Considering Wyndham Resale?

[sam332]

Hello, I recently attended a Wyndham presentation, where they offered 12,000 points for $20,000 at a 15% interest rate, but I walked out. Later, I saw I could buy the same points on resale for around $800, which got me interested. The salesperson mentioned RCI access (4,000 points for a week) and special $80/night resort discounts when out of points. If I buy resale, will I still get those benefits, or are they limited? What should I consider before committing to a resale purchase?

 

[dioxide45]

It sounds like you were at a Worldmark by Wyndham presentation. There is a dedicated forum on TUG for questions related to Worldmark.

Worldmark The Club

Forum for discussion of all Worldmark Timeshares and related topics!

tugbbs.com

 

[sam332]

Hello, I recently attended a Wyndham presentation, where they offered 12,000 points for $20,000 at a 15% interest rate, but I walked out. Later, I saw I could buy the same points on resale for around $800, which got me interested. The salesperson mentioned RCI access (4,000 points for a week) and special $80/night resort discounts when out of points.
If I buy resale, will I still get those benefits, or are they limited? What should I consider before committing to a resale purchase?

 

[geist1223]

Resell Worldmark has full access to the 90+ Worldmark Resorts, Bonus Time, Monday Madness, Inventory Specials (these are cash options that include the Housekeeping), WaitList, etc. If you buy Resell you have to join RCI and/or II on your own. Typically when you join RCI on your own this is a "Weeks" Account not a "Points" Account.

Resell Worldmark does not have access to Club Pass, Wyndham South Pacific, or Travelshare.

Also if you are buying resell make sure you understand if it is with Wyndham or Worldmark.

 

[Fido Chuckwagon]

Hello, I recently attended a Wyndham presentation, where they offered 12,000 points for $20,000 at a 15% interest rate, but I walked out. Later, I saw I could buy the same points on resale for around $800, which got me interested. The salesperson mentioned RCI access (4,000 points for a week) and special $80/night resort discounts when out of points. If I buy resale, will I still get those benefits, or are they limited? What should I consider before committing to a resale purchase?

What resort(s) are you interested in staying. Primarily worldmark or Wyndham? What time of year? That can help inform your decision of what is best to buy. And yes, you should absolutely buy it on the resale market.

 

[sam332]

Thanks @geist1223

Resell Worldmark has full access to the 90+ Worldmark Resorts, Bonus Time, Monday Madness, Inventory Specials (these are cash options that include the Housekeeping), WaitList, etc. If you buy Resell you have to join RCI and/or II on your own. Typically, when you join RCI on your own this is a "Weeks" Account not a "Points" Account.

housekeeping is separate? the salesman said you only pay for annual maintenance fees which include everything even the tax. Is that true? any other hidden fees?

Resell Worldmark does not have access to Club Pass, Wyndham South Pacific, or Travelshare.

so that $80/night won't be available to me? or that's through RCI

Also, if you are buying resell make sure you understand if it is with Wyndham or Worldmark.

When you say I have to join on my own, does that mean a simple sign up or I have to pay separately for annual membership.

 

[sam332]

What resort(s) are you interested in staying. Primarily worldmark or Wyndham? What time of year? That can help inform your decision of what is best to buy. And yes, you should absolutely buy it on the resale market.

@Fido Chuckwagon
Primarily yes but I'm also interested in RCI because I'm looking to travel to Istanbul, Italy, Mexico and Canada. I think once in the summer and once in the winter depends on the weather.

 

[TUGBrian]

congrats on discovering the resale market before throwing away 20 grand!

 

[Eric B]

Thanks @geist1223

housekeeping is separate? the salesman said you only pay for annual maintenance fees which include everything even the tax. Is that true? any other hidden fees?

so that $80/night won't be available to me? or that's through RCI

When you say I have to join on my own, does that mean a simple sign up or I have to pay separately for annual membership.

