Toftrees vs. Centre Hills Country Club: Two Ways to Buy Golf Living in State College

Toftrees' golf course is public and daily-fee -- anyone can play, resident or not, and an optional paid membership tier (unlimited range/short-game access, pro-shop and dining discounts) is open to the general public with no residency requirement. Centre Hills Country Club is the opposite: per its own centennial coverage, it is the only fully private country club in Centre County, with application-based membership, initiation fees and dues confirmed to exist and vary by class (though amounts are not publicly disclosed), and full clubhouse privileges (golf, tennis, pickleball, swimming, dining) reserved for members and their immediate families.

Toftrees is a single, deliberately planned development from the start -- Pennsylvania's first planned community, per widely repeated descriptions -- with the golf course as its organizing feature and a genuine mix of townhomes, single-family homes, and apartments (plus the adjoining age-restricted Village at Penn State) built directly into that plan. Centre Hills reads as a more traditional pattern: an organically developed, single-family neighborhood (developed by the Kissinger family) that grew up around and took its name from an already-established private club, with its largest homes commanding real course frontage.

A buyer who wants guaranteed golf access with no membership barrier, at the cost of playing a public course rather than a private one, and who values Toftrees' resort amenities (hotel, restaurant, and a major course renovation announced in 2025) fits Toftrees better. A buyer who wants the exclusivity and social structure of a genuinely private, century-old club -- and is prepared to apply and pay confirmed-but-undisclosed initiation fees and dues -- fits Centre Hills better. Neither model includes golf automatically with a home purchase; the real difference is whether golf itself is open to anyone (Toftrees) or gated behind membership (Centre Hills).