Cat Island, Beaufort, SC

Cat Island is a community on the southern end of Lady’s Island, in Beaufort County, South Carolina. The Cat Island Club’s address is 8 Waveland Avenue, Beaufort, SC 29907, and Beaufort’s waterfront and downtown are about 6 miles away, a drive of about 17 minutes. The golf course sits on the southern tip of the island, with marsh and tidal rivers along much of it.

It is not on Hilton Head. By road it is about 45 miles from Coligny Plaza, roughly an hour and ten minutes without traffic, across the mainland and over the bridges into Beaufort and onto Lady’s Island. Bluffton’s Old Town is about 50 minutes away, and Savannah’s airport about an hour and 20 minutes. Those times are estimates for a clear road; allow more at rush hour and in summer. It also isn’t the Cat Island off the Mississippi coast, which is a barrier island in the Gulf and a different place entirely.

For a visit to Beaufort itself, our Beaufort day trip guide covers the town, and Beaufort County has the county’s offices and services. Cat Island is private, so there is no public way in to the club; see below.

The Cat Island Club is the heart of the community: a private, family-oriented country club with a golf course, a practice facility, tennis, two pools, a clubhouse and a pro shop. The course was designed by George Cobb and first opened in 1985. It ran as the Sanctuary Golf Club for years, closed in January 2019, and was bought by Resort Development Partners of Virginia, which renovated it in the summer of 2022 and held a grand opening as a fully private club over Memorial Day weekend 2023.

The course runs under live oaks along the marsh and rivers. Marsh views frame six of the 18 holes, and two par 3s sit back to back on the water. Yardages, ratings and the club’s contact details are on our Sanctuary Golf Club at Cat Island page. There is no public tee time: the course is for members and their guests, so a visitor needs a member to play.

The club’s own site quotes owners who live on the course, one on the 18th hole behind the clubhouse, and says the pools and cabana are within walking distance of many homes. It does not publish a home count or a price range.

The listings below come from the Hilton Head MLS. Most homes in the Beaufort area are listed in a different MLS, so these are only the Cat Island homes and lots that also appear in this one, not every home for sale on Cat Island. For the full picture, ask a realtor to search both; our Hilton Head realtors guide is a place to start.

The Cat Island Club lists eight kinds of membership. Core memberships require an initial 12-month commitment, and seniors 65 and over on a Full Family membership, and widows and widowers, get 10% off monthly dues, though not both discounts together.

• Full Family: full access to golf, the practice facility, dining, the pool, tennis and club events.

• Young Executive Family (ages 21 to 39): the same full access.

• National Golf: for members whose primary residence is more than 100 miles from Beaufort, with dues paid once a year.

• Sports: every amenity, including the practice facilities, and one round of golf a month at cart fees.

• Social: dining, the pool, tennis and club events.

• Corporate: set case by case, depending on the number of designees.

• Founder’s and Lifetime Founder’s: limited offerings.

Tours are given on request Tuesday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and the club can be reached at (843) 524-2000. Its site does not publish dues or initiation fees, and it does not say whether owning a home on Cat Island carries a membership requirement or an association fee. Ask the listing agent for the community’s covenants, the association’s fees and rules, and the club’s membership terms before you make an offer, and have an attorney read them.

Cat Island is not a vacation-rental resort the way Sea Pines or Palmetto Dunes is. Whether a home here can be rented, and for how long, is set by the community’s recorded covenants and any association rules, and we have not found a published rule. Don’t assume nightly or weekly rentals are allowed, and don’t buy a home to rent it out until you have read the covenants and heard back from the association.

Beaufort County’s zoning office, (843) 255-2170, can tell you whether a county permit applies to a short-term rental at a given address and what it requires. Our Hilton Head vacation rentals guide covers the rental companies on Hilton Head Island.