The Vintage Club

Co-developer Mick Humphreys met Tom Fazio in 1978 to plan the club, and the Mountain Course opened in 1980. Sheltered against Eisenhower Mountain, it is the longer of the two layouts, and its 16th hole is one of the most photographed in the desert. Fazio returned to redesign the Mountain Course in 2014. The Desert Course followed a few years after the first, with water in play on close to half its holes, a waterfall and heavy bunkering. Top100GolfCourses ranks both among the best in California. The Vintage also has real tournament history: the Vintage Invitational, a Senior PGA Tour event, was played here from 1981 to 1992, with winners including Gene Littler, Don January, Lee Trevino and Chi Chi Rodriguez.

The clubhouse covers about 80,000 square feet and was renovated in 2016 to open up the dining and social spaces. It sits above the lakes with views across the golf courses to the mountains. Beyond golf, the club offers tennis and pickleball, spa and wellness services, and a full calendar that includes biking and hiking groups, member mixers and a speaker forum. Families are well looked after, with a Kids Klub and a fishing derby on the lakes, which reflects how many memberships pass from parents to children and grandchildren.

The Vintage describes itself as a private equity community, and property ownership within the club is required for membership. In practice that means you buy a home first and then apply, and the club does not offer memberships to outsiders. Members tend to share similar interests and backgrounds, and family memberships are common, with children and grandchildren often returning as adult members. The club does not publish its fees online; it sets current equity and dues figures and shares them with prospective owners through its membership office.

About 500 residences were built during the club's first years, spread across five distinct home types. Cottages share community pools, spas and grilling areas reserved for their owners. Terraces come with concierge staff available daily. Patio Homes are popular as family retreats and weekend getaways. Desert Homes sit on gently elevated lots of nearly half an acre, looking over the lakes or the Desert Course. Custom homes and estates fill out the top of the market. A local real estate guide puts recent values from about $550,000 for smaller condominiums to roughly $15 million for the finest estates, so the range is unusually wide for a single club.

The Vintage feels quiet and settled. The gates are unmarked, there is no showy entrance, and members value it that way. The cove setting at the base of Eisenhower Mountain gives the club a sheltered, tucked-away feel, and five acres of lakes and waterfalls soften the desert landscape and draw birdlife through the property. Owners describe the atmosphere as relaxed and resort-like rather than formal, with plenty of family time over the holidays. El Paseo and Highway 111 are close, but with golf, tennis, the spa and a busy social program on site, most owners spend their days inside the gates.