# DRI resale questions



## GTLINZ (Jul 27, 2012)

I am trying to understand DRI resale and have questions. TIA for the help!

If I buy resale points, and they are in the US trust:
1) Is there an underlying deeded property?
2) I am not in "the Club" - right?
3) can I travel to any resort in the US collection using points, using the points charts as normal?
4) Is there still a yearly fee to be paid (even though I am not in "the Club"? And if so, how much? 
5) Can I still borrow points? 
6) Can I still get half points reservations 2 months out? 
7) And are there any other fees (like reservations, borrowing, etc). 


If I am only paying a MF for a low points package, and still have the above flexibility, I might be able to find some deals within 2 months of travel .. that is my thinking ... but if there is a high DRI fee still and no borrowing or discount points, it would not work so well...

 Thanks again for you help!


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## fluke (Jul 27, 2012)

I can try to answer these questions

1 - Not in the sense that you personally own a deeded property with an underlying point value (like your HGVC).  It is a true real estate trust with the deeded weeks placed into the trust and you own "shares" in the collective trust of your collection.  

2 - No.  DRI usually requires additional retail points to enter into the Club(similiar to Starwoods requirements of requalifying voluntary resorts).  Reported amounts necessary do vary,  but about a year ago someone reported entering the club with 10,000 resale points with 2,500 retail purchase.

3 - yes.  I believe you only have a 12 month (not the 13 month advantage) advantage for your collection.  You also cannot use online reservation system and have to call a number (I have seen it before on DRI Members Forum and just looked but I can't find it now).

4 - You still have to pay a US collection fee (for management) of about $205.  You don't pay the club fee of about $245 which would include Gold II membership.

5 - I am not sure about this one.

6 - I am pretty certain you can but not absolutely certain

7 - No


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## fluke (Jul 27, 2012)

Note that the collection fee may be already listed as part of the MFs as most members don't realize the breakdown.


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## GTLINZ (Jul 27, 2012)

fluke said:


> I can try to answer these questions
> 
> 1 - Not in the sense that you personally own a deeded property with an underlying point value (like your HGVC).  It is a true real estate trust with the deeded weeks placed into the trust and you own "shares" in the collective trust of your collection.
> 
> ...



Thanks - that fee is high especially not including an II fee.


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## fluke (Jul 27, 2012)

GTLINZ said:


> Thanks - that fee is high especially not including an II fee.



Yes I agree that is the disincentive for small point ownerships.  The fee gets diluted by larger point totals.  MFs for the US collection have been 11-12 cents a point with those additional fixed fees.

Also if you by one collection (ie US) and then buy a second collection(Hawaii) you get hit with two seperate collection fees.  If you buy same collection with 2 seperate purchases only one collection fee.


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## T_R_Oglodyte (Jul 27, 2012)

GTLINZ said:


> Thanks - that fee is high especially not including an II fee.



Just to be clear how it all works ....

Each resort has it's own Homeowners Association, which sets the fees for each unit.  Since the Trust is the entity that actually owns the units, that Trust is responsible for paying those fees.

The trust then passes those fees on to the owners of the trust, based on the percentage of ownership in the trust.  So if you were to own 0.01% of the trust, you would pay 0.01% of the resort fees charged to the trust. 
The trust then tacks on an additional charge for the operating costs of the trust.  This trust management fee is usually a flat rate, assessed against each trust ownership.

So, in the end, the annual fee for a trust ownership unit is that units share of the resort fees charged to the trust plus a flat rate trust management fee.

****

If you then join the DRI Club you are responsible for those fees, plus an additional Club fee on top of that.  But note that the Club fee also includes II Gold membership.

****

When you put all of that together you quickly reach a conclusion that if you are primarily interested in one particular resort, what you should do is own at that resort if possible.  If there is a trust (a "Collection" in DRI terminology) that meets your needs, it makes sense to own that collection, and forego the Club.

But if it's you expect to travel beyond the confines of a given collection then the Club might be of value, particularly if most of your travel will be within the Club. If your travel interests lie outside the Club you still should consider the benefits of trading in II through the Club vs. doing exchanges outside the Club.  If you would be trading frequently through II, then the Club starts to look pretty attractive because your II membership fees are included in your Club membership.  You still pay II exchange fees, but you give II points instead of weeks, and the points exchange rates are pretty attractive when using II through the Club.  

Example - using points for our Poipu ownership, we can easily get two to four weeks in II for our one week at Poipu.  

A huge disadvantage though is that once you join the Club you can *only* use II. You can't make a Club reservation then try to deposit that reservation with an independent exchange company.

For ourselves, we concluded that the DRI network took care of most of the broader travel needs we had.  And it was important to us to be able to reserve directly at resorts instead of wishing and hoping for exchanges to come through.  Then we've got a non-DRI trader unit that we can deposit with any exchange company to gives access to locations outside DRI if we wish.

