Abound participation for Aventuras owners

[Italnsd]

I own a biennial VOI (even years) in Aventuras. Since 2023 is not a use year for me , having already paid my maintenance fees, I was not expecting to receive another bill for network fees, so I was quite surprised when after a long trip I came back home to find unpaid bills and notices of debt collection. I did pay the bill because I definitely want to keep the flexibility of my VOI, however there are a couple of issues that appear a bit murky to me and I thought of getting the perspective on them from more expert owners.

The first one is the justification for having biennial owner pay network fees for no-use years, which I see as paying for the privilege of exchanging home options that I do not receive. Vistana justifies it by saying that biennial owners "can use any banked StarOptions, elected Club Points; deposits with Interval, or Marriott Bonvoy points every year." My issue with that is that generally one pays for doing something, not for the mere potential of doing it. Wouldn't it be more reasonable to have to pay network fees only when indeed taking advantage of such mechanisms?

The second aspect is more about my understanding of the rules, and concerns the legitimacy of the threat of debt collection that I received. My understanding was that Aventuras is classified as a voluntary resort and hence it is the owner's decision whether or not to participate in the Vistana network (I guess the same choice holds with respect to Abound now) . Consequently, not paying the network fees would limit me to my home resorts, but not be considered an unpaid debt. Is my understanding incorrect? Is there maybe a deadline for the owner of a voluntary resort to communicate his decision to not partake in the network? Of course, my interest is to be part of the network, but I want to understand what the situation is.

Thanks

 

[VacationForever]

1) Vistana has made the rules that you have to pay yearly network fees regardless of whether you own annual or biennial VOI. You do not have a choice to opt out. It is in all the Ts & Cs.

 

[Italnsd]

Thanks for your reply. I understand point 1, the difference is that with Vistana many of the charges that are now obligatory were use-related.
In regards to point 2, in my contract the use of my options at home resorts is not constrained to my participation in the VSN. Shouldn't the Ts&Cs. be specified in the contract?
However, by what you say, shouldn't Aventuras then be classified as a mandatory resort? What's the point of it being classified as voluntary if it's worth nothing when you opt out?

 

[Italnsd]

2) Aventuras is closer to trust points than deeded weeks. In order to be able to book at Lagunamar or Los Cabos, you need to pay the network fees. Again this is in the Ts&Cs. If you don't participate in the network, there is nothing to book. You do not own a deeded week at a specific resort to bypass the network.

This is a very interesting point. In this case shouldn't I be able to buy Aventuras resale and have the VOI necessarily convertible into SOs? Of course, Abound points might be a completely different story, of course.

 

[Mroze]

This is a very interesting point. In this case shouldn't I be able to buy Aventuras resale and have the VOI necessarily convertible into SOs? Of course, Abound points might be a completely different story, of course.

We did have a couple of Aventuras packages [direct purchased to retro resale deeded weeks].
Late last year we exchanged out of them for Westin Nanea.
Glad to have gotten out of the Flex-Programs. Never should have gotten in, in the first place.

When we owned Aventuras we were already part of the VSN due to multiple Westin Kierland [6 x 2BR-PLAT] resales so we were not charged additional VSN-Dues.
One of the packages was for EOY, and I understood that if you own EOY you will be charged prorated MF + VSN-Dues each year.
Each year we paid HALF-MF + FULL VSN-Dues.
What is the amount of VSN-Dues you are billed for?

 

[VacationForever]

This is a very interesting point. In this case shouldn't I be able to buy Aventuras resale and have the VOI necessarily convertible into SOs? Of course, Abound points might be a completely different story, of course.

All these Flex programs, i.e. Aventuras, Sheraton Flex and Westin Flex are all voluntary, which means that when bought from the resale market, they cannot be used to book at other resorts outside of what is in each program.

 

[jabberwocky]

2) Aventuras is closer to trust points than deeded weeks. In order to be able to book at Lagunamar or Los Cabos, you need to pay the network fees. Again this is in the Ts&Cs. If you don't participate in the network, there is nothing to book. You do not own a deeded week at a specific resort to bypass the network.

This isn’t quite true. If the unit was purchased resale then there would not be any VSN/Abound fee, but the owner could still book at Los Cabos and Lagunamar as they are in the Aventuras collection and as such have access to both. The network fee gives you access to all of the other resorts via either SO or Abound points.

