Marriott One Week Owners and the Destination Club

I posted this on TUG also, but wanted to share on this board too in case it may help others to maximize ownership with their Marriott timeshare.

I sat on the fence until the very last day to join the Destinations Club (DC). I love my week at Ko Olina but I don't go every year and do trade for it. However, having points in another system has taught me the positive of points.

As a one week owner with over 4000 points, I noticed I could get more than a week. However, when I looked at TUGGER's Greg T and Stephen Ting's website, for renting points, it was obvious to me that even with one week joining the DC was advantageous. You get all of the upside and none of the down from my viewpoint.

I have always pushed the concept of renting points on this and other boards in the DC program. However, after reviewing their website again, I notice that it's growing in popularity amongst owners and I have not seen one complaint. People can actually get what they want when they want to. With this site, a one week owner with 2500 points still has a chance to get to Maui in the DC program and not have to wait forever to go through II and perhaps never get in. The best part is you don't have to buy additional points and that of course means, no continuous maintenance fees year after year after year!

I know the biggest drawback now for a one week owner would be the enrollment fee. I was lucky and joined at $595. However, I would still join because you can still recoup money if you do use II to lock off, trade for MRP, or if you do have to use II there are no exchange fees to go to a Marriott property. Also, if you exchange, you have to buy your II membership anyway. It's included in club fee.

I believe that the renting of points is a great option. As a one week owner, you read great things that multi-week owners have received from the DC. I say that when I don't go to my beautiful home resort, I can still use that DC program to my advantage by renting what I need and ensure my reservation through the DC earlier so I can get my air reservation knowing for sure I have the dates I need.

This is no plug for the DC program. However, it is a way to maximize our ownerships. Also, it also is a great way to help other owners who are able to maybe recoup some of their losses. Just another way to think of things.

I am a one week owner at Frenchme's Cove, St. Thomas. I did not join the points program because in my case having only one week it was too costly to do exchanges over the long run. Granted they give you 800 points for converting, but I look at the program as if I don't have any extra points. Please follow my logic and correct me if I do not understand the program. The sales personnel tell me that my time share here is worth 2750 points. If I want to go to St. Kitts the exact same unit will cost 2950 points. So I have to come-up with additional 200 points. I realize I can bank a year without vacationing, but at my stage in life at retirement, I don't want to miss a year of not vacationing. I can also buy 1000 points at a cost of over $10,000. Now what if I owned in St. Kitts, what would by time share be worth? Using marriott chart is it is worth 2,750 points and yet for me to go to St. Thomas it would cost me 2,950 points. How can that be like that if my current timeshare in St. Thomas is worth 2,750 points. So, in addition to the yearly membership fee that they charge you, they have built in another fee of 200 points. At $10.00 a point that comes to $2,000 to do the exchange. There is no even exchange for like units. Again, as a one week owner I do not see the advantage. I do agree with you, that it is a lot easier to exchange under the point system, but not cheaper.

thomasj282 wrote:

I am a one week owner at Frenchme's Cove, St. Thomas. I did not join the points program because in my case having only one week it was too costly to do exchanges over the long run. Granted they give you 800 points for converting, but I look at the program as if I don't have any extra points. Please follow my logic and correct me if I do not understand the program. The sales personnel tell me that my time share here is worth 2750 points. If I want to go to St. Kitts the exact same unit will cost 2950 points. So I have to come-up with additional 200 points. I realize I can bank a year without vacationing, but at my stage in life at retirement, I don't want to miss a year of not vacationing. I can also buy 1000 points at a cost of over $10,000. Now what if I owned in St. Kitts, what would by time share be worth? Using marriott chart is it is worth 2,750 points and yet for me to go to St. Thomas it would cost me 2,950 points. How can that be like that if my current timeshare in St. Thomas is worth 2,750 points. So, in addition to the yearly membership fee that they charge you, they have built in another fee of 200 points. At $10.00 a point that comes to $2,000 to do the exchange. There is no even exchange for like units. Again, as a one week owner I do not see the advantage. I do agree with you, that it is a lot easier to exchange under the point system, but not cheaper.

