Marriott Vacation Club point system

Steve, I appreciate your comments and feel much the same.

The current view of "necessity" is foreign to many of us who grew up in a simpler world.

Must be careful though and those of us who feel this way should not be "sucked in" by the Marriott sales model. Unfortunately, the sales approach has been refined to mask these thoughts long enough to catch us. I am probably the king of backing out of Marriott contracts within the rescission period. Of course , we got hooked a number of times. Dave Ramsey calls this a "stupid tax" but why does it have to go on for the rest of my life? Only glad, our spending habits enabled us to stumble a few times.

This forum is probably a lifeline to many as they may see alternatives to the "highest price" approach of buying from Marriott.

Incidentally, if I come up missing, it may be because my wife told me she would kill me if I signed up for another Marriott sales presentation.

Those are the biggest money makers of all dennish! I LOVE presentations, hundreds of thousands of Marriott rewards points for nothing more than sitting for an hour or so. That is, assuming you do not buy of course! It pays you back for your purchase. At 2 per year, thats 50,000 points per year * current value of .9 cents each (source: https://thepointsguy.com/2017/06/june-2017-monthly-valuations/), that's $450 per year for 2-3 hours of "work". Don't make the mistake of avoiding those, but do learn to resist. In 10 years, that's almost $5,000 at current valuations of "free" money. Combine that with credit cards (you do pay them off monthly I hope) that give you free stuff, it's easy to fund a timeshare purchase (at least at the old prices when they sold timeshares and not points). I finally got me a Starpoints card after the Marriott merger. Thus far, I have earned 50,000 Starpoints. That's just for part of this year and the massive bonus they give you. At current valuation of 2.7 cents per point, that's another $1,350 for basically an hour work to sign up for the card maybe. So, between Marriott presentations and Starwoods points, that's almost 2 grand just this year in Marriott rewards points. Just as cool is my Chase Mileage plus card, for which they have given me 66,457 miles this year including bonuses. At current valuation of 1.5 cents each, that's another $996 for basically free. What's really cool about that card is they have an app. In that app, when you do things like shop or eat somewhere that you would have shopped or eaten at anyway, you buy an electronic gift card for whatever you owe and you get it on the spot real time. That gift card (which pays for your meal or purchase you would have paid anyway) earns you United miles. What funny about it, is you pay with your credit card (Starwood Amex). So, I earn the United miles *and* Starwood points. Stacking is always nice. So, between those 3 things alone (all of the above), I will likely earn close to $4,000 this year alone. It's not really fair to offset a timeshare purchase with this money, the purchase price really was the purchase price, but, it's fair for at least the presentations.

Shocked someone agrees with me! It's a daily pet peeve of mine seeing how money is spent these days. Yes, buying from Marriott is not the greatest money saving idea especially today, but, more money on cars than a house is more absurd in my book. And more house than one can safely pay for is also more absurd. Cars, you use them, sort of enjoy them, but they go to $0 of course. I know a guy who makes close to 500k per year. His house is so expensive, and the money they spend on sofa tables (50K just for ONE), the guy is close to 60, he will be working until he's 90 just to pay debt. It's so ridiculous. He buys a new (more expensive) house every 5-10 years too, sure, go more in debt. That's what I want to do when I retire at year end, keep working and not retire so I can pay off house, cars, etc. And working several jobs slaving away for debt. Sure, sounds appealing. Th guy has no money, nothing, can't even travel. For what!?

I'd much rather spend my time traveling. Been to so many wonderful places. Cabo san Luca, Ko Olina, Vina del Mar, Vegas, Tahoe, Aruba, Cancun, Palm Desert, S Padre in winter, Kona, Vail, Branson, Perth, Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Busselton, Phoenix, Surfers Paradise, Williamsburg shortly, just to name a few. Its not the greatest logic per se, but honestly, I doubt I would have gone to all those without my timeshare. Looking forward to at least another 10 years of that sort of travel.

I holeheartely agree with you. I turn my presentations points into Amazon gift cards as I am a Hilton person. I use the Chase Marriott credit card for that one free night per year. For many Aruba presentations I take the restaurant coupon. I have just about become tired of the presentations and after the mandatory one that came along with an Encore vacation it may be my last time to sit for 90 minutes with a cookie and pretty bad tasting coffer. I'm tired of the sales pitch showing maps, beautiful photos and that wonderful calculation where you are told that a room in any hotel is at least $600.00. For $25,000 plus $1,500 per year and utility taxes etc you. can enjoy your one week in Aruba for 40 years. Yes, what happens to the Aruba deeds after 40 years.

Yeah, you have to be able to stomach the presentations, and I can certainly see how some (most) would find that difficult! I've had them as short as a minute or two. They're nothing more than money makers for me. We'll see what the competition offers me in Williamsburg soon. When they offer something piddly, I never go. But I don't mind them, I have time. I just feel like Marriott is paying me back, a good feeling!

No idea about Aruba deeds, would never buy in foreign country myself, seems like risk. At least with what I know now that is.