I believe there was an option to opt-out of the abound fee structure, but you would still have VSN fees I believe.

Vistana has always charged the network fee on an annual basis - even if the ownership is EOY. This is nothing new.

 

[VacationForever]

This isn’t quite true. If the unit was purchased resale then there would not be any VSN/Abound fee, but the owner could still book at Los Cabos and Lagunamar as they are in the Aventuras collection and as such have access to both. The network fee gives you access to all of the other resorts via either SO or Abound points.

I believe there was an option to opt-out of the abound fee structure, but you would still have VSN fees I believe.

Vistana has always charged the network fee on an annual basis - even if the ownership is EOY. This is nothing new.

I stand corrected then. I was told by sales that Aventura is a network and hence there is a fee.

 

[kozykritter]

I believe there was an option to opt-out of the abound fee structure, but you would still have VSN fees I believe.

Unfortunately, Abound enrollment and fees cannot be isolated from VSN enrollment and fees for voluntary resort ownerships. The ownership must be disenrolled from the VSN entirely to avoid Abound/Club Dues, a step which will end up treating it like an unqualified resale in the Vistana system. This is detailed in the VSN Voluntary section of the attached Maintenance Fees and Club Dues FAQ available on your Ownership Association page in your online account.

All home option ownerships are voluntary, meaning Westin Flex and Aventuras, Sheraton Flex and the single resort flex at Westin St John (Coral Vista/Sunset Bay) and Nanea.

@Italnsd, voluntary pertains to their enrollment in the VSN as it is not a contractual right for these ownerships but instead a perk bestowed upon purchasers when they buy from the developer/Vistana directly. The terms voluntary and mandatory go way back to when the VSN was formed as an internal exchange network decades ago (as the SVN, Starwood Vacation Network) when all ownerships were still deeded weeks. The owners associations at each existing resort had to decide whether they would make it mandatory for their owners to join the SVN/VSN or make it voluntary. (I don't know the exact details of how that decision process worked). For those associations that decided it was mandatory, that requirement was legally incorporated into those ownerships and therefore transfers to the new owners upon resale. For those associations that made it voluntary, any enrollment in the SVN/VSN an owner chose to make at the time did not automatically transfer upon resale of their ownership, a limitation on membership that Vistana set as it contractually has the right to determine and change any term of membership in the VSN (except for excluding mandatory ownership enrollments, of course). All resorts and new ownership products added to Vistana after that point were automatically voluntary, including said home options ownerships.

 

[Italnsd]

Glad to have gotten out of the Flex-Programs. Never should have gotten in, in the first place.

Thanks for your reply. What is in particular that you disliked in the Flex Program and makes you like Nanea more? If it's anything besides a preference for the location, of course.

Each year we paid HALF-MF + FULL VSN-Dues.
What is the amount of VSN-Dues you are billed for?

I am a relatively new owner, last year was my first year of use, and this year is my first year of ownership with no use. Not having to plan anything for this year, I hadn't followed closely the new changes related to Abound and I had assumed that since last year I paid everything in a single bill, this year would be the same. That is why I was surprised by receiving two bills, especially in a no-use year.
After reading the Maintenance Fees and Club Dues FAQ (the same doc posted by kozykritter) I understood the reason for splitting the single bill of the previous year into two bills for this year. However, I was still under the impression that each year I had to pay for HALF-MF + HALf VSN-Dues, due to what now I realize was my misreading of the table below, whose language is not super clear (I would have used "and" instead of "or", but then again I'm not a native speaker ;-)

Thanks to your, and other people's, clarifications, now I understand that under the old Vistana system I would have had to pay each year the full membership fee of $170.50 listed above. Hence, the new Abound fee of $230 is just $59.50 more per year.
While I understand that it is in the Ts & Cs and that I have to pay it, I still feel that receiving my home options every other year but having to pay for the mere possibility of converting them (either into SO before or into Abound points now) every year is a poor deal. Very surprisingly , an aspect that was not really stressed by the selling agent as it undermines the case for biennial ownership of a single VOI.

