Hilton Grand Vacations strikes deal to acquire Diamond Resorts

[ccwu]

I think only the HI Collection members can book The Modern Honolulu on Oahu at 13 months even if The Modern is not in the HI Collection.

We own both HI and US collection. Being Dri platinum member we can almost book everything 14 months in advance. But it is still hard to get certain resorts. We originally own Maui Embassy, it became Sunterra, and we trade our deed with Sunterra trust with strong objections Timon from our other deeded friends. We can not book into Maui between January to March. All the deeded owners who hold their deeds not giving out their deeded week so there is no availability. The deeded week has priority to platinum member. Platinum has priority over the other members. This is one of the reason it is hard for regular member to get peak prime properties.


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[frank808]

Is Diamond higher than platinum in DRI?

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[Tamaradarann]

They offer my resale Hilton club that I bought for $11,000 for trade in $83,000 and resale 57th street (I got for 5,000) for $50,000. Not a bad deal. I need to buy something for about $20K in pre construction price platinum premier Maui unit plus 15,000 bonus pts and Lower my MF by $2000. I rejected bc I like my resale NY properties better than Maui one. The price now is much lower than 2019’s offer. Some are close to resale price.


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Do I have this right the Maui property that they are offereing you costs 83K + 50 K + 20K = $153,000. So they are giving you some nice credit for the properties that you own but they are charging so much for the Maui property that they get 2 nice NYC timeshares and $20,000 for a Maui property.

 

[Tamaradarann]

Yes, that is DRI propaganda, but it should be taken skeptically. There were 461,619,220 points in the HI collection on December 31, 2019. The number of points at the two Hawaii resorts in the collection was 203,161,500. Thus, only 44% of the points were in HI. Since Diamond sells HI points with Hawaii as the special destination, this means 416.6 million demanders are chasing 203.2 million reservations.

The point you made with the number of points is precisely the point I was making: In the DRI Hawaii Collection there are more weeks owned by members in the Hawaii Collection than there are weeks available in the Hawaii Resorts in the collection. Therefore, it may be hard to book Hawaii. By the way is the Modern in the Hawaii Collection or not? If not why not? If it isn't I probably tell you why. Honolulu is so in demand that they want to sell it only to people who will pay for the location not let others in a collection get in who bought their points cheaper.

 

[geist1223]

Diamond is not higher than Platinum. Modern Honolulu is not part of the Hawaiian Collection. Why/why not ask DRI.

 

[nuwermj]

By the way is the Modern in the Hawaii Collection or not? If not why not? If it isn't I probably tell you why. Honolulu is so in demand that they want to sell it only to people who will pay for the location not let others in a collection get in who bought their points cheaper.

The Modern is not currently in HI Collection. Diamond acquired the hotel in April 2018. They announced their plan to convert it to condos one floor at a time, and sell those conversions as timeshare. I believe they started the conversion just before the pandemic and there were statements from Diamnd that the Modern would be added to HI collection. It will be up to the new management if any of this changes.

 

[Tamaradarann]

The Modern is not currently in HI Collection. Diamond acquired the hotel in April 2018. They announced their plan to convert it to condos one floor at a time, and sell those conversions as timeshare. I believe they started the conversion just before the pandemic and there were statements from Diamnd that the Modern would be added to HI collection. It will be up to the new management if any of this changes.

We know about Diamond acquiring the hotel and have gone to a presentation there right after the acquired it. When we stay at the Hilton Hawaiian Village we walk by it almost everyday going to and from the mall. If it does go into the Hawaii Collection then it would certainly help the balance between Hawaii and non-Hawaii resorts in the Hawaii Collection. While I believe that all of the resorts in the Hawaii Collection will be hard to book with more owner weeks in the Hawaii Collection than there are actual weeks available in Hawaii, the Modern will be the hardest just like the Hilton Hawaiian Village is harder to book than the resorts on the Island of Hawaii.

 

[dayooper]

If it does go into the Hawaii Collection then it would certainly help the balance between Hawaii and non-Hawaii resorts in the Hawaii Collection.

