[ Thread is unlocked ] Megarenter Rap Lawsuit

[raygo123]

Wyndham forum threads typically go off-topic within the first page. This thread is one of the worst for wildly off-topic posts. The last post related to post #1 was on page 6.

The 700 million points was some random number in an off-topic post on page 1 completely unrelated to the 67 million points.

No. It's a case of new math!

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[tschwa2]

.

Someone’s guess as to how many are owned by megarenters. Don’t know the provenance.

Does anyone know how many CWP points there are in existence? Is 700 million a significant percentage?

Yes just a round number. A billion seemed to high. Wyndham isn't trying to get rid of only this one member, even if she is on the higher end of the ownership equation. If she had 67 million there are probably another couple with 20+ million, and a bunch of 3-10+ million owners.

 

[VacayKat]

Someone’s guess as to how many are owned by megarenters. Don’t know the provenance.

Does anyone know how many CWP points there are in existence? Is 700 million a significant percentage?

So CWA points on 2021 were :51,686,105,449
2020 points were: 48,264,033,449

it is on the financials they send out each year (doesn’t include all the other resorts, just CWA specific points)

 

[Eric B]

Wyndham forum threads typically go off-topic within the first page. This thread is one of the worst for wildly off-topic posts. The last post related to post #1 was on page 6.

The 700 million points was some random number in an off-topic post on page 1 completely unrelated to the 67 million points.

Now I feel even worse about not policing a thread I started than I did when I decided not to call someone a hypocrite.

 

[Eric B]

So CWA points on 2021 were :51,686,105,449
2020 points were: 48,264,033,449

it is on the financials they send out each year (doesn’t include all the other resorts, just CWA specific points)

So we’re talking about ~1%?

 

[VacayKat]

So we’re talking about ~1%?

If they are all CWA points, which is unlikely. Far less if you count all wyndham inventory.

 

[VacayKat]

Was looking deeper into the financials.
It appears that in 2020 the developer paid $45,984,193 to the association (CWA) for any unsold points in any given month, at the same rate as other owners($6.28/1000). If we pretend it was the same # of points each month (aka average the costs) it means for CWA Wyndham owns 73,223,237,300 CWA points at any given month in 2020. (Someone check the math, it is Sunday so math free zone, could be way off, lol) So, if the math is correct, this makes Wyndham’s use far greater than any megarenter, and this is just the CWA inventory.

 

[raygo123]

Was looking deeper into the financials.
It appears that in 2020 the developer paid $45,984,193 to the association (CWA) for any unsold points in any given month, at the same rate as other owners($6.28/1000). If we pretend it was the same # of points each month (aka average the costs) it means for CWA Wyndham owns 73,223,237,300 CWA points at any given month in 2020. (Someone check the math, it is Sunday so math free zone, could be way off, lol) So, if the math is correct, this makes Wyndham’s use far greater than any megarenter, and this is just the CWA inventory.

Wyndham reported that they dropped below 5% of CWA points. At that point one additional board member would come from owners in 2020. With 48 billion points that's 2.4 billion points.

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[VacayKat]

Wyndham reported that they dropped below 5% of CWA points. At that point one additional board member would come from owners in 2020. With 48 billion points that's 2.4 billion points.

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That means my math is off- Sunday brain!!, and the points are higher in the beginning of the year than at the end- average would still be good. So 7.3 billion average over the year but front loaded. That means they offloaded a lot - or numbers in financials are misleading.

 

[raygo123]

That means my math is off- Sunday brain!!, and the points are higher in the beginning of the year than at the end- average would still be good. So 7.3 billion average over the year but front loaded. That means they offloaded a lot - or numbers in financials are misleading.

If a renter only books in the 60 day window that potentially doubles the points owned. Then there is a possibility that half of those, some can be used a third. That's an extreme but possible. Too many variables.

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[Eric B]

If a renter only books in the 60 day window that potentially doubles the points owned. Then there is a possibility that half of those, some can be used a third. That's an extreme but possible. Too many variables.

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IMHO, if an owner books a stay in the VIP discount window and rents that stay out, it's beneficial to the system as a whole. The average for owners booking their stays overall is 126 days per Michael Brown's discussion in the Q2 earnings call - that average included folks that book in the 60-day discount window, so may have been skewed low. The reason the units available in that window are not booked by other owners is very likely because they don't want them or don't own sufficient points to book them - in either case they would go unused or be repurposed by the developer for their own rentals through Extra Holidays or deposits in exchange systems like RCI (less likely because of the timeframe, but possible through the Last Calls, etc.). If an owner books and rents it, Wyndham gets additional folks to try to sell to, the points get used on less desirable inventory, the HOA gets their MF covered, and the owner might make a profit or recoup their MF payment.