 

[Italnsd]

Abound enrollment and fees cannot be isolated from VSN enrollment and fees for voluntary resort ownerships. The ownership must be disenrolled from the VSN entirely to avoid Abound/Club Dues, a step which will end up treating it like an unqualified resale in the Vistana system. This is detailed in the VSN Voluntary section of the attached Maintenance Fees and Club Dues FAQ available on your Ownership Association page in your online account.

@Italnsd, voluntary pertains to their enrollment in the VSN as it is not a contractual right for these ownerships but instead a perk bestowed upon purchasers when they buy from the developer/Vistana directly.

Thanks for all the replies received. I isolated the few paragraphs before because they suggest to me that I must have some misunderstanding of the concepts of mandatory and voluntary. My understanding is that by purchasing a mandatory VOI, the owner is obliged to participate in the VSN (because of the decision made by the owner's association), while purchasing a voluntary VOI the owner does not have that obligation and is free to make that choice .

Your use of terms like "enrollment in the VSN" or "disenrollment from VSN", though, makes me think there is more to it than just a simple choice to pay or not pay the club dues. The feeling that I must be missing something is strenghtened by reading this paragraph in the Maintenance Fees and Club Dues FAQ, which uses your same language:

"SN Members that have voluntary enrollment associated with their VOI(s) who do not pay annual Club Dues will be considered delinquent and will be unenrolled in VSN and unaffiliated with Abound by Marriott Vacations".

That is what I do not understand: how can someone be considered delinquent for not doing something that is "voluntary"?

 

[kozykritter]

Thanks for all the replies received. I isolated the few paragraphs before because they suggest to me that I must have some misunderstanding of the concepts of mandatory and voluntary. My understanding is that by purchasing a mandatory VOI, the owner is obliged to participate in the VSN (because of the decision made by the owner's association), while purchasing a voluntary VOI the owner does not have that obligation and is free to make that choice .

Your use of terms like "enrollment in the VSN" or "disenrollment from VSN", though, makes me think there is more to it than just a simple choice to pay or not pay the club dues. The feeling that I must be missing something is strenghtened by reading this paragraph in the Maintenance Fees and Club Dues FAQ, which uses your same language:

"SN Members that have voluntary enrollment associated with their VOI(s) who do not pay annual Club Dues will be considered delinquent and will be unenrolled in VSN and unaffiliated with Abound by Marriott Vacations".

That is what I do not understand: how can someone be considered delinquent for not doing something that is "voluntary"?

I think your challenge is that you are applying the term voluntary more to the current time frame whereas that term is actually more of a historical one that describe a class of ownership. It's saying in this context whether or not your class of ownership must be enrolled in the VSN when you buy it resale. Mandatory resort ownerships are enrolled, voluntary resort ownerships are not. If you have a voluntary ownership that is in the VSN now (bought directly from Vistana or requalified with an additional purchase), then you do have the choice whether or not you want to continue to be a member. That is the contemporaneous application of voluntary in this situation. However, ending your VSN membership is a serious thing because you can't just get it back if you change your mind later. If you choose to drop your VSN membership or do so by default of not paying your fees, the only way to re-enroll is to meet the new ownership purchase qualification (currently $10K) that still exists now but may not be available in the future if Marriott / Vistana changes the rules. By contrast, mandatory owners don't have the option to join or leave the VSN as it is a legal requirement of their ownership that they be a member and pay the dues.

Think of the VSN for voluntary ownerships as being similar to joining a snooty country club. They set high barriers to entry ($$ on purchases) and once you are in, as long as you pay your dues and behave all is fine. You are free to quit the club at any time but if you want back in again, you'll have to pay more big $$, that is if the option to rejoin even exists at that time.

 

[Mroze]

Thanks for your reply. What is in particular that you disliked in the Flex Program and makes you like Nanea more? If it's anything besides a preference for the location, of course.

The reason for my comment "Never should have gotten in".
All the Flex Programs have some of the highest MF relative to our weeks MF.

1. Ongoing MF Higher.
2. Limited inventory within each Flex-Network.
3. Little/No Resale Value

1. Here is a table from 2021 showing a comparison of Flex-MF VS our Lagunamar [WLR] & Kierland [WKV] MF.

As you can see the MF on the Westin-Flex is more than double that of WLR.
Aventuras [although lowest MF of the 3 x Flex-Programs] is still 50% higher than WLR.

