# Where can you trade into with post BS weaker SA weeks?



## jancpa (Jun 4, 2006)

Aside from Orlando, Williamsburg and Branson, where in the United States can you get a decent trade with weaker post BS South African weeks?

Thanks for any suggestions.


----------



## short (Jun 4, 2006)

Generally there is a lot of availability in the Eastern US from Florida to the NE starting in Sept and ending about February.

Try Myrtle Beach in Nov-Feb.

Short


----------



## ELE (Jun 4, 2006)

Although my SA weeks are weaker, I have found that searching consistently at various times of the day and night have gotten some good trades. You should find places that you want to go during shoulder seasons.  Of course, Florida is usually good, so is Atlantic City and Williamsburg.  If you can do last minute travel, there are often unexpected weeks available one to three weeks before check in.


----------



## Eric in McLean (Jun 4, 2006)

Cayman for next Thanksgiving (2007)


----------



## JACKC (Jun 22, 2006)

We put in ongoing searches around March, 2006 for Virginia Beach and for Fox Run (NC) for back-to-back vacations in late May using post BS white Sudwala weeks.

 We had our Fox Run within a couple of weeks. Virginia Beach took a little longer, but we were offered 3 choices (we rejected the first two) and took Barklay Towers right on the beach. We had a great vacation!

I don't see much with my Sudwalas just looking. I'm convinced that ongoing searches with RCI pay off, more so than just watching for what comes up in their lists. I find this is true with II as well.

Jack


----------



## bigrick (Jun 22, 2006)

JACKC said:
			
		

> We put in ongoing searches around March, 2006 for Virginia Beach and for Fox Run (NC) for back-to-back vacations in late May using post BS white Sudwala weeks.Jack



Jack, re late May.  Is that May of 2006 or 2007?

Either way, your experience is a good lesson for us.


----------



## JACKC (Jun 22, 2006)

bigrick said:
			
		

> Jack, re late May.  Is that May of 2006 or 2007?
> 
> Either way, your experience is a good lesson for us.



May, 2006. Just a few months out.  We returned a few weeks ago, rested and relaxed.

Yes, I know. For best results with RCI, begin planning one and preferably as much as two years out. This just doesn't match our style of vacationing. I'm sure we miss many good opportunities waiting so long, but we still do ok with just a few months lead time. Last May it was Fox Run (NC) followed by Sheraton Broadway in Myrtle Beach. We've had other decent trades, including some great ones off season in Orlando, without long lead times.

I'm not saying our SA's are hot traders, but they serve a useful purpose in our portfolio. 

Jack


----------



## Gramma5 (Jun 22, 2006)

I've traded into northen Minnesota in July & Aug.& Christmas, the Dells in late July, Sedona in Mar. etc. etc...........


----------



## grest (Jun 23, 2006)

Like others have said, most places are available, but you may need to work a bit harder to get there...isn't that half the fun??
Connie


----------



## banzai (Jun 27, 2006)

I just booked a week at Hacienda del Mar in Cabo for June 2007 with a Mt. Amanzi week deposited just a month or so ago.


----------



## derb (Jun 28, 2006)

*North Carolina Mountains*

The NC mountains have many excellent resorts and are generally available for SA weeks.


----------



## Laurie (Jun 28, 2006)

*Dolomites: Italian Alps*

This is a *great* destination if you love hiking/walking/driving in spectacular scenery. Most of the resorts are probably pretty standard, nothing to write home about, other than a place to hang your hat (which we needed, in June) and hiking poles - at least, ours was. I would have been disappointed had I had any expectations of something better, but we were really there for the outdoors. We just returned from 3 weeks in Italy - Venice, Tuscany, Dolomites - and I enjoyed Dolomites every bit as much as the other 2 - maybe more since it was my first time. Easy SA trade, lots of availability in prime summer and in shoulder season. 

If you love western US National Parks, you would love this region.

I did lots of research in advance, on which lifts were open in early June, and this paid off, ask me if you would like more info.

