Home Options, explained

[kozykritter]

The first time I heard of Home Options, I thought “What are those? Did they mean StarOptions?” Nope, it turns out. Home Points might have been a better name to avoid confusion but you’ll understand why those chose Options after we take a quick tour of what they are and how they work. Buckle up!

Originally Vistana had one form of ownership, the deeded week, where you buy a particular week/season/unit size at a specific resort. In 2015 they created a second form called Home Options
(HO). This was done by putting a bunch of deeded weeks into a trust, then selling general access to the trust rather than guaranteed access to any specific week/unit size/season within it. This created flexibility by not tying the HO owner to any particular season/unit size/seven-day length of stay.

There are two types of HO trusts in Vistana (you might also see them called Ownership Plans), ones with weeks from multiple resorts and ones with weeks from a single resort/phase. Sheraton Flex,
Westin Flex and Adventuras (Mexico) are multiple resort trusts whereas Nanea, St. John Coral Vista phase and St. John Sunset Bay phase are single resort/phase trusts. Just like deeded weeks, HO
owners have a 12-8 month priority reservation period for the home resort(s)/phase within their trust but in any unit size/season and for reservations from 1-14 nights. Their inventory pool during this time is limited to what is in their trust and doesn’t pull from the deeded weeks owner inventory pool.

StarOptions (SO) are not a form of ownership as you can’t buy them directly. They are a trade value assigned to each VSN-enrolled ownership (weeks, HOs) for exchanging within the VSN at 8 months out. Deeded weeks have SO values assigned based upon characteristics of the week whereas HOs convert to SOs on a 1 to 1 basis (e.g. 81,000 HOs can be used as 81,000 SOs, etc).

In a given use year, deeded week owners can use their week to book a priority period stay at their home resort, trade it in II OR use its SO value to trade through the VSN into other resorts at 8 months out but they can only do one. HO owners can do all three things in the same use year by using chunks of HOs for each function. It’s exactly what I’m doing personally in 2023 as a Sheraton Flex owner plus electing some HOs for Abound. That’s why they call it Flex!

Note about Abound: Single resort HO owners are being treated like deeded week owners when it comes to electing Club Points so they will have to elect their entire ownership contract if they choose to convert for Club points, which will eliminate their other use options in a given year. The multiple resort Flex product HO owners can convert the entire contract OR do it in increments of 20,000 HOs, meaning they could do all four activities in a given use year.

 

[Red elephant]

The first time I heard of Home Options, I thought
“What are those? Did they mean StarOptions?”
Nope, it turns out. Home Points might have been a better name to avoid confusion but you’ll
understand why those chose Options after we take a quick tour of what they are and how they work. Buckle up!

Originally Vistana had one form of ownership, the
deeded week, where you buy a particular
week/season/unit size at a specific resort. In 2015 they created a second form called Home Options
(HO). This was done by putting a bunch of deeded
weeks into a trust, then selling general access to the
trust rather than guaranteed access to any specific
week/unit size/season within it. This created
flexibility by not tying the HO owner to any particular
season/unit size/seven-day length of stay.

There are two types of HO trusts in Vistana (you
might also see them called Ownership Plans), ones
with weeks from multiple resorts and ones with
weeks from a single resort/phase. Sheraton Flex,
Westin Flex and Adventuras (Mexico) are multiple
resort trusts whereas Nanea, St. John Coral Vista
phase and St. John Sunset Bay phase are single
resort/phase trusts. Just like deeded weeks, HO
owners have a 12-8 month priority reservation period for the home resort(s)/phase within their trust but in any unit size/season and for reservations from 1-14 nights. Their inventory pool during this time is limited to what is in their trust and doesn’t pull from the deeded weeks owner inventory pool.

StarOptions (SO) are not a form of ownership as you
can’t buy them directly. They are a trade value
assigned to each VSN-enrolled ownership (weeks,
HOs) for exchanging within the VSN at 8 months
out. Deeded weeks have SO values assigned based
upon characteristics of the week whereas HOs
convert to SOs on a 1 to 1 basis (e.g. 81,000 HOs
can be used as 81,000 SOs, etc).

In a given use year, deeded week owners can use
their week to book a priority period stay at their
home resort, trade it in II OR use its SO value to trade through the VSN into other resorts at 8 months out but they can only do one. HO owners can do all three things in the same use year by using chunks of HOs for each function. It’s exactly what I’m doing personally in 2023 as a Sheraton Flex owner plus electing some HOs for Abound. That’s why they call it Flex!