2. The Aventuras Flex-Program has only Mexico properties and at 8-Months we could search elsewhere.

As mentioned earlier, we got into Aventuras Flex to enroll our Resale-Weeks [$35K = $10K/1-WEEK + $5K x 5-WEEKS].
Last fall Vistana offered to take back all of our Aventuras-Flex + WLR-Weeks [RTU] in exchange for 257700-SO Nanea [akin to a 3BR-EY].
We were offered credit [100% of what we paid for Flex + WLR] + Incentives [20%-DISCOUNT + 204K-SO + 500K-Bonvoy + $2K-Stay-Credit + 12 x BON-330K-CERTS].
The offer [taking into account the incentives] was difficult to turn down due to the following reasons.
1. Got rid of Flex: High-MF
2. Got rid of Mexico-Properties: RTU
3. Simplified Portfolio: 1-Nanea-Contract for 5 [3 x WLR + 2-Flex]
4. Better Exchange-Options: Easier to rent if we don't use
5. Better Resale Value over Flex/WLR

Our philosophy for TS has always been pay more for Higher-Value [Location/Season].
Reason: Accrue more Points for the same MF.
E.g., WLR-PLAT+ [148100-SO] has the exact same MF as WLR-GOLD+ [81000-SO].
Thus, it's better to pay more for PLAT+ [Higher CapEx] for lower ongoing MF [Lower-OpEx].

 

[Italnsd]

Think of the VSN for voluntary ownerships as being similar to joining a snooty country club. They set high barriers to entry ($$ on purchases) and once you are in, as long as you pay your dues and behave all is fine. You are free to quit the club at any time but if you want back in again, you'll have to pay more big $$, that is if the option to rejoin even exists at that time.

That's what exactly my understanding. However, it seems that I'm not free to leave at any time. Or at least not without being considered delinquent and possibly getting a hit on my credit report, if the collection threats were to be taken seriously.
Anyway, going with your analogy, of course I have no interest in leaving the snooty country club after having paid my costly entry fee, but I wanted to understand what is the obligation that an owner of a voluntary VOI has towards paying club fees. I think I got it now.
As you clarified, the difference between mandatory and voluntary really matters only when buying resale. When buying from the developer, owners who buy mandatory (I am not sure if this is a thing, as the developer might not have any more interest in selling mandatory) are automatically enrolled into VSN due to that old home owners association decision, while owners who buy voluntary must necessarily by constrained to some form of club membership by the terms of the contract. And sure enough, looking at my contract I found this language:

Unless otherwise terminated as provided in this Agreement, this Agreement shall become effective on the date it is executed by the Network Operator and shall have a term of five (5) years. This Agreement shall automatically be renewed for successive terms of five (5) years unless either party notifies the other in writing of its election to terminate at least ninety (90) days prior to the expiration of the initial term or any successive renewal term. [...]
To the extent that this Agreement is not renewed by an Owner and such Owner desires to later reactivate the Owner's membership, then such Owner may be required to pay a membership reactivation fee. Notwithstanding the foregoing, membership in the Network and this Agreement automatically terminate if (a) that Owner voluntarily or involuntarily transfers Owner's Vacation Ownership Interest(s) and owns no other vacation ownership interests participating in the Network, (b) any time the Resort Affiliation Agreementis properly terminated, or (c) Owner's total financial obligation associated with membership in the Network (exclusive of fees payable to the Association and optional transaction or other fees) exceeds Three Thousand Dollars ($3,000) during the term of this Agreement.

So by signing the contract, my voluntary enrollment became mandatory for at least 5 years.
I am not a legal expert, but thinking about it now, it's interesting how the selling agent was wearing different hats at the same time. He was representing the developer (which I believe is Westin Aventuras) when he sold me the VOI but then he was representing the "third party" VSN when he had me sign the Network Agreement (the doc that contains the language above).

 

[Italnsd]

All the Flex Programs have some of the highest MF relative to our weeks MF.

1. Ongoing MF Higher.
2. Limited inventory within each Flex-Network.
3. Little/No Resale Value

Thanks for the detailed analysis. While we have definitely some differences in terms of location preference (I live in San Diego, so for me Mexican resorts are just a cheap flight away from Tijuana airport and hence more convenient than, say, resorts in Florida) your breaking down the cons of Flex Program ownership is very helpful. Let me go over the 3 components.

