# Just started with Shell, found TUG



## ShirazFan (Dec 3, 2009)

Hi, everyone.

My wife and I were on a trip to San Francisco last summer (2009) when we ran into the offer for a Shell presentation.  I was very leery, and needless to say didn't know much about timeshares and had never visited TUG, but after a few hours we "gave in" and ended up purchasing a very basic "starter package" of 1500 permanent points in Shell West for about $7/pt.  They also threw in 2,000 bonus points that we had a year to use.

When I went to research more, it was a couple months later -- far beyond the rescind period.  At first, all I found on the internet was Shell promotional material and Shell horror stories.  I disregarded the promotional stuff, of course.  The horror stories seemed to fall into 2 categories -- (1) people who didn't actually comprehend what they were truthfully told, to which I cannot sympathize, and (2) people who claimed they were misled or lied to by salespeople, which does bother me.  I'm not sure how common the latter is; we were certainly given a "hard sell" at our presentation, but I can't say we were misled in any way, with one significant exception.  The impression was given to us that only owners can stay at the Shell resorts.  I now know this is not true; in fact I had no idea one can book rooms at the resorts just like any other hotel.

I will say TUG is the first (only) place I have found that has information that is not promotional and also not "this is a scam, they should be sued".

Anyway, before I found TUG and had any idea about the resale market, I did some net present value calculations and figured out pretty soon that buying from the developer is not a good option.  The main thing I had failed to take into account when making the original decision was the MFs.  I also had no comparison rental costs.  So I am in definite agreement that buying from the developers is overpriced.  I even saw the spreadsheet that one poster made regarding present values and agree with the conclusion, although I think a better analysis wouldn't be focused so specific, and the same would apply to any purchase from a developer, not just Shell.

Of course, then I found out about the resale market and I've been kicking myself for making a decision I wouldn't have made earlier with the information I know now, but after taking everything I've learned into account, I think it could have been much worse.  It's not like I bought 5-10K of points, and I'm happy with the service so far.  I am considering purchasing more permanent points (7-8K) at some point in the future RESALE.

Many people seem down on Shell because of the high MFs.  Others have expressed that they feel the MFs are worth the quality they are getting.  I think it depends a lot on your own situation.  Personally, I don't think I would have just "given in" to any timeshare presentation and purchased just anything that day.  One of the reasons we decided to go ahead with it is that many of the resorts are within close driving distance and we knew we would use them.  We like to attend operas and theater and so the Inn at the Opera seemed particularly attractive and convenient.  And even the SoCal locations (we are in NoCal) are within driving distance.

Here's what we have done so far:  My wife is attending a conference in Sacramento next week and used some of the bonus points for that.  We also went up to Vino Bello this past week for our honeymoon.  We were given 2 nights stay at the Meritage "on the house" for attending their 90 minute sales pitch again.  We then bought a third night 1-bedroom at Vino Bello for 400 points.  That means so far, we've only used about 1,000 of our bonus points and none of our annual 1,500 to stay 4 nights.  The Napa stay was great.  We were originally put into the most basic room at the Meritage -- a place to stay, but nothing worth paying points for.  The bellhop found out we were on our honeymoon, and they immediately moved us to the top room available -- a treat!  We didn't use the pool or spa, and the constant Muzak was a little off-putting, but the wine was good and the staff were excellent and made us feel special.  They even arranged to have a specific spot at the Vino Bello ready for us ahead of time so that they could help us move all our stuff to our new room.  The Vino Bello room was great too, the only downside I would say was that the floors seemed a bit thin?  Someone was pacing up and down and moving things in the room above us and it made a lot of noise.

I did some quick calculations and it seems about 10K points runs about $1600/year in MFs?  We plan on owning for many years (we're in our early 30s) so the cost of the points themselves (even with the original 1500 from the developer) is not as big an item in the long run.

I have a couple general questions too:

1. Given the economy has gotten very bad recently, I assume supply of points has gone up, demand down, so that the $1/pt resale price used to be more?  What was the rate 2-3 years ago? 5 years ago?

2. What's the major reason for the gap between developer and resale price?  Lack of information?  Has the market just not reached equilibrium yet?  I would expect to see in the long run given better information access the gap to decline.

Thanks.


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## aliikai2 (Dec 3, 2009)

ShirazFan said:


> Hi, everyone.
> 
> 
> I did some quick calculations and it seems about 10K points runs about $1600/year in MFs?  We plan on owning for many years (we're in our early 30s) so the cost of the points themselves (even with the original 1500 from the developer) is not as big an item in the long run.
> ...


That $1 a point is the price from a few years ago, today the resale value is near 0 per point


> 2. What's the major reason for the gap between developer and resale price?  Lack of information?


