Suggestions for starter TS with low MF and decent exchange potential?

Talent312 said:

Looks like you're being steered into buying a trader wherever it may be, which is fine, as long as that is your motif, but bear in mind that there may come a day when your travels are more like staycations.

Wanderlust is a fine thing when you're full of vim and vigor and time means little. But one day, that hop down the highway may seem more inviting. That's one reason why it's often suggested here that you buy where you can easily go, without much hassle.

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Mel, Read the above words as TUG wisdom. While exchanging is one large reason many of us own timeshares, and you are looking at the all-around cheapest way to do it, there is NO SUBSTITUTE for owning where you like to go. I'll repeat: For cheapness, own where you like to go! No membership needed in an exchange company. No exchange fees. If it's within driving range, no airfares. You know how the kitchen/laundry are equipped and can pack accordingly.

Jim

Passepartout said:

Mel, Read the above words as TUG wisdom. While exchanging is one large reason many of us own timeshares, and you are looking at the all-around cheapest way to do it, there is NO SUBSTITUTE for owning where you like to go. I'll repeat: For cheapness, own where you like to go! No membership needed in an exchange company. No exchange fees. If it's within driving range, no airfares. You know how the kitchen/laundry are equipped and can pack accordingly.

Jim

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The best timeshare to own is a fixed unit, fixed week, at a place you want to go every year and that is also well managed. It's truly the equivalent of owning an actual condo or vacation property where you rent it out the times you aren't there except its even better than that with less worry. No reservation or exchange worries needed.

I have been a big exchanger but exchanging amounts to little more than prepaying vacation rentals and being committed for the future and then some.

I am not sure why RCI points are recommended so prominently here to a newbie. I thought since the launch of TPUs by RCI, points become less important but I could be wrong. Personally, owning a high TPU week works well enough for me.

Not to mention if you own a fixed week and can drive to it you also save on the cost of a rental car. And, of course you can still exchange your fixed week if you want to go elsewhere.

The thing with points that makes them popular is that you can do shorter stays and also carryover points, possibly allowing the owner to get an additional vacation week out of them.The exchange fee (for RCI) is also inexpensive- I think it is $40). Not sure how the maintenance fees work with points- I think they are the same- but them you can get that extra week sometimes and no maintenance fee for that (I think).

There are some people who just don't care about having the same unit every year, etc. But, I really like having my fixed weeks which is why I am trying to acquire another one to tack onto my fixed summer week. And the pre-assigned floater that is attached to my fixed week is very enjoyable to have because it is a different week every year-spring or fall, but still at our home resort. Occasionally we exchange it, but- again- to somewhere we can drive to for the most part at this stage of our lives. But we used to exchange it to go all over the country.

Regarding the debate on owning where you stay versus exchanging, I love exchanging. If you own a trader with low MFs, you can get great exchanges very cheaply. In some cases it's much cheaper to get an exchange than to own, even after paying exchange company fees. For example, DVC (Disney Vacation Club) costs a ton if you're an owner -- both in purchase price and MFs -- but is much cheaper as an RCI exchange. (I own DVC, but I generally rent out my DVC points and exchange in via RCI instead.)

mpumilia said:

...The exchange fee (for RCI) is also inexpensive- I think it is $40). Not sure how the maintenance fees work with points- I think they are the same- but them you can get that extra week sometimes and no maintenance fee for that (I think).....

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The $40 RCI Points exchange fee is only if you exchange back to your own resort during the brief "Home Resort Exchange Window." If you exchange to any other resort, or exchange to your home resort outside that window, then the fee is much higher. For a full week's exchange, it's $169 if you exchange online to another Points resort. (If you use your Points account to exchange to a Weeks unit, it costs the full Weeks exchange fee, which I think is currently $209.)

The maintenance fees work the same with RCI Points as they do with RCI Weeks. With RCI Points, you still own your underlying week and pay the fees the same as if you were using the week yourself rather than trading. The only thing that changes is how you trade your week. RCI doesn't offer any programs to get extra points for free, although some resorts have various programs to get extra weeks at a discount. Sometimes these extra weeks can be traded in RCI.

While we're on the topic of RCI Points fees, AFAIK, saving points from one year to the next requires a $26 fee unless one has paid for an RCI Points transaction during that use year. Most of us Tuggers who own RCI Points make multiple transactions a year, which is probably why many people here don't know about this fee. (If you want to extend your points so they are usable a third year, that costs $65-$105, whether you have made a Points transaction or not.)

Although it may sound as if I am criticizing RCI Points, I actually like RCI Points a lot. I use it to trade for the DVC, which is one of RCI Point's real strengths -- much better availability than in RCI Weeks. I just want to clarify what the fees are. The fees are listed here: http://pgs.rci.com/landing/ptr/fees/indexUS.html

I can verify, though, that there is no fee to combine RCI Points from different resorts. (There *is* a fee in RCI Weeks to combine different deposits.)

Thanks, JudyS. I never fully understood how the various fees work in the points system. It all sounds complicated to me (and another way for the exchange companies to get more fees) which is why I personally like the simplicity of weeks. But I know many people really like points. Whatever works- different strokes for different folks!

