By 
Verdict: Recommended
Initiation Fee: Reported $25,000–$80,000 by category (not published)
Est. All-In Annual Cost: ~$12,000–$16,000
Best For: East Dallas families who want a walkable, historic club minutes from home
Avoid If: You need published pricing, or a megaclub with multiple courses
Last Reviewed: 2026-07-10
Turn off Gaston Avenue and the club appears exactly where it has been since 1912. This Lakewood Country Club review covers the private club in East Dallas, Texas — not the Lakewood clubs in Maryland, Colorado, or New Jersey that share the name. My take: it’s the most quietly renovated old club in Dallas, and the neighborhood still hasn’t fully noticed.
We score every club the same way — details in our review methodology.
Lakewood is what Dallas clubs looked like before Dallas got loud: 129 acres, one course, and members who walk.
Club Overview
Image: Lakewood Country Club
Collett Munger and George Aldredge founded Lakewood in 1912, making it one of the city’s oldest clubs. Tom Bendelow drew the original course; Ralph Plummer redesigned it in 1947, J. Press Maxwell reworked six holes in 1961 — and then Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw came back twice, rebuilding the range in 2011 and returning for a reported $6 million facelift of irrigation, trees, and bunkers.
| Club Type | Private Country Club |
|---|---|
| Location | Dallas, Texas (Lakewood, East Dallas) |
| Founded | 1912 |
| Membership Categories | Golf, Tennis, Social |
| Initiation Fee | Reported $25,000–$80,000 (golf); ~$25,000 (tennis) |
| Monthly Dues | Reported ~$640 base / ~$915 all-in for golf tiers |
| Social Membership | Reported ~$9,000/year |
| Waitlist | Referral from current or former members required |
| Golf | 18 holes on 129 acres; Bendelow/Plummer/Maxwell lineage, Coore & Crenshaw renovation |
| Other Amenities | Tennis, resort-style pool, fitness, dining |
| Dress Code | Country-club casual; traditional golf attire on course |
| Official Website | lakewoodcc.com |
Membership Costs & Fees
Lakewood doesn’t publish rates, and public reports disagree — which tells you the club reprices quietly. Here’s the honest spread as of 2026:
- Golf initiation: older aggregator figures cite ~$27,500, while a 2020s directory listing showed $80,000 with monthly dues of $640 base / $915 total. The truth has been climbing toward the higher number as Dallas golf demand exploded
- Tennis initiation: reported around $25,000
- Social: roughly $9,000 a year in older reports
- The lines nobody quotes: expect food minimums, capital components, and cart or caddie spend on top of base dues — budget $12,000–$16,000 all-in for a golf family
Every figure is attributed member-market chatter, not a rate card. The club will confirm current numbers only through a member referral.
How to Join
Entrance is by referral from current or former members, followed by the usual committee process. It is meaningfully easier than Dallas’s ultra-exclusive tier — think Brook Hollow — but this is still old Dallas: who proposes you matters.
Amenities: The Full Tour
Golf
The course is the sleeper. Bendelow-era corridors on just 129 acres mean tight, walkable golf where position beats power. The Coore & Crenshaw work — the same team behind Sand Hills and Friar’s Head — removed trees, rebuilt bunkers, and modernized irrigation without inflating the course’s ego. Greens are now the club’s calling card.
Racquet Sports
A serious tennis membership tier exists for a reason: courts are active year-round, with strong league play.
Pool & Fitness
The resort-style pool anchors summer for Lakewood families, and fitness facilities cover the basics well.
Dining & Social Calendar
Image: Lakewood Country Club
Dining is club-traditional with a Texas accent, busiest on weekend evenings. The calendar runs on neighborhood rhythms — member-guests, holiday events, swim-team season — rather than gala spectacle.
Family & Kids
This is genuinely a family club. Junior golf and tennis programs feed off the neighborhood, and summer at the pool is the club’s social center of gravity. Most members live minutes away, which changes how often the club fits into a week.
