# Cost of DRI points



## AKE (Jan 3, 2012)

Just wondering what others have been quoted for the cost of DRI points if bought from the developer? (we were quoted around $10k for 2500 points) for Orlando).  On a similar note, we were told that DRI points bought on the resale market cannot be added to a DRI points account.  Is this true and if so then what value are the points bought on resale?


----------



## dougp26364 (Jan 3, 2012)

DRI has really tightened down on resale units. If you buy trust points on the resale market, then they're only good for stays within the group of trust resorts that those points are assigned too. It seems to me from posts I've read that they make exchanging through I.I. difficult as well. Points can't exchange directly but, I think the work around is to reserve a week using your points, then deposit that week with the exchange company of your choice (I.I. or SFX for example). Still, they don't make it easy. 

The purpose is to discourage people from buying resale. The result is anything bought from the developer is essentially worthless other than to keep it and use it. Should your economic situation change, you're either stuck with it, have to sell it at fire sale pricing or give it away if you can find a taker. On the other hand, if you want to travel exclusively to resorts within that trust, you can pick up resale trust points on the cheap. For those who love Hawaii, this could be a great deal as DRI has some excellent resorts on Kauai and Maui. Keep in mind that the resort on Kauai (Point at Poipu) is going through a HUGE special assessment (read the Hawaiian forums).

DRI use to allow resales in if you purchased a points package direct from them but, I haven't read of any successful deals being struck in the last several years. I wouldn't count on that option anymore. 

I don't know about developer pricing. I haven't been in the market for developer priced points from DRI and really don't care to purchase into a trust based ownership. We generally view owners updates as a waste of our time and the salesmans time. As it is, we own more than we can use now. No sense in buying more points if we're not using all that we own every year as it is. 

I can say that 2,500 points won't get you anywhere unless you want to travel in shoulder season, want to take trips less than a week long and/or travel in studio accomadations. For instance, a fall weekend in Branson (Fri, Sat, Sun) will run you 3,150 points for a 1 bedroom unit. IMHO, one needs to own at least 10,000 points to begin to take advantage of all the resorts in the DRI collections. Even if saved one years points, used the current years points and borrowed from the next years points, that would only be 7,500 points for three years worth of ownership. For that you could get a one bedroom unit at sevreral DRI resorts for 7 nights. BUT, that's three years worth of MF's and three years worth of trust management fee's and DRI's THE Club fee's (THE Club fee's are currently $275/year). You'd be better off buying any decent deeded resale week (for any developer) and exhanging that week through either RCI or I.I.


----------



## msutton33 (Jan 5, 2012)

*Combining DRI resale and developer points*

I worked with owner enhancement in LV and purchased 2000 US Collection developer points for a total cash price of $8000.00 for a The Club membership.  At the same time I purchased 8500 resale US Collection points from eBay for a total price of $29.00.  I asked DRI to contractually paper my developer purchase contingent upon DRI combining my 2000 developer points with my 8500 resale points for a total of 10500 points in The Club.

My 2012 club dues are $1765.45 

2012-THE Club(R) Fee                                              277.00
ARDA-ROC Voluntary Contribution                                  5.00
2012-U.S. Collection Fee Per Point                            1269.45
2012-U.S. Collection Operational Fee                          205.00

When I login the DRI website shows that I have one member number with at total of 10500 points.  I am very please with DRI, the transaction went very smooth everything closed October 2011 just like DRI said it would.  I do not know if I over paid or not.  If someone could comment on the price I paid that would be well received.

I have not traveled to far yet but I am looking forward many years of travel with DRI.

I hope this information is of some use.


----------



## dougp26364 (Jan 5, 2012)

I'm glad there is still a pathway to get resale points into THE Club. There use to be a lot of posts about this topic but recently there hasn't been much.


----------



## mek13 (Jan 5, 2012)

*Diamond Resort Club points for sale*

No longer able to use points & would be interested in advice on how to
relinquish these points to another party


----------



## mek13 (Jan 5, 2012)

msutton33 said:


> I worked with owner enhancement in LV and purchased 2000 US Collection developer points for a total cash price of $8000.00 for a The Club membership.  At the same time I purchased 8500 resale US Collection points from eBay for a total price of $29.00.  I asked DRI to contractually paper my developer purchase contingent upon DRI combining my 2000 developer points with my 8500 resale points for a total of 10500 points in The Club.
> 
> My 2012 club dues are $1765.45
> 
> ...