If we were skiiers I would book this region for a ski trip, for sure.


----------



## dneuser (Jun 29, 2006)

*Re: Dolomites: Italian Alps*

My post BS weeks aren't even good enough to get South Africa any more.  I have 2 different standard SA resorts for prime red floating weeks.  On a recent trade test of my own, I searched with all my available banked weeks for the same period in 2007:  January and August which I know frequently cover holiday periods but which are not necessarily "peak" weeks.

My very, very best trader - Cape Code August 2/2 Studio picked up 20 resorts - many very nice ones all much bigger than 2/2.  Most were 2-3 bedroom units.

My Pre BS "better" SA 1BR 4/2 picked up 11 units - also larger units.
My Pre BS "lesser" SA 1BR 4/2 picked up 17 units - larger units than mine

My Post BS "better" SA trader (because it is the only Post BS SA I have banked) only picked up 2 and for a narrower date range within January and August.

On the off chance that I'd just selected a tough time of year for trading in, I did a similar test for Feb-March time period.  The results with my post BS week were not much better.  It picked up only 1 resort while my pre BS week for the same resort deposited 1 year earlier picked up 8 resorts.

Bottom Line:  SA traders have lost a lot of their power - most notably within SA itself.  Since there are about 165 SA timeshares listed in the RCI system, it's surprising to me that post BS I can't even pick up these weeks that have been deemed to now have "proper trading power" by RCI.  I would think there would be thousands of "overbanked" units just waiting for me to take them off RCI's hands.


----------



## dneuser (Jun 29, 2006)

*Re: Dolomites: Italian Alps*

deleted - duplicate post.


----------



## michelle (Jun 29, 2006)

*Re: Dolomites: Italian Alps*



			
				dneuser said:
			
		

> Bottom Line:  SA traders have lost a lot of their power - most notably within SA itself.  Since there are about 165 SA timeshares listed in the RCI system, it's surprising to me that post BS I can't even pick up these weeks that have been deemed to now have "proper trading power" by RCI.  I would think there would be thousands of "overbanked" units just waiting for me to take them off RCI's hands.



This is not quite correct. Yes, a lot of SAs have lost power, but a lot have also gained, most notably the Gold Crowns in prime locations. I dont have anything to test with at the moment, but I imagine these resorts will do pretty well in a search of +/- 165 SA timeshares, IF they are indeed available. And it is a big IF, since there is a big demand for SA weeks, mostly from within SA, but also from Europe. (And as with everywhere else, the demand for the better resorts in the better areas, in the better seasons will be higher.)


----------



## philemer (Jun 29, 2006)

jancpa said:
			
		

> Aside from Orlando, Williamsburg and Branson, where in the United States can you get a decent trade with weaker post BS South African weeks?
> 
> Thanks for any suggestions.


Anywhere, if you use DAE at www.DAELIVE.com  Not a ton of US weeks available but all weeks trade the same (not sure how long this model will last).

Phil


----------



## dneuser (Jun 30, 2006)

*South Africa Trades within South Africa*



			
				michelle said:
			
		

> This is not quite correct. Yes, a lot of SAs have lost power, but a lot have also gained, most notably the Gold Crowns in prime locations. I dont have anything to test with at the moment, but I imagine these resorts will do pretty well in a search of +/- 165 SA timeshares, IF they are indeed available. And it is a big IF, since there is a big demand for SA weeks, mostly from within SA, but also from Europe. (And as with everywhere else, the demand for the better resorts in the better areas, in the better seasons will be higher.)



You are right Michelle.  I've seen other owners of GC SAs say their weeks trade better in prime locations post BS, but I don't recall anyone testing that premise within SA itself.  It would be interesting for someone with a GC SA week to try trades within SA and test it against super traders from outside of SA to see if your good SA weeks get you good SA trades and what they are.   I could definitly see that a lot of the GCs were available in SA with my Cape Code summer week.  

If all has been appropriately equalized with SA weeks, I would also have expectation that the dozens of STD resorts in peak or red week ranges would still trade reasonably well for STD resorts w/i SA during peak or red weeks.  My own trade test seems to indicate that's not true.  The weeks are out there at lots of STD resorts that I can see with my Cape Cod summer week but there's nothing there when I check with my better-than-average but "uncrowned" STD SA weeks.  And most interesting of all was the the fact that my CC trader, which usually gets almost anything out there, never found one week at either of my STD resorts for any time of the year.  I would expect that, if they are over-deposited in RCI as we all have been told, there should be tons of them out there.  It's not a VEP issue, for sure, as anyone who has ever been to a CC resort knows it's about the location and the season -- not about the amenities.  CC summer and So. Cal beach resorts are among some of the best low buy-in traders around -- they can pull almost anything -- because they bypass VEP and pull the good, the bad and the ugly and give you the widest choice possible.

And I also found something really interesting with my two Pre BS SA resorts.  They have not been redeposited or changed in any way since they were first deposited in early 2005.  RCI told us that their trade power would not change unless re-deposited.  Up until early this year (I think around February or March was when I first noticed it) that was true.  My resort "A" always traded much better than resort "B" in almost every region of the world except the Western US where resort "B" seemed to pull better slightly better trades.  This Spring I started to notice that my Resort "B" was trading as good or better than my resort "A".   The trade power has definitely been adjusted.  Just seemed strange to me.  I'm not complaining about it.

Since SA has only been integrated for a little over a year, I would expect to see trade power fluctuate year-to-year until it finds it's correct place in the overall matrix and until demand can be truly determined in the exchange network.  Until SA was integrated into RCI completely, Non-SA RCI members couldn't even do online searches for SA.  Now that they can, we could see an entirely different picture of demand.  GCs should still pull better options, but you never know, there are probably some very ordinary, STD, CC and SoCal type resorts in SA that, because of location, can take you anywhere on a trade.


----------



## philemer (Jun 30, 2006)

SA is surely a dilemma. It will be interesting to see how things look a year from now. If anyone's deposit cannot pull a SA resort, ever, I'd say it has low trade power (TP). 

I just searched all of SA for Jan. and Aug. 2007 also and I pulled 20 resorts in Jan. and 18 in Aug. This was using my best trader, a UT ski week. I do own a SA week (Tenbury) but I don't have one avail. w/RCI right now. Wish I did.

If anyone with a SA week would like to do a trade test against my good trader I'd be happy to do it.

Phil


----------



## RayHoek (Jun 30, 2006)

Last minute decision we decided to go to SA this Serptember.
With our Kruger Park Lodge deposited early 2005 we have traded into Kwa Maritane 8/6 (ongoing search for about 4 weeks) and with this years Place on the Bay we have just had confirmed the Peninsula 6/4. This is a school holiday week in SA and were suprised we got it reasonably quick. We had an ongoing search for about 3 weeks for either Place on the Bay, Bantry Bay, or Peninsula. I know September isn't peak peak in Capetown, great spring weather not too hot.


----------



## Iowa Rod (Jun 30, 2006)

I have not noticed difference with my 2007 Dik week. I just got a march 1 bedroom manhattan club.
Rod


----------



## jancpa (Jul 1, 2006)

Rod

I own at Dikhololo also but did not have much luck using Dik for MHC.

What size and week do you own?

Tim


----------



## tedk (Jul 1, 2006)

Just done searches useing two of my south african weeks for internal exchanges. For january they pulled 25 resorts, august 22 resorts. I used the strand and peninsula.


----------



## Carolinian (Jul 2, 2006)

In spite of what I would have speculated myself, this model does work and does have staying power.  DAE has grown into a powerhouse in its own backyard, Australia, using it for over a decade, and has more recently brought the model to the US.  Even before DAE, the model has worked for Australian independent Interchange, which has been around since 1988.




			
				philemer said:
			
		

> Anywhere, if you use DAE at www.DAELIVE.com  Not a ton of US weeks available but all weeks trade the same (not sure how long this model will last).
> 
> Phil


----------

