Driving Home

From Prior Lake to Lake City, Blaine to Byron, some of Minnesota’s best golf and best living can be found in the same places: planned golf communities. Luxury neighborhoods arranged around championship-caliber public and private golf clubs offer folks of uncommon wealth and more modest means quality living and golf in a community atmosphere with offerings for kids, adults, families, and seniors. We highlight six local communities that illustrate the available variety.

Bearpath Golf and Country Club—Eden Prairie

We’re the only gated golf community in the state,” says Greg Olson of Bearpath Realty. “Do we need the gates in Minnesota? We probably don’t, but it gives a nice sense of security.”

A stone gatehouse leads to Bear-path’s two hundred single-family homes (which start at $950,000) and its one hundred maintenance-free townhomes and villas (from $650,000). Homes are situated on sites ranging from a quarter acre to just larger than a full acre on the golf course, in wooded seclusion, or overlooking marshes. Full-time security patrols the property.         

Bearpath is also unique for having the only Jack Nicklaus Signature golf course in the Upper Midwest. Nicklaus played an inaugural round on the private, par-72, 6,950-yard course in 1996.

Despite the rarified golfing and housing atmospheres, Olson says, “Bearpath as a community is much like any other community.” What sets it apart is that “all the amenities are here. It’s very high-quality living for families.”

Those amenities include a 48,000-square-foot clubhouse and recreational complex with five clay tennis courts and two paddle courts, two pools, a diving pit, professional instruction and competitive programs in racket and water sports, locker rooms, a spacious cabana with food service and lounge areas, and more—all for members and their guests.

Not all members own Bearpath homes, and vice-versa. The club offers three categories of permanent membership: golf, with no green or court fees; pool/tennis/fitness, with no court fees; and social, with access to all dining opportunities and events.

Deacon’s Walk Signature Golf Community—Blaine

On what used to be nearly seven hundred acres of sod farm, Arnold Palmer and PGA tour consultant Tom Lehman moved two million cubic yards of soil—not all by themselves, mind you—to create the par-72 private Tournament Players Club (TPC) of the Twin Cities.

Then, Sienna Corporation of Edina pitched in with hundreds of home sites, some in custom home neighborhoods with names like The Legends, The Fairways, Palmer Place, and The Pinnacle that reflect their connection to golf and the TPC. After five years of planning and building, Deacon’s Walk opened in 2000.

The TPC of the Twin Cities, a private club operated by PGA Tour Properties, has hosted the 3M Championship since 2001—this year it will run July 31–August 6. But according to Sienna Corporation’s John Vogelbacher, “you don’t have to be a golfer to appreciate the landscaping of a golf course. Architecturally and in terms of their layout, they’re very attractive. The amenity of green space is a great thing for a community.” The rolling TPC features marshes, natural prairie grasses, and twenty-seven bodies of open water.

Vogelbacher also says that Deacon’s Walk is accessible to different types of homebuyers. “It’s got such a mixture of people,” he says. “There are six or seven different types of housing, and they range from first-time homebuyer homes all the way up to homes that cost more than a million dollars.”

The Jewel—Lake City

Developers and course designer Hale Irwin created The Jewel in Lake City (named for scenic Lake Pepin) by maximizing natural resources. “From the very beginning of the planning phase, there’s been a very tight connection between the housing and the golf, and in both areas, preservation of unique natural features was kept in mind,” says Mark Fayette, of The Jewel. “Hale really wanted a natural feel, so we preserved some natural savannah and native flowers.” He adds that The Jewel sits on land that used to be a nursery, so they planted native trees to replace what they had to remove. No two holes at The Jewel are alike, says Dave Troyer, The Jewel’s director of golf. “We’ve got lots of variety,” he says. “Some links-style holes, some tree-lined, some mountain-golf-type stuff. Every hole is different. There’s a lot of risk and reward.” Golf Magazine named The Jewel as one of the U.S.’s top ten new public access courses in 2005.