But each person needs to figure out what makes most sense for them.  As you should have deduced by now, some of us have found the DRI system to be useful and cost-effective for our particular situations, and have decided that we can live with sharing a bed with DRI.  But by no means does that mean it makes sense for everyone.  Only you can decide what works for you; we can give you information about what works and doesn't work from a user's standpoint.  But you need to decide what works for you.


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## T_R_Oglodyte (Jul 27, 2012)

fluke said:


> Yes I agree that is the disincentive for small point ownerships.  The fee gets diluted by larger point totals.  MFs for the US collection have been 11-12 cents a point with those additional fixed fees.
> 
> Also if you by one collection (ie US) and then buy a second collection(Hawaii) you get hit with two seperate collection fees.  If you by same collection with 2 seperate purchases only one collection fee.



For small accounts that annual flat fee is an absolute killer.  If you wind up having to buy points to get into the DRI Club, it starts to make sense to surrender your deed instead of separately owning a worthless small points account and an Club affiliated deed.

You also need to be sure that you get all of your Club ownerships consolidated into one account.  That could be an issue if some of them were purchased at different times and might have different names or other IDs (such as husbands SSN on one account and wife's SSN on another account). At the time you come into the Club you need to be sure that all of your ownerships get brought in under one account so you only pay one Club fee.


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## tahoeJoe (Jul 31, 2012)

*What if no Club?*

If one buys resale at a DRI resort (say Lake Tahoe) and is NOT a member of The CLUB, do they have access to any internal trading? Or is there only option to go through II? Does II have a special DRI preference period like Starwood or Marriott?


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## fluke (Aug 1, 2012)

tahoeJoe said:


> If one buys resale at a DRI resort (say Lake Tahoe) and is NOT a member of The CLUB, do they have access to any internal trading? Or is there only option to go through II? Does II have a special DRI preference period like Starwood or Marriott?



No access to internal trading unless your are in the Club.  Trading is only through exchange companies - no preference.  The bonus DRI has probably negotiated is a favorable rate of exchange for the Club points in II.


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## fluke (Aug 1, 2012)

GTLINZ said:


> I am trying to understand DRI resale and have questions. TIA for the help!
> 
> If I buy resale points, and they are in the US trust:
> 1) Is there an underlying deeded property?
> ...



I was able to confirm on the DRI website that resale members can get the discounted reservations and also can bank and borrow points.  

Also from the website : Regional US Collection members can contact our Customer Service number, 877-374-2582 (877-DRI-CLUB) to book reservations.


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## TheWizz (Aug 22, 2012)

GTLINZ said:


> I am trying to understand DRI resale and have questions. TIA for the help!
> 
> If I buy resale points, and they are in the US trust:
> 1) Is there an underlying deeded property?
> ...



I don't know if the DRI "rules of engagement" are the same as they were 2-4 years ago (esp. after the incident on Kauai), but here is what I did and what worked well for me and my situation:

Prior to the Sunterra acquisition by DRI, I owned a few deeded weeks at Sunterra's Fall Creek and Sunterra Trust Points.  I also independently (around the same time) purchased a unit at Polo Towers Suites and later Villas (post DRI acquisition).  With my Sunterra ownership, I went to visit Kaanapali Beach Club for the purpose of joining Club Sunterra.  While they tried to get me to purchase additional points in Maui, we declined and told them we only wanted to join Club Sunterra, which we were able to do for ~$3K.

Later that year, DRI purchased Sunterra (I already owned PT Suites), and I received a call from the DRI Ownership Enhancement Dept. (800-966-1392).  They offered me the same $3K deal to bring my Polo Towers Suites deeded unit into THE Club to get to Elite level.  I agreed to do so with the stipulation that I could later (w/i 12 mo.) add another DRI property into THE Club as well.  So that is when I added a PT Villas unit (purchased on EBay) and was able to get to DRI Gold Elite level.  I also owned some DRI/Sunterra Trust Points that they added to THE Club (all in!).  Over the years I could not believe how quickly the MFs for THE Club Trust Points rose compared to my deeded units at Polo Towers.

Just before the "situation" arose with the DRI Kauai resort, I was able to "give back" my DRI Trust Points that I owned since the MFs per point value was far greater than I wanted to pay and far more than the points per MF $ for like deeded units at Polo Towers.  I also did this since I didn't need as many DRI Points since I also purchased some HGVC timeshare units.  

While I do like the DRI system/benefits, I would not buy into DRI today with THE Club Trust Points.  The MFs for these Trust Points is far too high a ratio (of points value to MF $).  Assuming they still allow conversion into THE Club via the flat-rate $3K, I would recommend that approach.  I am able to book any/all DRI resorts with points (incl HI, Europe, Affiliates, etc.) and yet still have reasonable MFs per point value ratios since the points I own are based upon deeded resorts that I converted and I still pay MFs like any other deeded timeshare owner at Polo Towers and Fall Creek.

I'd recommend giving the Ownership Enhancement Dept. a call and see if they will still do the conversion into THE Club for the $3k fee for deeded DRI resort units.  Best of luck in your decision.


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