I think this might wind up as an HGVC/bHC property. With it not currently being in a trust and it being in a very popular area, this would fit right in with HGVC.

 

[linsj]

I think this might wind up as an HGVC/bHC property. With it not currently being in a trust and it being in a very popular area, this would fit right in with HGVC.

This would be a good move for Hilton.

 

[Tamaradarann]

I think this might wind up as an HGVC/bHC property. With it not currently being in a trust and it being in a very popular area, this would fit right in with HGVC.

How much of it has been sold already? I don't know how HGVC would handle this type of move. This is what I believe are the previous HGVC timeshare acquisitions: In South-West Florida and the Bay Club the resorts were kept as affiliates and owners could join HGVC or not. The Elara was a partially finished and sold out building which is similar to the Modern at present. When the builidng was purchased from Westgate the units that Westgate finished and sold were kept as Westgate. The rest were completed by HGVC and became part of HGVC like all the other HGVC developed buildings.

 

[CalGalTraveler]

Yes, that is DRI propaganda, but it should be taken skeptically. There were 461,619,220 points in the HI collection on December 31, 2019. The number of points at the two Hawaii resorts in the collection was 203,161,500. Thus, only 44% of the points were in HI. Since Diamond sells HI points with Hawaii as the special destination, this means 416.6 million demanders are chasing 203.2 million reservations.

This is one of the key reasons I don't trust TS land trusts. Too easy to play games. Many developers don't tell you exactly what's in the trust to avoid being sued. Also deedbacks provide a great opportunity to take units out of the trust. I don't think there is anything obligating the developer to put specific units back in the trust once there is a deedback. I am sure the lawyers have put in language for every change and contingency. But maybe Diamond is different?

The other reason I don't trust trusts is that the law is not settled as to walking away from a trust. Whereas deeds have legal precedence per the terrific work that @Grammarhero has pulled together. State laws differ greatly.

What state laws prevail if there are deeds in a trust from multiple states? I believe Diamond is based in Nevada which BTW doesn't have non-judicial, anti-deficiency laws. So if NV law prevails on a trust, and you or a loved one must walk due to health or other catastrophe, you may be stuck paying out of your assets for developer legal fees and deficiency. Other states such as Calif, FL and SC are more forgiving and you only need to give back the timeshare as the deficiency.

Links to Official State Timeshare Laws and Guides/Manuals

@TUGBrian @DeniseM @CalGalTraveler take a look. This weekend, I’m creating a spreadsheet with official links to states’ timeshare laws, as well as their statuses as to non-judicial, anti-deficiency foreclosures. In the meantime, I will just keep adding notes. * Legal Disclaimer: This list...

tugbbs.com

 

[CalGalTraveler]

We own both HI and US collection. Being Dri platinum member we can almost book everything 14 months in advance. But it is still hard to get certain resorts. We originally own Maui Embassy, it became Sunterra, and we trade our deed with Sunterra trust with strong objections Timon from our other deeded friends. We can not book into Maui between January to March. All the deeded owners who hold their deeds not giving out their deeded week so there is no availability. The deeded week has priority to platinum member. Platinum has priority over the other members. This is one of the reason it is hard for regular member to get peak prime properties.


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There should also be KBC units in the trust separate from the deeded weeks. Perhaps those are not prime weeks?

However given the high rental values during prime for the Westin next door (e.g. $5000+/week in a 2bdrm), I surmise that deeded owners would rather rent it out for cash profit, or do an II trade for a Marriott, Hyatt or Westin, than trade for DRI trust points. This would be especially true if getting DRI points reservations at prime is a crap shoot.

I could envision (hope!) the deeded weeks owners at KBC and potentially Modern being added to HGVC deed/points system and assigning them an HGVC points value.