I suppose that some might look at this as taking away short-term availability from those owners that do not plan and book their stays prior to the 60-day point. There may be some of that, but it's clearly not the highly desirable stays that get rented this way. In any case, the available information suggests that most owners are booking before that point and speculative rental bookings inside the 60 days might also result in higher availability at the 15-day point from cancelations.

 

[55plus]

I think that you might be over estimating how many folks agree with you. I do not even see a majority of people in this conversation in agreement with your argument. I get that you feel this way and you have a right to your feelings, but when the situation doesn’t change when Wyndham cracks down on the very small portion of owners ’megarenting’, who will your next target be? It should be Wyndham, and I hope you come to see that. I guess what keeps me sane in these devolving discussions is that wyndham owners on the forums are a very small portion of all owners and very few (probably none) either think about screwing other owners over or are actively angry at owners for poor availability.
Also - your using school girls pejoratively is an offense to girls and women and I’d appreciate your using more appropriate language.

The very small portion of owner mega renters you refer to control hundreds of millions of points for the pure purpose of commerce. When this small portion of owners target certain resorts and timeframes, they wipeout availability for other owners who have a desire to vacation at certain locations with family.

 

[HitchHiker71]

But everyone had the same opportunity to book. I took over Skyline Towers for New Years before. I think over 100 rooms. I would book the 4 bedroom presidential and I think it was 4 3 bedroom presidentials every weekend when no one used their 13 or 11 month ARP. Even prime weeks I would book 3 nights then when allowed cancel and book just Fri - Sun. I would book a lot of Bonnet Creek all 4 bedroom presidentials I could get a hold of. When PR would release their units to the masses I would scramble to free up points and book everything I could. Thankfully would not have to hold it for 10 months as I would with normal inventory. When Tower 6 was being renovated I recall Wyndham must had decided they would finish early and released the whole Tower starting Thanksgiving week. I remember booking everything I could. Quite possibly my highlight of the business.

But lets remember everyone had an equal chance at it. I do not see any other way to make it equitable. Equal opportunity not equal outcome.

I have suggested before that Wyndham should have an extreme prime week at resorts. New Years, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Bike week, race week, easter, July 4, Mardi Gras. Another option is to go back to more of a fixed week model where one can purchase prime weeks at a premium but at so many months if not reserved it is released to everyone and the owner can use points to book where they want. But Wyndham seems to have gone the other way with CWA. I guess its easier to tell every owner they can book Bike Week instead of only being able to sell it to one person.

I've often seen this example used - that everyone has the same equal opportunity. But the problem with this example is that it lacks the context of intent. As everyone knows - intent matters - it matters legally (established motive) and it matters when using the reservation system. Your intent was to run a commercial business - and that is a very different intent than someone booking strictly for personal use. The system was never designed with the intent of running commercial enterprises. The system was designed with the intent of scheduling personal vacations. Now, there are those that will then say - hey - everyone booking personal reservations also has the same equal opportunity - but most of those folks saying this - are VIP owners with unlimited HK/RTs - whereas the majority of actual owners - are not VIP and therefore don't have the luxury of being able to reserve and cancel constantly without having to bear RT costs repeatedly. So it's easy to say - hey - book everything 10-13 months in advance - on the off chance that you could actually use it - but that's easier to say when there's no additional out of pocket costs involved every time yes?

Finally, let's examine that equal opportunity vs equal outcome assumption. Since intent matters - and the system was and still is being used for too entirely different use cases - then we cannot simply ignore intent - which is what some seem to want to do here. Since there's a very small but significant subset of owners - called megarenters - that are working with an entirely different intent (motive) than what the system was intended to facilitate - the idea of equal opportunity not equal outcome doesn't apply. Why? Because the equal opportunity in this case is the ability to book a vacation reservation for a personal use. This isn't something anyone can argue against based upon this simple logic analysis that I already shared in another megarenter thread:

All CWP reservations made for commercial rental purposes violate Wyndham Commercial Use Terms & Conditions
Commercial renters made tens of thousands of reservations consisting of hundreds of millions of points for commercial rental purposes
Therefore commercial renters violated Wyndham Commercial Use Terms & Conditions

True or False?

