Developer Deal too good to be true??

[eabishop2]

I sat through a Worldmark presentation today in Las Vegas (my wife was hooked by free tickets to Purple Reign). Before I start I want to point out that I'm a long-time Tugger and all my timeshares are resales. I had looked into Worldmark several years ago and almost pulled the trigger but other life situations intervened and we held off. We are here on an RCI exchange and decided to do the presentation for the aforementioned Purple Reign plus I hadn't sat through one in a while and wanted to see what the latest spin was. It really surprised me.

They talked up their acquisition of Travel & Leisure and all the new extra benefits that brings. But then came the meat of the deal. They offered to "give" me 9000 annual credits for each of 2 other timeshares I own for a total of 18,000 credits. I don't give up the other timeshares or change the way I use them. I just have to prove every 5 years that I still own them. They get no interest or access to my other timeshares. All I have to do is buy 5,000 credits at a "discounted" rate of $3.66 each. I said "and then I pay maintenance on the whole 23,000 right?" And he said NO! Just on the 5,000. I haven't seen an actual contract yet but on the financial proposal he printed off for me, the maintenance fee is $776.46 which is the 2026 amount for 5,000 credits. I'm not sure about HK and GC but I'll for sure ask about this if I move forward at all. He let me leave to consider it and get back to him by tomorrow.

Here's the thing. Even resale if I want to buy 23,000 annual credits the maintenance is like $2665 or something. That means I'd break even on the $18,300 in under 10 years! I would still need to confirm that I would have an account with 23,000 credits for OTU limits etc, but even without that this seems like, at the very least, an offer to do some serious cost/benefit analysis on before saying no. Have any of you heard anything like this before? What am I missing?

 

[bizaro86]

That was a lie. If you want useable credits for the other TS you have to turn in the usage (via an rci or ii deposit that worldmark gets). You would also only have a 5k account for things like housekeeping, guest certs, and otu rental limits.

 

[easyrider]

Something doesn't sound right. If you give them your 18,000 credits in membership and buy 5,000 credits from them, you would have the mf on 5,000 credits and have access to rci for extra vacations. You wouldn't have the same access to the Worldmark properties because you would be lacking enough credits to make a reservation.

Bill

 

[geist1223]

If a Deal sounds to good to be true. RUN! They are feeding you a line of 1/4 truths.

 

[HudsHut]

I agree with @bizaro86

They are describing the use of "Exchange Plus" where you "turn in" your timeshare (for an individual year) to WM in exchange for 9,000 one time use credits, plus an HK

Exchange your WorldMark timeshare with Exchange Plus.

Do you own qualified weeks with a timeshare other than WorldMark? Turn those weeks into WorldMark adventures with Exchange Plus.

worldmark.wyndhamdestinations.com

If you want to try WorldMark, there are dozens of "free" accounts being given away. Select the account size that works for you.


Here are some free listings:

Memberships for Sale

WorldMark Contracts (permanent credits) for sale or loan assumption

wmowners.com

Bulk List Inventory

docs.google.com

Tug Marketplace:

Search Timeshares for Sale, Rent, or Exchange by Owner | Save Thousands on your next Family Vacation!TUG Timeshare Marketplace Search Results - Worldmark Points For Sale Points

Search thousands of timeshares for sale, for rent, or exchange by owner. Save money dealing directly with the owners—no hidden fees, just great deals for your next vacation!TUG Timeshare Marketplace Search, Worldmark Points, For Sale, Points

www.tug2.com

 

[WorldT]

See post #5 above. If you want more credits, there are free ones with free closing available to acquire.
No need to try to calculate the break even point.

 

[davidvel]

I sat through a Worldmark presentation today in Las Vegas (my wife was hooked by free tickets to Purple Reign). Before I start I want to point out that I'm a long-time Tugger and all my timeshares are resales. I had looked into Worldmark several years ago and almost pulled the trigger but other life situations intervened and we held off. We are here on an RCI exchange and decided to do the presentation for the aforementioned Purple Reign plus I hadn't sat through one in a while and wanted to see what the latest spin was. It really surprised me.

They talked up their acquisition of Travel & Leisure and all the new extra benefits that brings. But then came the meat of the deal. They offered to "give" me 9000 annual credits for each of 2 other timeshares I own for a total of 18,000 credits. I don't give up the other timeshares or change the way I use them. I just have to prove every 5 years that I still own them. They get no interest or access to my other timeshares. All I have to do is buy 5,000 credits at a "discounted" rate of $3.66 each. I said "and then I pay maintenance on the whole 23,000 right?" And he said NO! Just on the 5,000. I haven't seen an actual contract yet but on the financial proposal he printed off for me, the maintenance fee is $776.46 which is the 2026 amount for 5,000 credits. I'm not sure about HK and GC but I'll for sure ask about this if I move forward at all. He let me leave to consider it and get back to him by tomorrow.

Here's the thing. Even resale if I want to buy 23,000 annual credits the maintenance is like $2665 or something. That means I'd break even on the $18,300 in under 10 years! I would still need to confirm that I would have an account with 23,000 credits for OTU limits etc, but even without that this seems like, at the very least, an offer to do some serious cost/benefit analysis on before saying no. Have any of you heard anything like this before? What am I missing?