Would be interested in the process that you had to take as we would like to sell our DRI points


----------



## bobpark56 (Jan 5, 2012)

*Buy points*

I would buy some for the US collection...say 500 or 1000 points...if the price were favorable and there were a way to add them to our The Club kitty.


----------



## mek13 (Jan 5, 2012)

bobpark56 said:


> I would buy some for the US collection...say 500 or 1000 points...if the price were favorable and there were a way to add them to our The Club kitty.



We would be interested in selling points but need to research the process-
have you had any info re this


----------



## mek13 (Jan 5, 2012)

mek13 said:


> Would be interested in the process that you had to take as we would like to sell our DRI points



What department at Diamond did you contact to purchase points from Ebay.

Would like to sell points & need info re process


----------



## msutton33 (Jan 5, 2012)

*Combining DRI resale and developer points*

The following is the process that I went through.

I did my research by asking questions on TUG regarding the number of points I thought I might need.  I decided that I needed about 10,000-12,000 points to travel the way I wanted to.  By calling DRI and reading tug I discovered that one needed to buy a minimum of 2000 developer points to get into the club.  I looked on eBay and found 8500 points for sale through Resort Closings, Inc., Bozeman, MT 59718 1-406-585-0688. The points were for sale through a buy now price of $29.00 or you could bid.  I decided to not mess with bidding.  All the closing costs and transfer fees were paid through a charity.

I contacted owner enhancement in LV at 1-866-804-9049.  I first negotiated my developer points and the price (which was $8000.00) and then I told them that I would go ahead with the sale as long as they combined my eBay purchased points (which I had not purchased yet).  The lady had to speak with her boss and she called my back about 30 minutes later and told me her boss had given her the OK.  She sent me a contact and the language was in the contact that once my eBay transaction closed and my developer transaction closed they would combine the points.  I then purchased the eBay points Resort Closing completed the resale transaction in about 2 weeks and sent the paperwork to DRI.  I called the same lady and she confirmed the transaction was complete and DRI completed their end of the deal.  That's how it worked for me and it took about 30 days or so.

If you have points to sell you might want to contact the original poster and ask if they would like to work with you in the same way.  They can contact owner enhancement and negotiate a price for the smallest number of Club developer points and then buy your points and have them transfer the number into one new contract.

I hope this was helpful.


----------



## mek13 (Jan 14, 2012)

bobpark56 said:


> I would buy some for the US collection...say 500 or 1000 points...if the price were favorable and there were a way to add them to our The Club kitty.



The selling price would be low-make an offer & I will contact DRI re transfer
process


----------



## TheWizz (Feb 2, 2012)

msutton33 said:


> The following is the process that I went through.
> 
> I did my research by asking questions on TUG regarding the number of points I thought I might need.  I decided that I needed about 10,000-12,000 points to travel the way I wanted to.  By calling DRI and reading tug I discovered that one needed to buy a minimum of 2000 developer points to get into the club.  I looked on eBay and found 8500 points for sale through Resort Closings, Inc., Bozeman, MT 59718 1-406-585-0688. The points were for sale through a buy now price of $29.00 or you could bid.  I decided to not mess with bidding.  All the closing costs and transfer fees were paid through a charity.
> 
> ...




I did something similar years ago when I independently purchased a few Sunterra deeded and US Collection points and also a 2BR Polo Towers Suites and a 1BR Polo Towers Villas units (all on EBay for LT $500 ea.).  Owner Enhancements let me combine them all into THE Club for the $2995 fee.  I was able to do so after Diamond bought Sunterra and never had to purchase any "developer points".  Perhaps things are tighter now?  I have noticed the MFs for the US Collection Club Points have grown MUCH faster than the deeded weeks that I converted to points - this is true for my Sunterra Fall Creek 2BR lockout unit as well as the two Diamond Polo Towers units.  I ended up unloading (for basically nothing) the 8500 US Collection Points I had and kept the deeded weeks.  Although I'll probably try and sell the deeded Fall Creek week as I don't really need that many DRI points since I also have a lot of HGVC Points.


----------



## MonicaLamStephens (Feb 3, 2012)

*Can you upgrade to Silver Level with Diamond by purchasing on the Resale Market?*

A friend of mine owns 10,000 US Collection points.  He wants to buy 5000 additional points on the resale market so that he will reach the Silver Level with Diamond.  Does anyone know if Diamond will allow him to combine the points once transferred, or would he have to buy through Diamond in order to reach Silver Level?


