A buyer touring North Scottsdale this spring pulled up a listing marked simply "Troon." The photos showed a fairway view, a stucco clubhouse in the background, and a caption about resort-style golf living. She assumed the home came with access to that clubhouse. It didn't. The property sat inside Troon Village, home to the private Troon Country Club, where membership does not transfer with a real estate purchase and where, as of the most recent reporting on the club, a new applicant faced a three to four year wait plus a six-figure initiation fee just to get on the course pictured in the listing photo. Had she been touring a similarly priced home a few miles north in Troon North, the golf course out back would have been open to public play the same afternoon, no application required.
Both places are called Troon. Neither is a typo, a rebrand, or a sub-neighborhood of the other. They are two separate master-planned communities, governed by two separate homeowners associations, built around two different mountains, and organized around two golf clubs that operate on opposite membership models. If you are comparing homes in either one right now, the name on the listing tells you almost nothing about which experience you are buying into. The membership structure does, and it explains a real chunk of the price gap between them.
Same Name, Different Mountain
Both communities trace their name back to the same source: Tom Weiskopf's 1973 Open Championship win at Royal Troon in Scotland. Weiskopf went on to design golf courses for both North Scottsdale communities, which is part of why the naming overlap happened in the first place.
Troon North sits on roughly 1,800 acres in ZIP code 85262, built out around Pinnacle Peak and anchored by two Weiskopf-designed courses, the Monument and the Pinnacle. Troon Village sits about 1,400 acres away in ZIP 85255, wrapped around Troon Mountain itself, and anchored by a single Weiskopf course at Troon Country Club, the first course design of his career. They are not phases of one development. They have separate master associations, separate boards, and separate governing documents. The Troon North Association and the Troon Village Association each run their own community, and confirming which one actually governs a specific address is a five-minute step that saves a buyer from a much longer misunderstanding later.
The Access Model Is the Real Divide
Troon North Golf Club is semi-private. Outside players can book a tee time without owning a membership, which means the golf course a Troon North homeowner sees from the back patio is genuinely public in the sense that guests, visiting family, and out-of-town clients can play it. That openness comes with a tradeoff: full club memberships have, at points, sold out entirely along with the waiting list, so buyers who want a locked-in membership tier can't assume it will simply be available when they want it.
Troon Country Club, the private club anchoring Troon Village, works the opposite way. As of a 2022 update, the club capped full golf membership at 300 members with an $85,000 initiation fee and had stopped accepting new applications outright, directing interested buyers to an interest list instead. By late 2024, reporting on the club showed golf initiation climbing from $150,000 to $200,000 effective January 2025, with a three to four year wait for a full membership, though a separate social membership tier with roughly a four to six month wait remained far more accessible. The club does not publish its membership pricing publicly, so the $85,000-to-$200,000 trajectory across those two updates is the clearest paper trail available, and it points in one direction.
The detail that matters most for anyone writing an offer: unlike several other private clubs in the area, including Silverleaf, Desert Highlands, Estancia, and Desert Mountain, a Troon Country Club membership does not transfer with the sale of a home. Buy the house, and you are still starting the application and waitlist process from zero.
What the Dues Actually Say About Each Community
Master association dues follow the same logic as the golf access does. Troon North's master dues run roughly $120 to $150 per quarter, or about $40 to $50 a month, which is low by North Scottsdale standards because the master association isn't carrying a clubhouse, pool complex, or staffed amenity campus on its books. Its assets are trails, entry monuments, and roadway lighting along corridors like Dynamite Boulevard and Alma School Parkway, low-cost infrastructure that keeps reserve obligations modest. Troon Village's master dues run roughly double that figure, a difference tied to the same structural math in reverse: a community built around a fully private clubhouse and its associated capital needs.
| Troon North | Troon Village | |
|---|---|---|
| Golf club | Semi-private, public play permitted | Private, membership required |
| Master HOA dues | About $40 to $50 per month | Roughly double Troon North |
| Golf initiation fee | No mandatory club purchase | Climbed from $85,000 (2022) to $200,000 (Jan 2025) |
| Membership transfers with home sale | Not applicable | No |
| 2026 median sale price | Roughly $1.34M to $1.4M (Mar-May) | Roughly $1.66M to $1.68M (Mar-Jul) |
That median gap, somewhere between 20 and 25 percent depending on the exact month compared, is not fully explained by square footage or finish level. Part of what a Troon Village buyer is paying for is proximity to a fully private club ecosystem and the exclusivity that comes with it, even before they ever apply for membership themselves. Part of what a Troon North buyer is getting in exchange for a lower entry price is a golf course anyone can play and an HOA structure that isn't carrying the cost of a private clubhouse.
The Sub-Associations Stack On Top
Neither master HOA is the last word on cost. Troon North contains more than a dozen individually governed sub-associations, including Candlewood Estates, Talus, Pinnacle Canyon, Stonedge, and Quisana, each with its own board, its own dues, and its own reserve funding level. Troon Village breaks down the same way, into neighborhoods like Windy Walk Estates, Troon Ridge Estates, Glenn Moor, Dorado, and Artesano. A buyer comparing two homes both labeled "Troon" could be looking at combined monthly costs that differ by a wide margin once the sub-association layer is added to the master dues, entirely apart from which club anchors the community.
Questions Worth Asking Before You Write an Offer
- Which master association actually governs this address, Troon North or Troon Village, and which sub-association sits beneath it?
- Does the listing marketing show a clubhouse, pool, or dining room, and if so, is that amenity semi-private, fully private, or does it belong to a resort next door rather than the HOA at all?
- If golf access matters to you, what is the current initiation fee and wait time at the relevant club, and does membership transfer with the sale?
- What is the sub-association's current dues figure and reserve funding percentage, and are there any pending special assessments?
- Are there rental restrictions or minimum lease terms specific to this sub-association that would affect a future resale or seasonal use plan?
Every one of these questions is answerable before an offer goes in, through the HOA resale certificate and a direct call to the relevant club. Skipping that step is how a buyer ends up standing in a beautiful backyard, looking at a golf course they assumed came with the house.
The Choice Isn't Which Troon Sounds Nicer
Neither community is the better buy in the abstract. A buyer who wants guests to play the course without an application, lower monthly dues, and more entry-level price points will find that in Troon North. A buyer drawn to the exclusivity and social calendar of a fully private club, and willing to plan years ahead for membership or simply not golf at all, will find that fit in Troon Village. What neither buyer should do is assume the name on the listing settles the question. It doesn't. The HOA documents and the club's own membership page do.
Working through that layer of North Scottsdale real estate, master association versus sub-association, semi-private versus private club, transferable membership versus a waitlist that starts over at closing, is exactly the kind of groundwork the DiBiase Team does before a client ever writes an offer in Troon North or Troon Village. If you're comparing the two Troons and want a clear read on what a specific address actually includes, reach out and we'll walk through it with you.
