Choma points to some $700 million in Trump IOUs. While plenty of these debts stem from expected sources such as hotels, office buildings and condo towers, a hefty slice is related to that favorite pastime of populists across the Rust Belt. Golf.
MoJo shows Trump is dealing with some massive greens fees.
From Deutsche Bank:
$125 million for two mortgages on his Trump National Doral golf course in Miami. Both were taken out in 2012.From Investors Savings Bank:
In 2010, Trump combined an earlier mortgage on his Westchester County, New York, golf course into a much larger $23 million mortgage that also leveraged his ownership of condo units in the Trump Park Avenue building in New York City.From Amboy Bank:
In 2010, Trump took out a mortgage on his Trump National Golf Club-Colts Neck in Monmouth County, New Jersey, for $16 million from Amboy Bank, a tiny New Jersey bank.From Chevy Chase Trust Holdings:
In 2009, Trump purchased a golf course in Loudon County, Virginia, for $13 million. To make the deal happen, he borrowed $10 million from the land development company that previously owned the property.From Royal Bank of Pennsylvania:
In 1995, Trump purchased a lavish estate in Westchester County, New York, and in 2000 he refinanced that purchase with an $8 million mortgage from the Royal Bank of Pennsylvania. Trump originally planned to turn the large estate into a golf course, but opposition from local residents blocked the project. The property has been used as a family retreat and a playground for Trump's two oldest sons.Though Choma didn't break this out, it appears as if at least $150 million of this $700 million in Trump debts are tied to golf, which, as Reuters pointed out last summer, may have become something of a money pit for the PEOTUS.
If Trump is losing money on golf, there's a perfectly good reason; golf is dying, as Karl Taro Greenfield told us last year in Men's Journal.
By any measure, participation in the game is way off, from a high of 30.6 million golfers in 2003 to 24.7 million in 2014, according to the National Golf Foundation (NGF). The long-term trends are also troubling, with the number of golfers ages 18 to 34 showing a 30 percent decline over the last 20 years. Nearly every metric — TV ratings, rounds played, golf-equipment sales, golf courses constructed — shows a drop-off.And the bleeding continues. More recent figures reveal another 600,000 golfers picked up and left the game in 2015, driving the total number of golfers down to 24.1 million.
Doesn't seem like a good industry in which to be heavily leveraged just now. Yet that is exactly the sand trap our next president finds himself in. One could speculate on the temptation for Trump to use the power of the Oval Office to curry favor with certain banks and certain governments for some, er, assistance when his golf bills come due. Please do.
This is where Nov. 8 has gotten us. The very fate of our nation may depend on a man with a history of sexual peccadilloes and an oddball obsession with military men (though he never served himself) orchestrating a miraculous turnaround of the doddering, hobbling golf market.
No, not Trump.
This guy.