The retail market works on people not researching their purchase as they are on vacation, as more and more resorts have wifi or travelers are using smart phones, this information gap is starting to crack, part of why for the 1st time in 30 years the retail sales of " New units" has fallen. 


> Has the market just not reached equilibrium yet?  I would expect to see in the long run given better information access the gap to decline.


If you are expecting the developer to drop their pricing to be more in line with the resale value, I think you will find that since the merchandising and sales costs of a package run from 50% to 75% of the sale price, this isn't going to happen anytime soon.


> Thanks.



ps you have mail regarding a package of points 

fwiw,

Greg


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## Bill4728 (Dec 3, 2009)

We own at Mountainside Lodge in Whistler BC. The resort is managed by Shell but we own outside of shell. 

My BIL bought 3 resale shell point packages ( $1  $100 & $100) For each the closing cost were by far his biggest cost. Maybe a year or 2 ago, Shell was selling for $1/pt but now a seller would be lucky to get $0.05 - $0.10 /pt ( pretty close to zero). 

 He now has about 7500 pts and paid ~$1700 in MFs.  All pts were in Shell CA (west)


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## am1 (Dec 14, 2009)

Are any new shell resorts being build or nearing completion??  I wonder how much the downturn in the economy will affect resale prices.  So far resale has dropped because of it but if no new resorts are being built less timeshares are being sold (retail) which should mean less timeshares are being dumped on the resale market.  Also the people that currently are buying retail are hopefully in a good financial position and less likely to quickly get rid of their timeshare.  Or the sales people are having to work extra hard and pushing timeshares on anyone they can.


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## Conan (Dec 14, 2009)

am1 said:


> ... but if no new resorts are being built less timeshares are being sold (retail) which should mean less timeshares are being dumped on the resale market.  Also the people that currently are buying retail are hopefully in a good financial position and less likely to quickly get rid of their timeshare.



Sooner or later almost everyone who buys a timeshare at full price realizes that 90% of what the friendly salesperson told them was a lie.  So there's a vast number of owners who are looking for a way out, hence supply in the resale market runs way ahead of demand.


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## Bill4728 (Dec 16, 2009)

am1 said:


> Are any new shell resorts being build or nearing completion??  I wonder how much the downturn in the economy will affect resale prices.  So far resale has dropped because of it but if no new resorts are being built less timeshares are being sold (retail) which should mean less timeshares are being dumped on the resale market.



In this economy, the resorts are finding a lot of owners are not paying their MFs.   So the resort is charging more to the owners who are paying. This make more owners think about dumping their TS. 

SO IMHO, there will be a lot more TS on the resale market not less. ( even with fewer developer built TSs)


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## Picker57 (Dec 16, 2009)

ShirazFan said:


> Hi, everyone.
> 
> I did some quick calculations and it seems about 10K points runs about $1600/year in MFs?  We plan on owning for many years (we're in our early 30s) so the cost of the points themselves (even with the original 1500 from the developer) is not as big an item in the long run.
> 
> Thanks.





You may be a bit low. We recently received our MF statement for next year. We own 8300 points and the billing was for $1687.  However we're in the Hawaii Club, so that may be higher.  If anyone knows fershure, please let me know. 

We, like you, have blown off the $tupid money we paid for purchase, and have sat back to enjoy the facilities.  No, they're not cheap - we're generally in for slightly over $100/night in MF's for the required points - more or less depending on the facility and room specifics.  Those bonus points and nights are pretty nice to use, and it doesn't sound like you bought enough developer points to really get burned. When you buy more points (resale of course), they'll need to be in the same Club in order to be combined (to minimize MF's). 

Enjoy !!

          Zach  aka Picker57

PS   There seems to be a lot of character assassination of timeshare salesmen.  We've had interesting experiences with them, and most were actually pretty pleasant.  The warning flag is when they start with "I'm not supposed to be telling you this, but........".  So far what we've heard after that statement starts ("Shell's buying a place on Maui",  "Shell will buy your points back for what you paid", and a few other germs) is PURE bovine droppings.


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## goaliemn (Dec 17, 2009)

Picker57 said:


> You may be a bit low. We recently received our MF statement for next year. We own 8300 points and the billing was for $1687.  However we're in the Hawaii Club, so that may be higher.  If anyone knows fershure, please let me know.


It does vary from club to club.  I've seen some charts that show the cost per point, and the base membership was higher for HI


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## Picker57 (Dec 17, 2009)

Shell recently sent out a Member Satisfaction Survey. While somewhat self-aggrandizing, it still asked some good questions. One of those was something about perceived value.  I hope they make the results available. 

              ZK[/B]


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