I am looking at it from this standpoint. The DC has other components to it. From what I know of people for a variety of reasons they cannot always go to their resort even in retirement. Yes, you can bank your resort to exchange for a couple of years, but sometimes that is difficult. The DC offers you other options to take advantage of. Now with 2750 points you will be more limited, but a lot would depend on how you use your timeshare. Maybe you might choose a studio instead of a one or two bedroom. Let's say the grands are coming and you need another room. You can rent another room with additional points and know right away as you are planning your trip what you have and not wait for six months to a year if you are going to get the accommodations you need by using Interval International.

In using your example, I am not saying to BUY anything. I am saying it's better to RENT points when needed. If you want to go to St. Kitts one year, you could go to the website I posted and have 200 points exchanged for only $100 and then you could make your reservation and be done with it. You could be making your reservation for a cheaper flight knowing in advance and being able to check in on a day that is more cost effective for you. Does this make sense? I did not make a mistake when I wrote only $100 for those points to be rented. That's the going rate. Heck no, don't buy points from Marriott at $10 per point and then have to pay those maintenance fees. Rent them and still get what you want.

Please understand my points here:

1. The DC allows you more options to your vacation choices.

2. You can rent points and get your reservation earlier to more difficult places through the DC than you can with Interval Internationa.

3. If you always stay at you reseort in St. Thomas and don't wish to go to other Marriotts and don't lockoff a two bedroom, then do as you always have.

I just wanted to let one week owners like myself understand there can be some benefit to it. It all depends on how you use your membership.

Charles, this came up this morning with a reminder of new postings. There is some really good information and advice here. I never looked at using points quite this way and I'm sure many will be helped by this. Many thanks.

My suggestion would be to give up Saturday and go to St Kitts for 6 nights. You still get a great vacation; you don't have to bank points and give up a year; you don't have to spend $10,000 to buy more points.

When I sat through the DC program, one of the points that bothered me was the fact that we would be receiving fewer points for our unit that it would take to go there. Why wouldn't you get the same number of points it would take anyone to stay at your home resort? I wouldn't even be able to trade for a different season.

mark1616 wrote:

When I sat through the DC program, one of the points that bothered me was the fact that we would be receiving fewer points for our unit that it would take to go there. Why wouldn't you get the same number of points it would take anyone to stay at your home resort? I wouldn't even be able to trade for a different season.

If you are going to your own resort, you don't use points on those years. Just make your reservations as you used to. It's only if you are going to another Marriott resort and you don't want to chance Interval International or you want to know right away that you can get the reservation to the Marriott resort you want. Also, if you make the reservation with Marriotts program, you don't have to pay any additional fees as you paid your club fee so if you only want to use a one bedroom, you would be in good shape of not having to pay a lockoff fee and an exchange fee.

Can someone explain the renting of points.

One of the biggest problems with trading for points is that they expire. Money tossed down the drain. Let's say you trade your Ko'Olina and get 4000 points. You use it to stay someplace for 3600 points. You now have 400 points that are effectively worthless. Unless, of course, you roll them to next year, but again, you'd have to convert your Ko'Olina for points again! So you have a choice, go to KoOlina and lose 400 points (that's 10% of your maintenance fee wasted) or not go to your home resort next year.

It's a treadmill, once you get on, it's difficult or expensive to get off.

Quote:

Can someone explain the renting of points.

One of the most powerful things about the new Marriott system is the ability to transfer points from one user to another on a one-time basis. In this manner, an owner can "rent" points to/from another owner for a single use.

As an example, if I am 250 points short of a Marriott reservation that I would like to make in 2013, I would place an ad on (edited out website) looking for 250 points with 2013 Usage Year. Someone with available points would respond to my ad and we would negotiate a price for the one-time transfer of those points. Marriott will transfer the points to my account and I will send the funds to the counterparty. I have rented points in/out for years with my Worldmark (different timeshare which also allows point transfers), and I have now already done seven rental transactions in 2011 and 2012 for Marriott DC points. It's very easy.

