"It's a Ponzi scheme."

Peter Finch looks at the dilemma many club members are facing: waiting to get out.

Unlike traditional clubs that allow you to quit whenever you want, these clubs insist you remain a dues-paying member until another warm body comes along to take your place. In a few cases, clubs have been known to continue demanding dues from members even after they've died.

Most common in the Sunbelt states and typically marketed by real-estate developers, these memberships surged in popularity over the past two decades. Their big lure is that the club will refund a portion of your initiation fee -- sometimes as much as 100 percent -- when you resign and sell your membership. Clubs like these now represent about one-third of all private golf clubs, says Frank Vain, president of the McMahon Group, a consulting firm based in Missouri.

It seemed like a great deal when demand for memberships was hot. But the crashing economy revealed the downside: You might have trouble finding a buyer for your membership. While you wait, you're stuck paying dues to a club you want to quit.

"It's a Ponzi scheme," argues Steve Graves, president of Creative Golf Marketing, a Kansas consulting group. Although I assume most clubs selling these memberships didn't intend to defraud anyone, Graves has a point in that they promise to pay off your initial "investment" (the initiation fee) with money from new members.

Never really thought of it like that. But they are indeed Ponzi schemes!