Boston Business Journal by Thomas Grillo, Real Estate Editor
Date: Friday, March 16, 2012, 12:07pm EDT

Shaker Hills Golf Club in Harvard is facing the auction gavel.
 
Attorneys for the Middlesex Savings Bank   have set the date for a foreclosure auction to be held on Thursday, April 12, at 11 a.m. at 146 Shaker Road, according to a legal notice.
 
The 18-hole championship golf course features a 13,000-square-foot clubhouse with functions rooms, a restaurant and bar, kitchen, locker rooms, pro shop, and members lounge area. Shaker Hills includes three parcels of property along Shaker Road.
 
Club owners could not be reached for comment. The phone number listed for Shaker Hills was not in service.
 
Shaker Hills received a $2.13 million mortgage from Middlesex Savings Bank, but failed to meet its obligations, the legal notice said.
 
Most of the 163-acre course is located along Shaker and Sheehan roads in Harvard, while the clubhouse and grill pub are in Ayer.
 
Golf courses began hitting hard times in 2009,according to industry sources. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, an oversupply of public and private golf courses developed. But by the mid-2000s, the ranks of golfers began to dwindle. Since 2005, when it peaked at 30 million, the number of golfers has dropped 9.6 percent to 27.1 million in 2009, the most recent data available.