tennis NEWS

Transfer of ownership - Newmarket

Feb 09, 2011
Transfer of Newmarket Real Tennis Club from private ownership to "Members Club" - �2000 to collect

The new management need to collect the final £2000 in loans.

This is the last opportunity to purchase a loan note - if you are interested please contact either�Stuart Arrandale (stuartarrandale@dial.pipex.com)�or Hazel Dunn (hazeld@f2s.com).

The information below is repeated from the original launch - essentially loan notes in multiples of £300 would be issued to any new supporters. This route is the best one to ensure the long-term survival of tennis at Newmarket.

Details below:

1. A new Company, Limited by Guarantee, is to be formed called "Newmarket Real Tennis Club Ltd" which will be the new "Members' Club". This is a commonly used structure for Golf and other Sports Clubs, amongst others. The advice received is that this provides a simple method of selling the existing Company and achieving the end result in one transaction, removing the need for reporting multiple share transactions to Companies' House and for all contributors to sign "Statements of High Net Worth"..

2. Instead, the new Company will issue 600 Loan Notes at £300 each to�contributors for�the money to purchase the existing Company and Freehold. Every contributor will be a Founder Member of the new Club.�

3. Each Founder Member will have a voting�rights corresponding to the Loan Notes he or she owns.� Day-to-day decisions on the running of the Club are expected to be made by a Management Committee. Founder Members who play less than 4 times a year at the Club will be granted special membership rights.� All other Founder Members will pay the same as Playing Members (see below). A�Founder Members Board will be erected at the Club listing all contributors.

4. Loan Notes will be numbered and repaid�at a projected*�amount�of £12,000 per annum giving a maximum�period estimated at 15 years by the Playing Membership�principally on the basis of an�annual lottery of outstanding Loan Notes. *The projected amount is based on the current number of�Playing Members paying an annual ring-fenced amount of £120, or £10 per month, into the Loan repayment fund, in addition to their cost of annual membership. The intention is to raise the number of Playing Members to 150 which would reduce the overall repayment period.

The end result is that the Playing Membership of the Club will, over the next few years,�have bought�the facilities they use for the long term benefit of future generations of Tennis players at Newmarket, and all Founder Members will have been repaid their contributions.�The constitution of a Company Limited by Guarantee does not allow its Members to profit individually by sale of its assets, so even if a fantastic offer was made by a Developer and the Membership decided to accept it, after paying off any loan notes still outstanding�the balance�would have to be used to build a new Court or some other project for the benefit of Tennis or other sports.�

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