# Diamond maintenance fees per trust



## craigrow (Jun 8, 2011)

Is there a schedule of maintenance fees per point for each of the different trusts in the Diamond system? If not, perhaps we could use this thread to build that schedule?


----------



## oceanvps (Jun 9, 2011)

i have the paperwork for the hawaii collection from jan 2011 somewhere. we bought while in hawaii, backed out when we got home.

One thing to note about the HI collection.  When we were signing our papers the second to last one was the one saying you are not on the hook for the special assessment for Kauaui property in 2011.  (paraphrased) . since i asked specifically at the beginning of the ordeal about special assessments this ticked me off and started me down the road of rescinding. my thought was okay, what about the other years coming up? 


I'll take a look for them later


----------



## craigrow (Jun 9, 2011)

We purchased in Hawaii also as we make an annual vacation there. We will also use points for resorts closer to home. I expect Hawaii properties have higher MF for various reasons. What I'm trying to figure out is, should we buy more Hawaii points to make things easy or would it be less expensive to own points in the US trust?


----------



## thearf1941 (Jun 13, 2011)

*DRI US Trust*

the US trust is about 11.4 cents a point , then add culb and other fees of about $460/yr

Exsample 10000 pts $1140 plus $460 other fees per year total cost per year =
$1600/year

I have been with Diamond for 12 years never had any special fees
                                             Art Culbertson


----------



## craigrow (Jun 15, 2011)

thearf1941 said:


> the US trust is about 11.4 cents a point , then add culb and other fees of about $460/yr
> 
> Exsample 10000 pts $1140 plus $460 other fees per year total cost per year =
> $1600/year
> ...



Thanks. The Hawaii fees are within half a penny per point. I guess there is no real MF advantage for US vs. Hawaii trust. Thanks again for the info.


----------



## T_R_Oglodyte (Jun 15, 2011)

craigrow said:


> We purchased in Hawaii also as we make an annual vacation there. We will also use points for resorts closer to home. I expect Hawaii properties have higher MF for various reasons. What I'm trying to figure out is, should we buy more Hawaii points to make things easy or would it be less expensive to own points in the US trust?


Assuming that your goal with all of this is to be in the DRI Club ....

The lowest annual fee route would probably be to buy a deeded week at a resort that is in the collection you prefer and that has the cheapest maintenance fees. Then, before you buy the week, verify that you can get that week attached to the Club by paying the $2995 fee to join and that it will generate the point values in the Club that you want.  Close on the week and pay the money to join the Club. Also make sure you retain the deed, so you are in the Club but not a Trust owner.

That will be lower cost per point than the comparable trust ownership because the Trust fees are a blend of the resort fees for all of the Trust holdings. But since you would own at the property with the lowest fees, your fees will be lower than the trust. On top of that, you also won't be paying the annual trust management fee.


----------



## TF865 (Jun 16, 2011)

I agree that buying a deeded property would be the way to go from what I have read.  I feel fortunate that I snagged a 1 bdrm at Daytona Beach Regency (deeded) off the internet for almost free (before market crash).  My MF, if I can recall correctly off the top, are about $750/$770 - a great deal compared to my Marriott resorts.  It is an exceptionally great trader - more so than my gold week in Aruba, when you book a prime week. The ONLY reason I have not enrolled in the Club is because I owned more Marriott weeks and enrolled in their points program instead.  I love my DBR and am considering getting rid of it only because I now have to pay for 2 II accounts. Just haven't been abe to bring myself to do it yet - but next time my II renewal is due, I probably will.  DBR gets me 6500 points and I knew that I would need more than that anyways to make enrolling worthwhile.


----------



## timeos2 (Jun 16, 2011)

thearf1941 said:


> the US trust is about 11.4 cents a point , then add culb and other fees of about $460/yr
> 
> Exsample 10000 pts $1140 plus $460 other fees per year total cost per year =
> $1600/year
> ...



Using those numbers it is clear why the post a few more down recommends (as do I) the purchase of a deeded week(s) then voluntary membership in the Club.  

If I owned 8500 points in the Club Trust that includes my Cypress Pointe Resort the fee - based on your numbers - would be $1429.  That is verified by some posts of owners who got their membership through the Trust. 

By keeping my deeded week and opting to become a Club Member (Cost us $1100 in 1998 - today I think it's $2999) we pay the resort fee - $892 plus the club membership of $260 for a grand total of $1152 or $277 less.  

