Steve, ROFR may certainly eliminate some buyers who are only willing to offer a low price but reducing the number of lowball offers isnt a disadvantage if the seller wants a certain price.
On the other hand how about a buyer who wants to own DVC. If you want to buy resale you absolutely know that you cannot buy a contract for less than lets say $85 per point. So what is the buyer to do. Either offer over $85 per point or the sale wont go through. Price protection for DVC owners.
My point is that while not everyone is a fan of ROFR, it can and does keep up resale prices for some high demand timeshares.
If you are a seller and you want to sell your Marriott or DVC, having a reduced number of offers is a HUGE disadvantage. People who don't need to sell don't have to accept a low offer whether there is ROFR or not. People who need to sell want to get every offer they can. ROFR reduces the number of buyers willing to make an offer (I will never make an offer on an ROFR resort again). How many owners might take $6000 for their week but will never get an offer because some buyers feel like $6000 won't pass ROFR. This poor seller has buyers that would pay a price he would take if not for ROFR. That makes it harder to sell the week and so he reduces the asking price to $5000 after having it for sale for months with no offers. It doesn't matter whether it is ROFR'd or not, it sold for $5000 instead of $6000 thanks to ROFR limiting the pool of buyers which ultimatelly lowered the final sale price.
Many DVC and Marriott timeshare owners assume that buyers have to have DVC or Marriott and will pay any price to get them. The current sale prices prove that theory wrong. The fact that so many weeks are for sale for months on redweek etc shows that these weeks won't sell at anywhere near the prices they commanded in the past. Ebay Marriott weeks are selling for half the price they brought 6 months ago, but they still aren't cheap enough to make Marriott want to ROFR them. Supply and demand in action with no regard to ROFR.
ROFR doesn't keep prices high on high demand timeshares. High demand and high quality keeps the prices high. ROFR keeps the cheap supply of inventory available for the developer to access if they want it. The weeks sell for whatever the buyer offered, the only thing ROFR changes is who the final owner is.
If I buy a week, pay MF's on the week, and want to sell my week for $1000 to a neighbor or friend, I should be able to sell it to whoever I want for whatever I want because I own it. If I spend my money and time advertising my week for sale I should be able to sell it to the buyer that finally made me an acceptable offer on my week. The owner is on their own to try and find a buyer. That is something that ROFR developers won't do, make an offer to buy your week. They simply wait until all the negotiating is done and then decide at their leisure if they can make money or not by ROFR'ing at the previously agreed upon price. If it is good for the developer they ROFR it. If it isn't something the developer wants, it is sold to the original buyer. Either way it is sold for the original price, not one penny more. I personally will never buy a week at a resort that has ROFR again, and I love Marriott resorts.
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