Founders Level [Wyndham]

[Richelle]

I can't help you find airfares or cruises but I'll give you my opinion on use of your points. If this hasn't been said, the only good use of Wyndham points is for room reservations. No other use of points provides a decent return of value for your money. Unless the idea that you otherwise would not have vacationed, or cruised, or gone to Disney - intangible things -- if that is of value to you, then it's worth it.

If 1.4M points is going to be more than you can use, you might want to consider gifting (or renting) to friends and family. Maybe you could charge family maintenance and use the money for your airfare or cruises?

And in all seriousness, depending on your age, it may be the best loophole you have going for you. In my opinion, the most successful lawsuits we hear about, are those related to Wyndham taking advantage of the elderly. Selling elderly more points than they possibly need for top dollar. Confusing them, lying to them, that kind of stuff.

No one here will recommend paying someone to take it off your hands. NEVER pay an upfront fee. Timeshare stuff is extremely confusing and even if you have an awesome lawyer, you likely don't want to pay them to litigate on your behalf. If you were going to pursue litigation, you'd want someone experienced with timeshares.

What do others think about the Florida Department of Business & Professional Regulation (Florida DBPR)? Wyndham answers to no one, but they like to keep the Florida DBPR happy. You can file a complaint with them. It won't cost you anything. Wyndham doesn't have to do anything, but I hear sometimes they will out of goodwill. If you are elderly, maybe they'd consider making you happy versus you persuing litigation? My 2 cents, hopefully others will weigh in.

So sorry for the situation you are in. You are not alone, it's how many got here. TUG is a great place. Any questions you have, drop them here. You'll get plenty of opinions, take the advice or leave it. But it's a good place to bounce ideas around. I'll also be founder when the new program is introduced. Hoping we are happy with whatever is (finally) delivered. It's been teased around (and changed some) for quite some time. For sure, one reason it's been floated so much is to increase sales (and for sure you are not alone in your purchase and flawed promises (how's that a new name for lies))?

Best of luck to you!
Sandi

Best advice so far.

 

[Jan M.]

It's a shame you wasted your money on an attorney before you found TUG. Unless the claims the sales person made were in writing in the sales agreement you signed there is zero chance whatsoever that you would be successful in dealing with Wyndham. If in your anger you're thinking of getting rid of what you have, don't cut off your nose to spite your face. No one is going to pay you more than a few pennies on the dollar of what you've spent. Don't fall for a scammer who tells you otherwise.

The other bad news, like Sandi Bo told you, is that using your points for airfare, rental cars, cruises and maintenance fees is a very poor value and a waste of points. Sign up on the airlines you like to use websites so you get notified for their fare sales. For next month I booked two round trip flights from Cleveland, Ohio to Orlando, Florida on Frontier Airlines for $121.96. That's $60.98 per person found trip and includes us sharing a checked bag both ways. We're on a trip right now that I booked the flights through Spirit Airlines. $166 or $83 per person found trip sharing a checked bag.

Use www.autoslash.com to make rental car reservations and use their price tracker to be notified when they find a lower fare. We're currently on a 24 day rental out of Las Vegas that ended up being $463.43 for a full sized car. However when we got to the rental car location we were offered a Hyundai Santa Fe and took it because we're doing a lot of mountain and desert driving. It comes out to about $19 a day and isn't the best price we've gotten on a rental car in the last couple of years by far but it was by far the best price we were going to get this time. Because we decided to extend our trip I booked another reservation for 10/3-17 that as of now will be $398. You can only rent a car for 30 days as anything longer than that is a lease. There's still time before the second rental for Autoslash price tracker to find us a better rate. However I'm not holding out a lot of hope because the demand is likely high here for Columbus Day weekend.

For cruises www.vacationstogo.com and www.cheapcaribbean.com will get you great prices.

Now for the good news. Although the new VIP levels and benefits won't take effect until November making you Founders you're still platinum for the time being. The advice to learn to use what you have is best advice anyone could give you.

Here's the break down for our current trip, September 9-October 17.

24,000 points, 9/9-11, 2 night at Desert Blue in a
2 bedroom presidential unit upgraded from a studio.

$61.61, 9/11-12, Hotel in Ely, NV booked through a Priceline Express deal using a coupon code I found online. We did the nighttime Star Train excursion on the restored Northern Nevada Railroad in Ely. I wouldn't waste Wyndham reward points on something I can book at this price.

93,600 points, 9/12-22, 10 nights at Wyndham Vino Bello resort in Napa. One bedroom upgraded from a studio.

36,750 points, 9/22-26, 4 nights at Wyndham Angel's Camp resort in a 2 bedroom unit upgraded from a 1 bedroom. Close to Calaveras Tall Trees State Park to see sequoias. They are amazing!

$99, 9/26-10/3, Grandview at Las Vegas in a 1 bedroom unit. Because we own at this resort we got the week for $99 however any Wyndham owner could have booked the same thing for $269 + tax through an RCI last call week. These weeks are available within 45 days of check in and you don't use any points.