One other item. Virtually every Marriott Timeshare has work going on and usually when you want to go. You find pools closed , fitness centers closed , air conditioning shutoffs and water shutoffs. With a hotel you can readily change rooms if you have an inconvenience that you did not expect when you reserved. With a timeshare you have the inconvenience and never a break in your maintenance charges. We have never had an Aruba stay where something was not being worked on or when there was a necessity to visit the room for an air conditioning filter, water shut off, power shut off, temperature of air conditioning reduction, construction, construction and construction. We await the assessments for the construction.

Hi, I don't know where you find such good air fare prices? Every booking I find for First class is usually 10 times Economy class?

"Virtually every Marriott Timeshare has work going on and usually when you want to go. You find pools closed , fitness centers closed , air conditioning shutoffs and water shutoffs. With a hotel you can readily change rooms if you have an inconvenience that you did not expect when you reserved."

Much different than my experience, must depend on the location. In close to 20 years of visiting Desert Springs, I have not seen a pool closed, a fitness center closed, air conditioning shutoff, or, water shutoff. It was cold one day. At Desert Springs, I have seen them refurbishing buildings fully, but they closed buildings for that.

You can only change rooms anywhere (hotel or not) if they are not popular or sold out. I recall one timeshare from someone where I was able to change rooms, but they were obviously not fully booked. It was probably in Colorado in summer.

You know wha is really fun.. Going into the presentation and the sales person realizes that they cannot sell you a thing.. Last time we went I had just inherited my parents timeshares and now have a total of 21,000 Destination Exchange points per year.. ummm what are they going to sell me at that point, hell I could go on an African Safari EVERY year. Yes the maintenance fees are high so I do choose to rent out most if not all (why I am on this site).. They do TRY to convince me that I need to buy the Trust points and there may be a time that WILL be needed, but I do think Marriott will get some serious backlash if they impose what they can do. What they can do is that because unlike what they tell you in presentations a point is NOT a point.. there are the Exchange points and there are the Trust points and technically all NEW resorts are fully Trust point and all Older resorts are a combination of Weeks, Exchange Points (enrolled Weeks) and Trust points (unsold inventory when they changed programs).. So they can eventually if they choose say that you need Trust points to get a Trust reservation. but that goes both ways in that a resort that is 90% weeks and Exchange would be hard for a Trust owner to get..

However, until the above scenario comes up I don't need anything more and I will be honest I do NOT suggest anyone buy into the system at this point. The point system though good for reservations 1, 2, 3, 4 to any amount of days it is just more expensive and for anyone to get into points they really need to buy 3500+ points a year (to get to go anywhere good) and @ 10-11$ per point that is well over $35K which is about $13K more than I paid for my Las Vegas 3BR and I get 250 points more per year in trade + if I choose I can turn it in for rewards points more than the Trust point equivalent gives or I can use it as the week.

The alternative if one wanted to buy some is resale market. But I still think a legacy ownership is a better deal, even resale, than points. You have a lot of points there!! They can be sold if you ever want to, easier to sell than werks at a better price for the most part.

Only issue with points resale is that Marriott is protecting the points by charging a decent amount to enroll hem back into the full use Destinations program (not doing so puts severe restrictions on them), so unless you get them reasonably cheap you might not make out any better than if you just bought from Marriott playing a little bit of Hardball and getting perks and or lower pricing direct (they will tell you it can't be done, but because they can't really sell to me they have offered quite a bit more to try to entice me including points down to around 7$ a point. Granted this might be on a case by case basis and does change from presentation to presentation but they will offer it at times. Granted I still didn't take them up on it as all I would end up doing is renting them out and I am notarially in the business of being a full-time broker.

Points, points! My point is the need to pre spend over $215.00 per day before you step into the suite. Want a two bedroom before you step in the price is over $270.00 per night. Well you do get cleaning once a week. I can change my hotel room and some I book are over 600 square feet. I change the hotel reservations several times and sometimes cut the final price in half.I also get free full breakfast and I am not charged for government daily fees.

I paid *way* less than $7 per point, total, counting enrollment or whatever it is called fee that is steep, something like $2 per point, closing, etc. It is possible on the resale market and it is possible to get past ROFR. There are many people selling points. Marriott does have ROFR, however, if they exercise it and you are the seller, they pay you. So, it's pretty easy to sell points since you really don't care as the seller if they exercise or not. SO, if you ever want to get out, it would be pretty easy for you to do so. That's all I was saying. Buying takes a lot more effort and thought.

How are you calculating Michael pre-spending $215 per day!? Where you are getting that number from, formula please?

Maintenance fees for 2,050 points are $1,500 per week use a year for one bedroom and about $1,900 per year for a two bedroom, My two weeks purchased in Aruba have a total of $3,000 maintenance fees. Marriott allows a purchaser of points from a secondary market the same privileges to book say Aruba in that 10 - -2 month window of so-called opportunity?

A $200+ maintenance fees per night is a pretty good number for "deeded" timeshares (the old program). Examples: Newport Coast $1200, Boston Custom House (1 Bdrm) $1500, Las Vegas Grand Chateau $1200. I know Hawaii is higher which would increase the average.

Points program participants pay more per equivalent timeshare use.

