# A Festiva Owner with questions



## mitishr07 (Sep 28, 2011)

Hi - I am a newbee to TUG and timesharing.  I belong to the 
Festive Timeshare. I have not seen very many TUGers on this site who are Festive owners.  Almost everyone refers to RCI, which I don't understand?  Anyone out there I can talk with who owns Festive?  Also, everyone who rents out time, rent out weeks at a time.  Has anyone had any success with mid-week or weekend rentals??  I sometimes prefer this since it gives me several mini-vacations throughout the year.  Any thoughts???


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## loafingcactus (Sep 28, 2011)

I'm a newbie, so if I get this wrong I'm sure someone will set me straight...

You can own a week at a Festiva managed resort, and then having it enrolled in the Festiva points system is a different, additional, thing. (If you could clarify which you have, people will give you better answers specific to your situation.)

I only own a week at a Festiva managed resort (it is not in the points program).  The rules of my resort (Church Street Inn) allow me to split me week into two halves, but they have to be the first half and the second half of the week (I can't take two second halves of weeks in the same year).

Once I reserve my week, I can either use it, or deposit it into RCI to trade in RCI.  I'm not sure how RCI would work if you were in the points system (could someone let me know... I'm curious?).

Lastly, I would suggest calling Festiva with your questions.  They are very nice and, despite some other people's bitter relations with them, didn't even try to sell me into the points program but just answered my questions.


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## bobpark56 (Sep 28, 2011)

*Festiva Points*

My wife & I are satisfied Festiva Points owners...6000 points/year. We use these points almost exclusively for trading outside of Festiva...starting with a 1BR unit from Festiva (3600 points) that we deposit with II. The units have been decent traders. They have gotten us weeks at Marriott's Canyon Villas (2BR), Royal Islander (2BR), Royal Sands (2BR), Royal Sea Aquarium (1BR), Sedona Springs (1BR), Marriott's Summit Watch (1BR), The Ponds at Fox Hollow (1BR), and Brewster Green (2BR). 4600 points has also gotten us a 2BR unit at Rangeley Lakes for next June. And we have done one of Festiva's sailing vacation out of St Vincent & the Grenadines (at a healthy discount).

I did try to get a midweek stay at one resort, but found that you could do this only within something like 45 days of your stay, which did not work for us.

So far, no complaints, except that there was a $400 special assessment this year, which we had not expected.

FWIW, we also own at Marriott's Grande Vista, Westin Lagunamar, Westin St John, and Sandos Caracol...though so far we have stayed only at Sandos Playacar (we like it there). Our Festiva membership has has been a pleasant addition to to our other ownerships.


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## mitishr07 (Sep 28, 2011)

*Festive Owner*

Thanks for the information.  Any other thoughts would be appreciated.


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## Tia (Sep 29, 2011)

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Peppertree-EquivestOwners/?yguid=301889772

Is where there are some other Festiva owners


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## tombo (Sep 30, 2011)

bobpark56 said:


> So far, no complaints, except that there was a $400 special assessment this year, which we had not expected.



Assessing is a common practice with Festiva. I own a resort that was taken over by Festiva. Year 2 guess what, a 3 year assessment. I know of 6 different resorts they have taken over, and all had assessments levied and all had MF increases. No sealed bids between different contractors, Festiva simply picks a company to renovate and hires them. Can you say possible kick backs? Who knows. They manage the resort, pick the budget, control the board, buy the furnishings, hire the contractors, etc, etc, etc, and simply bill the owners for the upgrades. IMO when Festiva gets low on cash they assess and renovate. I own at several independent resorts that have never assessed for maintenance or upgrades because they add fees for scheduled upgrades into the budget. 

Read about the law suit filed at the atrium against Festiva by the owners (which Festiva settled) and at possibly a law suit at sandcastle.
http://sandcastleowners.blogspot.com/

Quote about successful lawsuit atAtrium:
"Not only did they have to refund monies, but it was found that payments of assessments had gone to Festiva general funds and not to improvements at the resort that was paying the bill!!!"


http://www2.gobeach.com/sxm/read.php?1,61876

http://news.caribseek.com/set-up/exec/view.cgi?archive=131&num=45292

Quote from article:
"“They (Festiva) quickly added an item number to the Atrium Rules and Regulations booklet that included their right to bill assessments whenever the need arose. They claim it should have always been there and couldn’t understand why we didn’t have a copy. "



Festiva also votes their employees in as board members so they can vote for assessments, upgrades, renovations, and MF increases anytime they want. They vote themselves in as the mgt company. At my owner controlled resorts if the mgt company is not keeping the quality of the resort high while keeping MF's reasonable, the board can and will fire them. At festiva it is the fox guarding the hen house. The Festiva employees on the board will never fire Festiva as the mgt company. 

Festiva controls some nice resorts, but they pad their bottom line by assessing owners and by charging high mgt fees IMO. I would bet that they make a lot more money on existing owners than they make on sales to new owners.


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## mark1154 (May 20, 2012)

*Are We Still Happy Church Street Inn Owners?*

What a moneypit this Festiva Church Street Inn has become. Did anyone every check out what your timeshare is worth now? And Festiva keeps coming back and asking for more. I just sent another 1/3 of the "Special Assessment". I refused to pay it all at once even though they "Recommended" I do so. Let's see if they send anything out regarding anything new at Church Street Inn. They probably won't unless I ask for it.


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