----------



## T_R_Oglodyte (Feb 3, 2012)

MonicaLamStephens said:


> A friend of mine owns 10,000 US Collection points.  He wants to buy 5000 additional points on the resale market so that he will reach the Silver Level with Diamond.  Does anyone know if Diamond will allow him to combine the points once transferred, or would he have to buy through Diamond in order to reach Silver Level?


No - he's probably going to have to purchase something from the developer.

What he should try to do is negotiate the minimum possible buy-in - probably 2500 points - and negotiate into the sale the right to buy more points on the resale market and have those added to the club as part of the purchase. 

Also very important - he needs to make sure that when the process is complete all of his points are consolidated into one account so that he only pays one trust maintenance fee.

He should also be aware that down the road disposing of those small 2500 point contracts could be difficult.


----------



## MonicaLamStephens (Feb 3, 2012)

*Forgot to Mention...*

I forgot to mention that he bought the 10,000 points owned now directly from Diamond.  Does that make any difference?


----------



## T_R_Oglodyte (Feb 3, 2012)

MonicaLamStephens said:


> I forgot to mention that he bought the 10,000 points owned now directly from Diamond.  Does that make any difference?



Not unless he negotiated into the deal the right to purchase additional contracts on the resale market and get them added to his club account.


----------



## MonicaLamStephens (Feb 3, 2012)

*Thanks!*

Thanks so much for your helpful advice!


----------



## TheWizz (Feb 4, 2012)

There are a few times (exceptions ?) when they allow folks to buy into the Club (again) for the $2995 fee and include additional add-on deeds or points.  I was a member of Sunterra Club (bought all my deeds/points via EBay) by visting KBC and converting all my deeds/US Collection points into Sunterra Club for the $2995 fee.  Back then, they would let you do so by visiting an actively sold resort like KBC and paying the $2995 fee. They tried to sell me a deed at KBC for $10k and give me the club for "free", but I just paid the $2995.  Seperately I owned at Polo Towers, so when Diamond took over, The DRI Ownership Enhancement Dept. let me combine my Diamond and Sunterra deeds/points into a single account for another $2995 fee.  I had them add a provision where I could add additional "Diamond/Sunterra deeded or points based units" for the next 6 months.  So I found another Polo Towers resort on EBay and bought it and had them convert it to Club Points.  The reason being is that the MFs on 10k points at Polo Towers is still a lot less than the MFs on 10k points via the US Collection system.  So if your friend makes a deal, I would recommend he word it to where he could add more points via US Collection Points or a deeded property.  Second, since he already owns points via the developer, I would recommend he call the Ownership Enhancement Dept. and see if they will let him "upgrade" his Club Points for $2995 and add additional Diamond resort(s) for Club points over the next 6-9 months.  Never hurts to ask and that would be a cheaper route to take to get to Elite.  Just don't buy at Point of Poipu right now... 

The way the US Collection Points MFs have gone up over the past few years, I gave back all my Club Points last year (back when they did "take-backs") for $250 and am now in the Club via converted deeds at Polo Towers and Fall Creek only.

Here's some cheap options for good points:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/POLO-TOWERS-SUITES-PREMIER-TIMESHARE-DEED-/140676611502
http://www.ebay.com/itm/2BR-LOCKOFF-POLO-TOWERS-SUITES-PREMIER-TIMESHARE-DEED-/140676614245
http://www.ebay.com/itm/VILLAS-POLO-TOWERS-CASINO-GOLF-LAS-VEGAS-NEVADA-TIMESHARE-/140693754153


----------



## MonicaLamStephens (Feb 5, 2012)

Thanks, I'll pass along the information!


----------



## dakotafamily (Feb 12, 2012)

There is probably a link on TUG for DRI Hawaiian Collection but can someone tell me if you are a silver, gold or platinum member can you sell the whole collection of points and does the new owner get the sellers status?


----------



## TheWizz (Feb 20, 2012)

dakotafamily said:


> There is probably a link on TUG for DRI Hawaiian Collection but can someone tell me if you are a silver, gold or platinum member can you sell the whole collection of points and does the new owner get the sellers status?




Unless something has changed recently, access to the "full" Club for all DRI resorts is NOT transferable.  When I got in, I had to pay $2995 to get full club access to any/all resorts.  So whoever you sell to would have access to the original value for those points, e.g. if the US collection then only those ~13 resorts, etc.  If they still have the upgrade program, then they could pay the $2995 to DRI and basically restore the Elite status.


----------