JudyS - thanks for providing the specific information on the fees. In RCI Weeks - by the time you pay for your membership, then pay for your deposit, then pay for the exchange, RCI fees can really add up. It is kind of deceptive really and I think a lot of people either just don't think about it or don't consider that in the beginning.

You Typed A Mouthful.

ace2000 said:

In RCI Weeks - by the time you pay for your membership, then pay for your deposit, then pay for the exchange, RCI fees can really add up. It is kind of deceptive really and I think a lot of people either just don't think about it or don't consider that in the beginning.

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RCI fees have escalated to the point that it's getting harder & harder to get luxury timeshare accommodations at Motel 6 & Super 8 rates.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

AwayWeGo said:

RCI fees have escalated to the point that it's getting harder & harder to get luxury timeshare accommodations at Motel 6 & Super 8 rates.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

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We've found similar experiences. It's getting to the point that cruises and VRBOs are competitive with timeshare exchanges when you total up all the nit-picking expenses. The fact that all the costs (initial buy-in, MF, exchange co. membership, exchange fees, possible SA's, taxes, resort fees for parking, internet, etc. etc.) all come due at different times- some spaced out over multiple years- masks the fact that timesharing isn't as el-cheapo as it used to be. Square that with the fact that one is pretty much 'trapped' in the cycle of ownership expenses by the difficulty of and lack of ready market to unload your unwanted timeshares just adds to the cost and uncertainty. <sigh>

Jim

Great Advice - Too much good stuff to even quote!!

Thank you all for the great insight. Too much really valuable stuff here to even try to quote at this point!

It has become clear to me that if I want to go the points route, I really need to figure out how many points I need annually and then devise a strategy to get that in an economical way with as little risk as possible. Thanks to you all I have the benchmarks by which to judge a "good deal", and a framework within which to make a plan. I think I will probably pursue that as a longer range plan, once I am more familiar with the ins and outs of TS ownership.

For now I am going to start out with a property I located through the bargains forum (YAY TUG) that has low MF and is in a location I already know I love and would like to visit on a regular basis. It's a TS I will likely just use as-is, but will also give me a toe-hold into II for access to getaways so I can start exploring some other locations and properties when it its a good enough "deal" for me to do so.

Thank you all again for all of the wonderful insight and advice.

Gratefully,
Mel

MelM said:

Thank you all for the great insight. Too much really valuable stuff here to even try to quote at this point!

It has become clear to me that if I want to go the points route, I really need to figure out how many points I need annually and then devise a strategy to get that in an economical way with as little risk as possible. Thanks to you all I have the benchmarks by which to judge a "good deal", and a framework within which to make a plan. I think I will probably pursue that as a longer range plan, once I am more familiar with the ins and outs of TS ownership.

For now I am going to start out with a property I located through the bargains forum (YAY TUG) that has low MF and is in a location I already know I love and would like to visit on a regular basis. It's a TS I will likely just use as-is, but will also give me a toe-hold into II for access to getaways so I can start exploring some other locations and properties when it its a good enough "deal" for me to do so.

Thank you all again for all of the wonderful insight and advice.

Gratefully,
Mel

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That strategy puts you on the right track............

Pat

mpumilia said:

Thanks, JudyS. I never fully understood how the various fees work in the points system. It all sounds complicated to me (and another way for the exchange companies to get more fees) which is why I personally like the simplicity of weeks. But I know many people really like points. Whatever works- different strokes for different folks!

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There is a lot that is complicated in RCI Points. I've owned RCI Points for quite a while -- close to 10 years, I think. So, I've had a chance to figure out how it works (often with little help from the RCI reps, who often seem confused by RCI Points themselves.)

By the way, I see you are from Pine Bush, NY. I lived there for about five years when I was growing up. Small world!

JudyS said:

There is a lot that is complicated in RCI Points. I've owned RCI Points for quite a while -- close to 10 years, I think. So, I've had a chance to figure out how it works (often with little help from the RCI reps, who often seem confused by RCI Points themselves.)

By the way, I see you are from Pine Bush, NY. I lived there for about five years when I was growing up. Small world!

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Wow! That is so funny! We actually live up in the Walker Valley area- in the Town of Mamakating (Sullivan County)- you know- in the Twilight Zone where the 3 counties (Orange, Sullivan and Ulster)meet. Been here since 1987; Lived in Monroe for 10 years previously, but I grew up in Rockland County.

When our family asks about timeshare, I steer them toward WorldMark points. We live west, and the WorldMark resorts nearby are worthy of staying without exchanging. Estes Park, Windsor (Napa Valley) and Yellowstone were three big reasons we bought.

rickandcindy23 said:

When our family asks about timeshare, I steer them toward WorldMark points. We live west, and the WorldMark resorts nearby are worthy of staying without exchanging. Estes Park, Windsor (Napa Valley) and Yellowstone were three big reasons we bought.

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I live in MI and there were no reasonable timeshares for me to purchase with a summer use, so I purchased a flex week that I can use in the winter and early spring and late fall in MI and then my beloved SDO. I wish something like Welk was within driving distance of my state...you are so lucky:whoopie: