# High Country Club new rates ($ per night)



## Steamboat Bill (Feb 11, 2007)

On March 1, 2007, High Country Club will have a new pricing structure:

The buy-in price for an Affiliate Memebership increases from $30,000 to $40,000 and the MF increases from $4,800 to $5,400, but you get an extra 4 night of use.

The Private Membership increases from $50,000 to $60,000, but the MF stays the same at $8,400 for 45 nights of use.

Thus, I will compare the two plans (before and after changes):

Assume the total cost per night = lost opportunity cost per night (5%) of buy-in + annual cost per night (MF divided by night of use)

Current HCC affiliate membership (before March 1, 2007):
$30,000 purchase price, $4,800 annual dues, 21 nights usage, 
Cost per night = $71 + $229 = $300 per night

New HCC affiliate membership (after March 1, 2007):
$40,000 purchase price, $5,400 annual dues, 25 nights usage, 
Cost per night = $80 + $216 = $296 per night

Current HCC Private membership (before March 1, 2007):
$50,000 purchase price, $8,400 annual dues, 45 nights usage, 
Cost per night = $56 + $187 = $243 per night

New HCC Private membership (after March 1, 2007):
$60,000 purchase price, $8,400 annual dues, 45 nights usage, 
Cost per night = $67 + $187 = $254 per night

The interesting thing is that the average cost per night for the Affiliate Membership actually DECREASES $4 per night under the new plan and the average cost per night for the Private Membership actually INCREASES $11 per night under the new plan.

No matter how you slice it....it is WAY cheaper than any other Destination Club and is cheaper than DVC and Marriott Hawaii or Ski weeks.


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## travelguy (Feb 12, 2007)

*High Country Club Private Membership fee increase date*

Bill,

The High Country Club membership fee increase information that you posted is correct except for the dates of the increases.  They are as follows:

Affiliate Membership – March 1, 2007

Private Membership – MAY 1, 2007

Group Membership – July 1, 2007 (from $60K to $70K)

Corporate Membership – July 1, 2007 (from $60K to $70K)


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 12, 2007)

travelguy said:


> The High Country Club membership fee increase information that you posted is correct except for the dates of the increases.
> 
> They are as follows:
> 
> ...




Ooops....my bad.

I just ASSumed that all price increases would take place in March. The stagered dates seem a little strange to me, but I am sure they have a good reason to do this.

I am more concerned about the $ cost per night with the new plan.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 12, 2007)

OK...I just got off the phone with Heath at HCC and received a ton of info...some I will post now and some later.

They raised the days of usage to 25 nights because other DC have this as their Affiliate membership. They are really interested in raising their buy-in price so they can start to pay down their mortgages. The MF is primarily used for yearly expenses and maintenance. 

HCC does not make projections based upon $/night like I have been posting...they will consider this in the future as I told them that is how we (the members) compare resorts.

Current $30,000 buy-in affiliate members can upgrade to the new 25 night usage for FREE as long as they pay the increased MF....

Current HCC affiliate membership (before March 1, 2007):
$30,000 purchase price, $4,800 annual dues, 21 nights usage, 
Cost per night = $71 + $229 = $300 per night

Free upgrade to 25 nights @ $5400 MF
Cost per night = $71 + $216 = $287 per night

They also are planning on a few new locations for 2007....(hint....think elvis) and one close to where I live....(hint....bikini models).

Thay are also going thru a voluntary audit by the Destination Club Alliance and will report that they are financially solid and have the equity in their properties to pay back members if the club goes bust or there is a mass exit of members wanting to sell.

I also e-mailed them a list of 10 things I want changed or improved about the club and they are already instituting a few of them as we speak (hint....reservations will be based upon EST rather than CST...).


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## Bourne (Feb 12, 2007)

Steamboat Bill said:


> Current $30,000 buy-in affiliate members can upgrade to the new 25 night usage for FREE as long as they pay the increased MF....



That is good news. If the offer is extended to me, I would certainly take it. Any idea if the offer is open to all members and would require a new contract.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 12, 2007)

Bourne said:


> That is good news. If the offer is extended to me, I would certainly take it. Any idea if the offer is open to all members and would require a new contract.



I am sure there would be a modification to any current contracts. Give Heath a call and tell him you heard about the FREE upgrade from me.

The exciting thing about this new option is that the NYC property is available on a 3 or 4 night useage. As future properties like Las Vegas, Miami, Chicago, Boston...city properties are added...they all should have the ability for 3/4 night rentals rather than the 7 night rentals like the Ski/Beach weeks.


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## lostinjapan14 (Feb 12, 2007)

Steamboat Bill said:


> The exciting thing about this new option is that the NYC property is available on a 3 or 4 night rental. As future properties like Las Vegas, Miami, Chicago, Boston...city properties are added...they all should have the ability for 3/4 night rentals rather than the 7 night rentals like the Ski/Beach weeks.



Bill, not picking at your word choice, just looking for clarification.  You don't mean "rental" do you?  You mean a week or 3/4 days of "use", right?


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 13, 2007)

lostinjapan14 said:


> Bill, not picking at your word choice, just looking for clarification.  You don't mean "rental" do you?  You mean a week or 3/4 days of "use", right?



yes...sometimes my fingers type faster than my brain can work....I have edited my post to reflect that the HCC NYC property offers three options:

3 night use - Sun-Tue nights
4 night use - Wed-Sat nights
7 night use - 

All three options are possible with your membership. The neat thing about the new 25 day option is that is allows for 3 full weeks of vacation and 1 mini get-away vacation.


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## lostinjapan14 (Feb 13, 2007)

This is really a great deal.  If only I took more than 1-2 vacations that weren't visits to home a year.  But believe me I'm doing everything to justify this purchase.  I've asked 8 friends in the past week!  If I don't make it by the end of the month, I'll probably still be joining in a year or two


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## travelguy (Feb 14, 2007)

*High Country Club NYC Property Reservations*



Steamboat Bill said:


> I have edited my post to reflect that the HCC NYC property offers three options:
> 
> 3 night use - Sun-Tue nights
> 4 night use - Wed-Sat nights
> 7 night use -



FYI - From a recent e-mail that High Country Club Travel Services sent:

NYC property Reservations are:

3 nights – Friday to Monday
4 nights – Monday to Friday
Week – Friday to Friday

This actually makes more sense as the weekends remain intact!


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## Fletcher921 (Feb 14, 2007)

Just curious - what reservations have you been able to make for yourself so far?  Did you find availablity when you were hoping for or did you need to adjust your desired dates?  I am intrigued but cannot justify any more time away - and we are not ready to give up the guaranteed fixed weeks we have in place.
Babs


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## Laura7811 (Feb 14, 2007)

Babs-

I have been a member of HCC, since sept 06. So far, I have made a 4 day res over veterens day, a week in Hi over spring break, a week in cancun the second week in august....and still have 3 days to use somewhere before the end of september..

I have said before, one of the things I like best is HCC reservation process....

Laura


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 14, 2007)

Bourne: Did you join HCC?


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## Bourne (Feb 14, 2007)

Yes, I did. 

However, I have not contacted HCC on the 25 day offer.


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## Laura7811 (Feb 14, 2007)

Bourne-

Congrats on your purchase...Do you think you will ask for the 25 days?
I havn't decided if I need them, I'm having a hard time using what I have...
 Laura


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 14, 2007)

Bourne said:


> Yes, I did.
> 
> However, I have not contacted HCC on the 25 day offer.



I wish you a belated congrats....welcome home (oops that is DVC...sorry)

I think the offer to UPGRADE our membership from 21 nights to 25 nights for FREE (plus a $600 per year increase in MF) is a slam dunk....except I too would have a hard time using all that time. I am about 20 years away from receiving Medicare.

Current $30,000 buy-in affiliate members can upgrade to the new 25 night usage for FREE as long as they pay the increased MF....

Current HCC affiliate membership (before March 1, 2007):
$30,000 purchase price, $4,800 annual dues, 21 nights usage, 
Cost per night = $71 + $229 = $300 per night

Free upgrade to 25 nights @ $5400 MF
Cost per night = $71 + $216 = $287 per night

No matter how you slice it.....$287 per night to stay in $1m homes, condos, and townhomes in fantastic locations is a great deal. I am not aware of any other timeshare, DC, fractional, hotel-condo, etc that can match that offer.

There is a thread on the 20% increase in MF for Harborside Atlantis....and they are paying about $530 per night (my estimation) by owning a 2 bedroom timeshare there. I want to ask them..."who's your daddy now" but that would be mean.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 15, 2007)

*HCC press release*

This is an interesting press release from Helium Reports.

We posted a story last week about the growth of High Country Club. The destination club reached the 200 member milestone, in part due to a deal that waived dues for new members for six months - not one of our favorite tactics, in terms of the impact on the income statement.

We received a response from Christian Kirschner, the CEO of the club. Some excerpts here:

We agree that offering a discount on dues is not feasible long term. Our free dues incentive lasted 45 days (mid-November through December) with the purpose of keeping our momentum through the holidays. In fact, we added 15 new members in January at our standard pricing after the incentive concluded and did not honor it past December 31st. 

We will be increasing our membership pricing again in 2007. March 1st our Affiliate Membership will increase, May 1st our Private Membership will increase, and on July 1st our Group/Private Membership will increase. We are well underway with our plan to raise our pricing to the $100k pricing within the next couple of years.


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## BocaBum99 (Feb 16, 2007)

Steamboat Bill said:


> On March 1, 2007, High Country Club will have a new pricing structure:
> 
> The buy-in price for an Affiliate Memebership increases from $30,000 to $40,000 and the MF increases from $4,800 to $5,400, but you get an extra 4 night of use.
> 
> ...



This methodology is incorrect.  You forgot to include guaranteed depreciation into your calculation.  If you put money into a money market account, the principle amount is virtually guaranteed to be returned.  Not so, with a DC.  So you need to determine a reasonablue use period and depreciate your asset thereby increasing your annual usage.  Also, I wouldn't use 5%.  8% or more would be more in line with the risk you are taking.

And, this assumes that you absolutely will use 100% of your allocated time every year.  Probably won't happen.  90% occupany would be more reasonable, especially given the competition you will face for prime weeks.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 16, 2007)

BocaBum99 said:


> This methodology is incorrect.  You forgot to include guaranteed depreciation into your calculation.  If you put money into a money market account, the principle amount is virtually guaranteed to be returned.  Not so, with a DC.  So you need to determine a reasonablue use period and depreciate your asset thereby increasing your annual usage.  Also, I wouldn't use 5%.  8% or more would be more in line with the risk you are taking.
> 
> And, this assumes that you absolutely will use 100% of your allocated time every year.  Probably won't happen.  90% occupany would be more reasonable, especially given the competition you will face for prime weeks.



I partially agree with you.

True, I never accounted for the GUARANTEED immediate loss of 20% into my HCC $ per night calculations I posted because it would have required too many calculations and I simply assumed that someone would continue their membership for 20-30 years, etc and pass the membership down to their kids when they pass away (insert joke here). 

I did, however, run some calculations myself before I joined and here is a brief summary.

I previously calculated the current HCC affiliate membership (21 nights use) at = $300 per night.

So here are some modified scenarios based upon an immediate loss of 20% on a $30,000 membership fee = $6,000 loss.

If you are a member for 3 years = $2,000 loss per year = $95 per night additional cost. Thus the TRUE cost per night would be $395.

If you are a member for 5 years = $1,200 loss per year = $57 per night additional cost. Thus the TRUE cost per night would be $357.

If you are a member for 10 years = $600 loss per year = $28 per night additional cost. Thus the TRUE cost per night would be $328.

If you are a member for 15 years = $400 loss per year = $19 per night additional cost. Thus the TRUE cost per night would be $319.

As you can see the LONGER you are a member, the LESS impact the 20% loss has on your cost per night. I think, realistically, that I will be a HCC member for 12 years as the kids will be in college then and my wife and I will only need to stay in studios or a 1 bedroom unit. There is also a real possibility that we will be so SPOILED with the HCC accommodations that I will NEVER give up my membership….only time will tell. Be that as it may, the cost per night is still CHEAP in my book for the type of accommodations they provide. 

As a comparison, I have been a 'happy" DVC member for 6 years and will also continue that membership for another 12 years or so, although I will probably reduce the number of points I own. The current TRUE cost (lost opportunity cost + MF) for DVC AKL is about $9 per point/per year and it takes 268 points to stay in a standard 2 BDR unit in the Dream (non-holiday/non-prime week) season = $2,412 per week = $344 per night. A holiday week would be $590 per night (ouch!....but it beats rack rates)….Thus, my HCC membership is actually CHEAPER than DVC and the HCC quality blows DVC away (no comparison here folks).

I have always used 5% in all my calculations for lost opportunity costs as this is a pretty standard no-brainer rate. Yes, the historical average of the stock market has been 11% per year, home mortgages have a 7-8% historical average and you pay taxes on any investment (I also never included that in any of my calculation)….but this really complicates things….go to www.bankrate.com and 5% CD are pretty standard…..If you use 8% (as you suggest) and are in a 35% tax bracket…you still only net 5%.