True (based on documented Wyndham T&Cs)

With the above listed analysis foremost in mind, and using the undeniable fact of this truth - then we can invalidate the argument of equal opportunity given the opportunity is to book personal vacations - and none of the opportunities for megarenters or anyone else running a commercial business - are booking personal vacations for personal use. It really is that simple folks. It may not be what some want to hear - and inevitably they will likely disagree - but it will be difficult to establish any valid premise when we look at things from the above listed factual perspective. If anyone doubts this perspective - simply look at the response from Wyndham embedded in the article:

“Ms. Klebba’s actions are an apparent attempt to operate a commercial rental business in violation of clearly disclosed rules prohibiting such conduct,” an unnamed spokesman for Wyndham said in a statement. “We believe her claims are without merit and we will continue to protect our timeshare owners from those who would seek to profit at their expense.”

 

[rickandcindy23]

The self-employment tax rate is 15.3%. The rate consists of two parts: 12.4% for social security (old-age, survivors, and disability insurance) and 2.9% for Medicare (hospital insurance).

Social Security is financed through a dedicated payroll tax. Employers and employees each pay 6.2 percent of wages up to the taxable maximum of $142,800 (in 2021), while the self-employed pay 12.4 percent.

Why are people saying that it's only slightly more? Self employment is expensive. Being an employer is also expensive.

 

[Eric B]

All CWP reservations made for commercial rental purposes violate Wyndham Commercial Use Terms & Conditions

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, can you cite the Wyndham Commercial Use Terms & Conditions that these violate? All I've been able to find is the milk toast statement on page 254 of the directory that "The Program is for a Member’s own personal use and enjoyment and not for any commercial purposes." I don't disagree with the sentiment that commercial rental of CWP timeshares is not the reason why CWP exists; in fact I completely agree with that sentiment. I'm having trouble with agreeing that there is a clearcut violation of the applicable Terms & Conditions, or more accurately the "Club Wyndham(r) Plus Program Guidelines" that Wyndham provides for us to follow.

 

[dgalati]

“Ms. Klebba’s actions are an apparent attempt to operate a commercial rental business in violation of clearly disclosed rules prohibiting such conduct,” an unnamed spokesman for Wyndham said in a statement. “We believe her claims are without merit and we will continue to protect our EH timeshare Rentals from those who would seek to profit at Wyndham's expense.”

 

[Eric B]

The self-employment tax rate is 15.3%. The rate consists of two parts: 12.4% for social security (old-age, survivors, and disability insurance) and 2.9% for Medicare (hospital insurance).

Social Security is financed through a dedicated payroll tax. Employers and employees each pay 6.2 percent of wages up to the taxable maximum of $142,800 (in 2021), while the self-employed pay 12.4 percent.

Why are people saying that it's only slightly more? Self employment is expensive. Being an employer is also expensive.

It all depends on context. For someone that is employed full time and makes more than $142,800 per year, the SE tax payable for renting timeshares as a second source of income would only be 2.9% of the net earnings from the rentals because their payment of the 6.2% on the wages earned at their full time job coupled with the employer's share would cover the OASDI (Social Security) portion of SE taxes. The 2.9% on net earnings seems on the order of only slightly more to me; on the other hand, 15.3% on net is a lot.

 

[rickandcindy23]

“Ms. Klebba’s actions are an apparent attempt to operate a commercial rental business in violation of clearly disclosed rules prohibiting such conduct,” an unnamed spokesman for Wyndham said in a statement. “We believe her claims are without merit and we will continue to protect our EH timeshare Rentals from those who would seek to profit at Wyndham's expense.”

So Wyndham is protecting its Extra Holidays website by stopping megarenters? That sounds blatantly like corporate greed to me. You can disagree with me all you want, but if your new competition is Wyndham, you will lose. They have the power to book whatever, whenever they want. You exchange several bad-guy renters for a corporation that wants to take all of that income for itself. Sounds purely wicked.

 

[rickandcindy23]

It all depends on context. For someone that is employed full time and makes more than $142,800 per year, the SE tax payable for renting timeshares as a second source of income would only be 2.9% of the net earnings from the rentals because their payment of the 6.2% on the wages earned at their full time job coupled with the employer's share would cover the OASDI (Social Security) portion of SE taxes. The 2.9% on net earnings seems on the order of only slightly more to me; on the other hand, 15.3% on net is a lot.

I paid a lot for our timeshare rental business in SE tax. Turbo Tax makes me pay that 15.3% on my net profit. That is how it's computed.

 

[Eric B]

I paid a lot for our timeshare rental business in SE tax. Turbo Tax makes me pay that 15.3% on my net profit. That is how it's computed.

