The Lakes Country Club is a private gated condominium community on 380 acres in central Palm Desert, built in 1983 and owned by the people who live there. Ted Robinson put water on nearly every hole of a 27-hole layout. The association publishes 902 condominium homes, each with a golf course or lake view. That is the product: lock-and-leave condos, a homeowner-owned club, and a social calendar that runs year round. It is not a custom-estate hillside, and it is not a resort with a hotel on the property.
The course uses mature shade trees, tall palms, Scottish-style bunkers, and lakes and waterfalls as the routing idea. Practice includes a driving range, bunkers, chipping greens, two putting greens, and an 18-hole putting course. The clubhouse is about 50,000 square feet, with a Grill Room, dining room and lounge looking at the Santa Rosa Mountains, and a pro shop. A 5,000-square-foot Fitness Center and Spa opened in 1997 and expanded in 2001. Official Q&A copy lists 15 championship tennis courts, eight of them lighted, and a tennis clubhouse over a stadium center court. Forty-four pools and spas are distributed so that each building is close to water. Security staffs the gate twenty-four hours and monitors in-home alarms. Management sits with a nine-member board elected by homeowners, operating through The Lakes Country Club Association, Inc.
Every owner becomes a Resident Social Member at close and signs a membership agreement. Up to four owners per condominium must join, with spouses or an unmarried owner and cohabitant counting as one. Social membership covers clubhouse, tennis, and fitness use, plus events and pro-shop discount on a club account. Golf is an election. A new owner must decide within thirty days of close whether to take golf privileges for that fiscal year, then decide again by July 15 each year. Golf privileges are limited to two Resident Social Members per condominium. The club publishes current homeowners dues, social dues, food-and-beverage minimums, and golf dues on lakescc.com. Those numbers change. Verify the live Q&A and the membership packet before you underwrite monthly carrying costs. Do not copy a third-party fee table into an offer worksheet.
Agent catalogs describe about twelve named floor plans. Official club plan PDFs are archived for Stanton Williams Group research and are not attached to Luxury Presence Files on this page pending rebrand. Confirm plan name, square footage, and any remodel approvals in the listing file. The address commonly used for the club is 161 Old Ranch Road, Palm Desert. The condo format and on-site security are why seasonal owners choose The Lakes over a single-family lot they would have to watch from somewhere else.
Buy the view and the association. Then decide whether you want Robinson's golf on top of social. Norman Williams and Jacqulyn Stanton of The Stanton Williams Group at Compass work with buyers and sellers at The Lakes Country Club. Reach Norman at 760.464.2190 or Jacqulyn at 760.702.2557.