As far as use is concerned…that is a personal responsibility. All my calculations assume 100% usage. Thus, if you don't use a week or two….it will increase your cost per night. I think it is safe to assume that most TUGers that join HCC as an Affiliate Member will use MOST of their allotment (anything less would be considered an infraction and may get you booted off TUG). The DC data for Private Members shows that rich people only use about 70% of their allotment…but that would be better discussed in another thread.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 16, 2007)

I agree that Destination Clubs need variety and diversity to attract members that are willing to pay top dollar. When I first heard about HCC last year, I did NOT join as they only had 6 properties all located in Colorado. Now that they have 25 properties in places I really want to visit...I joined. Money was not the issue....the choices of properties were!

Here are my brief impressions of the differences:

Full ownership condo = usually one owner and one location

Hotel-condos = a hybrid between a condo and a hotel room, usually one owner and one location

Fractionals = usually 6-12 shared owners in one location, can be a condo, townhouse, home, boat, plane, car, etc

Personal Residence Club = a group of fractional condos with trading between different locations

Destination Club = a bunch of properties owned by a corporation with dues-paying members that can use the properties

Timeshares - we all know what these are!


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 16, 2007)

PerryM said:


> I suspect that VRBO is a viable alternative to HCC at least.  I suspect that the high end DCs are the same way – renting costs about the same or is cheaper than a DC.



Yes, VRBO is always an option and requires $0 membership fees.

I (personally) would choose VRBO vs joining a higher cost Destnation Club like Exclusive Resorts because I don't have $325,000 to join and the $1400 average cost per night is too rich for my blood.

However, HCC is priced right for me (currently at about $300 per night)....is cheaper than VRBO and offers me consistant quality and easy bookings.

I actually get a headache when I try to filter all the options on VRBO....and I eventually give up. I like redweek.com much better.


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## Bourne (Feb 16, 2007)

The number listed above is cost of purchase at a specifc time in the life(Time and Number of Properties) of a DC. 
Private Escapes PE
Exclusive Resorts ER
High country Club HCC

HCC - .75ys in business - 750K properties - 20K membership fees
HCC - 1.5 yr in business - 1 mil property. - 40K  membership fees
PE   - 1 yrs in business - 750K property - 25K membership fees
PE   - 4 yrs in business - 1.25 Mil property - 100K membership fees
ER -  1 Yr in business - 2.5 Mil property - 195K membership fees
ER -  5 Yrs in business - 3.5 mil propperty - 395K membership fees

You cannot charge a premium right up front without setting up a brand name or track record. The market will not support it. Why would anyone buy HCC at 100K when PE has a better track record and more number of properties.  The earlier you buy, the cheaper it is. Along with it comes the risk of failure or stagnant growth. 

There is a price point in the industry for each level of cost, quality and amount of risk involved. At the end, the lower the risk, higher the price. You have to pick your own spot on the graph.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 17, 2007)

*Where did the posts go??*

I moved MANY posts (discussing the pros and cons of DC's) from this thread to a new thread:

http://tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=41187

This was done as because too many posts on this thread did not address the original post.

None of the messages were deleted....they were just moved to the thread titled: Destination Clubs - General Discussions on Membership.

This thread is to discuss the NEW March 1, 2007 pricing for High Country Club.


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## Iowa Rod (Feb 21, 2007)

*do you get 21 night*

Bill I was looking over the web site and I was wondering do you get 21 nights or do you get less than that if your in a prime week or a bigger unit.
Thanks, Rod


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 21, 2007)

Iowa Rod said:


> Bill I was looking over the web site and I was wondering do you get 21 nights or do you get less than that if your in a prime week or a bigger unit.
> Thanks, Rod



That is the beauty of HCC...you get 21 nights (or 25 nights after March 1) regardless of location, week, or size.

The smallest HCC property is NYC at 1 bedroom + kitchen + living room = 668 sq feet. This is small, but in a killer location in Times Square.

The largest is Breckenridge at 4800 square feet....that is correct....FOUR THOUSAND EIGHT HUNDRED square feet....that is more than 7x the size of NYC.

With the affiliate membership you get 7 nights of holidays, 7 nights of long term use and 7 nights of short term (within 90 days) use.

The typical Club home averages between 1,250 and 3,000 square feet, has two to four bedrooms, and will sleep at least eight people comfortably.


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## Iowa Rod (Feb 22, 2007)

*how do you pay the Mf*

Do you pay them monthy, quarterly or annually?


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 22, 2007)

Iowa Rod said:


> Do you pay them monthy, quarterly or annually?



They offer monthly payments....I pay in full.


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## Steamboat Bill (Feb 22, 2007)

Iowa Rod said:


> Do you pay them monthy, quarterly or annually?



They offer monthly payments....I pay in full.


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