Newbie Question

Which mandatory resort has the lowest maintenance fees?

Tucson traveler said:

Which mandatory resort has the lowest maintenance fees?

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If you are buying a Platinum Plus unit then WKV or WSJ (mandatory hillside)

Thank you! We would like the ability to try different places but we do love Lagunamar so am not sure which way to go, buying there or a mandatory resort. Is it possible to trade into Hawaii. or Lagunamar if we purchase at Kirland.

Tucson traveler said:

Thank you! We would like the ability to try different places but we do love Lagunamar so am not sure which way to go, buying there or a mandatory resort. Is it possible to trade into Hawaii. or Lagunamar if we purchase at Kirland.

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My only ownership is wkv 2bed PP. Successfully staroptioned into Bahamas, St John and Lagunamar. Not yet shopped for HI but should be good for their also.

Tucson traveler said:

Thank you! We would like the ability to try different places but we do love Lagunamar so am not sure which way to go, buying there or a mandatory resort. Is it possible to trade into Hawaii. or Lagunamar if we purchase at Kirland.

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Yes, with Kierland, you get Staroptions when you buy resale, and at 8 mos. before check-in, you can "attempt" to make a reservation for Hawaii or Lagunamar.

Lagunamar is fairly easy year-round. Maui is more difficult, and some weeks like Christmas and New Years cannot be reserved with Staroptions.

If you are locked into school holidays, it will be more difficult - for instance, right now, there is zero Maui inventory for July, and the 8 mo. reservation window hasn't even opened.

If you can travel any time, and you make your reservation exactly when the reservation window opens at 8 months, you will have a lot more success.

At Kierland, you want a 2 Bd. Plat week with 148,100 Staroptions, and that will cost you $15-20K on the resale market, so not exactly cheap.

The cheapest mandatory resort is Sheraton Vistana Villages, but the MF is higher. You can often acquire SVV deeds for less than $1,000.

9) What do Mandatory and Voluntary mean?

a. If a resort is Staroption "Mandatory," it means that when the week is sold to a new owner (resale) the Staroption value of the week transfers to the new owner, and the new owner has the right to exchange his timeshare in the Starwood Vacation Network. These resorts are Staroption Mandatory:

* Harborside at Atlantis
* Vistana Villages (Bella and Key West phases only)
* Westin St. John (Virgin Grand - Hillside only)
* Westin Ka'anapali & Westin Ka'anapali-North
* Westin Kierland Villas

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Lagunamar is hard to get into during the event weeks of Christmas and New Years. I own week 51 and we go every year. I've also tried to use SO from my WKV ownership to extend the week into New Years and have had no success.

DeniseM said:

Yes, with Kierland, you get Staroptions when you buy resale, and at 8 mos. before check-in, you can "attempt" to make a reservation for Hawaii or Lagunamar.

Lagunamar is fairly easy year-round. Maui is more difficult, and some weeks like Christmas and New Years cannot be reserved with Staroptions.

If you are locked into school holidays, it will be more difficult - for instance, right now, there is zero Maui inventory for July, and the 8 mo. reservation window hasn't even opened.

If you can travel any time, and you make your reservation exactly when the reservation window opens at 8 months, you will have a lot more success.

At Kierland, you want a 2 Bd. Plat week with 148,100 Staroptions, and that will cost you $15-20K on the resale market, so not exactly cheap.

The cheapest mandatory resort is Sheraton Vistana Villages, but the MF is higher. You can often acquire SVV deeds for less than $1,000.

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It all depends on when you want to go to Lagunamar. If you want to go in Platinum Plus, then you probably would need to buy Kierland since you will need the higher StarOptions. If you only need to go in Gold Plus, then a Vistana Villages high season would do the trick but still with higher MFs than Kierland. This is what we did and just used our 81,000 StarOptions to book 13 nights in May. Though when Vistana converts the Westin Hotel in Cancun to timeshare, there is a chance they will increase the StarOptions at Lagunamar to increase the sales price at the new property.

Kierland vs Vistana Villages. Kierland has a lower MF per SO, but a much higher upfront cost. SVV has a lower upfront cost but a higher MF per SO. I did the analysis and I think it was about 8-10 years where the higher upfront costs breaks even with the higher MF.

I hope they increase the SO at WLR when the Westin Cancun goes into sales. We have stayed at the Westin Cancun several times and while it is a nice resort, it isn't anything like Lagunamar - location and quality-wise. Plus, there isn't as much property space for large pools and the slide like they have at Lagunamar. I would hope they would increase the SO similar to the difference phases at WSJ.

dioxide45 said:

It all depends on when you want to go to Lagunamar. If you want to go in Platinum Plus, then you probably would need to buy Kierland since you will need the higher StarOptions. If you only need to go in Gold Plus, then a Vistana Villages high season would do the trick but still with higher MFs than Kierland. This is what we did and just used our 81,000 StarOptions to book 13 nights in May. Though when Vistana converts the Westin Hotel in Cancun to timeshare, there is a chance they will increase the StarOptions at Lagunamar to increase the sales price at the new property.

