How do you personally trade through II?

[remowidget]

I have never traded through II as I am a VSN owner and love our properties. However, with us being able to have priority in trading to MVC and vice versa through II, I'd like to learn more. I am asking Marriott owners because I think if you have traded your Marriott time through interval your experience and practice is probably more relevant than owners of properties that can't do internal exchanges through II.

I understand there are three ways to trade. What I am interested is specifically your process and any tips your be willing to share.

 

[10spro]

I might be minority but I trade manually. It's more work but hugely successful.

 

[CPNY]

I have never traded through II as I am a VSN owner and love our properties. However, with us being able to have priority in trading to MVC and vice versa through II, I'd like to learn more. I am asking Marriott owners because I think if you have traded your Marriott time through interval your experience and practice is probably more relevant than owners of properties that can't do internal exchanges through II.

I understand there are three ways to trade. What I am interested is specifically your process and any tips your be willing to share.

Just saw June and September availability with MVC Aruba properties. Have never seen that before!

 

[CPNY]

I have never traded through II as I am a VSN owner and love our properties. However, with us being able to have priority in trading to MVC and vice versa through II, I'd like to learn more. I am asking Marriott owners because I think if you have traded your Marriott time through interval your experience and practice is probably more relevant than owners of properties that can't do internal exchanges through II.

I understand there are three ways to trade. What I am interested is specifically your process and any tips your be willing to share.

Go into II exchange, search a destination and if the avail is there exchange the unit and year you want to use, pay the exchange fee and voila. Or create an OGS for what you want, pre pay the exchange and when it becomes avail they will let know then book it. My SVV one bedroom saw a 2 bedroom in September at Marriott Aruba surf club + 59 dollar upgrade fee. I love the new preference exchange lol

 

[heathpack]

I’ve never traded my Marriott week actually, but might this coming year. It rents for a few hundred dollars over MF so that’s what I’ve done when I haven’t used it in the past. If I deposited my non-lock off Barony week, I’d probably only use it to put in an exchange request for a Hawaiian Marriott. Maybe Spain, but I’d be most interested in Mallorca for cycling and I’d be going therefore probably March so that it would be cooler and could likely easily get that trade less expensively.

However I always trade my SBP. Sometimes I enter an exchange request but I’m not sure I’ve ever had one match before I found what I wanted in II inventory or via a TUG sighting. So I’m almost always doing instant exchanges. We are not tied to a school schedule and we are not always looking for Marriott or Vistana properties, so that helps. We’ve trade SBP into Westin Kaanapali twice, Hyatt Highlands Inn (Feb week but we love it then), Diamond’s Sedona Summit over Thanksgiving week (the exact week we wanted and our favorite TS location in Sedona relative to trails we want to be on). You can get some great stuff with instant exchange.

I use my Hyatt in II the same way.

I have a lot of things that constrain my schedule- I race my bike, compete with my dogs in field events and Nosework, I sometimes have to travel for CE conferences for work, sometimes need to cover for someone else at work, sometimes have weekend travel plans with friends. It’s really hard for me to set up exchange requests because I have very few weeks that are absolutely free. But I can decide to skip a race or a dog event say if the exchange opportunity is good enough, or I can move things around in my schedule. It’s much easier for me to make a plan knowing X exchange is possible in Y unit size checking in on Z date than it is to come up with an exchange request that excludes every date I might conceivably be tied up and then frequently go in and modify my request as things change.

Long winded answer but I think what you’re going to find is that people do exchanges all kinds of different ways, because we all have different constraints and priorities.

 

[Swice]

To our new VSN friends:
Trading is pretty simple, but you have to keep several things in mind...
1. You have to be reasonable in your expectations. GENERALLY, you've got to give up something of value to get something of value in return. There will always be a few who score a great trade... but generally if you want Myrtle Beach or Newport Beach in July, you better be offering a two-bedroom in a high demand resort.
2. High demand properties were already in high demand before you got the Marriott preference.
3. Marriott owners have noticed fewer weeks in Interval over the past few years. When Marriott began the transition from weeks to points, we were told week owners would opt for "vacation club points" instead of depositing weeks in Interval-- and slowly that has started happening. Points to Marriott owners mean we can specify if want a certain view (ocean front instead of looking at a dumpster). Obviously, certain views/weeks cost us more points. But the result of electing "points" in any given year instead of "weeks" means fewer Interval deposits. In other words, there does appear to be less Marriott inventory in Interval... especially during summer.

 

[Quadmaniac]

There will always be fluctuations in inventory but as an avid II trader, I still see plenty of availability and for the difference in cost, I'm still a fan of II trading.

 

[AlmostRetired]

I have always owned one pure trader since 1995 that I have never visited. Currently it is an EOY 2 bedroom at the Grand Chateau that I trade as a 1 bedroom and studio.