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Guest Policies & Reciprocal Clubs
Standard member-hosted guest play with posted guest fees. Formal reciprocal networks aren’t published; Dallas clubs mostly trade access through member relationships.
Culture, Dress Code & Vibe
Old East Dallas, understated by Dallas standards. Members skew multigenerational — this is where Lakewood-neighborhood families have belonged for a century. Dress codes are traditional but not stuffy. The flash lives elsewhere in this city; Lakewood prefers being the club you walk to.
What Members Actually Say
Image: Lakewood Country Club
The consistent praise: on TexAgs threads comparing Lakewood with the Dallas Athletic Club and Royal Oaks, the recurring points are course conditioning post-renovation and the walkable, neighborhood feel.
The consistent complaint: in older city-data forum discussions, the opacity of pricing and the referral hurdle frustrate newcomers to Dallas.
The surprise: golf purists rate the Coore & Crenshaw greens among the best putting surfaces in the city — at a club many outsiders still think of as social-first.
What I Liked
Image: Lakewood Country Club
- Coore & Crenshaw renovation work at a fraction of famous-club prices
- Walkable 129-acre routing minutes from downtown Dallas
- 1912 heritage — one of the city’s oldest memberships
- True family club: pool, tennis, junior pipelines
- Referral path is realistic for connected newcomers, unlike Dallas’s closed tier
What I Didn’t Like
- No published pricing, and public reports span a confusing $25K–$80K
- One course means peak weekend tee sheets get tight
- Compact acreage limits practice-facility sprawl
- Amenity footprint trails newer megaclubs in the suburbs
Is It Worth It?
Take the higher reported numbers: $80,000 in and roughly $915 a month. A family using the club eight times a month pays about $115 a visit before minimums — for golf, pool, tennis, and dinner in the same place. Amortize the initiation over fifteen neighborhood years and the math gets friendlier still.
If you want maximum golf volume per dollar instead, Brookhaven’s three-course model is the counter-argument a few miles north.
Who Is This Club For?
This club fits East Dallas families who will actually use it weekly — proximity is the whole value equation.
It fits golf purists who care about greens and walkability more than square footage of clubhouse.
Skip it if you’re comparison-shopping on published rates; Lakewood won’t play. And skip it if you need 54 holes and a tee time guarantee — one beloved course has limits.
People Also Ask
How much does it cost to join Lakewood Country Club in Dallas?
Public reports vary widely: older figures cite around $27,500 initiation, while a more recent directory listing showed $80,000 with monthly dues near $915 all-in. Tennis initiation is reported near $25,000. The club confirms pricing only through member referral.
Is Lakewood Country Club private?
Yes. Lakewood is a fully private club, and entrance requires a referral from a current or former member. There is no public application or posted rate card — prospective members start by getting proposed and meeting the membership team.
Who designed the Lakewood Country Club golf course?
Tom Bendelow designed the original 1912 course. Ralph Plummer redesigned it in 1947, J. Press Maxwell reworked six holes in 1961, and Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw modernized the range, bunkers, trees, and irrigation across two renovation visits.
Which Lakewood Country Club is this?
The Dallas, Texas original — founded 1912 at Abrams Road and Gaston Avenue in East Dallas. Clubs in Rockville (Maryland), Denver, New Jersey, and elsewhere share the name but are unrelated. This review covers only the Dallas club.
How old is Lakewood Country Club?
Founded in 1912, Lakewood turns 114 in 2026, making it one of Dallas’s oldest country clubs. It has operated continuously on the same 129-acre East Dallas site through more than a century of the city’s growth.
Verdict & Score
GCR Score: 4.4 / 5 — Recommended. Historic bones, quietly elite greens, and a genuine neighborhood soul. It loses marks for pricing opacity and single-course capacity. Browse more country club reviews to compare the Dallas market.
Last reviewed: July 10, 2026
Ranked #3 in our Best Golf Clubs in Texas — see how it compares with the rest of the top 15.
Author Note
I’ve compared club markets across Texas for years, and Dallas hides its best value inside referral networks. I write reviews to shrink that information gap for you.