Kierland vs Vistana Villages. Kierland has a lower MF per SO, but a much higher upfront cost. SVV has a lower upfront cost but a higher MF per SO. I did the analysis and I think it was about 8-10 years where the higher upfront costs breaks even with the higher MF.

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FYI - 4 Mexican Holiday Weeks -include 2 floating on either side of Easter Sunday

cubigbird said:

Lagunamar is hard to get into during the event weeks of Christmas and New Years. I own week 51 and we go every year. I've also tried to use SO from my WKV ownership to extend the week into New Years and have had no success.

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****
Christmas Week and New Years are 2 of the 4 big Mexican Holiday Weeks.
they are always consistent. (ie 51 & 52)

The other 2 big Mexican Holiday Weeks are the 2 weeks on either side of Easter Sunday . Since Easter floats you need to plan ahead if you wish to go in
March/ April .

Many Mexican TS resort systems (inc.Vidanta/Mayan that I own) - do not include these 4 weeks in regular use contracts .
On RCI week exchanges the TPU's needed go up significantly compared to weeks just before or after .

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I saw a Sheraton Vistana Village for under 4,000 with around 1,300 main tenance fees by Buy My Timeshare Now. It claims 81,000 pts. It sounds too good to be true. Am I missing something and is this a broker to avoid. We used Fidelity resales for our 2 Hyatt weeks and were happy with them but did not see much inventory for Westin there. Any suggestions for brokers. We are going back to Lagunamar in March. We were offered 5 nights in a 1 bedroom for under $500 to attend another presentation. We are very excited about going back. I can't say enough good things about the resort!

Tucson traveler said:

I saw a Sheraton Vistana Village for under 4,000 with around 1,300 main tenance fees by Buy My Timeshare Now. It claims 81,000 pts. It sounds too good to be true. Am I missing something and is this a broker to avoid. We used Fidelity resales for our 2 Hyatt weeks and were happy with them but did not see much inventory for Westin there. Any suggestions for brokers. We are going back to Lagunamar in March. We were offered 5 nights in a 1 bedroom for under $500 to attend another presentation. We are very excited about going back. I can't say enough good things about the resort!

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$4000 for SVV Mandatory is actually kind of high. You might do better on Redweek or Tug Classifieds. I'm in the process of selling my SVV worth 95,700 SOs for $2750, with buyer paying closing costs. The seller found my ad on TUG. $2750 is actually a little low but I wanted to get rid of it this year before 2017 MFs were due.

Tucson traveler said:

I saw a Sheraton Vistana Village for under 4,000 with around 1,300 main tenance fees by Buy My Timeshare Now. It claims 81,000 pts. It sounds too good to be true. Am I missing something and is this a broker to avoid. We used Fidelity resales for our 2 Hyatt weeks and were happy with them but did not see much inventory for Westin there. Any suggestions for brokers. We are going back to Lagunamar in March. We were offered 5 nights in a 1 bedroom for under $500 to attend another presentation. We are very excited about going back. I can't say enough good things about the resort!

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Two phases at SVV are mandatory (have Staroptions on resale) - the others are not:

* Vistana Villages (Bella and Key West phases only)

$4,000 is actually on the high end - we have seen these for less than $1,000.

Why are they so cheap?


Compared to Westin Kierland Villas:

WKV

Staroptions = 81,000
Plat Season - 1 Bedroom Premium
MF = $838.98
Taxes = 28.35 (billed separately)
SVN Fee - $140


SVV - Key West

Staroptions = $81,000
Plat Season - 2 Bedroom
MF = $1,138
SVN Fee = $140

So this is the trade-off:

Thank you both. Those MF are still very reasonable.

Be aware, that at the top new resorts, 81,000 Staroptions is only enough for a one bedroom - you need 148,100 Staroptions for a 2 bdm. during high season, at the top new resorts.

Are there many 1 bedrooms at the top resorts? I know for our Hyatt Hawaii resort in Maui there are not many 1 bedrooms built in the resort and no studios.

Tucson traveler said:

Are there many 1 bedrooms at the top resorts? I know for our Hyatt Hawaii resort in Maui there are not many 1 bedrooms built in the resort and no studios.

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Yes - because they have two bedroom lock-offs. Half the lock-off is a 1 bdm.

P.S. If you get a 2 bdrm L/O at SVV Bella or Key West, for ~$1400 in MFs, you can get 95,700 SOs annually, which will get you a 1 bdrm at WSJ during platinum plus season or a 1 bdrm WKORV Ocean Front unit year round. (All subject to availability, of course.)