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Can you purchase small amounts of StarOptions?

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We are about 1200 StarOptions short for how we'd like to use the ones we've banked. Is it possible to purchase such amounts from Vistana/Marriott? If so, who do you contanct and how?

Thanks!
 

VacationForever

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Instead of purchasing, which I do not think is possible, are you open to paying $Z for a promo offer of X days / Y nights at the resort? If so, you need to call their Marketing folks at corporate. My friends do so regularly with Vistana and Marriott. They are owners of both and that's how they extend their vacations.
 

jabberwocky

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You could buy a small Flex package. I'm not sure what the minimum size would be (probably around 5k as I think that is the minimum increment). The downside is that it would be too small for any bookings by themselves so you would essentially be restricted to using theses only as StarOptions within the 8 month window.
 

Sea Six

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You can also advance options in from the following year by pre-paying a maintenance fee.
 

controller1

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You can also advance options in from the following year by pre-paying a maintenance fee.

+1 This since you stated you are short what you have "banked" indicating this is a short-term need and not something that needs a permanent addition of StarOptions.
 

dioxide45

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There is no way to purchase one time use SOs. Your only real option is to borrow points from a future use year and prepay.
 

CalGalTraveler

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It's too bad there is not a market to rent Staroptions from owners similar to Worldmark, Disney and Marriott DC points.
 

emeryjre

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I agree that being able to rent star options would be a good thing.
 

alexadeparis

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There is no way to purchase one time use SOs. Your only real option is to borrow points from a future use year and prepay.
Unless you are an EOY use.
 

dioxide45

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Unless you are an EOY use.
You can still borrow from an EOY week. So for 2019 you could borrow from 2021 by prepaying 2020 and 2021 MFs. You can only borrow in to a use year. So borrowed 2021 SOs would be able to be used in 2019.
 
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What about if I get an SPG Credit card and accumulate "points". Can they be converted into Star Options?
 

tschwa2

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It's too bad there is not a market to rent Staroptions from owners similar to Worldmark, Disney and Marriott DC points.
It's not that there isn't a market, it is that Vistana does not allow transfers from one member to another. You can get another member to book one or two nights for you that line up with the reservation you have but then there may be additional housekeeping fees and you may have to move units.
 

DannyTS

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i think the Vistana StarOption system is great, even with shortcomings like this one. Let's be honest, the developers like points that expire, they may just end up renting that inventory. At the same time, i prefer the SO where this may happen sometimes vs the MVC points system where a skim exists all the time for the week owners.
 

CalGalTraveler

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@HarborsideHappyGirl Actually, there is a hotel workaround. If you only need a day or so to add to a reservation. Why don't you just rent the night from Marriott hotel website using the SPG/Marriott owners discount code of 25% off? Should not be too bad if only one night. Alternatively pay for the night with credit card points if the rental price is astronomical.
 
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zsn

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I have 1050 points I have for 2019* that I can let you have for round of appropriately priced "beverages" if transferring between owners were allowed :) Seriously, I am/was in the same boat. I used part of my points to gift my parents for their 5 nights stay and I was left with just enough points for 4 nights at Sheraton Poipu.....I then used my nee-SPG points to book two nights. Would have been nice if I could buy points at a discount for a couple of nights' stay. One way to maximize is to use the SO points for Sun-Thu night stay and hotel points for Fri-Sat stay. Hotel points are same all days of the week, but Mon-Wed is lowest SO usage, Thu and Sun a little higher and Fri-Sat is highest.

*TUG sages: is it worth banking these by paying $99 (that's 9.5c/point)? I think not, as regular SO (at least at WKORV) is worth about 1.6c/point. Just let it expire is my thought.
 

Sea Six

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What about if I get an SPG Credit card and accumulate "points". Can they be converted into Star Options?

You can't convert rewards points to star options, but you can get nights at vistana resorts using rewards points. These are the nights made available by people who convert their weeks to rewards points. You can also use CASH! Sometimes there are nights available using rewards points that aren't available using star options. I had that experience at WSJ years ago, but the star points (at the time) were more than I was willing to spend.
 

needvaca

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We Vistana owners should make our own “market” for renting each other our small leftover unused Staroptions if someone just needs an amount under 10,000 to get that extra 1 night for their reservation. I’ve sometimes been left with 5-10,000 staroptions with no use for them, when it could mean an extra night for someone else.

Harbor side girl- maybe someone could make a one night reservation for you at your location if you post the #of options it requires
 

VacationForever

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I posted that I had something like 27K banked SO leftover last year that were expiring and thoughts about what to do with them. A few TUGgers immediately reached out to me to book several nights while I was still figuring out what to do with the SOs. I indicated that I would want them to cover MF cost pro-rated for the SOs, plus guest certificate. Several backed out of the requests as they were willing to only pay for the guest certificate. One was willing to reimburse but I ended up booking 5 nights for our good friends to extend their vacation and they reimbursed me the $59 guest fees. In the end I felt good about how I used them.
 

Venter

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I know this is an old thread.
I am 50 points short :confused:.
 

Venter

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Do you think they will combine a premium 1 bedroom and a normal 1 bedroom if I get one through marriott.com and the other with Flexpoints?
 

jabberwocky

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Do you think they will combine a premium 1 bedroom and a normal 1 bedroom if I get one through marriott.com and the other with Flexpoints?

it never hurts to ask (do it early but don’t expect confirmation until just before). I’ve had them automatically keep us in the same room that was booked part cash and part SO. They just need to know about it.
 

Venter

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it never hurts to ask (do it early but don’t expect confirmation until just before). I’ve had them automatically keep us in the same room that was booked part cash and part SO. They just need to know about it.
Thank you.
 

mrichards

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[This would be a good post to send as a private message - click on the recipient's blue user name and then click START A CONVERSATION. DeniseM]
 
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