The Jewel’s nine hundred acres along Mississippi River bluffs include almost four hundred—and is approved for sixteen hundred—single family home sites, townhomes, twinhomes, condominiums, and maintenance-free golf cottages. Lots start in the $30,000- range, and detached townhomes and twinhomes start in the low $200,000-range. “There’s a unique lifestyle here in Lake City,” Fayette says. “It’s a small town in the Mississippi River Valley. We’re close to Rochester, or the hustle and bustle of the Twin Cities, but here we have just two stoplights.”

All the Jewel’s facilities are currently open to the public, but will become private when a minimum number of memberships are sold.

Somerby—Byron

Somerby—developed by Golden Tee Development, a partnership between Ames Construction, Inc. and Wensmann Homes—was recently rated by Golf Digest as one of the ten best new private golf clubs in the U.S.

“Our clubhouse is unbelievable,” says Wensmann’s Kelly Domaille. “It’s not geared just to golf.” The 38,500-square-foot, English-manor-inspired clubhouse holds a wine cellar, separate men’s and women’s card rooms, and a fitness center featuring a spa and tennis and swimming facilities and instruction.

Somerby’s links-style course, which will host the PGA’s 2006 Scholarship America Showdown July 10–16, winds through four hundred and fifty acres that was farmland not long ago. Natural wetlands and mature trees are prominent in its landscape, as are thoughtfully placed water features. The club has been designated as a Certified Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary for its conservation of natural resources.

In thirteen on- and off-course neighborhoods, Wensmann offers maintenance-free row-style townhomes, urban villas, rambler townhomes, one-level executive twinhomes, and fashionable condominiums with services and amenities aimed toward the fifty-five and over crowd. Lot and home combination prices range from $300,000 to over $1 million.

Somerby homeowners are automatic social club members, which gives them three rounds of golf per year and full use of the clubhouse and its facilities and restaurants.

Stonebrooke—Shakopee

Semi-private Stonebrooke’s seventeenth hole—a 600-yard par-5 with a dog-leg right and generous opportunities to get hung up in sand, trees, and all sorts of water—was ranked second in KSTP-TV’s list of the Twin Cities’ 10 Toughest Holes. Its eighth hole is also famous, says Einar Odland, of Stonebrooke. “Basically, you tee off on the north side of Lake O’Dowd, hitting across a bay—which can be a 240-yard carry—then you put your cart on a pontoon that takes you across the lake,” he says.

Both of Stonebrooke’s courses—the par-71 Championship Course and the par-30 Waters Edge—are open to the public. Annual leagues and memberships are offered for each course or for both. Membership benefits include advance tee time privileges and discounts on green fees and pro shop merchandise.

According to Odland, the Stonebrooke neighborhood development, situated among rolling terrain and natural marshes, streams, ponds, and lakes, includes seventy-five homes, only eleven of which are directly on the course. “We wanted it to feel like a golf course,” he says, “not a fairway with houses along both sides. We get complimented all the time by golfers who say it doesn’t feel like they’re golfing among wall-to-wall homes. Homeowners like that, too.”

The Wilds—Prior Lake

 We’ll always be a public course,” says Aaron Ressler, The Wilds golf pro. “But we want anyone here to feel like they’re playing a private course.”

The Wilds Golf Course, designed by Tom Weiskopf and Jay Morrish (who apprenticed with legendary course designer Robert Trent Jones Sr.), has one hundred and fifty feet of elevation changes, water in play on nearly half its holes, swift bentgrass fairways, and more than seventy bunkers.

Residentially, The Wilds is a planned community of luxury homes, villas, townhomes, groomed parks, and walking paths set among hills, lakes, Ponderosa pines, hardwoods, wetlands, and wildlife habitat, but also offers a view of the Minneapolis skyline.

The Wilds Clubhouse—including its restaurant, sports bar, and golf shop—is open to the public. “We want people to feel like this is their clubhouse to use,” says Ressler. “It’s a very friendly atmosphere, but also very upscale.”

The Wilds Golf Course opened in 1997, and at that time, Ressler says many of its golfers were from the corporate world. However, in the last two or three years, as home ownership at The Wilds has increased, he’s seen a big jump in tournament and juniors’ and women’s programs participation. Homeowners at The Wilds can receive significant membership discounts on green fees, clothes and equipment, and club dining.