Jun082007
Top Property
Publication: Missoula Living
Issue Date: June/July 2007
Colleen Powers explained the new concept of The Ranch Club. She was giving a tour of the clubhouse and, to explain the new décor, she stopped at a bench with green plaid cushions in one of the locker areas.
Colleen and her husband, John, recently purchased and renamed the Phantom Hills Golf Community, west of Missoula on Mullan Road. The couple is remodeling and expanding the clubhouse, restaurant, and bar. Other plans include a training academy, a fitness facility, and an events center. The original look at Phantom Hills – which included the green plaid cushions – fit the classic American golf-community style. The new look might be described as “new West” or “sophisticated rustic elegance,” says Colleen.
The new concept of The Ranch Club is a way for the new owners to stay true to the property’s ranching history while also embracing its future as a members-only golf club community in western Montana.
Many of the core features of the property will stay the same. The golf course remains open to the public for the time being, but will grow enough to accommodate a Nationwide PGA Tour, which could add a Missoula stop to the schedule as soon as 2008.
The development began in 2002, when Washington Corporation built an 18-hole public golf course with a clubhouse on the property. Plans included about 300 residential lots on about 200 acres.
John and Colleen took over the reigns of the project from Washington Corp., which has successfully developed commercial and residential real estate projects in the past.
John and Colleen are from Montana – John’s parents are from Butte and Colleen was born and raised in Helena. The couple moved to Seattle in the 1980s, where John built a business designing and manufacturing handblown glass urns. In the early 1990s, they worked out of the same building where the band Nirvana rehearsed.
In 1993, the couple returned to Missoula, where Colleen had landed an executive position with Terry Payne and Company, and John continued to run the urn operation from home.
When the couple learned that Phantom Hills was for sale, they jumped on the opportunity.
“It’s been a lot of work,” says John. “The plans keep evolving. We’re talking about a spa, indoor tennis.” Also in the works are a full fitness facility and an outdoor pool.
John and Colleen hope The Ranch Club will fill a gap in Missoula’s real estate market without competing against other golf courses in town.
The Ranch Club offers developer-built cabins as well as custom lots, giving buyers an option to use their own builders as long as the architecture meets The Ranch Club’s guidelines. The architecture will fit the New West theme with the use of natural materials, such as wood, stone and rock. The exteriors will be rustic. Step inside the door – it’ll be Montana’s style of elegance.
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