 

[dayooper]

How much of it has been sold already? I don't know how HGVC would handle this type of move. This is what I believe are the previous HGVC timeshare acquisitions: In South-West Florida and the Bay Club the resorts were kept as affiliates and owners could join HGVC or not. The Elara was a partially finished and sold out building which is similar to the Modern at present. When the builidng was purchased from Westgate the units that Westgate finished and sold were kept as Westgate. The rest were completed by HGVC and became part of HGVC like all the other HGVC developed buildings.

From what it sounds like, there's still most of The Modern's inventory left. How they would handle the current owners, I'm not sure. If I'm to understand what I've been told about the property, it's not part of a trust. How was ownership sold? If they are true owned weeks, they could easily be converted into HGVC style of points. You could give the owners the option of joining HGVC (voluntary resort like the other affiliates) or buy them back as they come up for sale. HGVC loves the upgrade tactic so I'm sure they would jump at at the chance to get trade in's on these deeds. If they are trust style points, you could also give the owners time to make their reservations (like a Home Season booking) and make the club booking start at 9 months. You could give the current owners options to enroll their points (turn them into weeks, depending on the amount of points owned).

I think HGVC merged with DRI for multiple reasons. One of the big knocks of HGVC was the limited locations. Even if booking is difficult, they can say they have all of these great locations under the Hilton umbrella. Much like the SW Florida resorts, they are in the system, but not easily booked. Mark Wang said they would be rebranding DRI resorts and some of them would be branded HGVC. I believe there will be some ability for current HGVC members to book into certain DRI resorts (just like I believe there will be options for DRI members to book into certain HGVC resorts). HGVC has to have some vehicle to upsale DRI owners into the more expensive HGVC deeds and the best way is to have the prospective buyers stay in the resorts. As far as The Modern goes, it's just too easy to rebrand HGVC. It's in a great location and, if I understand the situation properly, no trust situation to complicate things. They could jack up the prices for these weeks to Ocean Tower or even the NYC property levels. This would give HGVC more inventory in Oahu (it seems there just can't be enough) and more properties to sell prospective HGVC buyers on. They would have a total of seven Oahu properties to entice buyers.

 

[GT75]

This is one of the key reasons I don't trust TS land trusts. Too easy to play games. Many developers don't tell you exactly what's in the trust to avoid being sued. Also deedbacks provide a great opportunity to take units out of the trust.

Once you buy into the trust, your points is variable. If they oversold, they just raise points for reservation. That is why so many unhappy owners, they bought 4500 for s studio week, now they could not get a week with the points. Whatever DRI changed the points rate is not right.

I agree. I also think that a DRI member reported previously in this thread that Diamond changed the point requirements to reserve units in their Trust. Wow, this certainly doesn't seem right to me after I purchased into the Trust. Just think for example if HGVC could change the point requirements of LT without changing the points that owners purchased at LT. Hopefully, I misunderstood/misread the post.

 

[nuwermj]

From what it sounds like, there's still most of The Modern's inventory left. How they would handle the current owners, I'm not sure. If I'm to understand what I've been told about the property, it's not part of a trust. How was ownership sold?

The Modern is currently a traditional hotel. Nothing has yet been converted to timeshare. There are no timeshare owners.

 

[nuwermj]

I also think that a DRI member reported previously in this thread that Diamond changed the point requirements to reserve units in their Trust.

That statement was made in error. Diamond has not changed point values. And "short stay point values" (the 10% premium) predates Diamond.

 

[Tamaradarann]

The Modern is currently a traditional hotel. Nothing has yet been converted to timeshare. There are no timeshare owners.

I know I went to a presentation at the Modern 2 years ago. I want't buying so I didn't pay attention to exactly what they were selling only that they were selling a timeshare that was going to cost me more than I was paying to stay in a Studio at the Lagoon Tower at the Hilton. Are you saying that they weren't selling the Modern at that time only membership in a trust which did NOT include the Modern? Furthermore, are you saying that the Modern renvoation into Timeshare units hasn't started yet?

