Think before you buy

Think before you buy 

The now-closed Rolling Hills Golf Club pictured Above, a retention pond at the 14th hole Is green with algae at the course In Longwood. Many homeowners find the courses they paid a premium to live on are shutting down.

No Resident expects to be living next to a weedy scrubland lot or a mixed-use development in the next few years?

According to the National Golf Foundation, there were 15,516 "golf facilities" across the country as of Jan. 1. A facility could be a single course or a complex containing multiple courses. And Florida leads the nation, with 1,048 as of the beginning of this year.

The falling number of courses aligns with a precipitous drop in the number of golfers, from 30 million in 2005, to 25.3 million in 2012, the latest figures available. And those aren't the only dwindling numbers affecting the sport TV ratings and sales of golf equipment are also down.

There are enough theories about what's behind the decline to fill a golf bag. The 2008 economic meltdown, changing leisure interests, faulty growth forecasts,the tailspin is a stark contrast from a decade ago, when the number of courses was on the rise, the economy was strong and new players were coming to the game.

"It was kind of a perfect storm: Houses were being built, courses were opening, Tiger was winning all these tournaments, more people were taking up golf

The game's overall decline in popularity. Most of the courses that are going under, he believes, were doomed from the start

"A lot of the golf courses across the country, but especially in the Orlando market, that were developed over the last 10 to 15 years were done so as amenities for a housing development," Stine said. "They didn't have any regard for whether there were enough players to support that golf course or to support another golf course in the Greater Orlando area. They're just in the business of selling houses."

Many failing courses were built too far from the population centers — and concentrations of affluent residents — needed to sustain them. In his view, an aggressive push by the National Golf Foundation for more courses is to blame too.

Some see factors beyond shortsighted developers at play.But whatever the root causes, residents of communities with struggling golf courses should get used to the idea of something new moving into the neighborhood.

The bottom line is these golf courses, they're going to have to redevelop them into something, you can't just leave them as land for coyotes.