They are just selling you 5,000 credits, nothing more nothing less. The bunk about the extra 9,000 credits they claim you are getting you will never be seen on the contract.

 

[TUGBrian]

great deal... for the salesman.

 

[eabishop2]

Thanks for all of your replies! I suspect at least one of you (and maybe more) are correct, but I asked several of these questions specifically and there was no clarification that made the lie apparent. Now it's more an exercise in curiosity to see what the lie was and how big it was. I will keep you posted.

 

[bizaro86]

Thanks for all of your replies! I suspect at least one of you (and maybe more) are correct, but I asked several of these questions specifically and there was no clarification that made the lie apparent. Now it's more an exercise in curiosity to see what the lie was and how big it was. I will keep you posted.

That's because they are not just liars but shameless liars.

 

[JohnPaul]

They are talking about the PIC program which Wyndham has had for a long time but is new to Worldmark. You don't "get" the extra 9000 credits they are talking about but you do get "credit" for them toward VIP status. If you value VIP status it can be a good deal.

 

[easyrider]

They are talking about the PIC program which Wyndham has had for a long time but is new to Worldmark. You don't "get" the extra 9000 credits they are talking about but you do get "credit" for them toward VIP status. If you value VIP status it can be a good deal.

Thanks John. I looked up the PIC program. The last presentation at Worldmark had a person trying to explain this but it sounded like bs so I called it bs. Here is what AI says.

Bill


Club Wyndham's Personal Interval Choice (PIC) Plus program allows owners to enroll qualified non-Wyndham, RCI-affiliated timeshare weeks to convert them into Club Wyndham points. This program enables you to use your external week for Club Wyndham points, trade it via RCI, or use it at your home resort, with points contributing toward VIP eligibility.

Travel + Leisure +1
Key Aspects of the PIC Program:

• How it Works: You maintain ownership of your non-Wyndham timeshare but, after paying a conversion fee, you can deposit that week and receive Wyndham points in exchange.
• Requirements: You must generally purchase additional developer points from Wyndham (often a minimum of
  
  points) to enroll in PIC Plus.
• PIC Plus vs. PIC Express: PIC Plus typically offers a permanent, life-of-contract enrollment, whereas other forms might have different requirements.
• Fees: There are fees associated with converting the week, sometimes over
  
  
  per conversion, and maintenance fees on the non-Wyndham unit must be current.
• Restrictions: Points from PIC contracts may not be eligible for certain premium upgrades, and they cannot be used with the standard Points Deposit Feature.

 

[gravityrules]

I sat through a Worldmark presentation today in Las Vegas (my wife was hooked by free tickets to Purple Reign). Before I start I want to point out that I'm a long-time Tugger and all my timeshares are resales. I had looked into Worldmark several years ago and almost pulled the trigger but other life situations intervened and we held off. We are here on an RCI exchange and decided to do the presentation for the aforementioned Purple Reign plus I hadn't sat through one in a while and wanted to see what the latest spin was. It really surprised me.

They talked up their acquisition of Travel & Leisure and all the new extra benefits that brings. But then came the meat of the deal. They offered to "give" me 9000 annual credits for each of 2 other timeshares I own for a total of 18,000 credits. I don't give up the other timeshares or change the way I use them. I just have to prove every 5 years that I still own them. They get no interest or access to my other timeshares. All I have to do is buy 5,000 credits at a "discounted" rate of $3.66 each. I said "and then I pay maintenance on the whole 23,000 right?" And he said NO! Just on the 5,000. I haven't seen an actual contract yet but on the financial proposal he printed off for me, the maintenance fee is $776.46 which is the 2026 amount for 5,000 credits. I'm not sure about HK and GC but I'll for sure ask about this if I move forward at all. He let me leave to consider it and get back to him by tomorrow.

Here's the thing. Even resale if I want to buy 23,000 annual credits the maintenance is like $2665 or something. That means I'd break even on the $18,300 in under 10 years! I would still need to confirm that I would have an account with 23,000 credits for OTU limits etc, but even without that this seems like, at the very least, an offer to do some serious cost/benefit analysis on before saying no. Have any of you heard anything like this before? What am I missing?

Here's the devilish sales logic ... you would only be paying MFs to Worldmark for 5K credits. But you're still on the hook for the MF for your other 2 weeks, it is just that you would NOT be paying that to Worldmark, it's paid to whoever you currently pay MF to for those 2 weeks. You would end up with Worldmark MF on 5K credits and non Worldmark MFs on those 2 weeks. See how sales can say they didn't lie (you're not paying Worldmark for MFs on 23K credits)... but they certainly misled you down a tempting path (greatly reduced MFs for more TS product) you found of interest. How could Worldmark ever make a promise about MFs on properties they don't own? WM is certainly not going to sign up to pay MFs on those 2 weeks for you!
And there's a Worldmark fee for converting those weeks to 9K credit every time you do it.

 

[geist1223]

Actually Worldmark has had PIC for a very long time. At least 20+ years. We have been members for almost 24 years and it has been available the whole time.