 

[nuwermj]

I know I went to a presentation at the Modern 2 years ago. I want't buying so I didn't pay attention to exactly what they were selling only that they were selling a timeshare that was going to cost me more than I was paying to stay in a Studio at the Lagoon Tower at the Hilton. Are you saying that they weren't selling the Modern at that time only membership in a trust which did NOT include the Modern?

Yes, they were selling points in the HI trust fund. And at that time the Modern was not in that trust. But Diamond owned the building and they were letting members use points to reserved rooms there. It was like an affiliate resort.

Furthermore, are you saying that the Modern renvoation into Timeshare units hasn't started yet?

Diamond's stated intention was to convert the Modern one floor at a time. I recall a DRI exec saying that renovations on one of the floors had started before the pandemic arose. I don't know if the renovations on that one floor have been completed in the interim. I also don't know whether the timeshare declaration which creates the HOA has been approved by the state of Hawaii. @youppi Luc have you heard anything about the status of the renovations?

 

[Jason245]

I actually wonder if the embarc brand might be rolled into hgvc. My understanding is that the quality is similar, they were previously affiliated with eachother.

I know those owners fought joining dri network.. would they fight a combination with hgvc? Points conversion already exists and has history if not in use currently.

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[dayooper]

I actually wonder if the embarc brand might be rolled into hgvc. My understanding is that the quality is similar, they were previously affiliated with eachother.

I know those owners fought joining dri network.. would they fight a combination with hgvc? Points conversion already exists and has history if not in use currently.

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I think it will be at least like the external exchange resorts (GP Palisades, GP Seapointe).

 

[holdaer]

Hopefully, the Embarc resorts will have a similar point structure like GP Palisades and GP Seapointe and not the goofy odd point structure previously. Why didn't they have points rounded to the nearest 100s place? Booking a week reservation for 7,348 points was weird.

 

[Jason245]

Hopefully, the Embarc resorts will have a similar point structure like GP Palisades and GP Seapointe and not the goofy odd point structure previously. Why didn't they have points rounded to the nearest 100s place? Booking a week reservation for 7,348 points was weird.

It might not be ideal, but the points transfer structure already exists which means it is probably easy to turn back on.

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[youppi]

Yes, they were selling points in the HI trust fund. And at that time the Modern was not in that trust. But Diamond owned the building and they were letting members use points to reserved rooms there. It was like an affiliate resort.



Diamond's stated intention was to convert the Modern one floor at a time. I recall a DRI exec saying that renovations on one of the floors had started before the pandemic arose. I don't know if the renovations on that one floor have been completed in the interim. I also don't know whether the timeshare declaration which creates the HOA has been approved by the state of Hawaii. @youppi Luc have you heard anything about the status of the renovations?

No and when I do a search for availability, I see no new type of units with kitchen because from what I understand from the following quoted sentences, hotel rooms will be changed to unit with kitchen/kitchenette.
"The Modern is a hotel that is being converted into a timeshare property. During this time, the hotel rooms will not have kitchens or kitchenettes."

 

[Fried_shrimp]

For those who are interesting, here is the URL that lists all of the Diamond resorts. Unfortunately, it also lists all of the affiliates so you have to look at the symbols to determine which is which.

As someone stated earlier, Diamond IT, in all of their glory, decided (or screwed up) and deleted the link on the website to Locations so I had to access it abackdoor way to get it.

https://member.diamondresorts.com/Resorts/

 

[Fried_shrimp]

Not true. “Dirty” points do earn status, it’s just that you cannot use them for any of the worthless additions that they’ve introduced in recent years (such as cruises, flights or hotel stays). We started our journey with DRI back when it was the Grand Vacation Club (prior to Sunterra taking over) with 5000 points. Those are the only points we ever bought from the developer but have increased our ownership to 31000 by buying resale. We are Gold members by having over 30000 points.

I'm sorry but that is incorrect. Status is only gained when being a member of The Club and dirty points are not in The Club and have none of the benefits of The Club. Dirty points can (used to be at least) cleaned but unless that was done at some point in time, dirty points grant no privileges in the The Club.