1) MF Fees. This is an interesting point as one would expect the generally lower cost of life in Mexico with respect to the US to be reflected into lower MFs. Maybe that's not the case because Cabo and Cancun are the two places in Mexico with the largest influx of tourism from the US, with resulting price adjustments.
If the values of the MFs in your table are provided by Vistana in a transparent way (i.e., by disclosing the analysis used in their determination) , it would be interesting to see what makes the MF for Aventuras higher than the average of the MFs of its home resorts.

2) Inventory. Is it known what percentage of accomodations in the home resorts is available for Aventuras owners?

3) Resale value. I see this as an important factor only in regards to purchases from the developer, since in purchasing resale one is going for cheap by design. Clearly, in this regard, my purchase of Aventuras from the developer was not a great decision.

As mentioned earlier, we got into Aventuras Flex to enroll our Resale-Weeks [$35K = $10K/1-WEEK + $5K x 5-WEEKS].
Last fall Vistana offered to take back all of our Aventuras-Flex + WLR-Weeks [RTU] in exchange for 257700-SO Nanea [akin to a 3BR-EY].
We were offered credit [100% of what we paid for Flex + WLR] + Incentives [20%-DISCOUNT + 204K-SO + 500K-Bonvoy + $2K-Stay-Credit + 12 x BON-330K-CERTS].

How does this sort of exchange really work? Can I just approach Vistana and ask for it or does it start from them, depending on some ongoing strategy they are pursuing? In particular, what is Vistana's interest in getting back Flex VOIs in exchange for deeded weeks at a single resort so much so to give all those additional incentives? It's not very common for any transaction to be a win-win for both sides.

From your perspective, you exchanged 3 weeks at Westin Lagunamar and 2 weeks Aventuras for a certain number of weeks at Nanea. Since Nanea is a voluntary resort, how does this increase your resale value since the SOs (or Abound points) do not transfer? In general, what makes the resale value of a voluntary single resort higher than that of a Flex program? It must be lower MFs (measurable, at least assuming that present delta values are reflective of future ones) and/or higher inventory (is this an available figure?).

Our philosophy for TS has always been pay more for Higher-Value [Location/Season].
Reason: Accrue more Points for the same MF.
E.g., WLR-PLAT+ [148100-SO] has the exact same MF as WLR-GOLD+ [81000-SO].
Thus, it's better to pay more for PLAT+ [Higher CapEx] for lower ongoing MF [Lower-OpEx].

Sorry for this long reply, but you made a lot of interesting points. This is my last question, promised. Are you saying that buying a week in the Plat+ season (which costs more and is valued at a higher number of SOs than a week in the Gold+ season) generates the same $ amount of MFs? How can this bethe case, aren't MFs computed as a constant unit cost times the number of owned SOs?

I am very interested in all this as I believe the fee structure does not favor my current single biennial VOI, so I'm looking into possibly getting more on the resale market. The Abound merge seems to have made that plan more complicated though.

 

[Mroze]

Thanks for the detailed analysis. While we have definitely some differences in terms of location preference (I live in San Diego, so for me Mexican resorts are just a cheap flight away from Tijuana airport and hence more convenient than, say, resorts in Florida) your breaking down the cons of Flex Program ownership is very helpful. Let me go over the 3 components.

1) MF Fees. This is an interesting point as one would expect the generally lower cost of life in Mexico with respect to the US to be reflected into lower MFs. Maybe that's not the case because Cabo and Cancun are the two places in Mexico with the largest influx of tourism from the US, with resulting price adjustments.
If the values of the MFs in your table are provided by Vistana in a transparent way (i.e., by disclosing the analysis used in their determination) , it would be interesting to see what makes the MF for Aventuras higher than the average of the MFs of its home resorts.

2) Inventory. Is it known what percentage of accomodations in the home resorts is available for Aventuras owners?

3) Resale value. I see this as an important factor only in regards to purchases from the developer, since in purchasing resale one is going for cheap by design. Clearly, in this regard, my purchase of Aventuras from the developer was not a great decision.



How does this sort of exchange really work? Can I just approach Vistana and ask for it or does it start from them, depending on some ongoing strategy they are pursuing? In particular, what is Vistana's interest in getting back Flex VOIs in exchange for deeded weeks at a single resort so much so to give all those additional incentives? It's not very common for any transaction to be a win-win for both sides.

