Texas-based Evergreen Alliance Golf Ltd. is scheduled to decide next week whether to buy the San Geronimo Golf Club.
C&N, the course owners, are now in escrow with Evergreen, which intends to make the course public once again should the sale go through, said Rick Tine. Tine is a lawyer with the San Francisco property-management firm NKS, which is handling the sale for C&N.
Evergreen is also considering "extensive upgrades" to the club, Tine said, declining to elaborate. The 157-acre semi-private golf course covers much of the San Geronimo Valley floor.
Details of Evergreen's plans for the course will likely be made public some time in October, Tine and Evergreen representatives also said this week.
San Geronimo would be the first course Evergreen owns in California, although it manages the Stanford University Golf Course. Evergreen Alliance owns or manages another 27 other golf courses in the US. Among these are Mira Vista in Denver, Iron Horse in Texas, and Crystal Springs in New Jersey.
Golf course owners Kenji Nakajima and Tadasuro Takahashi of C&N, both citizens of Japan, and their two Japan-based bank lenders have agreed to sell the property for a substantial loss, Tine said.
C&N purchased the golf club for $13 million in 1990 but got hit hard in the last recession. C&N now owes more in mortgage payments than the course is worth, Tine said.
Other issues concerning the golf course property include:
Valley residents had expressed concerns that the land could be developed into homesites. However, since 1978 the golf course has been zoned Resort and Commercial Recreation, said county planner Christine Gimmler.
"The purpose of this district is to create and protect resort facilities with emphasis on public access to recreation areas," Gimmler said, reading the zoning ordinance. "Residential ... and general commercial uses are not permitted."