Driving Home

May 2006 Special Advertising Section

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.”