Additionally, as per previous post, the owner who gets 4,000 points for their week, and only uses 3,600 points and has 400 "orphan" points can now rent those points out to another owner and not be trapped on the points treadmill, which is a real risk in the Marriott system.

Good luck, and please visit the website if you are interested in more information on renting points.

Best,

GregT

Note: (edited out website) is StevenTing's and my website and it is free to use. I hope that it is helpful!

We are currently in Kauai, and went through the DC presentation while we're staying at Kauai Beach Club. I was glad they have a 'hybrid' system for owners like myself, so I can stay at my home resort anytime like always without points. However, I would still have to pay the points maintainence fees every year along with my traditional maintainence fees. For 1,500 points, the yearly fee is over $600 just for the points.

randy190 wrote:

We are currently in Kauai, and went through the DC presentation while we're staying at Kauai Beach Club. I was glad they have a 'hybrid' system for owners like myself, so I can stay at my home resort anytime like always without points. However, I would still have to pay the points maintainence fees every year along with my traditional maintainence fees. For 1,500 points, the yearly fee is over $600 just for the points.

The extra $600 is for an extra 1500 points that you bought, and then the maintenance fee is for your Kauai week you already own, correct?

Correct, the $600 points fee is in addition to our maintainence fee for our week at Kauai Beach Club, as I understand it..

randy190 wrote:

Correct, the $600 points fee is in addition to our maintainence fee for our week at Kauai Beach Club, as I understand it..

Now unless you really plan on using those additional 1500 points each and every year, you could possibly have been good at renting those points. You have put out about $15,000 just to have the points and then your maintenance fees are $600 annually. We know that maintenance fees are going up evey year. The Marriott points that you can rent run between .45 and .55 per point. I bet you could come out quite a bit ahead if you just rented the points you need for your stays when you needed them and saved yourself some money.

I apologize for being off topic and hope that you will return to the topic at hand after my thought.

Rental of Dest Pts and/or Timeshare Weeks - Certainly, some are willing to give away good weeks at extraordinarily low rental rates and the same for Dest Pts. This, however, is probably more a sign of desperation than the true market. I use excess points to acquire good weeks or fractional periods for rent and do achieve higher values than those mentioned in earlier comments.

I hope prices for timeshare weeks/points have bottomed out. As owners, let's help ourselves and other owners by carefully considering our prices for both. Incidentally, Marriott Vacation Club is doing it's part by raising prices.

These might be only my thoughts, but I do not want to see further erosion in our values or the usefulness of our interests.

dennish144 wrote:

I apologize for being off topic and hope that you will return to the topic at hand after my thought.

Rental of Dest Pts and/or Timeshare Weeks - Certainly, some are willing to give away good weeks at extraordinarily low rental rates and the same for Dest Pts. This, however, is probably more a sign of desperation than the true market. I use excess points to acquire good weeks or fractional periods for rent and do achieve higher values than those mentioned in earlier comments.

I hope prices for timeshare weeks/points have bottomed out. As owners, let's help ourselves and other owners by carefully considering our prices for both. Incidentally, Marriott Vacation Club is doing it's part by raising prices.

These might be only my thoughts, but I do not want to see further erosion in our values or the usefulness of our interests.

Marriott is raising their rates. I heard that from Marriott's Owner Services and read it on TUG. Owner Services also said that Marriott will be exercising ROFR more too. So we will see what will happen. However, if you are the average person who is a legacy owner, you just don't want to add on to your maintenance fees. Especially those of us who own in Hawaii.

Thanks for the explanation. Would you e-mail to me your website?

I don't have a webssite., but if you mean the Marriott website it is

www.marriottvacationclub.com

Sorry, I thought I was replying to Greg T

How can we find out what the address is for this "renting points" website?