Kinloch Golf Club

Kinloch Golf Club sits on 645 acres in eastern Goochland County, about 20 minutes west of downtown Richmond, and is widely regarded as one of the finest and most exclusive private clubs in Virginia. The course opened in 1999-2001 as a Lester George design developed with input from Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, and Golf Digest named it the #1 Best New Private Club in America in 2001. Kinloch Development Corporation, formed in 2001, built out the residential side of the same rezoned property -- up to 350 custom home lots (0.75 to 1.5+ acres) around a 70-acre lake -- so unlike some elite golf-only-by-design clubs (The Honors Course in Tennessee, Shadow Creek in Nevada), Kinloch genuinely combines a national-caliber private course with an active custom-home community on the same land.

For a golf-oriented buyer, the critical distinction is that the residential development and the golf club, while physically co-located and commonly developed, are administratively separate on membership. Kinloch's Resident and National memberships are extended strictly by invitation -- a prospective member needs an existing member to sponsor them and a second member to endorse the nomination. There is no waitlist to sign up for and no purchase price that buys a membership outright; owning a custom home inside the Kinloch development does not itself grant, guarantee, or preference an invitation.