From your perspective, you exchanged 3 weeks at Westin Lagunamar and 2 weeks Aventuras for a certain number of weeks at Nanea. Since Nanea is a voluntary resort, how does this increase your resale value since the SOs (or Abound points) do not transfer? In general, what makes the resale value of a voluntary single resort higher than that of a Flex program? It must be lower MFs (measurable, at least assuming that present delta values are reflective of future ones) and/or higher inventory (is this an available figure?).



Sorry for this long reply, but you made a lot of interesting points. This is my last question, promised. Are you saying that buying a week in the Plat+ season (which costs more and is valued at a higher number of SOs than a week in the Gold+ season) generates the same $ amount of MFs? How can this bethe case, aren't MFs computed as a constant unit cost times the number of owned SOs?

I am very interested in all this as I believe the fee structure does not favor my current single biennial VOI, so I'm looking into possibly getting more on the resale market. The Abound merge seems to have made that plan more complicated though.

A1: MF in Mexico [DEEDED-WEEKS] are some of the lowest in the Vistana network. WLR is probably the lowest which is why we purchased 3 x EOY contracts.
However, since COVID the MF for WLR have spiked by double digits.
Aventuras uses a different convoluted blended mechanism, to compute MF and all of the Flex programs have much higher MF than the underlying Deeded-Weeks.

Here is a table depicting the MF at WLR over a decade. As you can see it was flat [even dropped for a while] due to the favorable Peso/$ Exchange-Rate.

A2: Flex-Inventory: I have no information on what exact inventory is included in Flex.
However, reading from some of the experts on TUG, I have discovered that the Flex programs don't necessarily have the best inventory [e.g., not as much OF Westin Maui or more Low-Season].

A3: We Exchanged 3 x EOY 2BR-WLR PLAT+ [Direct-Purchase] + 2 x Aventuras-Packages [TOT: 321700-SO] for 1 x 257700-SO Nanea. Lost 64K-SO/Year.
We received about $100K Credit for what we gave up + we paid an additional $25K so the developer did not lose. However, the incentives softened the blow.
Since this was directly transacted with Vistana, the Voluntary-Nanea was automatically Enrolled or considered Developer-Purchase eligible for all benefits within Vistana as well as Abound.
It is NEVER a Win-Win for both. ALWAYS a Win for the developer.

A4: As for resale value, I guess that's a matter of supply/demand.
On RedWeek I can see Westin Aventuras for sale 176700-SO for $5.5K
On RedWeek I can see Westin Nanea for sale 257700-SO for between $55K to $75K.
Actual closings maybe lower, however, there is a dramatic difference in resale value.

A5: MF are the same [Same-Unit-Size/Type] irrespective of the Season.
However, this is true for Deeded-Weeks [NOT Points-Based-Programs like Flex] at Marriott, Vistana, Hyatt. Not sure about other chains.
Example-1

• Owning a 2BR-OF at a Marriott or Westin in Maui can accrue 6.5K-7K Abound-Points with MF: $2893.
• Owning a 2BR-ISLAND at a Marriott or Westin in Maui can accrue 4.5K-5K Abound-Points with MF: $2893.
• 2BR Event-Weeks [Christmas/New-Year] accrue upwards of 12K-Abound with MF: $2893.

Example-2

• Owning a 2BR-PLAT+ WLR in Cancun accrues 148100-SO with MF: $1783.
• Owning a 2BR-GOLD+ WLR in Cancun accrues 81000-SO with MF: $1783.

This is why we were willing to spend more on the upfront Purchase [CapEx] since the ongoing MF [OpEx] is identical:

Exchange-Value Example

• 2BR-WKV-PLATINUM+ [148100-SO]: Purchase-Price $12K - $20K. MF: $1879.
• 2BR-WKV-GOLD [56300-SO]: Purchase-Price $2K - $3K. MF: $1879.

We have exchanged the 2BR-WKV-PLAT+ for 12-Nights into a 2BR at Atlantis [Summer/Platinum] for 153100-SO [Check-In Sunday].
However, the 2BR-WKV-GOLD would get us 5-Nights in a 2BR at Atlantis [Summer/Platinum] for 57400-SO [Check-In Sunday].
Both WKV-Weeks [PLAT+ or GOLD] have the exact same annual carrying costs with very different Return-Value.

