Well we were looking to actually deposit them for trade. We too like to travel in shoulder season.
A good policy within the present Marriott system. Get the highest demand week you can to exchange. I guess I'm fortunate in that, under normal circumstances, I don't feel the need to grab those weeks for what I'm asking for in exchange. Not needing the extra exchange power that a holiday week provides takes some pressure off trying to get those tough weeks. I'm also fortunate that, with our Vegas ownership, holiday weeks are not necessarily the highest demand weeks and, there just isn't that much compitition to get the weeks that actually have higher trade power like NASCAR week (either week 9 or week 10 in Vegas).
It also highlights the theory that exchanging for holiday weeks within the Marriott system might not be as tough as home resort owners reserving them for personal use. Lots of compitition for those weeks both from owners wanting them to use and from owners wanting them for their precieved exchange power.
Not to highjack this thread but, that's were points based exchanges systems even the field. When the management company controls the inventory of their resorts, they can hold the most desirable weeks for owners wanting to stay at their home resort and internal exchangers within the system wanting to stay at these resorts. Only after owners and internal exchangers have had their opportunity to select what they want does the management company release weeks to an exchange company.
On the other side of that equation is that all points become equal. If you are one of those owners who have the disipline and desire to make those early morning phone calls and get those high demand weeks, you may preceive a decline in trade power. If you're a last minute planner who never has a chance at a prime week, suddenly you may feel an increase in exchange power or, you may find better weeks available not only at your home resort but at all resorts within the system.
I'm accustomed the the system as it is now and have learned to work it to my advantage in certain situations. It isn't that difficult to trade up to a larger unit if you're a little bit flexible, know what to look for and how to look for it. If the playing field is leveled out by a points based system, some of that advantage will be lost.
If Marriott ever does make changes to it's internal trade system, there will be good and bad about it. If they don't ever make a change I'm fine with that as well. There's good and bad about how it works now. The bad is the compitition to get higher demand weeks for either personal use or to exchange. The good is being able to take a smaller unit and trade into a larger unit. I would miss being able to trade up but, I enjoy the relative ease of getting good weeks with the two systems I own that utilize a points based system for exchanges.