For the Chateau, I always deposit it into II. I always do an instant search. I do it this way because I always look for a larger unit upgrade, willing to pay the upgrade fee and sometimes looking for what pops up for a change of plans. We are a beach family so my searches are Aruba, St Thomas, St Kitts, HHI, Newport and the coast of Spain in the Summer. We will only stay at Marriott's. I have never been able to get Spain or Newport in the summer with a one bedroom. I have never tried with a two bedroom. When I trade into HHI and do not use a two bedroom, I will only get the 2nd through 4th week August when it is less crowded. So If I need to go in July and I need to sleep more than six, I trade my summer Monarch to the GO for July. With the Monarch I have a little bit of an advantage in that it is fixed week and gets put into my account 18 months before the week. In this case, I use a request first which doesn't take your week until you get what you want.

I think often with Newport (summer) , HHI ocean resorts (summer) and Aruba (anytime), a lot of owners rent or use. If anything has an impact on trade success, this would do it over exchanging these resorts for points.

I have to say as a trader since 1995, I see no difference in trading within II since points. I started an II facebook group 3 years ago and while I often send people to TUG, It might be a few years since I posted the link to the facebook group on TUG. There some members frustrated with II, new II members, members that feel cheated with their resort/point ownership but there are many II knowledgeable members.

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[turkel]

I might be minority but I trade manually. It's more work but hugely successful.

There will always be fluctuations in inventory but as an avid II trader, I still see plenty of availability and for the difference in cost, I'm still a fan of II trading.

Both of the above posts speak for me too!
I will occasionally put in an ongoing search but most often find what I want searching myself even when the on line inventory matches my request.

The cost of points makes my bargain timeshares not a bargain so I have refused to purchase DP’s I am 100% positive I am not the only legacy and week owner who always deposits and trades.

 

[Steve Fatula]

I might be minority but I trade manually. It's more work but hugely successful.

Yeah, me too, minority. Once I decide on a place (region) to go, I just check daily/weekly (depends how far out) until I find it. One time ever I did a request first. While I am checking manually, sometimes I see places I had not thought about or was not looking for, and I'll pick those up. As I am retired, flexible. So, for example, when I went to Spain, I wanted a second week somewhere near Spain, no idea where. I kept looking on II until a Canary Islands came up, which I hadn't even thought of and pounced on it. Loved that trip.

 

[davidvel]

Both of the above posts speak for me too!
I will occasionally put in an ongoing search but most often find what I want searching myself even when the on line inventory matches my request.

The cost of points makes my bargain timeshares not a bargain so I have refused to purchase DP’s I am 100% positive I am not the only legacy and week owner who always deposits and trades.

We always unlock off and trade as well. We have done this for over 10 years, and consistently trade both our studio and one-bedroom for two bedrooms at Marriotts. Only on a few occasions have we traded into something less than a two-bedroom. Most of our trades are for Lake Tahoe and Park City during ski season, the desert in the spring, and Hawaii.

Our average cost per night has been about $125.

 

[b2bailey]

For 20+ years I've owned units that trade with Interval. I have never placed an exchange request. Using my Timber Lodge 1 bedroom, I was recently able to catch a 1 bedroom at Kauai Beach Club for Jan 03 to 10. If I had placed that as an ongoing search, I probably would have received phone calls from II saying it was an impossible request. ( I did already have a Wyndham Kauai week reserved that I was able to cancel without penalty.)

 

[brianfox]

We haven't traded with II in the last 7 years, and let our membership lapse.
We own where we like to stay, but if we want to stay elsewhere we find it more economical to rent ours out and rent into someone else's.
As such, we go in knowing what is available rather than crossing our fingers.
While we sometimes got a good exchange, using II was always such a hassle and a gamble. Not fun for a Type A personality... But many swear by it.

 

[jmhpsu93]

I'm REALLY new to the trading business (and also a DC points owner). I have four 2 BR lockoff weeks - 2 gold season at Marriott Grande Vista and 2 platinum non-mandatory at Sheraton Vistana Villages. I just started kicking the tires in II. Well, to be honest, with my recent activity I think I've jumped in the car and made a cross-country trip.

I just locked off and traded both haves of one of my MGV 2020 week (booked week 27 at Ocean Pointe through Florida Club) and traded the two halves for weeks 52/1 MGV 2 BRs. I got two bonus ACs from that and booked two early November weeks at Barony in Hilton Head. Total cost: $1500 MF + +$90 lockoff + $600 II trading fees + $800 AC costs = $2990 for four weeks.

Those four weeks would cost me about 9,600 DC points @ $.58 = ~ $5600 or $6371 booking direct on Marriott with 7VC discount code (nothing available on Redweek for Barony).

Going forward I'll likely do something similar to maximize time south of here in the winter (I work out of the home and our daughter goes to college in August 2020) while also hunting for those great trades into luxury spots when they come up. Next up will be trying to snag a week at Waiohai in May 2021 - might take a full 2BR to do that.

 

[brianfox]

Waiohai has 2BR only units. Used to be II would let you try to trade a < 2BR for it. Don't know if that is still the case. I'm guessing they will for a fee.

There's always a fee...

 

[Steve Fatula]

I'm REALLY new to the trading business (and also a DC points owner). I have four 2 BR lockoff weeks - 2 gold season at Marriott Grande Vista and 2 platinum non-mandatory at Sheraton Vistana Villages. I just started kicking the tires in II. Well, to be honest, with my recent activity I think I've jumped in the car and made a cross-country trip.

