Development to combine apartments, golf course

The dirt is moving in the 3300 block of North Ingram Mill Road, and it is on the fast track to become an integrated apartment complex and championship 18-hole golf course.

The project, dubbed "The Greens," is the latest by Fayetteville, Ark.-based Lindsey Management and its first in the state of Missouri. According to Roy Stanley, president of Lindsey Management, the company has similar facilities across Arkansas and Oklahoma.

The first stage of development will include approximately 450 apartment units, both one and two bedroom. The development covers 235 acres and will cost $20.5 million to complete. The second stage of development could expand The Greens up to 960 apartment units.

Tenants of moderate income levels are the target, Stanley said, and rents will range from $495 to $545 for one-bedroom units to $625 and up for the two-bedroom units. The size of the units will range from 556 to 1,037 square feet.

"You would think that with a golf course we would be high-end," Stanley said. "But we offer a lot of quality and value without a sticker-shock price."

Other amenities to be offered include a fitness center and pool for apartment dwellers, as well as a clubhouse on the course. The 10,000-square-foot club house will have its own fitness center, pro shop, mens' and women's locker rooms, and a small restaurant. Residents of The Greens will get discounted membership prices for use of the golf course during off-peak hours, Stanley said.

The concept of an integrated golf course and residential complex began in the 1980s with the company's owner. "Jim Lindsey purchased the Paradise Valley golf course in Fayetteville, Ark.," Stanley said. "There was adjacent land where he also built apartment housing. It became very popular. People like 120 to 130 acres of manicured greens in their backyard."

The golf course should be complete by this fall, said Kevin Rogerson, a construction estimator with Lindsey Management. The first units should also be available for rent by early fall 2000.

"We are working on the course irrigation right now and should be grassing by July," Rogerson said.

More information is available at www. lindseymanagement.com.