Ask a seller in St. James Plantation what their disclosure form covers, and most will say some version of "the HOA stuff." Dues, whether there's a lawsuit pending, whether an assessment is coming. Ask the same seller what happens to their golf membership when the house changes hands, and the answer gets a lot less certain. That uncertainty isn't a knowledge gap on the seller's part. It's a structural feature of how North Carolina's disclosure law and St. James Plantation's club system were built, and the two were never designed to talk to each other.
That gap matters because in St. James, an active, transferable club membership can be worth tens of thousands of dollars to a buyer, and none of it shows up on the one form everyone assumes handles the community's paperwork.
Two agreements, not one
Every home in St. James Plantation sits inside the Property Owners' Association, a mandatory covenant-based entity that funds gate security, road maintenance, landscaping along common areas, and architectural review. As of the 2025 estimate, master POA dues run around $1,050 a year. If the home is a townhome, condo, or maintenance-free cottage, there's usually a second, sub-association fee on top of that, often $300 to $600 or more a month, covering landscaping, exterior insurance, and the roof.
Membership in The Clubs at St. James is a different animal entirely. It's owned and managed by Troon, and it's optional. You can own a home in St. James and never join. The club gives access to four golf courses under one 81-hole umbrella: The Reserve Club, designed by Nicklaus Design and home to the community's newest and first LEED-certified clubhouse, The Founders Club by P.B. Dye, The Members Club shaped by Hale Irwin, and The Players Club, laid out by North Carolina designer Tim Cate. Membership comes in tiers. Signature Golf gets you full access to all four courses. Signature Sport trades golf for tennis, pickleball, fitness, swimming, and dining, with a limited number of discounted rounds at three of the four courses. Signature Social is dining and social access only. A separate Premier tier covers Founders, Players, and Members, but not The Reserve.
Here's the part that catches people off guard: North Carolina's disclosure statute, G.S. 47E, requires sellers to complete the Residential Property and Owners' Association Disclosure Statement, and the association portion, under G.S. 47E-4(b1), asks specifically about a "mandatory" owners' association. It covers dues, pending or approved special assessments, unsatisfied judgments against the association, and transfer fees tied to that association. A private country club membership contract with a third-party operator like Troon isn't a mandatory covenant obligation. It has no line on the form. It was never supposed to.
What "transferable" actually costs
This wouldn't matter much if the dollar amounts were small. They aren't.
In 2023, joining Signature Golf from scratch cost a $25,000 buy-in, a figure that had held flat since 2022 under a five-year agreement between Troon and the community's developer. By late 2025, that initiation fee had moved into the roughly $30,000 range, often structured as $15,000 non-refundable and $15,000 refundable. Signature Sport initiation sat around $15,000 over that same period.
Now compare that to what it costs a buyer to activate a membership that's already attached to the home. Both in 2023 and again in the late 2025 market guide, that transfer or activation fee has held at roughly $5,000, whether the membership is passing to a new owner intact.
Run the math and the gap has actually widened. In 2023, a buyer who bought a home with an active membership saved roughly $20,000 over joining fresh. By late 2025, with initiation up near $30,000 and the transfer fee still around $5,000, that same buyer is looking at closer to a $25,000 advantage. The incentive to keep a membership active, and to document that it transfers cleanly, has grown, not shrunk.
None of that appears on the state disclosure form. It lives entirely in a separate conversation with Troon's membership office, one that has to happen deliberately, because the paperwork that governs the sale of the house doesn't ask about it.
Where the friction actually shows up
North Carolina's disclosure process has its own timing quirks even before you get to the club question. The seller's Owners' Association Disclosure Statement is due no later than when a buyer makes an offer, but the deeper financial documents, budgets, reserves, meeting minutes, only reach the buyer after the offer is accepted, through the resale package. And on any individual question on the state form, a seller is allowed to answer "No Representation," which tells the buyer nothing at all.
Layer a private club contract on top of that timeline and you get a predictable failure mode. A buyer assumes the disclosure form would have flagged anything unusual about the community's amenities, because that's what the form is supposed to be for. It isn't built to. A seller assumes the listing agent has handled the membership question because it feels like part of "the HOA stuff." It isn't the same paperwork at all. The result is a membership status that gets discovered, or misunderstood, somewhere in the due diligence period rather than settled before the property ever goes live.
That's expensive in both directions. A buyer who finds out mid-contract that the membership lapsed years ago is suddenly staring down a $30,000 initiation fee they didn't budget for. A seller who never confirmed transferability in writing has no way to market an active membership as the asset it actually is, and loses leverage on price for a home that, on paper, looks identical to one without a membership attached.
Before you list, confirm this in writing
If you're selling a home in St. James Plantation and there's ever been a club membership tied to it, active or not, a few things are worth nailing down before the sign goes in the yard, not after an offer comes in.
- Contact The Clubs at St. James membership office directly and get written confirmation of the membership's current status, whether it's active, and which tier it's under (Signature Golf, Signature Sport, Signature Social, or Premier).
- Confirm in writing whether the membership is transferable to a new owner and what the current activation fee is, since these figures are set by Troon and can change.
- If the membership has lapsed, get clarity on whether reactivation carries different terms than a first-time initiation.
- Make sure your listing agent writes the membership status into the marketing materials and the purchase contract itself, rather than assuming the state disclosure form will carry that information forward. It won't.
- Keep the confirmation letter or email on file through closing. It's the only record that ties the membership to the transaction if a question comes up later.
None of this replaces the state disclosure form. It runs alongside it, covering the one piece of a St. James sale that the form was never designed to reach.
A few questions that come up often
Does the state disclosure form ask about club membership at all? No. The Residential Property and Owners' Association Disclosure Statement addresses the mandatory Property Owners' Association, not a private, optional club contract managed by a separate company.
What if the membership lapsed years ago and the seller never uses it? It still matters to disclose the status clearly, because a buyer evaluating the home may be pricing in club access that isn't actually there, or assuming a transfer fee applies when a full initiation would be required instead.
Does this apply the same way to condos and townhomes, like those in HarborWalk? The club membership question works the same way regardless of home type, since it's tied to the individual membership contract, not the property style. Condo and townhome owners typically carry an additional sub-association fee on top of the master POA dues, which is a separate disclosure item from the club question entirely.
Can a seller just skip the disclosure form altogether? North Carolina law allows both parties to agree in writing to waive the disclosure statement, but that shifts even more of the burden onto recorded documents and direct verification, which makes confirming club membership status in writing even more important, not less.
If you're preparing to list in St. James Plantation, or trying to figure out what a membership attached to a home you're considering is actually worth, Vic's Picks can help you sort the paperwork that matters from the paperwork that just feels like it should. Reach out anytime to talk through where your property and its membership status actually stand.
