East Cobb Pools: HOA Amenities and Separate Club Memberships

Ask yourself this before you write an offer on a home near one of East Cobb's swim and tennis neighborhoods: is that pool actually part of what you're buying, or is it a separate club that happens to sit nearby?

Most buyers assume the answer is obvious. The listing photos show the pool. The HOA dues are printed right there on the sheet. Case closed. But East Cobb runs on two different amenity models that look identical from the street and behave completely differently at closing, and the paperwork you'll sign only fully accounts for one of them.

Two systems wearing the same swimsuit

In subdivisions like Chimney Springs, a community of more than 700 homes dating to the 1970s with a lake, trails, a large pool, eight lighted tennis courts, and a renovated clubhouse, the pool and courts come bundled into mandatory HOA dues, which run around $71 a month, or $850 a year. Pay the association, and you're automatically a member of the amenities. The same is true at Chestnut Ridge, an 83-home pocket built between 1976 and 1979 with dues near $54 a month covering its pool, playground, and picnic pavilion, and at Providence Corners, where dues around $72 a month include a renovated pool and ALTA tennis within walking distance of East Cobb Park. Chestnut Springs, Willow Point, Tally Green, and Somerset, a roughly 325-home community with a competition-size saltwater pool renovated in 2020 and a swim team that competes in the Cobb County Summer Swim League, follow the same pattern: one dues payment, one membership, no separate application.

Then there's the other model, and it's easy to miss if you've only shopped the first kind. Post Oak Recreation Association, known locally as PORA, sits along Piney Grove Creek and serves the Post Oak Square and Post Oak Springs neighborhoods, but its own materials note that membership extends beyond those subdivision borders. It caps out at 275 family memberships, runs on its own fiscal year from May through April, and opens registration each January, closing enrollment before Memorial Day. Holly Springs Swim & Tennis Club has operated in East Cobb since 1977 with a hard limit of 250 members. East Cobb Swim and Tennis, a standalone social club rather than a subdivision amenity, set 2026 membership at $550 for the calendar year and says it sold out in eight weeks in 2025, with an expectation of selling out even faster this year.

You apply, and depending on timing, you might not get in.

The disclosure gap nobody points out

Georgia's standard Community Association Disclosure Exhibit, the form Realtors attach to a purchase agreement, has been updated twice already in 2026, most recently in a version effective June 1. The form (GAR Form F322) asks the seller to identify the type of association the buyer will be required to join because of the property itself, list the mandatory dues, disclose any pending special assessments, and arrange for a closing letter confirming the account is current. That form does real work. It's how a buyer at Chimney Springs or Providence Corners confirms the dues on the listing sheet match what the association will actually charge going forward.

But the exhibit is built around the association tied to the lot, not every recreational amenity a resident might want to join. According to Georgia HOA & Condo Requirements 2026, Georgia's non-condo subdivisions are governed by a different statute than condominiums, and the buyer protections aren't identical between the two. That is part of why agents are trained to treat every association disclosure as a real contractual document rather than a formality to skip because "it's just a subdivision."

The result is a blind spot that has nothing to do with anyone acting in bad faith. This year's 275-family allotment closed out before Memorial Day, and the listing agent may not know that. The buyer finds out once the pool season is already underway, or already over.

Picture a family closing on a house a few blocks from a pool they toured all spring, only to learn that fall that the neighborhood's real amenity access runs through a club whose roster filled months before they ever made an offer.

That scenario isn't a prediction about any one home. It's the mechanical outcome of a capped-membership club sitting next to a subdivision that has nothing to do with running it.

What this means if you're buying

Before you get attached to a listing because of its proximity to a pool, ask the listing agent one direct question: is this amenity part of the mandatory HOA, or a separate club? If it's separate, follow up with:

• What's the current membership status, and is there a waitlist right now?
• When does the club open registration each year, and does that window line up with your closing date?
• If you're buying into a hybrid setup like Chadds Walk, which offers non-resident memberships on top of its HOA-based pools, exactly what does that non-resident tier include, since it typically covers amenity access only and not the community's social calendar?

None of this shows up automatically on the community association exhibit if the club in question isn't the mandatory association. You have to ask before you're under contract, not after.

What this means if you're selling

If your home sits near a capped-membership club rather than an HOA-bundled pool, the smartest move is to get ahead of the question rather than wait for a buyer to raise it during due diligence. Somerset's HOA publishes a detailed clubhouse rental and lifeguard fee schedule on its own site, right down to the $250 refundable deposit and the $40-an-hour lifeguard minimum. That level of specificity isn't required by any disclosure form. It's a seller's advantage, because it answers a buyer's questions before they become a reason to walk away or renegotiate two weeks before closing.

Sellers near Post Oak, Holly Springs, or East Cobb Swim and Tennis have the same opportunity. A short, honest note about how the club works, what it costs, and how to apply does more for buyer confidence than another listing photo of the water.

A few quick answers

Does every East Cobb swim and tennis neighborhood require a separate club membership? No. Chimney Springs, Chestnut Ridge, Providence Corners, and several others bundle pool and tennis access directly into mandatory HOA dues, so paying the association makes you a member automatically.

How do I find out which model a specific home falls under? Ask the listing agent directly, then check what actually appears on the community association disclosure exhibit once you're under contract. If the pool isn't named there, it's worth a phone call to the club itself before you assume access.

Do these clubs really run out of space? Some do. Holly Springs Swim & Tennis Club caps membership at 250, and East Cobb Swim and Tennis sold out its 2025 memberships in about eight weeks, with the club expecting 2026 to move even faster.

Whether you're weighing a move into one of East Cobb's swim and tennis pockets or preparing to list a home near one, the difference between a bundled amenity and a standalone club is the kind of detail that's easy to miss and expensive to discover late. Kimberly Eslinger walks buyers and sellers through exactly this kind of local detail before it becomes a surprise at closing. Schedule a consultation to talk through what a specific East Cobb address actually includes.

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.