Oakmont homeowners emerge as frontrunner to buy Oakmont Golf Club

In what can hardly be described as an upset, the Oakmont Village Association has emerged as a clear favorite to buy the golf club occupying 225 acres in the heart of the adult community in Santa Rosa.

After losing money in four of the last six years, the Oakmont Golf Club informed its 260 members in February that it would soon be up for sale. The asking price for the club, a private business separate from the homeowners association, was set at $4.8 million.

At least eight suitors expressed keen interest and four submitted bids, said Steve Ekovich of Marcus & Millichap, the real estate brokerage handling the sale for the golf club, which includes a pair of 18-hole golf courses, plus a restaurant and two clubhouses.

Now the golf club and homeowners association for Oakmont Village residents have signed a letter of intent to complete a deal for the association to acquire all property held by the club, according to a memo sent to its members.

While neither party would pinpoint the amount of the winning bid, golf club President Gary Smith said Monday, somewhat cryptically, in relation to the $4.8 million asking price, “We're right there, maybe a hair under if you look at it one way, and well over if you look at it another.”

The Oakmont Village Association's bid is contingent on the board's ability to raise the monthly dues of village residents by $23, up to $98 per month.

Of that increase, $17 would go to golf. Ballots for the proposal went out to all 3,200 members of the homeowners association in early July, and are due by Aug. 8.

Ekovich said there was interest in Oakmont's golf course and restaurant property from real estate developers as far away as China and Germany. Also leaning in, he said, were “high-net-worth individuals and golf companies.”

The four offers were entered on a spreadsheet. The seller considered factors like “time frame, do we know the buyer, do we have proof of funds, do we know they can close, and do they want to develop,” Ekovich said. “All those things went into the matrix.

“It was my belief all along that it would be nice, and a fairy tale ending, for it to be owned by the community (Oakmont Village),” he said. “But the community had to step up to the plate and pay market price.”

The engagement may yet be broken. Members of the golf club must approve the sale in an upcoming vote. Getting the necessary votes from Oakmont homeowners could be a taller hurdle.

Oakmont Village resident Ellen Dolores is among those fervently opposed, for what she described as “constitutional” reasons.

“The (OVA) board is saying they have the right to buy a business that is in no way a part of Oakmont,” Dolores said. “I know I live in a capitalist country, but you can't tell me I have to buy a business - a business I'm never going to get any stock in - just because a bunch of people in my neighborhood wanted to buy it.”

Residents in favor of acquiring the club cited studies showing that homes on or near failed golf courses lose considerable value.

Opponents of the sale accused them of exaggerating that danger, and preying on the fears of the elderly.

While obstacles remain, that green light from the golf club - its decision to keep the club in the Oakmont family, as it were - was an important step that had not been anything close to a sure thing.

At two neighborhood meetings in early July, the Oakmont Village Association board revealed that it had joined forces with a lease partner.

Representatives of Advance Golf Partners spoke of their intention to plow $1 million into the golf club in the first year - much of it to dramatically upgrade the restaurants. While not everyone in the community golfs, Josh Smith of Advance Golf said, “everyone eats.”

That was music to the ears of Ekovich, whose first reaction, upon seeing the golf club's Quail Inn restaurant, was: “This is it?”

The restaurant, he said, “is shockingly inadequate” for a community with the financial resources of Oakmont.

The club's lack of “a really cool wine bistro with some major vintner” as a wine sponsor is, in his view, a badly missed opportunity.

The Oakmont Village Association board's decision to add a lease partner was crucial.

“Had it just been (the OVA) making the offer,” Smith said, “we would've had serious reservations. But the plan they put together to bring in the golf partner that will take full control of the operation - that makes a world of difference.”

While the association's bid may not have been the highest, it was the one that proved the closest fit “with our members' desire,” Smith said, “which, at the end of the day, is to have a golf course out there.”

Editor's note: An earlier version of this story misstated the Oakmont Golf Club's property size. It's 225 acres.