I would be open to buying a deed to hold for a few years at Elara. Is this a terrible way to accomplish what I am trying to do? I am worried it would be hard to sell or transfer costs would be significant.
It's an okay idea. Elara isn't hard to acquire or hard to sell. Elara 2 BR Grand has low maintenance fees, so it's a good deed to have. It's comparable with LV Boulevard, LV Paradise, and some LV Trump (Studio Plus Platinum). Just be aware that listing prices you see on sellingtimeshares.net and other brokers include broker fee, which for these lower point
non-Platinum deeds is the majority of the price. For example, 2 BR Gold at Blvd or Paradise is typically listed at $1.5K, but anything between $0 and $500 goes to the seller. If you'd like to recoup the costs of your Elara purchase, you'd have to acquire it privately, and then sell or give away privately. Be aware of closing and post-closing costs of around $1.5K when acquiring any HGVC deed - this cost isn't recoverable in anyway, and isn't part of the listing price (except for some Ebay listings that explicitly state otherwise).
If we're talking 2 BR
Platinum at Elara, Flamingo, Blvd, Paradise, these are very good deeds that sell for $4K to $6K. Note however that even these desirable deeds don't appreciate value over time. See
http://rofr.net/ - HGVC on the Boulevard - to see 2 BR Plat went typically for $7-$8K several years ago, and goes for $5K-$6K today. Rather, they slightly decline in its value, without even accounting for inflation.
However, you should consider the value of your constant use of HGVC points over the years. Sure, if you "invest" $6K total to acquire Flamingo 2 BR Platinum, and then sell it for $3K 5 years later, you lost $3K in equity value, but meanwhile, you paid around $6.1K in MFs (SUM 0...4: $1142 * MF_inflation_rate ^ year_number) in MFs, gained 5 * 11,200 pts = 56,000 pts, and these points bought you what would cost $25K on hilton.com, or $15K on hotels.com to book somewhat comparable accommodations (they wouldn't quite match but would be close). Let's say $20K to be reasonable about it. When accounted for everything:
-$6K deed purchase incl. closing, post-closing
-$6.1K maintenance fees for 5 years, assuming 3% MF increase every year
+$20K value of received accommodations from HGVC points
+$3K deed sale
=
+$10.9K
You come on top, but obviously, only if you look at what you'd pay for comps.
One warning for Elara resale purchases: be on the lookout for no-points deeds at Elara. These are old Westgate deeds that cannot be enrolled for points in HGVC. If you're fine with that, cool, you'll acquire a deed like that for free, and often closing will be covered for you, but you'll have a hard time selling... erm... giving it away... erm... paying someone to take if from you in the future. They're not desired at all, so you basically have to pay someone to take them from you if you want to get rid of them.
Would it be impossible to book Elara (or similar) 2BR with Valdoro?
Points are points. Elara isn't busy so you can book anything at Elara with points. Elara deed as good as any to book at Elara. You can have Blvd, Paradise, or even SeaWorld in Silver season.
One of the two most important thing in HGVC timesharing is MF-per-points economics. Your goal is to get the ratio as low as possible. And then there's acquisition cost. Deeds with low MFpp are priced higher, so it takes longer to break even (compared to buying cheaper). For example Blvd 2 BR Gold is free + $1.5K closing, and you get 8000 points for $944 MF, while Blvd 2 BR Plat is $5K + $1.5K, and you get 11200 points for $944 MF. It takes a lot of time before "investing" into 2 BR Plat pays off compared to getting 2 BR Gold cheaply.
However, if you'd like to have home week access to Valdoro, which is very busy and very hard to book with points, you should consider Valdoro ownership for that purpose. It's hard (but not impossible) to book Valdoro with points. This is the second most important thing in HGVC timesharing - get a home week if a resort is almost impossible to book with regular points in your desired season.
To summarize, there's two aspects at play in HGVC timesharing:
1. MF-per-points economics for booking anything that isn't super busy.
2. Home week value - where you pay a premium in MFs to get a priority booking window for most desired units in most desired seasons (typically, large units with ocean views [if applicable] during holidays and summer break)
Parents + 3 kids + grandma (flying from Poland to join us). I originally had 5 nights in MarBrisa, 3 nights in Vegas, 2 nights in Hilton hotels in Los Angeles, but the grandma decided to join us, therefore I switched it all to Vegas for simplicity.