 

[bizaro86]

Actually Worldmark has had PIC for a very long time. At least 20+ years. We have been members for almost 24 years and it has been available the whole time.

Worldmark has changed the PIC program - it now requires a new developer purchase or you can't use it.

 

[WManning]

Pick up 20k credits for free and forget about what the salesman spewed.

 

[eabishop2]

Here's the final update: Many of you were correct (and I never really doubted that something was amiss) but they went to great lengths to keep the lie alive for quite a while! I even have it in writing! Here's the text exchange I had with the sales rep:

"Hi <Name>, we are still discussing the proposal from this morning and we aren't sure we both understand how it would work. Is the 18,000 credits for our 2 timeshares a one-time thing or is it every year? And just to confirm, we don't have to give up use of them or give WorldMark access to them in any way, is that correct?"

And here's the response:

"You get the 18,000 credits each year on your anniversary date into your travel account. You still keep your other timeshares and WorldMark has no access to those whatsoever. You continue to use as you do now. Honestly (haha!) it's a great offer. Hope to see you today! Any other questions let me know."

So I followed up with:

"Sorry to keep beating this but I'm still feeling like I'm missing the catch. So every year I would end up with 23,000 credits in my account that are good for 25 months? It would be just like I bought 23,000 credits from you directly except my maintenance would be based on 5,000 credits? What about Housekeeping and Guest Certificates? Just trying to make sure I'm understanding all the details".

At this point she called me. She confirmed everything I had sent in that second text and told me I would get 3 HKT and 2 GC per year. I said if that's all really true and I can see it in a contract we would probably be interested. So we setup an appointment for this morning and when we got there and I pressed again, she brought in the guy who had given us all these great details 2 days ago. He started backtracking with "fixed week vs points gobbledeygook blah blah blah" and "let me put in exactly what you own and see what happens blah blah lies lies lies" and then he comes back and describes the PIC Program exactly as easyrider described it above. He apologized (hahahaha) about him being confused about how it all works and said he had misunderstood the program because it was relatively new. We were out of there in 15 minutes.

Thanks for all the feedback. I knew this was too good to be true, but they strung me along right up until they had to give it to me in writing. I told my wife before we went in there that we weren't buying anything because there was no way this could be real. We were all correct!

 

[davidvel]

So to sum this up (I don't know this ownership), the 18K "credits" are just "credits" toward status, but cannot be used to reserve anything? So what does the text that said "You get the 18,000 credits each year on your anniversary date into your travel account" mean. Isn't your travel account what you can reserve with? So that is a blatant lie, in writing (text)? Or am I missing something?

 

[eabishop2]

So to sum this up (I don't know this ownership), the 18K "credits" are just "credits" toward status, but cannot be used to reserve anything? So what does the text that said "You get the 18,000 credits each year on your anniversary date into your travel account" mean. Isn't your travel account what you can reserve with? So that is a blatant lie, in writing (text)? Or am I missing something?

There never really were 18,000 points. I could pay a fee to convert my existing timeshares each year, but then I don't have use of it anymore. There was a bunch of stuff that I was tuning out about whether they were fixed, floating or points and the different ways I could give them up and pay to get them put into RCI. And yes, they blatantly lied to me in text and to my face several times, even when I used the words "Too good to be true" or "What's the catch?". They kept it going right up until they wanted to talk about financing and I said I wasn't doing that until I saw the contract. Then the hemming and hawing began and some version of the truth came out.

 

[davidvel]

There never really were 18,000 points. I could pay a fee to convert my existing timeshares each year, but then I don't have use of it anymore. There was a bunch of stuff that I was tuning out about whether they were fixed, floating or points and the different ways I could give them up and pay to get them put into RCI. And yes, they blatantly lied to me in text and to my face several times, even when I used the words "Too good to be true" or "What's the catch?". They kept it going right up until they wanted to talk about financing and I said I wasn't doing that until I saw the contract. Then the hemming and hawing began and some version of the truth came out.

At least they acknowledged that they were not being honest with their "ha ha" comment.

 

[eabishop2]

At least they acknowledged that they were not being honest with their "ha ha" comment.

Oh, to be clear those hahah's were added by me as sarcasm.

 

[HitchHiker71]

Here's the link to information on the updated Worldmark Exchange Program (otherwise known as PIC in the Wyndham world): https://worldmark.wyndhamdestinations.com//us/en/resorts/news/2025/changes-coming-to-wm-exchange

 

[HitchHiker71]

So to sum this up (I don't know this ownership), the 18K "credits" are just "credits" toward status, but cannot be used to reserve anything? So what does the text that said "You get the 18,000 credits each year on your anniversary date into your travel account" mean. Isn't your travel account what you can reserve with? So that is a blatant lie, in writing (text)? Or am I missing something?

Depends on which version of the Worldmark Exchange program was being pitched: https://worldmark.wyndhamdestinations.com//us/en/resorts/news/2025/changes-coming-to-wm-exchange

 

[davidvel]

Oh, to be clear those hahah's were added by me as sarcasm.

Got it.As a FYI when you add to or change a quote, that should be in brackets, not parenthesis, so the reader knows this.