Shooting for a better return on their investment in a declining industry, the owners of Brynwood Golf and Country Club in the town of North Castle want to develop a 243-unit condominium community for club members on the property.
The residential development would be part of an estimated $100 million in improvements over five years that will include a redesign of the 50-year-old former Canyon Club course near Armonk by one of the nation”™s top golf-course architects, Rees Jones.
Principals in Canyon Club Partners II in late 2009 acquired the roughly 160-acre property on Route 22 from Mitsubishi Inc. at a bargain price of $6.3 million.
If town officials reject their condo proposal, the developers instead will convert the 18-hole course on roughly 160 acres to an estate housing tract and eliminate one of the town”™s remaining open spaces, said one of the Brynwood partners.
As the Business Journal went to press June 22, the North Castle Town Board was scheduled to receive the developers”™ petition to create a new country club community zone for the development. A call to the town seeking comment was not returned by press time.
Brynwood Principal Jeffrey B. Mendell said the property is currently zoned to allow single-family housing on 2-acre plots.
Mendell is a 16-year Armonk resident and CEO of JBM Realty in Greenwich, Conn. He and two investment partners, real estate developers in New York City and Florida, renovated the 1960s-era, 65,000-square-foot clubhouse and opened the renamed private club in April 2010.
“This was always part of our game plan,” Mendell said of the proposed country-club community of one-bedroom and two-bedroom condos in two-story and three-story buildings that would rise on a 14-acre site beside an expanded clubhouse. He said condo buyers will be required to join the Brynwood club, where annual fees are $8,000 for a sports membership and $10,000 to $14,000 for individual and family golf memberships.
The Brynwood partners bought into a flagging industry. Mendell, an avid golfer himself, said golf rounds nationwide peaked at 500 million in 2000 and since then have steadily declined. The number of course closings outpaces golf-club openings, he noted. In Westchester County, two financially struggling private courses, Ridgeway Country Club in White Plains and Hampshire Country Club in Mamaroneck, were sold in 2010.
“This model, the golf model, is in trouble, is not going to work,” Mendell said during a recent tour of Brynwood, where a clubhouse gallery presents the owners”™ and architects”™ visions for redevelopment in video interviews and large-paneled sketches. “We”™re doing well, but we”™re not getting an adequate return on our investment ”“ and I”™m a businessman.”
Mendell said the country-club community concept is especially popular in the South and Southwest. “It really appeals to the so-called active adult market ”“ the empty-nesters,” he said.
He said the Brynwood development would be targeted for those aging baby boomers in the Armonk area. Limited to one-bedroom and two-bedroom units, the project is not expected to attract younger couples with school-age children.
“We think we”™re presenting housing that”™s desperately needed” by that large older segment of the population, Mendell said. “We”™re not going to do this as an age-restricted community. We”™re going to do this as an age-targeted community.”
Brynwood”™s owners have retained Hart Howerton, a Manhattan-based architectural firm with a roster of international clients, to design the condo development. The award-winning firm has designed seven of America”™s top 10 golf communities as ranked by Travel and Leisure Golf.
At Brynwood, “We”™ve created a plan that gives local residents a housing alternative that is popular in other parts of the country but does not yet exist here,” Hart Howerton CEO Jim Tinson said in a prepared statement. “Inspired by the rich local architectural heritage and the spectacular landscape, we”™ve created a product that allows empty-nesters to sell their large homes and downsize right here in their own community without giving up their quality of life of the meaningful relationships they have forged over most of their lives.”
Mendell said the town”™s required environmental review of the project is expected to take up to two years. “We view this as a collaborative process,” he said. “We”™re encouraging the town to work with us to make this happen. ”¦We”™re not the big bad developers.”
“If the town doesn”™t want to do this, while it would break my heart as a golfer, we would demolish this golf course and build 49 estate houses” in compliance with existing zoning, Mendell said.
“I don”™t want to do that. I don”™t think it”™s the best use for the property. I don”™t think it”™s the best use for the town. The important thing, as a business, that”™s our fallback.”
Regarding the proposed condo community, “We think it”™s the right use at the right time on the right piece of property. ”¦ We preserve a town amenity. We save a golf course. It becomes open space forever. ”¦ This is one of the few opportunities in North Castle to have growth that we think is intelligent growth.”
Mendell said sale prices for the condos have not yet been set.
“We”™re banking on the fact that a couple of years down the road, we”™ll have a better economy,” he said. “They (potential condo buyers) will be able to sell their houses and that”™s where the demand for this will come from.”