I'm not surprised; my understanding is that you are not working full time for another employer. On the other hand, I am employed full time, so for me the SE tax is only 2.9% because my employer and I each pay the OASDI portion through the ceiling ($142,800 - my employer actually continues to pay above that because there isn't a ceiling for the employer's portion, unlike the circumstances for self-employed people). That's why I said it depends on the context - I only pay 2.9% on my net earnings from the minuscule amount of renting I do, while someone else might pay 15.3%. (That's in addition to the income taxes for Federal and State).

 

[HitchHiker71]

Ok, so help me out here. This person was sold the points and paid the MF yearly. They were not in arrears. How does Wyndham have to protect other owners from these folk who were ‘profiting at their expense’? And exactly how does someone renting out their legitimately gotten points hurt me, another owner who also has legitimate points. I honestly just do not grasp how someone renting their points harms me. If points are only sold that track to actual availability to rent, then it does not matter whether the owner or a guest uses the reservation, it’s legitimate.
Please do not start a thread attacking me - help me actually understand in factual terms and examples how a renter hurts other owners. (As in, don’t say it is a fact unless you cite the evidence)

Because those owners expressly violated the Wyndham Terms & Conditions for using the entire system. Whenever anyone utilizes a system in a way other than intended - it produces harm to everyone else using that same system for legitimate purposes. Per the post I just put out - we cannot ignore intent. And since megarenters had very different intent when using the system - per @am1's own examples - he would utilize his millions (more?) of points to book up the largest rooms in the resorts right at 13 months - and then utilize a process to then start consuming additional inventory from there. What normal owner would ever do anything like this? Granted - this was prior to the 2016 changes - but that's not really relevant. It does matter whether the owner or a renter uses the reservation. As many have indicated - and we see this all of the time on the FB forums - if an owner is trying to find a week available for vacation - and cannot see any availability - but can see availability out on third party rental sites such as eBay, Tripadvisor, Redweek, Expedia, etc., that creates a real problem for both Wyndham and for us as owners. Realistically - since the intent is very different for a commercial business owner when compared to a normal owner - specific to how does this impact you - this is proven by the second set of factual observations I also made in the other thread:

Every rental reservation booked for a non-Wyndham renter removes that exact amount of available inventory for an actual Wyndham vacation owner
Commercial renters made hundreds of millions of points rental reservations (at least)
Therefore commercial renters removed hundreds of millions of points of inventory availability for renters that was made inaccessible to Wyndham vacation owners

True or False?

True (IMHO)

Since we know that intent matters - and we know from actual admission right here on this same thread - at least some megarenters book up the largest rooms available as far in advance as is possible. By admission - they said (paraphrasing): I have no idea who will use this inventory so far in advance - but I know it's going to be consumed by someone. This shows a very different intent than a normal owner booking for personal use. The megarenter does not have to know any approximation of when the inventory will be rented. Whereas an owner at least has to have an approximation of when they can actually take a vacation - and where. It's two very different use cases - two very different forms of intent. So with that in mind - along with the above listed logic statement - inventory is being removed from the system - that is no longer accessible to you or to any other owner looking to book a personal vacation. This means that inventory is being removed from the system by a megarenter with very different intent than any normal owner. When the system is used in any way other than intended - this harms everyone using the system - including you. How? Since we know that the average owner books 126 days in advance - for a planner like you - this will mean that all of the megarenter inventory will become available - and at least a subset of that inventory will become available to normal owners - like you - for personal use. Is that a guarantee you will find more available inventory? No it is not - but it's more likely than before. As Ron is so fond of saying - it's points chasing reservations. But since intent matters - and megarenters have a very different intent than normal owners - their methods of using the system will be eliminated - and there will likely be more availability - at any one point in time - for normal owners - especially for planners - than before.

 

[CO skier]

The reason the units available in that window are not booked by other owners is very likely because they don't want them or don't own sufficient points to book them - in either case they would go unused or be repurposed by the developer for their own rentals through Extra Holidays or deposits in exchange systems like RCI (less likely because of the timeframe, but possible through the Last Calls, etc.).

I suppose that some might look at this as taking away short-term availability from those owners that do not plan and book their stays prior to the 60-day point. There may be some of that, but it's clearly not the highly desirable stays that get rented this way.

Take a look at all the 60-day rentals on Ebay for places like Bonnet Creek and Glacier Canyon. Do you really think other owners "don't want them" for their getaway vacations? The megarenters use a lot of resale points with the 50% discount to book these cancellations within the 60-day window. After the changes in mid-August, many of these will not be adequately profitable without the 50% discount, and owners will book these desirable reservations at full points costs to enjoy the vacation they paid for with their initial purchase and ongoing maintenance fees.

