Dear Elara Westgate owners, or prospective Westgate resales buyers.
My wife and I very recently attended a Hilton Grand Vacations sales meeting. I agree with many of the posts to date suggesting that Westgate owners with deeded title are being mistreated by Westgate, and HGV acting on behalf of Centerbridge Partners, L.P..
We were notified yesterday of a number of HGVC strategies which will potentially have serious adverse consequences upon some of us. I now have to wait until I get back to Ireland to see if I got lucky.
From the talk by HGVC staff Hilton have no intention of introducing Westgate owners into their system. This was their opening statement.
The Hilton sales staff were still using the existing standard accommodation floor plan of 'studio', '1 bedroom' or '2 bedroom grand', however based on their other properties in Vegas, it appears they are likely to have 3 categories of exchange week gold platinum and event week. Event week equates with Westgate's later introduction of weeks 51/52 as special weeks, differing from their '52 all red' preconstruction days pitch.
From HGVC's existing property the weeks in Vegas are allocated as follows ( from my notes):
Platinum: 1-4, 9-20, 37-43, 50, 51e, 52e
Gold: 5-8, 21-36, 43-49
I think these are correct for the hotels with most platinum dates
In addition with relation to Elara, we were advised by Hilton yesterday that they were restructuring, as a pilot 2 floors, and they offered us preconstruction prices on these. Which are due to end "so we were told at the end of the month".
From the Elara specific data sheet which I had a limited period to review (it would be great if any others of you can get a better look), HGVC are planning a further subdivision of "standard" and "plus" category rooms. The advisors told us related to the floor level of the room in The Elara Tower.
They were unable to advise (or unwilling) what that cut off level would be.
However in the building for those of you who have not yet visited there is a lower level
lift :hysterical: to first 28 floors and a higher level
lift :rofl: between 28 to 46 floor (not labelled as such).
There is a special lift to penthouse suites and they are 47-52. We plebs have not found that yet.
It appears at HGVC owners buy into points at either gold, silver bronze platinum or event standard weeks. The more points you own in total the better "loved" you are by HGVC. 14000 points ownership appears to be the lowest level of gold promotion of membership which rises to Diamond. This is not the same as the weeks value, an unfortunate mixture of precious metals perhaps the clarity woul have been best served by making membership status precious stones throughout unless they want to sow confusion?
They advised us yesterday that HGVC currently equate annual studio Elara as 2200 points, and 1 bedroomed as 4800 points, and 2 bedroomed as 7000 points.
In platinum weeks the cost is greater we were told (again from my recollection):
Elara Studio 2200 points $10990 @ $5.00 per point (I think platinum weeks as I caught this concept late sorry.)
Elara 1 Bedroom 4800 points never discussed price not sure of category of week.
Elara 2 bedroom 7000 points $39000 @ $5.57 again I'm not sure if this was platinum or gold class week
They were just interested in selling us 2 weeks of this to hit 14000 points magic number to raise one above "silver scum" level we're there are lots of additional charges to pay. But again I'm not sure if this was gold or platinum type week.
They have a 2 bedroomed grande and this is worth 8000 points at standard floor level and 9200 points at plus level but both in gold weeks I think.
I think this because when I did get a look at the Elara specific sheet briefly I noted "Plus" "2 Bedroom Grand" Platinum week was $61980 worth 11400 points @ $5.437
Another quote was I think variations around Standard or gold week but 2 bedroom grande (which is what we own hence my interest)
$49990 worth 9200 points @ $5.434 per point & $42980 worth 8000 points @ $5.373 per point
Event weeks are just over $6.00 per point I noted (not exactly).
They were also talking about 3 bedroomed properties, and so I imagine their refurbishment is restructuring westgates rather poor room layout. This will create some variability but we were not shown plans just the elara specific pricing sheet with 3 bedroom Availability indicated and definite 2 bedroom and 2 bedroom grand classifications. Though the staff did not clarify the 2 bedroom 2 bedroom grand distinction only the existing floor plan still used the term 2 bedroom grand. (which Westgate now describe as 2 bedroom villa
http://westgateresorts.com/ph-towers/accommodations/
The on line Elara web page classification:
http://www3.hilton.com/en/hotels/ne...nter-strip-LASCSGV/accommodations/suites.html
I share this info with you not because I want out, and not necessarily because I want in to HGVC. However I feel that information is the key to sucess. We as current Westgate owners have been misused, or at least not as well treated as we deserve. Previously with reapect to another part related Westgate issue, I tried through frank Perez a Nevada lawyer to make some headway over our allegation of misselling which took place at the Westgate lakes in Florida. Unfortunately because this was governed by Florida law, Frank was not particularly able to make headway or assist.
However Elara and all of our ownership deeds are controlled by Nevada Law. We are planning to see him during our 2 week stay to identify what our ownership rights are, and what our position would be if Westgate was to completely fold, or Mr Segal were to pass on.
As owners I'm not sure why we cannot potentially establish an independent link with RCI.
Our experiences with Interval International have been extremely poor. For example , we have been trying unsuccessfully with interval to secure a trip for our 25 wedding anniversary. Yesterday HGVC were willing to give us the points for free if we signed up. Interval have been unable to generate an exchange for Aug 2013, since Aug 2012 with a 2012 deposit made in Feb 2012 for year 2012. Clearly interval are struggling to utilise Westgate Elara property since the takeover.
I'm sorry this a long post. I hope it provides some important info, and I wonder as we are all in the same boat if we need to group together in a subforum of Westgate Elara Owners in order to manage our combined problem.
Good luck to you all.
