Desert Mountain is a highly acclaimed, 8,200 acre, gated, golf and outdoor recreation-oriented master planned development started around 1988 with an acclaimed membership-optional private club in it, The Desert Mountain Club, at elevations ranging from about 2,600’ to 3,800’ on the south-facing slopes of the Continental Mountains on the northern edge of Scottsdale, Arizona. The community’s Front Gate is about twenty-eight air miles and a roughly forty-one-minute drive from Phoenix Skyharbor Airport, and is a roughly twenty-nine-minute drive to the FBO on the west side of the field at Scottsdale Airport, a hub for private jet traffic.

The opportunity to be a Club Member is a huge benefit of living in Desert Mountain for most property owners. It is the emotional, physical, and social “core” of the place, rightfully internationally famous as a golf mecca, with seven clubhouses, nine dining venues, six eighteen-hole championship Jack Nicklaus Signature courses, four practice ranges, a high-tech golf performance center, and, as of Spring 2019, a seventh course, an eighteen-hole par-3 course, long enough to be rated for handicap purposes. Desert Mountain is also famous for outdoor recreation, with, in addition to what the Club’s clubhouse for Member-related non-golf recreation, the “Sonoran Clubhouse”, offers, there is a roughly twenty-five-mile-long private trail system in the mountains at the back of the property ranging in altitude up to 4,890’ available to all residents for hiking, biking, running, and horseback riding. You can get a great workout and the views are fantastic.

The Club’s nine dining venues offer a wide variety of food, wine, and atmospheres. No coats and ties required! The Club’s membership is catered to relentlessly by an attentive Club staff and Concierge, providing unparalleled service. If one wants to join in, and essentially overnight re-create the social structure that took decades to create “back home”, there are all kinds of ways to do so (golf groups, tennis, pickleball, bocce, card playing, hiking, wine dinners, photography, church or synagogue, travel, etc., etc.). Alternatively, it is a great place to “hide out” and enjoy the anonymity that is possible in a larger club.

Desert Mountain is a place of surpassing scenic beauty with long-range, panoramic views of Phoenix, Scottsdale, the entire “Valley of the Sun”, many mountain ranges near and far, and, of course, Arizona’s famous sunrises and sunsets! It is successful, too, with just over 2,000 finished homes ranging in size from 1,800 to over 20,000 square feet and in price from about a little over $1,000,000 (depending on any access to a Desert Mountain Club Membership that may be offered by the seller) to $25,000,000. Typically, about sixty homes are under construction, a pace that will slow as the numbers of quality available homesites continues to plummet (as of June 2025, there were only about 186 vacant homesites not owned by a neighbor to protect views or privacy, out of a total of 1,867 total custom homesites, with roughly 1,506 completed custom homes (there are also an additional 550 semi-custom homes). It is not known (or knowable) how many of these sites might someday be put on the market, but of that group, however many it may be, very few of them would offer many of the characteristics strongly preferred by most people: a least a modicum of size, not be close to a source of noise (road or golf course), be relatively buildable, have a southerly exposure to a probable back patio/yard, be in a relatively central location within the community (some homesites are a very solid fifteen minute drive to reach the Front Gate), and that have some decent views, notably of the McDowell Mountains by day and “city lights” on the Valley floor after dark. Owners have invested over $30,000,000 in individual homes. It has attracted full-and part-time residents from all over North America and western Europe, most of whom seem to have made “having fun” a key priority in their lives. One thing that makes a lot of them happy is real estate taxes that are strikingly lower than what they are used to, particularly if “home” is or was in the Northeast, Midwest, or California.

The weather is famously sunny. Our risk of natural disasters is extremely low. Being higher and somewhat removed from the city means the stars are bright at night, the air typically much cleaner, and the daytime high temperatures about ten degrees cooler than the Valley floor, every day of the year. If you are wondering what it is like in the summer at Desert Mountain, the answer is “Awesome!”, since it only gets over 100 degrees about ten or twelve days a year here, compared to ninety days at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport. In addition, the temperatures drop fifteen to twenty degrees at night in Desert Mountain during the summer, a significant difference from life further “down the hill”. The lack of humidity means 95 degrees is very comfortable, if you are sitting in the shade. So, being in Desert Mountain on a year ‘round basis is a very attractive proposition thanks to its dry, Mediterranean climate.

Day-to-day shopping needs for Desert Mountain owners are well-handled within about a ten-minute drive by the merchants in the nearby towns of Carefree and Cave Creek. There are roughly 70 restaurants and bars within about sixteen minutes’ drive. Our area is famous for world-class shopping, major league and collegiate sports, terrific air service, and a wide variety of cultural attractions. Desert Mountain is within two and a half hours of normally excellent snow skiing in Flagstaff and access is easy to the entire American West, with especially easy access to San Diego, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, the Grand Canyon, Lake Powell, and a plethora of unbelievably beautiful places in Southern Utah. “Paradise” doesn’t overstate it.

The availability of world-class medical care brings many people to Scottsdale. The Mayo Clinic and Hospital and the Barrows Neurological Institute headline a long list of excellent facilities.

If you would like to see a conceptual map and layout of Desert Mountain, click here.