The redevelopment of the historic Marbella Golf & Country Club into the Higuerón Marbella Golf Resort is the most consequential capital event in Marbella East in a decade. In late 2025, Higuerón Developments acquired the course; a redesign by Robert Trent Jones Jr. and the first Waldorf Astoria in southern Europe are confirmed for the site. For buyers weighing the eastern Marbella corridor, this is the kind of project that re-rates a whole area — and it sits five minutes from Marbella’s old town, between Elviria and Las Chapas.
This guide is an editorial briefing on what the project means, not a sales brochure for it. It sets out the acquisition, the brand, the course and the likely impact on the corridor, and is honest about what has been publicly announced versus what is still to come. It sits within the wider Marbella area.
The acquisition
In November 2025, Higuerón Developments — the group behind the established Reserva del Higuerón estate above Fuengirola — acquired the historic Marbella Golf & Country Club and announced its rebranding as the Higuerón Marbella Golf Resort. It is the company’s second flagship resort in southern Europe, and signals a clear strategy: to build a coastal portfolio of service-led, branded estates rather than a single destination.
The Robert Trent Jones lineage
The course carries real pedigree. It opened in 1994 to a Robert Trent Jones Sr. design, and the redevelopment hands the reinterpretation to his son, Robert Trent Jones Jr. — a contemporary reworking that preserves the original’s character while modernising its playability and, crucially, its interface with the residential and resort elements around it. For a project of this kind, the quality of the course itself is not a detail; it is part of what underpins residential values.
The Waldorf Astoria agreement
The headline is the brand. An agreement signed in New York on 5 November 2025 between Christopher J. Nassetta, President and CEO of Hilton, and Javier Rodríguez, CEO of Higuerón Developments, brings the first Waldorf Astoria in southern Europe to the site. A Waldorf Astoria flag is among the strongest signals of intent in luxury hospitality, and its arrival anchors the resort’s positioning at the very top of the market.
The integrated programme
The resort is conceived as an integrated environment — accommodation, wellness, sport and residential — built on the model that has worked at the group’s existing estate. For a sense of how that model matures in practice, the Reserva del Higuerón guide is the most useful reference: it is the proven sibling, and the best available read on how the new estate’s residential offer is likely to perform. The resort’s official site carries the current public detail.
The Marbella East corridor effect
The project’s significance extends well beyond its own boundary. Marbella East has, on a quality-adjusted basis, long traded below the Golden Mile; a branded, service-led resort of this calibre is the most credible catalyst in years for a structural re-rating of the corridor. The second-order beneficiaries are the established areas around it — Elviria and Hacienda Las Chapas just west, Las Chapas, Marbesa, Artola and Cabopino to the east, and the Río Real and Santa Clara golf addresses toward Marbella town. Buyers positioning ahead of the resort’s completion are, in effect, buying the corridor before the catalyst fully lands.
Buyer profile and investment thesis
When residences launch, the project is built for the Waldorf Astoria-branded-residence buyer — international, mobile and comfortable with branded ownership and hotel-grade service. Alongside them, HNWI principal-residence buyers will be drawn to a Marbella East address with that infrastructure on the doorstep, and family offices to the structural revaluation of the corridor. Internationally, Waldorf Astoria-branded residences have tended to trade at a meaningful premium to comparable non-branded product; the relevant local comparator for likely pricing and performance is the resale market at Reserva del Higuerón. To frame the buying numbers, our cost calculator and the 2026 investment outlook are useful starting points.
What is — and isn’t — yet known
In the interest of an honest read: the acquisition, the Robert Trent Jones Jr. redesign and the Waldorf Astoria agreement are publicly confirmed. Detailed residential pricing, unit mix and launch and opening dates were not, at the time of writing, fully public — and a buyer should not anchor price expectations to a specific opening date, since projects of this scale rarely run in a straight line. We update this guide as firm information is released; the most reliable current source is the resort’s own channels, and a direct conversation for anyone seriously considering an early position.
The verdict
Higuerón Marbella Golf Resort is the single most important thing to understand about Marbella East right now — a Waldorf Astoria-anchored, Robert Trent Jones Jr.-designed resort that should lift the whole corridor over the next several years. For the branded-residence and principal-residence buyer it is a project to watch closely and, when residences launch, to assess seriously; for the buyer of the surrounding areas, it is a tailwind already in motion. The discipline, as ever, is to separate the genuine signal from the marketing — which is exactly what an independent read is for.
Ask Mikael for a private briefing on Higuerón Marbella Golf Resort and the Marbella East corridor — including how the surrounding areas are likely to move as the project advances.
This is an independent advisory guide. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or representing Higuerón Developments S.L. or Hilton Worldwide; it is editorial commentary only.
Related guides
Explore the corridor and the sister estate: Reserva del Higuerón · Elviria & Hacienda Las Chapas · Las Chapas, Marbesa, Artola & Cabopino · the Marbella area guide · or browse all Costa del Sol area guides.