 

[Italnsd]

A1: MF in Mexico [DEEDED-WEEKS] are some of the lowest in the Vistana network. WLR is probably the lowest which is why we purchased 3 x EOY contracts.
However, since COVID the MF for WLR have spiked by double digits.
Aventuras uses a different convoluted blended mechanism, to compute MF and all of the Flex programs are much higher than the Deeded-Weeks.

Here is a table depicting the MF at WLR over a decade. As you can see it was flat [even dropped for a while] due to the favorable Peso/$ Exchange-Rate.

Thanks once again for all your time and courtesy. What has prevented me to increase my VOI so far is the overwhelming feeling that this matter is so ridiculously complicated that I can't even evaluate what my level of knowledge is. Everytime I think I grasped some concepts, I realize that there are many more shades of gray in between than I thought.

If I understand correctly what you are saying:
1) MFs for Flex programs are proportional to the number of points/options owned (In my particular case, since I get 67100 home options every 2 years, I pay $ c * 33550 per year where c is the cost per home option. From your table, in 2021 c = $0.01524308. Since this year I paid $544.52, this makes c(2023)=0.01623010 for an increase of about 6.5% in two years

2) The MFs for deeded weeks depend only on the size of the apartment (e.g., studio, one-bedroom, two-bedrom, etc). However, the same apartment size is worth a different amount of SOs depending on the season (btw, is there a difference between a fixed week and a floating week?) and or features (e.g., views and so on) . This creates an opportunity to get more bang for the buck, i.e., a better SOs/MFs ratio (and MVC points/MFs ratio), by purchasing platinum season possibly with the best features from the developer. The con side is the larger initial cost, but it is partially mitigated by a higher resale value.

In light of the above, I fully get your point now that purchasing Flex from developer is the worst choice, as it comes with the highest MFs, without any flexibility to tweak the points/MFs ratio, low resale value and, as with every purchase from developer, high initial price.
Is Vistana still selling the whole gamut of property types: flex, deeded week mandatory, deeded week voluntary, or is it able to cut down on some of the types by moving properties from one inventory to the other when it gets them back.

My understanding was that when buying resale the key parameters are very different, as the purchaser willingly trades flexibility for low cost of entry. So, thinking that buying price and resale value were less relevant, I would have ranked resale purchases this way:
1) Mandatory resale at the top, on a sliding scale based on the SOs/MF ratio
2) Flex resale: no SOs but some flexibility due to the pool of home resorts
3) Voluntary resale: no SOs, and hence no SOs/MFs tweaking, and just one resort to choose from

This situation will not change after the merge with Abound as no new Vistana resale purchases will be admitted into Abound.
(BTW, this opens up a question of whether buying a mandatory resale I would have to pay the Abound club fee for my current VOI plus the Vistana club fee + Vistana a la carte fees for the resale purchase. Such a messy situation lol)

My understanding of resales is however challenged by the numbers you report from Redweek. A resale price 55k-75k is a really high figure that I would not have expected. In fact, the top range of the corresponding interval of 21.3- 29.1 cents per option is not much below what I paid for my Aventuras from developer, which is 36.4 cent per option (taking into account its biennial aspect), and which is shown by Redweek to be offered at a resale value of 3.1 cents per option, below 10% of the purchase price .

I must confess I really do not understand the resale market, as there seems to be an extreme variability in asking prices for things that appear to me almost identical. My maybe too hasty conclusion was that the resale market prices were more the expression of the desire of the owner to get rid of his VOI than by that of selling at a fair market price. It's not infrequent to see properties offered away for just a few dollars, even at mandatory resorts. What I cannot understand is why these properties stay on the market for months. Where is the catch, in other words what are the telltale signs of a resale that is better to pass on? There must be one, because even considering that gold is worse than platinum, resort A is worse than resort B, would not all these difference dwarf when buying at $1? Or not?

 

[EnglishmanAbroad]

I think the wild variation in resale prices at the resorts I pay closest attention to (Maui) is simply down to the fact that some sellers refuse to acknowledge that they paid the developer way over the odds and still think they can recuperate their original outlay.