Note about Abound: Single resort HO owners are
being treated like deeded week owners when it
comes to electing Club Points so they will have to elect their entire ownership contract if they choose to convert for Club points, which will eliminate their other use options in a given year. The multiple resort Flex product HO owners can convert the entire contract OR do it in increments of 20,000 HOs, meaning they could do all four activities in a given use year.

I never thought I could split my HO in a single year like that and use in 3 different ways. Good to know.
I thought single resort/phase trusts homeoptions don’t have week owners in those phases. Like Nanea does not have week ownership neither does WSJ Sunset Bay. I maybe wrong. There should not be any deeded weeks inventory pool.

 

[dioxide45]

When depositing Nanea or WSJ phases into II, do you have to deposit the entire VOI (like one will have to do with Abound) or can you deposit only a fraction of your HomeOptions?

 

[timsi]

They are going to have a very hard time explaining that a type of ownership (Flex programs) is the same as an internal exchange (like Abound or VSN) when it comes to allocating inventory during the Home Resort Reservation Period.

 

[kozykritter]

When depositing Nanea or WSJ phases into II, do you have to deposit the entire VOI (like one will have to do with Abound) or can you deposit only a fraction of your HomeOptions?

A few posters confirmed in previous discussions that they could deposit or use their Nanea HOs in II in chunks. The nature of any type of Home Options as an ownership form is essentially the same (except when used in Abound as noted). What varies is the number of resorts/phases they have priority at.

 

[kozykritter]

I never thought I could split my HO in a single year like that and use in 3 different ways. Good to know.
I thought single resort/phase trusts homeoptions don’t have week owners in those phases. Like Nanea does not have week ownership neither does WSJ Sunset Bay. I maybe wrong. There should not be any deeded weeks inventory pool.

I understand what you are saying. I made that general statement to apply across all trusts because most every Vistana property was sold as weeks. In the case of ones that were strictly HO's they would have likely deposited all of the resort/phase HO's when the trust was formed and then started selling them. Nanea HO's can be found in the resort trust and also Westin Flex.

 

[Herbalwise]

Thank

The first time I heard of Home Options, I thought
“What are those? Did they mean StarOptions?”
Nope, it turns out. Home Points might have been a better name to avoid confusion but you’ll
understand why those chose Options after we take a quick tour of what they are and how they work. Buckle up!

Originally Vistana had one form of ownership, the
deeded week, where you buy a particular
week/season/unit size at a specific resort. In 2015 they created a second form called Home Options
(HO). This was done by putting a bunch of deeded
weeks into a trust, then selling general access to the
trust rather than guaranteed access to any specific
week/unit size/season within it. This created
flexibility by not tying the HO owner to any particular
season/unit size/seven-day length of stay.

There are two types of HO trusts in Vistana (you
might also see them called Ownership Plans), ones
with weeks from multiple resorts and ones with
weeks from a single resort/phase. Sheraton Flex,
Westin Flex and Adventuras (Mexico) are multiple
resort trusts whereas Nanea, St. John Coral Vista
phase and St. John Sunset Bay phase are single
resort/phase trusts. Just like deeded weeks, HO
owners have a 12-8 month priority reservation period for the home resort(s)/phase within their trust but in any unit size/season and for reservations from 1-14 nights. Their inventory pool during this time is limited to what is in their trust and doesn’t pull from the deeded weeks owner inventory pool.

StarOptions (SO) are not a form of ownership as you
can’t buy them directly. They are a trade value
assigned to each VSN-enrolled ownership (weeks,
HOs) for exchanging within the VSN at 8 months
out. Deeded weeks have SO values assigned based
upon characteristics of the week whereas HOs
convert to SOs on a 1 to 1 basis (e.g. 81,000 HOs
can be used as 81,000 SOs, etc).

In a given use year, deeded week owners can use
their week to book a priority period stay at their
home resort, trade it in II OR use its SO value to trade through the VSN into other resorts at 8 months out but they can only do one. HO owners can do all three things in the same use year by using chunks of HOs for each function. It’s exactly what I’m doing personally in 2023 as a Sheraton Flex owner plus electing some HOs for Abound. That’s why they call it Flex!

Note about Abound: Single resort HO owners are
being treated like deeded week owners when it
comes to electing Club Points so they will have to elect their entire ownership contract if they choose to convert for Club points, which will eliminate their other use options in a given year. The multiple resort Flex product HO owners can convert the entire contract OR do it in increments of 20,000 HOs, meaning they could do all four activities in a given use year.

You

The first time I heard of Home Options, I thought
“What are those? Did they mean StarOptions?”
Nope, it turns out. Home Points might have been a better name to avoid confusion but you’ll
understand why those chose Options after we take a quick tour of what they are and how they work. Buckle up!