Now there aren't any special assessments in the Trust as they blend all expenses - including any special assessments at any affiliated resorts - into the base cost. The real difference appears to be the management overhead that gets tacked on to Trust memberships.  Of course there is always the chance of a special assessment at any resort but by carefully choosing one that has adequate reserves and an Owner controlled BOD you can be fairly sure you buy where that isn't likely to occur. Even if it did your annual savings of $277 or more would quickly add up to cover the SA and more if required. You also get to keep your vote for Board members, etc, at your home resort - if you own through the Trust they, not you, get to vote.  

Overall we are fans of the DRI Club but we'd only belong as voluntary members not by the Trust(s) due to the vote situation and the extra costs of the Trust itself.  Remember that the Club membership cannot be resold so the resale value of that is $0.  When you sell or buy resale you are only dealing with the underlying week(s) sans the Club use & membership.


----------



## bobpark56 (Aug 25, 2011)

*There is no universal rate per point within a collection*

We were told yesterday that the maintenance fees (within The Club, US collection) do not follow a constant rate. Instead, the more points you own, the less your per-point charge. One reason may be the inclusion of the $ that pay for your Interval Gold membership.


----------



## regatta333 (Sep 15, 2011)

Does Club membership enable you to book reservations at Diamond's European properties?


----------



## dougp26364 (Sep 15, 2011)

regatta333 said:


> Does Club membership enable you to book reservations at Diamond's European properties?



Yes it does. There is a thread on this forum which links to an interesting read about DRI in Europe, indicating that more favorable exchange rates had increased US demand for European vacations and how DRI had increased deposits of developer owned inventory to bolster supply to meet that demand. 

http://www.tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=155325


----------



## T_R_Oglodyte (Sep 15, 2011)

bobpark56 said:


> We were told yesterday that the maintenance fees (within The Club, US collection) do not follow a constant rate. Instead, the more points you own, the less your per-point charge. One reason may be the inclusion of the $ that pay for your Interval Gold membership.



I believe the maintenance fees are the same per point within a given trust.  Maintenance fees per point in any trust is simply the sum of all fees fees charged to the trust for the deed that the trust holds, divided by the total number of points held be owners in the trust.  Maintenance fees for each owner are then the fees per point times the number of points held by the owner.

That being said, total trust fees per point do decline as the ownership increases.  That's because a flat rate trust administrative is added to each account.

With very small accounts, the trust fee becomes a huge portion of the overall bill, making very small points memberships worthless.


----------



## gjw007 (Sep 16, 2011)

I don't know if this will help or not but it shows the relationship that the club fees have on final maintenance fees per point.  The more points, the less effect that the club fees has to the total cost.

	Points		                                                 4000	        8000	         15000	        30000
Club Fees			                                        $460 	        $460 	         $460 	         $460 
Fee per Points		$0.1140 				
Points time fee/pt			                        $456.00 	$912.00 	$1,710.00 	$3,420.00 
Total Maintenance Fee			                $916.00	        $1,372.00	$2,170.00	$3,880.00
Cost per point (pts / total maintenance	$0.2290	        $0.1715	        $0.1447	        $0.1293

Table explanation
Points - owner points
Club fees - $460, not directly related to number of points - doesn't change with more points
Fee per point - $.0.1140  - fixed amount per point
Points time fee/pt - the number of points owned time fee per point
Total maintenance fee - Club fees plus the points time fee per point
Cost per point - total maintenance fee divided by the number of points


----------



## regatta333 (Sep 16, 2011)

Does anyone know if Diamond is still letting you buy into the Club with a resale purchase, or has that been discontinued?


----------



## dougp26364 (Sep 16, 2011)

regatta333 said:


> Does anyone know if Diamond is still letting you buy into the Club with a resale purchase, or has that been discontinued?



I'm pretty certain that's been discontinued. I believe the only way in at this time is to purchase additional trust points at developer pricing, and I'm not even certain that option remains open.


----------



## hulamamapapa (Oct 8, 2011)

Does anyone know the breakdown of how the Diamond Poipu Point water assessment fee will be allocated to the Diamond Hawaii Collection trust point owners?  Will the owners in the trust share equally in this assessment?


----------



## T_R_Oglodyte (Oct 8, 2011)

hulamamapapa said:


> Does anyone know the breakdown of how the Diamond Poipu Point water assessment fee will be allocated to the Diamond Hawaii Collection trust point owners?  Will the owners in the trust share equally in this assessment?


As far as the resort, the Trust is just like any other who owns multiple weeks.  The resort sends bills to the trust for fees due based on the deeds that are owned by the trust, and the trust is expected to pay those fees just like any other owner.

So if the trust owns, say, 40% of the deeds at the resort, then 40% of the special assessment will wind up being paid by trust owners.  

******

The trust will simply add the amount of the special assessments to its annual cost, and bill that through to the trust owners prorated to their ownership interest in the trust. Which is exactly the same way that it deals with all fees and assessments imposed by all resorts in the Trust.


