From the president:

From the president:

Hacienda Riquelme Golf Resort - Presidents Newsletter

Regrettably, this newsletter is going to concentrate on some of our financial challenges.

Cash flow
Because of the decrease in revenue due to the increase in debtors (PW being by far the largest) we are generating substantially less cash than was forecast. Accordingly, we have embarked on an austerity program and are only spending on existing contracts plus essential repairs to maintain our security and infrastructure. Although we budgeted for 100,000? for long term repairs and renewals, our cash flow means we would be ?unwise? to consider committing to expense when we cannot be sure that we will receive all our budgeted revenue.

Holidaymakers
June, July and August are the months when those owners who rent their apartments seek to optimize their revenue so that HR resembles a holiday resort.

Unfortunately, too many holidaymakers are attracted by some of the extremely low rentals that can be had here but who do not understand that apart from the golf course, there is little else to do. If the holidaymaker does not have access to a hire car, their options are decidedly limited.

We have already had a serious incident when one of a group of teenagers renting a second floor apartment apparently tried to jump off the apartment wall. He failed to walk away from his misguided attempt. This same group had earlier been smashing glass on to the road and had an altercation with our security.

If you rent, please make sure that your tenants understand the limitations of our facilities. HR was designed as a 5* golf resort and is just not suitable as a general holiday resort.

Our owners and renters must also appreciate that they have no rights to enter the golf course area, which includes the buggy paths unless they are actually playing the course. Any unauthorised person who is on the golf course is trespassing and there at their own risk. If they, or worse, their child, are hit by a golf ball, they would not be covered by insurance and the golfer would have no liability for the injury.

Phase 7 storage area
Owners on Phase 7 are understandably upset about how the storage area is being used by contractors which causes them varying degrees of nuisance depending on their position. Successive committees have recognized this and endeavored to improve matters for Phase 7 but, regrettably have had little success. It would appear that some Phase 7 owners believe that the committee does not care about this issue but nothing could be further from the truth.

The problem lies with the issue that there is nowhere else for our contractors to use that is remotely as effective as the storage area. The alternative areas for contractors to use are both outside our perimeter so would need to be secured before they could be used. One of these areas is adjacent to the pump house to the left of the road to Sucina and the other is outside our security fence opposite the end of Phase 6. We understand that both these areas are owned by PW or IRM so the golf course machinery could be moved to these areas but our gardeners would have no right to use these areas. This would mean that we have nowhere for our gardeners to base themselves.

Moving these operations will involve costs which, eventually, would be passed through to us ? either in increased golf course costs or increases in gardeners? costs. For these reasons, the majority of the committee has not been supportive of the idea to force the contractors to move although we have tried to have the contractors reduce the nuisance of the storage area and to reduce its adverse visual impact.

Some owners on Phase 7 have now had enough and are taking matters in to their own hands by initiating legal action to have the contractors removed. The majority of the committee is not prepared to support the action because they believe that such an action would not be in the best interests of the HR community as a whole.

We should also have a concern that the golf course is owned by a consortium of banks who have no choice but to take a tough commercial line. They have already told us that they are making a loss on the HR course with no sign of an improvement until they can source cheap water. We need to be mindful that if we push them in to a corner they could choose to close the course. I have had the benefit of being in communication with IRM so have a very real fear that this could well be their response so have this comment to say to the good folks on Phase 7: ?Be careful what you wish for?

Nigel Bradbury
President,
Hacienda Riquelme Golf Resort