A Chinese company with an ambitious Makaha Valley resort development plan is seeking investors or a buyer for the project, raising uncertainty over the plan it announced last year that includes golf superstar
Tiger Woods designing one of two golf courses at the heart of the endeavor.
Pacific Links International announced Wednesday that it has retained commercial real estate brokerage firm CBRE to market 644 acres planned for hotel, timeshare and residential properties along with one new golf course to be designed by Woods and reconstruction of an existing course by boutique firm Gil Hanse Golf Course Design.
Pacific Links primarily
described CBRE’s job as a
“recapitalization” effort to seek investment from outside China in response to economic challenges in China that make it difficult for Pacific Links to carry out its project.
However, the company also said CBRE will explore “all strategic options.”
CBRE’s offering states that Pacific Links is receptive to co-investment, or an outright sale “where a new owner can create their own vision.”
Rudy Anderson, president and CEO of Pacific Links, said in a statement that the economic forecast in China over the next three years encouraged the company to consider options with its Makaha Valley property and that attracting capital investment from outside China provides the best chance to realize its vision.
“Chinese companies with
offshore holdings are currently facing pressures as the government increases capital controls in response to macro-economic issues and the depreciation of the national currency, the renminbi,” Anderson said. “Many companies are looking to alternative sources of financing major projects as moving money out of the country becomes more difficult, and Pacific Links International is no different in this regard as its primary source of revenue is generated in mainland China.”
Pacific Links is wholly owned by Du Sha, an entrepreneur in China and a Canadian citizen. The company sells memberships primarily to golfers in China who can play at courses owned by or affiliated with Pacific Links in
50 countries. The company, which has 21,000 active members, also has arrangements with customers of other golf club networks.
Pacific Links first floated its Makaha resort development plan in 2016 as a $300 million joint venture with local developer Stanford Carr.
At that time, Greg Norman Golf Course Design was slated to renovate Makaha Golf Club West. This course, now referred to as the Makaha North Course, has been closed for almost a decade and is what Woods’ firm TGR Design Co. was lined up to redevelop.
The operating golf course in Makaha is called Makaha Valley Country Club and was once known as the Makaha Valley East golf course. This property, which Pacific Links also refers to as the Makaha South Course, was assigned to Hanse for renewal.
Pacific Links bought the west course in 2011, acquired the balance of its Makaha
Valley real estate in 2013 and razed a hotel on the property in 2014 to make way for redevelopment.
Last year, Pacific Links announced that a new golf club along with an arts/community center and a health and wellness center would be part of an initial phase of development, followed by a second phase with hotel and timeshare units, golf villas and condominiums.
Carr later said last year that an initial phase was
expected to include
154 condo-hotel units and 260 single-family homes.
CBRE in its marketing materials said Carr is finalizing plans for 152 condos and 230 single-family homes in an initial phase on land zoned for resort use and another 264 single-family homes later along with options for hotel and timeshare development.
CBRE also noted that some Pacific Links golf members have made significant deposits to buy lots and homes.
Pacific Links had not announced a development timetable for its Makaha property, but CBRE said that administrative government approvals needed to proceed with development would take two years on the land that has long been zoned for resort and residential use.