Hi Sam. I would recommend going through the information in the linked sticky thread above for all of the answers you'll need. There's a lot there but it's worth learning all you can in the timeshare world - the sales staff at the resorts is only interested in selling you something in order to earn a commission and very likely doesn't really have a good grasp on how the products they sell work. You will occasionally meet one that owns with the timeshare system they are selling but it is definitely the exception rather than the rule. I'll try to answer the questions you asked in any case, assuming that you were looking at WorldMark ownership based on the number of points (really credits) they offered you.

Housekeeping is tracked separately by "housekeeping tokens". The salesman didn't lie outright on that - you would be billed on a quarterly basis for your dues as an owner based on the number of credits you own. What you would get for those dues is the use of the those dues to make a reservation and certain number of housekeeping tokens to cover the cost of cleaning the room when you depart. The number of tokens is based on how many credits you own - up to 10,000 credits would come with one token and you would get another for each additional 10,000 credits you own. For the ownership they were trying to sell you with 12,000 credits, you would get one housekeeping token each year. If you have used all your housekeeping tokens and want to make another reservation in the year you can pay the cost of the housekeeping as a standard amount based on the unit size. If you think about it, it's a decently fair way to allocate those costs to what drives them.

The other piece of information you got from the salesman on taxes is wrong - the way things in WorldMark are set up the dues do not cover tourist taxes, etc., that some locations impose to pay for sports arenas, etc. Instead, when you make a reservation in a place that is covered by a tourist tax, transient occupancy tax, or whatever it's called there you have to pay that in addition to the credits and the housekeeping token.

The $80/night thing is probably meant to (poorly) describe the cash methods of booking a stay that WorldMark has. Read up on what "Bonus Time," "Inventory Specials," etc., are in the sticky note and linked articles. Those methods of booking for cash when you have used your credits or when you decide it's a better deal have a set cost per credit that it would have taken to book the reservation and do not require a housekeeping token. It was previously set up with a minimum cost per night of $80, though I believe it's going up to $85 per night. Bottom line is that it is similar to what they told you but they didn't give you the details, perhaps because they didn't know them. Those bookings are limited to WorldMark resorts within 14 days of checking in for Bonus Time (overseas has a longer availability) or to specified resorts for Inventory Specials and is not done through RCI.

With a resale WorldMark ownership, you do not get a "free" RCI account. The scare quotes around "free" are there because there is an upcharge in dues for retail ownership to cover the few additional perks that comes with. I only own resale in WorldMark though I own on the Wyndham side of the house with some developer purchases. Bottom line is that you would have a choice of joining RCI, Interval International, any independent exchanges system that accepts WorldMark deposits, or none of the above. As an owner of a number of RCI-affiliated resorts I have plenty of access to that exchange system and never felt a great need to use my WorldMark ownership there - instead, I have used it in Interval and with independent exchange systems.

One of the recommendations you received above was to be sure you understand whether it is Wyndham or WorldMark you are looking at. They are two separate resort systems; WorldMark is predominantly in the west and Wyndham has a bigger presence in the east but there is a fair amount of crossover. One of the few things you would not have access to as a resale owner is the ability to book a Wyndham resort using a WorldMark ownership or vice versa. In my opinion, this isn't a great loss because the access to book using Club Pass from one to the other doesn't become available until several months after owners in each side have already had the opportunity to reserve the high demand resorts/dates - as a result, you can't get into certain resorts from the other side anyway (e.g., WorldMark Marina Dunes, Fiji, or Yellowstone). That's in large part why I picked up a resale WorldMark account as a Wyndham owner in the first place - getting one resale ownership on each side would cost you substantially less than paying retail to get the access to Club Pass and would get you the ability to actually book the high demand spots earlier.

Hope this helps. WMOwners.com is another great resource for WorldMark information.

 

[geist1223]

sam332 I think Eric answered all or most of your questions. As he said www.wmowners.com/forum is a great resource. It is by WM Owners for WM Owners. Neither Wyndham or Worldmark has anything to do with the site. Folks there like here are happy to help and answer questions.