----------



## oceanvps (Oct 9, 2011)

not sure if this helps or not....
according to exhibit d from jan 2011 of the description of resort interests

point of poipu was 34,579,250 / 137,347,250 total points registered for hawaii collection

70 units 2 bedroom std (865 intervals), 41 units 2 bedroom gv (848 intervals), 38 units 2 bedroom po (615 intervals), 39 units 2 bedroom ov ( 550 intervals), 2 bedroom of (343 intervals)

so if an interval was a week for s.a. and the trust owns 3221 intervals (which i'm not clear if that is total intervals for property or just the trusts intervals

then the first years (the 2000 payment as 1 of 3 payments per interval) is .046 per point
so on our 3500 point package i think we would of paid an extra 164 for our maintenance for 2012 fees? assuming all my assumptions are correct - which they probably aren't.


----------



## ccwu (Oct 16, 2011)

regatta333 said:


> Does anyone know if Diamond is still letting you buy into the Club with a resale purchase, or has that been discontinued?



You are kind of restricted to have resale points.  It is hard to search on line for availability.  You can buy additional points from 5,000 (depends on how many points you want to bring in) and they will work to bring your resale points to the club.  There is no more $2,995 to convert to the club now as far as I know.  The $2995 is when it was Sunterra.  But if you did converted in Sunterra to Club, DRI will accept it. 

I have mostly Hawaii points by giving them my Kaanapali Beach club deed and bought additional points from developer.  The advantage of club member is that you can get to the home resort (mine is Hawaii) 13 weeks in advance for reservation for all DRI resorts.  I can always get what I want if I made in 13 months advance.  By the way, before I signed my deeded property to DRI, my deeded resort MF is going as high as DRI points.  I have some US collection points.  The MF fee is about the same.  I do save by only paying one club due with all my points.


----------



## ccwu (Oct 16, 2011)

ccwu said:


> You are kind of restricted to have resale points.  It is hard to search on line for availability.  You can buy additional points from 5,000 (depends on how many points you want to bring in) and they will work to bring your resale points to the club.  There is no more $2,995 to convert to the club now as far as I know.  The $2995 is when it was Sunterra.  But if you did converted in Sunterra to Club, DRI will accept it.
> 
> I have mostly Hawaii points by giving them my Kaanapali Beach club deed and bought additional points from developer.  The advantage of club member is that you can get to the home resort (mine is Hawaii) 13 weeks in advance for reservation for all DRI resorts.  I can always get what I want if I made in 13 months advance.  By the way, before I signed my deeded property to DRI, my deeded resort MF is going as high as DRI points.  I have some US collection points.  The MF fee is about the same.  I do save by only paying one club due with all my points.



Sorry, when I respond, I did not see my bill for 2012.  I was respond for 2011.


----------



## Kpaul (Oct 18, 2011)

*Ripped Off In Maui....bye bye vacation dreams*

CCWU  you must be in shock now that you got your invoice with the special assessment.  It sounds like you were a KBC owner that converted to points and now you get to help pay for the $65-$80 million for repairs for Poipu.

Diamond is just running a ponze scheme.

http://nvsos.gov/sosentitysearch/CorpSearch.aspx

Check out this website for Nevada Secretary of State

Type in a business search for Diamond Resorts and you will see approximately 28 registered corporations.

Can  you imagine the commingling that could go on between their own companies?
You will see that the great majority are all LLC's (Limited Liability Corporations) which is a vehicle for a company to collapse and not be liable..... no surprise there!
It would not surprise me that they have corporations or LLC's in other states such as Florida.
The only way they stopped Capone was with the IRS.........

I hope the members of www.poipupoint.org and www.kbcowners.com find a way to stop the Las Vegas Monkey Business!


----------



## Kpaul (Oct 18, 2011)

*More Diamond Resorts LLC's*

Well I posted so I should back up my allegations.
A quick glance to Florida's LLC's has Diamond Resorts owning 10 companies and a California search showed 6 more.

Hmmm....wonder why the resorts are paying millions in management fees


----------



## craigrow (Oct 18, 2011)

Wow, you're really getting off topic Kpaul. 

I'm not sure how you can call Diamond a Ponzi scheme or how the existence of multiple shell companies is evidence of one. 

A Ponzi scheme takes money from new investors to pay early investors. Since points owners are not _investors _and never expected to _get _money from Diamond, to the contrary they expect to send Diamond money every year, I don't see how you can call it a Ponzi scheme. 

Also, is the structure of Diamond any different from any of the other companies in this business, Worldmark, Marriott, Disney...I doubt it. Put those names into the search engine you referenced and you'll get similar results to Diamond.


----------

