$ 4 million signature Design fee???

[Mike_Young]

Word is one of the "signatures" has upped his fee to $4 million.  RUMOR HAS IT..that he has plenty of work.. it gives more room for negotiation of his "non signature" designs etc  and.... he doesn't have to worry about  a client that pays $1.5 mill or 2 mill fee etc and doesn't like getting a big jet bill with a site visit.  Supposedly this fee includes site visit expenses.  
IMHO this had to happen after TW charged what he charged.....AND I can't blame the guy.....he has a track record where TW has none.....

[cary lichtenstein]

Hopefully this opens the door for others

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Is this for projects only in Dubai or China?

I'd like to see who hires him here in the US at that number.

[Jay Flemma]

That's too much money.  especially for a "signature" design.

We are pricing the game right out of the pockets of ordinary people.

[Mike_Young]

Is this for projects only in Dubai or China?

I'd like to see who hires him here in the US at that number.

IT WILL HAPPEN...I AM SURE THAT IS FOR IN COUNTRY...

[JESII]

Mike,

Would a professional GCA see this as a positive for their business? Or would there likely be no trickle-down effect in acceptable fees across the industry?

My instinct tells me these are very isolated "brands" that are able to make this type of shift and not suffer. Your thoughts would be informative.

Could this be a strategic move to "slow down"? Or does this person have a succession team in position to hand the business off to that might fill the void in the lower end (for this group) projects?

[Mike_Young]

Mike,

Would a professional GCA see this as a positive for their business? Or would there likely be no trickle-down effect in acceptable fees across the industry?

My instinct tells me these are very isolated "brands" that are able to make this type of shift and not suffer. Your thoughts would be informative.

Could this be a strategic move to "slow down"? Or does this person have a succession team in position to hand the business off to that might fill the void in the lower end (for this group) projects?

JES
I don't think it filters down to us at my level.....IMHO this type of fee is not about the golf as much as the added value of the brand to Real Estate..which is where they make the difference.....as for Succession team...I have often thought how that will affect this first wave of "signatures" as they pass on.....yes, this firm does have different levels of involvement for the signature which is another form of fee negotiation.
Mike

[JESII]

Thanks Mike,

[Jay Flemma]

I also dont think it filters down because these are rates for people who are getting that money because the were great PLAYERS and CELEBRITIES, not great golf course architects.

[JESII]

Jay,

Makes sense to me that the real estate dollars are going to be driven more by celebrity status than by design track record.


In your earlier post you state that this type of thing will price out ordinary people. Without a trickle-down effect in fees, wouldn't it stand to reason that there will be no trickle-down effect in overall golf expense? In other words, do these costs effect anyone outside the specific development that pays the increased fee?

[Jay Flemma]

Well I see a mixed effect.  basically we just have to keep fighting.  TV has a huge disproportionate effect on the public perception.  if trump had his way, and to a lesser extent Nicklaus, golf would be a rich man's diversion.  People will see the exorbitant fee and raise prices accordingly.  So guys like Brauer and Hurdzan and Engh and Doak and the like have to keep championing great design features and reasonable prices to offset this.  For every Turning Stone casino course, we must have one Black mesa.

[Tom_Doak]

Hey, Jay, you don't need to limit my fees for me.  I'm sure Jeff B. and Jim Engh would love to charge some clients $4 million so they could cut others a sweetheart deal.

I've always just figured we had to stay a million dollars less than Nicklaus to look like a bargain, so maybe our fees are going way up!

Four million dollars is indeed a lot of money, but most of Jack's and Fazio's projects are $200 million plus when you include the real estate development, so it's still just 1 or 2 percent of the bottom line.

The difference between a half-million dollar design fee and a million is not so much, in the overall scheme of things, if they really want you and not somebody else.  By the old rule of thumb, it's an extra $5 on the green fee.  I don't think that is the straw that's going to break the camel's back, especially not  if the architect is able to build a good course for half a million less in the construction budget.

[Mike_Young]

As TD says above , I don't think it will be the design fees that will end up hurting golf as much as outrageous design features embedded in some of  these high dollar projects for the sake of selling RE yet after the RE s sold they cost a fortune to maintain.  That is the real problem....

[Adam Sherer]

To quote the parlance of our times, "Don't hate the player, hate the game."

It is not the Tigers and Jacks of the design world , or the "outrageous design features" that will become the bane of the industry, rather the developers and real estate brokers that  perpetuate the need to have a "name brand" on a golf course development.

If Jack and Tiger, et. al. can obtain $4-40 million for a design, can you blame them (when there is somebody out there to play them that)?


On the plus side: Designers are getting what they are worth vs. the "Golden Age" of Design (though probably more nowadays?). Tilly, Mcd, etc had always struggled financially despite their prolific careers

On the negative side: Golf wouldn't be what it is now if money was the only driving force. Crump probably wouldn't have been able to do Pine Valley, Ross wouldn't have been able to tinker with #2, and nobody would buy the idea to "replicate the 18 greatest golf holes in the world".




An aside, what do the people on this website think that the average architect earns for a design job, and what does that entail (construction work, shapers, hours a week, days a week, etc), and what is the "life of an architect" like? What does the $4 mil go to? When Jack does four signature jobs, does that mean that he pockets $16 mil?

[cary lichtenstein]

All this does is drive up the price of housing at JN's signature courses. He is doing so many courses all over the world, he probably has little or no life inspite of the fact that he has no time to devote to architecture.

I see this as a win win for JN and everyone else in the industry. Work will now get spread around. Not every porject can afford JN and the JN signature is so diluted now...what 250 worldwide???