If an owner books and rents it, Wyndham gets additional folks to try to sell to,

There have been a number of posts about how it is easier to sell to an existing owner (upgrade) than non-owners.

the HOA gets their MF covered

The HOAs do not get a dime of these rentals. The maintenance fees are paid whether or not someone stays in a unit. Someone will be paying the maintenance fees on those 1M+ contracts selling on Ebay as a result of resale points no longer qualifying for VIP discounts.

and the owner might make a profit or recoup their MF payment.

There will be less profiteering on desirable cancellations within 60-days. The no-longer-profitable but desirable dates at places like Bonnet Creek and Glacier Canyon will remain available from the cancellation date to day 0 for owners to book at full points cost. (More availability for owners, which is a positive development from the owners' point of view.)

 

[dgalati]

So Wyndham is protecting its Extra Holidays website by stopping megarenters? That sounds blatantly like corporate greed to me. You can disagree with me all you want, but if your new competition is Wyndham, you will lose. They have the power to book whatever, whenever they want. You exchange several bad-guy renters for a corporation that wants to take all of that income for itself. Sounds purely wicked.

It was satire only!
“Ms. Klebba’s actions are an apparent attempt to operate a commercial rental business in violation of clearly disclosed rules prohibiting such conduct,” an unnamed spokesman for Wyndham said in a statement. “We believe her claims are without merit and we will continue to protect our timeshare owners from those who would seek to profit at their expense.”

 

[SmithOp]

The self-employment tax rate is 15.3%. The rate consists of two parts: 12.4% for social security (old-age, survivors, and disability insurance) and 2.9% for Medicare (hospital insurance).

Social Security is financed through a dedicated payroll tax. Employers and employees each pay 6.2 percent of wages up to the taxable maximum of $142,800 (in 2021), while the self-employed pay 12.4 percent.

Why are people saying that it's only slightly more? Self employment is expensive. Being an employer is also expensive.

If I earn $100k from an employer as W-2 wages, 1/2 of the SE tax is deducted from my paycheck every week. I don’t pay income tax on the 1/2 amount the employer pays for me.

If I earn $100k as an independent contractor I pay the full SE tax myself, BUT I get an AGI adjustment for 1/2 the amount, so I still don’t pay income tax on it.

Independent or not, everyone pays the employment taxes that fund SS and Medicare, so its not like independent workers are unfairly taxed, everyone is paying it one way or another.

The information on the SE tax form is sent on to SS every year so that people get credit for those wages toward their SS, and they get the SE tax money back with interest when they file SS - its a forced retirement benefit.

I have to explain this every year to independent contractors when I do their taxes. Its been a lot of people since companies like Lyft and Uber started.

 

[VacayKat]

As many have indicated - and we see this all of the time on the FB forums - if an owner is trying to find a week available for vacation - and cannot see any availability - but can see availability out on third party rental sites such as eBay, Tripadvisor, Redweek, Expedia, etc., that creates a real problem for both Wyndham and for us as owners. Realistically - since the intent is very different for a commercial business owner when compared to a normal owner - specific to how does this impact you - this is proven by the second set of factual observations I also made in the other thread:

Alright, suppose I agree to your premise, if I, an owner, have points available to me, and I can not find any availability at the resort that I want to book at during a certain time frame, but find gobs and gobs of availability at Extra Holidays and end up shelling out loads of money per night to rent the resort, is that not the same problem? [because I've had this exact problem, and paid about $1000 for a 2-3 night rental when all the fees and add-ons were calculated. It has been a while so I don't have the receipt handy]

Does Wyndham not have the same obligation to ensure that it is not taking inventory that an owner might want to reserve? Or is it just owners who are prohibited from doing such things?

I guess what I'm not understanding is how megarenters differ from Wyndham and how little folks renting out a stay here and there to manage the ever increasing MF hurt me by their intent. And if that is the problem, then every time Wyndham let their sales people tell folks to make a sale that they could rent out points to cover their MF then we have an even bigger problem because Wyndham created the problem.

Do not get me wrong - I am not suggesting that someone should use a timeshare for a business. That sounds like the most painful way to make a living. I am just trying to figure out how these folks, who most likely are not as big as everyone thinks they are, are impacting my vacation when the only time I've ever had trouble finding a place to reserve is when I can find the inventory on Extra Holidays, a resort appears to be closed [no inventory at all for months on end] or during the craze earlier this year as folks tried to use up all their covid canceled vacation points. Quite literally, there is no way I would have even thought it a thing before finding these forums where megarenters are the scapegoat. So let me ask this, is the way that they are hurting me this: they are hurting the brand....?