83,750 points, 10/3-11, 8 nights at Wyndham Sedona resort in a 2 bedroom lock off unit upgraded from a 1 bedroom deluxe. I rented the 1 bedroom suite side of our unit for enough to cover our maintenance fees on the points for the reservation with enough left to pay for a nice dinner out for the 2 of us. So our stay here cost us nothing.

32,000 points, 10/11-16, 5 nights at Wyndham Flagstaff in a 2 bedroom loft unit. The first 2 nights had nothing available to get the upgrade on but the next 3 were upgraded from a 1 bedroom suite.

$57.57, 10/16-17, La Quinta Inn in Law Vegas. Again booked with a coupon code for a Priceline express deal that I found online by just Googling Priceline coupon codes. Again not wasting Wyndham reward points for something this cheap. Wyndham isn't allowing single night stays at this time but even if they were the cheapest night I could book would be 13,250 points for that Friday night at Grand Desert. Our maintenance fees with the program fees included are $5.47 per thousand points. That would make that night $72.48 if I had been able to book it instead of the $57.57 I paid. I'd rather save the points because we use every single point we have and sometimes are even borrowing from our next use year.

So 29 nights booked with 270,100 Wyndham points. 83,750 of those points cost us nothing because I rented the other side of our lock off unit at Sedona which paid for the stay. All these stays were booked within 60 days of check in and all but 2 of the 29 nights were upgraded either at the time of booking or later with the automatic upgrades. We rarely book anything at full points. So if you're free to travel or at least somewhat free don't let anyone tell you that you won't be able to use what will soon be the 60% discount and free upgrades.

Thanks to SIP at home for 3 months and being cautious about where we go because of Covid we will ONLY be staying at the resorts booked through Wyndham and RCI 160 nights this year. And that's if we stay home from mid November til the end of the year. It could happen that we'll stay home for the remainder of the year but it's not likely to, lol!

I make the best use possible of our points. Points=$. When it's more cost effective to use $ than points I don't like to waste our points.

When I book my sister and her family their own unit they pay what it costs us in maintenance fees for their stay. We don't ask family to pay if they're staying in our unit with us.

When we're dead and gone our son will be paying the maintenance fees and we're good with that. The idea of him being able to vacation as an adult without having the expense for accommodations was one of the reasons we first bought back in 2002 when he was a younger teen. We typically don't buy our son and DIL birthday, Christmas or anniversary gifts. Instead I book stays and we pay for their flights. And we take their girls, ages 9 and 4, on their own vacations with us so they have time together sans kids which they and the girls love. We had planned to stay longer on this trip but their 4 year old daughter told my husband "Papa, it's getting chilly here (Cleveland, Ohio) and I need a Florida vacation. "Several times a year I fly up and bring one or both granddaughters down to Florida for a couple of weeks and we stay at one of the beach resorts and one of the ones Orlando too. For the past two years she's done Brick or Treat at Legoland for Halloween and Papa couldn't disappoint her so Grandma waived her magic wand to make it happen.

We have friends we've made through TUG that we sometimes share a unit with. Sometimes it's our reservation and sometimes it's theirs. Gotta love those calls or texts saying: "Just found this reservation, wanna go?" Being able to book a 2 bedroom lock off unit so each have their own unit is a great way to start when you're getting to know each other.

In just the last 13 months we've stayed at the following Wyndham resorts and resorts through RCI. Some more than once. Not in any order time wise just as I'm thinking of them off the top of my head. I may miss one or two.

Wyndham resorts:
Austin
Portland
Ka Eo Kai
Kauai Beach Villas
Harbor Lights
Margaritaville St. Thomas
Glacier Canyon
Sundara
Clearwater
Emerald Grande
Panama City Beach
Ocean Walk
Bonnet Creek
Star Island
Reunion
Royal Vista
Palm-Aire
Fairfield Glade
Nashville
Fairfield Plantation
Desert Blue
Vino Bello
Angel's Camp
Sedona
Flagstaff

Through RCI:
Grandview at Las Vegas
Caloosa Cove, Islamorada in the Keys
Caribe Beach Resort, Sanibel
Lighthouse Resort, Sanibel
Shell Island Resort, Sanibel
Little Gull Cottages on Longboat Key
The Houses at Summer Bay, Orlando
Vacation Village at Parkway, Orlando
Silver Lake, Orlando
Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge, savanna view unit
Disney's Saratoga Springs Resort

You truly do have something worth having. I hope I've given you some ideas and encouraged you to dream bigger.

 

[Pathways]

Please show me examples of how to find multiple airfares and cruises with by 1.2 million.

Club Wyndham Travel 800-732-0203. That's the Wyndham way to use your points on airfare, cruise, hotel, and car rental. You tell them what you're looking for and they will work with you to find it. Or shop for the best flight available, then call them and they will book using your points and a one time fee.

Any of the above is a terrible use of points, but you asked. 1.4m points could easily do all of the above. Example: two or three $100 flights, a 3 day cruise inside stateroom, and so on.

 

[55plus]

If you are like us and enjoy travel, staying at nice resorts, are flexible, plan ahead and take advantage of point discounts and upgrades, you can come-out ahead. We’ve owned for almost 30 years. We now use our points to snowbird in Florida for 6 months every winter along with other trips throughout the year with friends and family.