[RJ_Daley]

We are pricing the game right out of the pockets of ordinary people.

Will the last 'ordinary person' on GCA.com please turn off Tom Paul's computer, and close his study door...

The only "ordinary people" I know as it is, who might like to play a round with their wife or kids a couple times a summer won't afford more than about $30-40 a round.  Pay for a couple of beers and sandwiches, and you pretty much have spent the rec budget of "ordinary people" once you have an outing of over $100-150 for the two or more in the family that would like to recreate together.  What club can 'ordinary people' join for less than $5000 intitiation and a couple 2-3 hundred a month?  There are a whole lot of ordinary people out there making <40-50K a year.  They have to be satisfied to fish, hike, bike, roller blade, or play rec at the public park.  Golf justisn't much of an 'ordinary people' thing now.  God forbid that an ordinary fellow take an interest in golf course architecture!    He won't see much of it around the old $20-25 muni...  

[Tyler Kearns]

On the plus side: Designers are getting what they are worth vs. the "Golden Age" of Design (though probably more nowadays?). Tilly, Mcd, etc had always struggled financially despite their prolific careers

Adam,

Tillinghast, Macdonald and Perry Maxwell were independently wealthy before they entered the profession of golf course architecture. In fact, Macdonald never charged for his design services, opting instead for a lifetime membership at each club. Stanley Thompson rose to great fame and fortune here in Canada, and I imagine Donald Ross and Alister Mackenzie lived quite comfortably.

What really did these guys in was the Great Depression of the 1930's, although both Thompson and Maxwell remained active and completed some of their best work during this period. When the work unexpectedly dried up, like the majority during these times, so did their wealth. I think the lifestyles they (Thompson, Tillinghast) led during the 'Roaring' 1920's also contributed to the their rapid financial decline.

TK

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

Mike in all due respect to the profession. That seems so out of wack with the fees generated by any other similar profession where fees have traditionally been put in some sort of rational basis with costs of project.

[Peter Pallotta]

I used to think the cost of construction (including the architect's design fees) was directly/proportionally related to green fees. I now think that's a myth.

No one is charging $250 green fees (or selling $1 million homes) BECAUSE they've paid Jack $2 million; instead, they've always INTENDED to charge $250 green fees, and use Jack's name and his high fees to "justify" those prices.

JN should try to get as much as he can for his services. (As Ronald Coleman said during the height of his fame as an actor: "Before God I'm worth a dollar and a half; before Hollywood I'm worth as much as my agent can get me.") I'm obviously not the "target market" that Jack's developers have in mind, but many others must be.

What I appreciate about the architects on this board is not that they charge less for their services than Jack, but that they're about designing good courses for people who simply want to PLAY GOLF, and so seem to draw to themselves developers who have business models/intentions that presuppose reasonable green fees.

And just to be clear, I'm a pretty "ordinary" golfer myself (good post RJ), so I really hoping I'm right about all this.

Peter          

   

[Mike Nuzzo]

I assume this is the new fee for the ultra signature signature golf course?
He will have 25 clubs that bear his name.


I recall Palmer came out with an ultra signature not too long ago also.

[Wayne_Kozun]

Mike in all due respect to the profession. That seems so out of wack with the fees generated by any other similar profession where fees have traditionally been put in some sort of rational basis with costs of project.

You mean like legal fees for class action suits, or investment banking fees?  In those instances it is a % and the bigger the deal, the bigger the fees - it has very little to do with costs incurred and more to do with value added.   If JN can add value to the proposition then he is worth it.

[Wayne_Kozun]

What I appreciate about the architects on this board is not that they charge less for their services than Jack, but that they're about designing good courses for people who simply want to PLAY GOLF, and so seem to draw to themselves developers who have business models/intentions that presuppose reasonable green fees.

That's not always the case - I have nothing against Tom Doak but Cape Kidnappers sure doesn't fit what you describe.  Many of Tom's other courses may, but that course is an exception.

[Adrian_Stiff]

Commercially in the UK, if you value an average good golf club at £5,000,000 and strip out clubhouse build, land cost, equipment, a golf course value is circa £3,000,000, its very hard to generate a design fee in excess of $500,000 out of that. That £5M golf course as an investment should yield around £400,000 profit per year. There are not many in the UK doing that, I would estimate it may be only 1%.

On this basis no way could a UK project justfy a $4M design fee, unless its someones 'trophy'. We rarely have projects with internal housing due to our planning laws.

In other parts of the world, to live on a Jack Nicklaus resort does inflate the housing price, and on this basis the $$$$ fee could be justified. $4M divided by 500 units is $8000.

Do you get a better golf course? Almost certainly not. But 90% of people would think it was.

[Tom_Doak]

Wayne K:

Cape Kidnappers was the wrong course of mine to pick on.  It may be expensive, but there is so little traffic (because of the high price and the VERY long distance that most of his target market is coming from) that the client is most likely losing money on the course ... so I don't see how you can blame him for charging as much as the market will bear.

Sebonack or Stone Eagle would have been a better target.

However, I've said before that once a course gets to opening day, it doesn't make any difference what it cost to build or what the architect got paid ... the client can only charge what the market will bear, and I haven't met many developers who wanted to charge any less than that.

[Paul Stephenson]

I just returned from a week at Ocean Hammock in Palm Coast (no I didn;t get to play it).

Lots alone were going for $599K to $799K in the development, and the condos for $500K.

4 million doesn't seem like a big number when you see those prices.