A GOLF club running what is described as the 'Augusta of Scotland' is being wound up after it emerged that it is expected to run out of money next month.

The committee of the Letham Grange Golf Club on the outskirts of Arbroath say that its 300 members have agreed by a simple majority that it will cease to occupy and operate the golf courses by November 4.

They have also agreed by the required two thirds majority that there should be an "orderly winding up" of the affairs of the club which is to be dissolved.

The 283-acre Letham Grange, was opened in 1987 by Sir Henry Cotton and magazine Golf Monthly once bracketed Letham Grange alongside Augusta National, the home of the US Masters.

The Herald:

But it been dogged with legal wrangling for much of that time.

The cases and appeals over the ownership of the two courses - the Old Course and the Glens Course - and its adjoining hotel are said to be among the longest running and complex in Scottish legal history.

The club decision comes after a 15-year legal battle over the ownership of the golf resort that finally came to an end last year.

After the long litigation, golf club members learned a settlement had been reached between the liquidator of Letham Grange Development Company, which collapsed in 2002, the company’s former Taiwanese owner Peter Liu and PI Ltd.

READ MORE: Members "devastated" as Mount Ellen Golf Club is forced to close down

The move saw Mr Liu regain control of the assets through another of his companies.

Members of the club, who had been maintaining and operating the courses since 2011 had hoped the club would continue to operate as normal.

But Captain Malcolm Turner said: "We have given it our best shot at running the courses....

The Herald:

"We still have two excellent courses that meet with unreserved positive responses from those playing them for the first time.

"However we have to face the reality that in the current marketplace excellent golf courses are not in themselves sufficient to constitute a viable business model without the related off-course quality facilities and services that the modern market expects.

READ MORE: Nick Rodger - Golf club closures par for the course in savage natural cull

"We had hoped, indeed expected, that the resolution of the ownership dispute would lead to a reduction in uncertainty over the future direction.

"Getting on for two years later, no meaningful progress is evident. We have significantly improved the courses over time especially in respect of drainage and keeping them open during and after adverse weather, and take pride in handing them back to the current owners in better condition than when we started."

It comes after Glasgow City Council said it is seeking views about the future of six golf courses, "due to low usage and a substantial annual deficit", raising fears that they might close down.

Last month councillors in Dundee voted to close the popular Camperdown Golf Course at the end of next year.

And Mount Ellen Golf Club, which was formed in 1904, also shut last month, succumbing to the financial pressures and current challenges that also led to the closure of Eastwood Golf Club near Newton Mearns.

In a statement, the club said: "The committee assured the members, in taking on... greatly increased responsibilities, it would not incur any debt or liabilities exceeding its financial resources.

"This was because of the way the club is structured.

"Letham Grange Golf Club is an unincorporated association, which means that the club has no corporate or legal identity of its own.

"Each member is therefore potentially liable both individually and collectively for the entirety of the club’s debts without limitation. As the years have progressed, this is an assurance that has become increasingly difficult to honour, but it must be honoured."

It added: "An updated cash flow forecast was produced in mid-August. This indicated that the club was likely to run out of money at some point during October and well before the end of the season in February 2020. The committee did not consider it realistic to expect existing members to fund this deficit."

The club said it was apparent that no financial support could be expected.

"There is a fundamental and irreconcilable difference between the club and the owners as to what the occupation of the courses represents," the club said.

"The club believes that they are maintaining the owners assets, both courses and hotel, at minimal cost to them and so protecting their value pending the owners’ decision as to their future plans. "

The club said that a general meeting to discuss the way forward saw many members express "surprise, disappointment and even mild anger at the lack of financial support from the owners in the last 18 months".

“It is indeed a strange situation in that the owners had fought so hard for 16 years to regain control of Letham Grange Hotel and Golf Courses and then appear to have done nothing to assist the continuation of the Golf Club,” said honorary secretary Bruce Currie.

Mr Turner added: “My heartfelt thanks on behalf of current and past committee members to all the people who have helped us to come this far, whether as contractor, volunteer, or in providing professional advice and to those members and some Letham Grange residents who have continued to stick with us through thick and thin.

"We will continue to keep the courses open as long as our financial resources allow.”

Attempts have been made to contact Mr Liu.