Why did you choose the club you did?

[MiniBlueDragon]

Just heard back from another semi-private course I've enquired at although at £90 GBP visitor fees it's not likely to attract "joe public"... The course is absolutely stunning so it's not surprising the price is as high as it is.

5 day membership has a yearly subscription of £2380 and a joining fee of £3100 so the first year would cost £5961 and then £2380 per year thereafter. Monthly that's £496.75 per month for a year and then £198 per month after that.

I generally find that when comparing US prices to UK prices although the currency converts, the amount paid is generally 90% or so, e.g. if something is $100 US it'll usually cost £90 in the UK.

Example:

http://www.golfsmith.com/products/304174/TaylorMade/Penta_TP

http://www.americangolf.co.uk/product/Taylor-Made-Penta-TP-Dozen-Golf-Balls/p53611.aspx

[michaeljames92]

It's the best course in W.A., held many Tour events and is 7100 yards with excellent practice facilities. I pay about $1500 a year until i'm 21, then about $3300 after that

[MiniBlueDragon]

Something else I've just discovered through adding everything to a spreadsheet is the additional cost of fuel when looking at golf clubs to join.

I really didn't think it would make much of a difference but it's actually quite pronounced!

For example:

Club #1 - 2.6 miles away. Fuel cost per round of golf £0.80 round trip.

With a yearly 7 day membership of £829.05 it will cost me roughly:

2 rounds per week = £9.57 per round

3 rounds per week = £7.72 per round

4 rounds per week = £7.19 per round

5 rounds per week = £7.19 per round

Basically the more I play, the better value I get here. Optimally I should be playing 4+ rounds per week.

Club #2 - 6.9 miles away. Fuel cost per round of golf £2.13 round trip.

With a yearly 7 day membership of £839 it will cost me roughly:

2 rounds per week = £12.32 per round

3 rounds per week = £11.75 per round

4 rounds per week = £12.53 per round

5 rounds per week = £13.85 per round

For this club the fuel affects the cost per round dramatically. In order to get the best value I need to make sure I'm playing 3 rounds per week exactly, no more and no less. Anything outside 3 rounds and the per round cost increases.

Club #3 - 3.6 miles away. Fuel cost per round of golf £1.11 round trip.

With a yearly 7 day membership of £1,495 it will cost me roughly:

2 rounds per week = £16.59 per round

3 rounds per week = £12.91 per round

4 rounds per week = £11.62 per round

5 rounds per week = £11.29 per round

Yearly membership here is almost double that of the other two above, yet as long as I'm playing 3+ rounds per week it's less per round than Club #2!

The question then is whether the club itself is X % better than the other club, e.g. Club #3 may cost me ~60% per play more than Club #1 but is it a 60% better club in terms of facilities, friendliness and challenge?

[LankyLefty]

Im sort of going through the same process as you although I wont be joining anywhere until next season. My choices are somewhat limited though as my country has only 6 courses and only 3 are anywhere close to me. None of the courses are busy, I can walk 18 holes in under 3 hours when im out alone at all 3 places. Nor are any very expensive both of the places Im seriously considering are under 1000(about 1450 american) euros per year. The savings from on a per-play basis are quite astonishing. To break even you only have to play 3.3 times per month at one place and only 2.5 times per month at the other. They are both gonna cost me some gas but thats ok.

The courses are both very nice, one is out near the sea and was rated one of the top 100 courses in europe in 2009.

The other is not anything special from a golf perspective but Is a nicer environment.

Both are well maintained and staffed with very nice practice facilities. I dont know which one I want to join yet, good thing i have until next spring to decide...

[MiniBlueDragon]

As an update to this I think I've found the perfect club for me; it ticks all the right boxes:

- 2 miles from home so only a 10 min drive meaning I can play daily before work.

- Cheap on fuel to get to/from it.

- Everyone there seems friendly.

- Loads of social events, rollup times and a "buddy" system for newcomers should they want to use it.

- Nice clubhouse with changing facilities, lockers, bar, offices, balcony overlooking 18th green, pro shop and pro is also a club maker.

- Course is on a private, security-gated estate so quite secure.

- Course layout gives it several "loops" I can pick and choose between depending on the amount of time I have to play.

- Course is an "executive" course so shorter than a full course but still has some longer holes.

- Course is built on what used to be a gravel quarry until 1900 and it's on a hill so drainage is excellent and they never use temporary tees.

- The course was buzzing with greenskeepers today in mowers and with strimmers keeping everything nice (although at one point a guy in a mower drove over my ball and sent it flying down the fairway with a chunk taken out of it although he did stop to apologise)

- Tee boxes are nicely kept and have divot seed on each one.

- Tee boxes are all well signposted and have yardage markers on all of them.

- Fairways are well kept and not speckled with pebbles, holes, bald patches etc like other courses I've played.

- Fairways have ok yardage marker disks or stakes but could be a little easier to see.

- Greens were nice and smooth but a little slow; the pro shop guy did warn me that they were sprayed an hour or so before I arrived so they're normally much faster.

- Definitely a thinking man's course with quite a few "in between yards" par 3's, tree-lines par 4's and it's bunkered half to death with some of them having big old walls between you and the green.

- "Intermediate" membership is the same as "Full Unrestricted" membership except for younger players and it's 33% cheaper. I'm 33 so I have 3 more years of being able to be "Intermediate"

- "Intermediate" have a couple of current vacancies for members.

- No joining fee.

- £985 for a year's membership.

- £45 for a year's large locker rental for all my clubs to be stored securely.

I have an interview with the club captain booked for 1pm on Saturday.

[SamW]

Interesting that you are posting from London (where I also live). I joined a private course 6431yds par 71, superb greens, tight fairways, generally challenging and its around the £160/month mark.

Quality and upkeep of the course was top of my list.

Large number of competitive events was second, e.g. I wanted to be able to play in a competition at least every other weekend and at least once a week midweek in the summer.

General good feel of the club acting as a club, I ideally wanted to join a club owned by its members. So the feel of the place was a big factor also, I particularly didn't want to walk into the bar and find a bunch of stuffy old men wearing Blazers.

[edit] forgot to mention that I also wanted good golfers to play at the club, so I was looking for a club where > 1/2 the membership were better golfers than me :)

Cost would have been a factor if I thought that the one that I picked was too expensive but I don't. I spend plenty of time at the club and get good value out of my membership fee. The club doesn't exist to line anybody elses pockets anyway so everything the members pay gets spent on the course and the club house.

Thanks

Sam

[MiniBlueDragon]

Is that Muswell Hill by chance? :)

I'm actually in SW19 (Wimbledon) so my choices are dependent on exactly how much each club around here decides to tack on the "It's Wimbledon dahling" extra. *grumble*

[NuclearMike]

I was a member of two clubs in the past.  The first one was because of rates and the quality of the course.  The second was because I had good friends as members and the fact that there are two 18s and an 18 hole par 60 executive course (now closed).  I gave up the game for a number of years and during that time the second club folded and was bought by the city and is really well maintained.  I'll be out there again on Tuesday next week.  I'll stick with public golf now simply because I don't have enough available time to play regularly, and the Houston are has a lot of really good public venues to play when I do find the time.

[SamW]

Originally Posted by MiniBlueDragon

Is that Muswell Hill by chance? :)

I'm actually in SW19 (Wimbledon) so my choices are dependent on exactly how much each club around here decides to tack on the "It's Wimbledon dahling" extra. *grumble*

Could be yea :) and I know what you mean SW London courses have quite bumped up prices on the "it's easy to get to from Chelsea" factor. Still I think you'll find something good around there, the other member's of the club become the most important thing in the end.