factor
“business” relationship between the property golf estate. are regional considerations in addition to
developer and the golf facility. the desire to have a “fairway view” (well,
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75:25 in favour of the non-golfers as