Trump gets back to US, and right down to business..and what really matters..

Golfing...at his VA Golf Resort...what else..

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

In the past, Trump’s initiation fees were refunded when a club member left — as long as he or she had been there at least 30 years. But the money wasn’t sent back until a new member joined, essentially ensuring that the same amount of money was always available to Trump. No interest was given to the members, who also had to pay additional fees to receive the refund – fees that the Bedminster rules put at 15 percent in 2010.

The practice of requiring a new member to replace an existing member had been the norm for high-end clubs. But Trump’s threshhold of a 30-year membership was less common. Most clubs allowed a deposit to be returned in just a couple years if four to five new members signed up, Karen said.Henry DeLozier, a principal in Global Golf Advisors, which works with investment bankers, real estate developers and golf owners, said refundable deposits became popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s. “It was a means…to gain access to capital with a 30-year payback,” he said. “It was a 30-year interest free loan.”

After the recession — when more members wanted to resign from clubs than wanted to join them — owners began to forgo refundable deposits for initiation fees that were never to be returned.On at least one occasion, Trump apparently tried to convert refundable deposits into the nonrefundable kind: In February, a federal judge ordered the Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter, Fla., to give back nearly $6 million to members who accused Trump of keeping their refundable deposits, promised under a prior owner, and refusing to allow them to have access to the club after they said they planned to resign.

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/article159988504.html#storylink=cpy