Actually, Hawaii if you bought the correct units is way low, however, if you went in for the off season or cheaper units then yes they are more expensive.. At least maintenance for Legacy.. BTW Michael my $7.00 per point is NEW purchases Not when I or you cot in at as I could say that I am way less than anyone because I inherited most of them.. But I did purchase myself at LV and yes my total purchase pricing was below $7.00 per point bought New as a Week and then enrolled. Oh and BTW you are paying government Daily fees on the Hotel rooms they just lump them into the price in many cases as people hate fees.. and as well with the Timeshare you only get hit with daily fees if you go to places that require them such as Hawaii's Transient Tax. And... additionally I think I would consider myself lucky if I didn't have the timeshare to guarantee me a great room at a low price and could get a 1BR unit in a place I wanted to go for $200.00 per night. But basically it is the earlier you got in the better your deal.. Problem that is true now as well but it takes Much longer to recoup as it is WAY expensive.. Our Hawaii 2BR KoOlina Penthouse Oceanview would point out to require something like 6700 points for a stay meaning it is upwards of 85-90K if I were to buy the equivalency in points.. OUCH...

Why not just save your money and not buy Marriott points. If you look around you can find real nice places to stay at a fraction of the cost for points and maintenance fees. Marriott is in a win win situation. They change the rules and everyone PAYS. We are legacy owners but since going to so many presentations, they were willing to forego the start up fees to be enrolled in the destination points program. Used to be no problem to book a summer week at Newport Coast but since they began this program, it is very hard to get a week in the summer. We have resorted to exchanging our Maui week to points and going in off season. Funny how a week in Maui isn't worth the same points. They got to keep making money to pay off the ceo.

Ever notice that mention is not made of the purchase price to acquire weeks or points. It is so easy to disregard this initial "sunk" cost and any attempt to amortize this cost over nights used? The cost per night must include some amortization of this cost. Marriott Vacations must love the fact that is ignored and dismissed immediately after purchasing weeks or points.

Michael,

Maintenance fees per points are ~ 53 cents each. If you convert a timeshare to points, mine is 49 cents per point. Of course, you lose a little doing that, so, per point maint fees is a little lower than the 49 cents. But yours are higher from what you said as are many, not sure what the average is, but, I don't see much difference in maint fees. The main difference is the purchase cost. Of course, my reservations get a 30% discount on points, making the effective maint fee lower.

But I agree with you in that for 99% of people, unless they inherited it's much much higher.

Secondary market points = points from Marriott, there is no difference once you get past ROFR.

Dennish - no doubt! They, the salesman, never mention the upfront cost.

"Secondary market points = points from Marriott, there is no difference once you get past ROFR."

Which they actually almost never invoke..

However, they do charge an re-enrollment/deeding fees to gain full access which I think for 2500 points is around $3000.00 (though I could be wrong), not cheap, but not as expensive as buying new but could approach a decently sized second market number especially if you don't get points dirt cheap on the secondary market. Unless you do this enrollment fee you are stuck with 60 day use points, which is the same as all other points but by that time everyplace good to go is gone, especially Hawaii which books a good 9-12 months in advance so you aren't really getting a 60 day unless you are lucky.

Yep, and all of that considered, got in way under $7 per point total (see below), about half that. And for maintenance fee folks, those who compare to ownership, that includes II, lockoff fees, internal exchanges, etc. So, the points can be very competitive maint fee wise. Where they are not competitive unless you find the right seller or get beat by ROFR, is purchase price. I could argue given a decent membership level that points maint fees are lower overall. But price is vastly higher in general which is the more important metric and in general makes it not worth it for sure unless you just have more money than you want. Certainly it is almost always cheaper to buy a resale ownership though not as flexible but if you really like a place. They were going for $1 a few years back in the downtime.

Actually, the timeshare resale folks had never got one past Marriott ROFR below $5 per point + closing and re-enrollment, which is $2 per pt = $7 which is expensive (to me). But we found a way. There's a website out there I used where you enter your potential purchase and whether or not Marriott exercised ROFR. Mostly, they do on points, they are propping up the price and the real reason, is they make money of course. If someone is trying to sell for $2 per point (and they are), Marriott buys it for $2. Not bad when they sell for 5+ times that. That makes them more money than just letting the sale go and getting the enrollment fee.

You'd be surprised on what is available on points within a 30 day window (which I intend to use given 30% discount). I have a spreadsheet where I have been tracking this (min 7 days in a row, I don't want to go for less than a week). On August 1 for example, I could get into the deserts (no thanks), Lake Tahoe (love the place and have a friend in Reno, perfect time of year), Miami, Orlando, Palm Beach, Panama City, Riviera Beach, all Hawaii islands, Branson (love it), Vegas, Utah, Thailand, Australia (though it's "winter"), Aruba Ocean club, St Kitts, Frenchmans Cove. All of these had at least a week available for points use. That makes, for example, Kauai 1,631 points. Orlando just over 1000, Utah (good summer spot) 881. Granted many people especially younger folks can't make plans that quickly, we can. So, once I get a year of data, I can plan out a year as far as what is cheapest time of year for a destination, and, does it generally have availability within 30 days. Other summer months had Spain and some others available within 30 day window.