Originally Vistana had one form of ownership, the
deeded week, where you buy a particular
week/season/unit size at a specific resort. In 2015 they created a second form called Home Options
(HO). This was done by putting a bunch of deeded
weeks into a trust, then selling general access to the
trust rather than guaranteed access to any specific
week/unit size/season within it. This created
flexibility by not tying the HO owner to any particular
season/unit size/seven-day length of stay.

There are two types of HO trusts in Vistana (you
might also see them called Ownership Plans), ones
with weeks from multiple resorts and ones with
weeks from a single resort/phase. Sheraton Flex,
Westin Flex and Adventuras (Mexico) are multiple
resort trusts whereas Nanea, St. John Coral Vista
phase and St. John Sunset Bay phase are single
resort/phase trusts. Just like deeded weeks, HO
owners have a 12-8 month priority reservation period for the home resort(s)/phase within their trust but in any unit size/season and for reservations from 1-14 nights. Their inventory pool during this time is limited to what is in their trust and doesn’t pull from the deeded weeks owner inventory pool.

StarOptions (SO) are not a form of ownership as you
can’t buy them directly. They are a trade value
assigned to each VSN-enrolled ownership (weeks,
HOs) for exchanging within the VSN at 8 months
out. Deeded weeks have SO values assigned based
upon characteristics of the week whereas HOs
convert to SOs on a 1 to 1 basis (e.g. 81,000 HOs
can be used as 81,000 SOs, etc).

In a given use year, deeded week owners can use
their week to book a priority period stay at their
home resort, trade it in II OR use its SO value to trade through the VSN into other resorts at 8 months out but they can only do one. HO owners can do all three things in the same use year by using chunks of HOs for each function. It’s exactly what I’m doing personally in 2023 as a Sheraton Flex owner plus electing some HOs for Abound. That’s why they call it Flex!

Note about Abound: Single resort HO owners are
being treated like deeded week owners when it
comes to electing Club Points so they will have to elect their entire ownership contract if they choose to convert for Club points, which will eliminate their other use options in a given year. The multiple resort Flex product HO owners can convert the entire contract OR do it in increments of 20,000 HOs, meaning they could do all four activities in a given use year.

Thank you! My sweetie has HO's at Westin Villas Ocean View on Maui, so this helps us understand the system better.

 

[grrrah]

When depositing Nanea or WSJ phases into II, do you have to deposit the entire VOI (like one will have to do with Abound) or can you deposit only a fraction of your HomeOptions?

edit to remove wrong info. I missed the part about into II

 

[Red elephant]

When depositing Nanea or WSJ phases into II, do you have to deposit the entire VOI (like one will have to do with Abound) or can you deposit only a fraction of your HomeOptions?

No you don’t . You deposit what you need for the particular reservation. That’s was I told anyway. Abound makes you deposit the whole thing for home options but not flex.

 

[alexadeparis]

Just an important note for future readers, that upon resale, the ability to use staroptions disappears. You would then be limited to home options use or II deposit only.

 

[sponger76]

*deleted* realized it was an irrelevant point to discussion

 

[kozykritter]

Just an important note for future readers, that upon resale, the ability to use staroptions disappears. You would then be limited to home options use or II deposit only.

Yes, that's true of any Vistana ownership except mandatory deeded weeks.

 

[GrayFal]

When depositing Nanea or WSJ phases into II, do you have to deposit the entire VOI (like one will have to do with Abound) or can you deposit only a fraction of your HomeOptions?

I will be depositing some left over HO this week so will let you know.
As a resale owner at WSJ SB and CV I had to “upgrade” to a Club Interval Gold account that lets me deposit both weeks and points into my private II account.
If you are a retail owner, the points would go into your corporate paid for II Vistana account Along with your weeks.

 

[GrayFal]

I was able to deposit my left over home options.
For 2023 it gave me the option of pre paying my MF and depositing any amount of HO. It gives you a disclaimer that the minimum amount of points needed for an exchange is 20,700.
But upon further reading it stated that all points can be combine which is good as I have both Sunset bay and Coral Vista.

 

[kozykritter]

View attachment 67786
I was able to deposit my left over home options.
For 2023 it gave me the option of pre paying my MF and depositing any amount of HO. It gives you a disclaimer that the minimum amount of points needed for an exchange is 20,700.
But upon further reading it stated that all points can be combine which is good as I have both Sunset bay and Coral Vista.

That's great! You'll have to keep track of your options deposited in Interval and how you use them, what the remaining balance is because there is nowhere you can go in Interval to see that info.