Shameless real estate shill David Lereah is trading in his cheerleader's uniform for a business suit.  The chief economist for the National Association of Realtors will become an executive VP with Move Inc., which operates real estate related web sites. 

    You wouldn't think a bland economist could inspire blog sites devoted to him, but Lereah's unremitting words of love about the market fed the bubble, many believe, and people needed places to vent.  No fewer than four times did he predict the bottom of the housing market.  The business media enabled the guy by going to him as if he were real estate's equivalent of Mariano Rivera (for those who don't follow baseball, Rivera is the relief pitcher who closes games for the New York Yankees).

    I first caught Lereah's act four years ago when he shared the stage for a panel discussion about real estate on CNBC.  I didn't know him from a one-iron, but he sounded as if he were reading from a press release issued by the realtor's assocation.  I didn't trust him from the gitgo, but there were probably others who made some bad buying decisions based on his Pollyanna predictions.  Good riddance. 

    According to today's Wall Street Journal, Lereah's parting words were unusually candid:  "I represented realtors so I tried to be as positive as I could," adding that he "believed it [i.e. his own hype]."  Lets hope the NAR can do better than deceptive and dumb in their next hire. 

    When was the last time we read about a professional golfer drinking and driving his car into a tree?  The baddest boy the PGA tour can offer is John Daly, whose flaws seemed to give the tour a more human face, not a nastier one.  And how great it is that Daly seems on a strong reformation kick lately.

    Growing up, my favorite golfer was Champagne Tony Lema, but I don't remember Lema wrecking any cars (I do remember he drank a lot of champagne, though).   

    I thought of Champagne Tony today.  If you read the U.S. sports pages, you know that St. Louis Cardinals relief pitcher Josh Hancock was killed in a tragic car accident in the early morning hours a few days ago.  He was a well-respected and well-liked young man (too young).  In the days that followed his death, the media respectfully did not speculate about what caused the one-car accident.  But the media can be respectful only so long.  Today the specter of alcohol looms large in follow-up reports. (He ran into a tow truck with its warning lights blazing, so where's the surprise?)       

    Baseball has its alcohol and steroids problems and football has its convicted murderers.  And if we totaled up the number of children across the land that are carrying the DNA of their absentee NBA basketball player dads, we'd probably fill a small city (Heck, Wilt Chamberlain did that himself!).     

    Golf, on the other hand, is a game played by gentlemen whose adherence to the game's intricate set of rules and regulations is almost anal-retentive.  These are not perfect men by any means, but their flaws seem almost quaint compared with those of other professional athletes.  I loved playing all sports as a kid, especially the "major" ones but, on balance, I'm grateful my son is a golfer.

    I met this morning with the folks at Fox Computer Systems, a web design firm that helps me with this site.  The goal of the meeting was to discuss ways to make the site more meaningful for those looking for golf community reviews and related information.  In the coming weeks and months, we will be adding a few new features to the site.  These include:

• An area containing scorecards of courses we have played with accompanying photos.
• A one-question poll about golf communities; we'll include real-time results.
• A network of experienced real estate agents with in-depth knowledge of golf communities (free service to all who register at this site).  You tell us where you are visiting and we identify someone to show you the communities, with no cost or obligation to you.
• A golf lifestyle questionnaire that we match against a database of golf course community information.  You tell us what is important to you, we run your responses against our database, and we provide a list of communities that best match your criteria, at no cost or obligation to you.
• A new, improved HomeOnTheCourse advisory newsletter at a special discount price for GolfCommunityReviews.com registered users.
• Access to a currency converter for our friends from the UK and elsewhere.

    If you have your own ideas for how to make this site more useful, please let us know via the "contact us" button on the right-hand side of this page.

    Thank you for visiting GolfCommunityReviews.com. 

    Faithful readers of our newsletter and this site know that we are obsessed with traffic.  It is one big reason we haven't rushed to review golf course communities on the coasts of Florida or in Orlando, and why a number of Floridians are packing it in and bouncing back to the Carolinas, Georgia and Virginia.  We loathe the idea of spending our retirement years or vacation weeks at a stop and go pace. 

    And it isn't just Florida, either.  We've seen problems brewing in places like Charlottesville, VA, and Wilmington, NC; these issues are partially the result of geography, since many of the most desirable areas are almost surrounded by water, as is Wilmington, and partially the result of bad planning.  Mark Twain might have put it this way:  "Everyone talks about the traffic, but no one does anything about it."

    Apparently officials in Jasper County, South Carolina are doing something about it before it is an issue.  Jasper, the county immediately to the west of Hilton Head and Beaufort, SC, is one of the few remaining "low country" areas of the east coast that hasn't been overrun with development. County officials are not anti-development, but they seem intent on making sure growth is reasonable and that the inherent nature of the area is preserved.  According to a story in today's New York Times (Real Estate section, page 7), developers in the county have to meet certain restrictions, and make certain investments, that ensure high-quality communities that respect the land.       

    Jasper County is bisected by I-95 and is a convenient drive to Savannah.  Although the county doesn't run to the coast, it is within easy reach of the beaches and the buffet of golf courses on and around Hilton Head.  Toll Brothers is developing a community called Hampton Pointe , about seven miles from the interstate, that will feature a Nicklaus Design course as well as a fitness center and spa and all other amenities typical of communities that encompass more than 1,000 homes.  Prices start in the mid-$300s.

    The New York Times article can be found currently by clicking here.