Marriott special "Hurricane Fee"?

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Original Message:

Marriott special "Hurricane Fee"? (by George P.):

We are among the original owners of the Frenchman's Cove. The ever increasing fees associated with the unit are beginning to get out of hand. Also, it appears that Marriott is taking advantage of the hurricane to assess yet more fees on the owners. Our fees went up by over $600 this year and they say its an Hurricane assessment. Well our exorbitant maintenance fees cover hurricane insurance so I am questioning why the fees went up especially by that much? I think that we (the Timeshare owners) are paying for the repairs to the Frenchman's Reef and Morning Star Hotel.

All of these fees, expenses, taxes combined with Marriott doing nothing to help you out with selling your timeshare etc... have greatly tarnished an otherwise beautiful experience in the Virgin Islands.....It's a real shame.

Question 1: Why are we paying $900 a year in property taxes (gold week) to the USVI, shouldn't that be assessed as part of our maintenance "FEES" like all other Marriott timeshares? ? I don't think any other Timeshares pay separate property taxes....Plus if you do the math of the Property tax assessment, extrapolated out to 52 weeks, they have each unit assessed at close to 3 Million dollars....

Question 2: Are people afraid to go to St. Thomas now for some reason? We are trying to rent our week this year and have priced it CHEAP, no hits at all. Look at the rentals on Redweek, very few weeks have rented for some reason. They normally are somewhat difficult to rent but they used to rent after a while. This year there are hardly any units rented, like maybe 1 or 2 in the entire database. Is it because the USVI government has assessed even more fees on the Timeshares? $25 per night.

Question 3: We need to sell our timeshare as the fees, taxes etc... have more than tripled since we bought the place. Has anyone sold their unit recently? If so, could you please give us some advice? I have contact a few very honest realtors as part of the LTRBA which is VERY reputable. I just want to see if anyone has had any luck with selling a gold week recently and can offer advice.

Thanks so much, GR