I just locked off and traded both haves of one of my MGV 2020 week (booked week 27 at Ocean Pointe through Florida Club) and traded the two halves for weeks 52/1 MGV 2 BRs. I got two bonus ACs from that and booked two early November weeks at Barony in Hilton Head. Total cost: $1500 MF + +$90 lockoff + $600 II trading fees + $800 AC costs = $2990 for four weeks.

Those four weeks would cost me about 9,600 DC points @ $.58 = ~ $5600 or $6371 booking direct on Marriott with 7VC discount code (nothing available on Redweek for Barony).

Going forward I'll likely do something similar to maximize time south of here in the winter (I work out of the home and our daughter goes to college in August 2020) while also hunting for those great trades into luxury spots when they come up. Next up will be trying to snag a week at Waiohai in May 2021 - might take a full 2BR to do that.

So, what you do now is add on to each of those weeks with the cheaper weekdays via dc points. Up to 5 more days for each week. Assuming you can. Or, at least a couple cheaper weekdays to make flights cheaper.

 

[jmhpsu93]

So, what you do now is add on to each of those weeks with the cheaper weekdays via dc points. Up to 5 more days for each week. Assuming you can. Or, at least a couple cheaper weekdays to make flights cheaper.

The gamification on this process is stellar.

 

[SteelerGal]

I am a manual trader as well. I follow the Sightings Board and look weekly on II. Since we are school schedule, I always have the schedule on hand so I can get whatever interests me. So far we have 5 week long vacations planned.
I am already waiting to book our 2021 vacations. I already have 2 wks deposited so just waiting for the right destination to come along.

 

[remowidget]

I might be minority but I trade manually. It's more work but hugely successful.

What do you mean manually? Do you search until you find something available and book? Do you search every day?

 

[remowidget]

I’ve never traded my Marriott week actually, but might this coming year. It rents for a few hundred dollars over MF so that’s what I’ve done when I haven’t used it in the past. If I deposited my non-lock off Barony week, I’d probably only use it to put in an exchange request for a Hawaiian Marriott. Maybe Spain, but I’d be most interested in Mallorca for cycling and I’d be going therefore probably March so that it would be cooler and could likely easily get that trade less expensively.

However I always trade my SBP. Sometimes I enter an exchange request but I’m not sure I’ve ever had one match before I found what I wanted in II inventory or via a TUG sighting. So I’m almost always doing instant exchanges. We are not tied to a school schedule and we are not always looking for Marriott or Vistana properties, so that helps. We’ve trade SBP into Westin Kaanapali twice, Hyatt Highlands Inn (Feb week but we love it then), Diamond’s Sedona Summit over Thanksgiving week (the exact week we wanted and our favorite TS location in Sedona relative to trails we want to be on). You can get some great stuff with instant exchange.

I use my Hyatt in II the same way.

I have a lot of things that constrain my schedule- I race my bike, compete with my dogs in field events and Nosework, I sometimes have to travel for CE conferences for work, sometimes need to cover for someone else at work, sometimes have weekend travel plans with friends. It’s really hard for me to set up exchange requests because I have very few weeks that are absolutely free. But I can decide to skip a race or a dog event say if the exchange opportunity is good enough, or I can move things around in my schedule. It’s much easier for me to make a plan knowing X exchange is possible in Y unit size checking in on Z date than it is to come up with an exchange request that excludes every date I might conceivably be tied up and then frequently go in and modify my request as things change.

Long winded answer but I think what you’re going to find is that people do exchanges all kinds of different ways, because we all have different constraints and priorities.

So, with your SBP, do you simply search frequently until you find something you like?

 

[remowidget]

There will always be fluctuations in inventory but as an avid II trader, I still see plenty of availability and for the difference in cost, I'm still a fan of II trading.

So do you just search yourself? How often do you search?

 

[remowidget]

I have always owned one pure trader since 1995 that I have never visited. Currently it is an EOY 2 bedroom at the Grand Chateau that I trade as a 1 bedroom and studio.

For the Chateau, I always deposit it into II. I always do an instant search. I do it this way because I always look for a larger unit upgrade, willing to pay the upgrade fee and sometimes looking for what pops up for a change of plans. We are a beach family so my searches are Aruba, St Thomas, St Kitts, HHI, Newport and the coast of Spain in the Summer. We will only stay at Marriott's. I have never been able to get Spain or Newport in the summer with a one bedroom. I have never tried with a two bedroom. When I trade into HHI and do not use a two bedroom, I will only get the 2nd through 4th week August when it is less crowded. So If I need to go in July and I need to sleep more than six, I trade my summer Monarch to the GO for July. With the Monarch I have a little bit of an advantage in that it is fixed week and gets put into my account 18 months before the week. In this case, I use a request first which doesn't take your week until you get what you want.

I think often with Newport (summer) , HHI ocean resorts (summer) and Aruba (anytime), a lot of owners rent or use. If anything has an impact on trade success, this would do it over exchanging these resorts for points.

I have to say as a trader since 1995, I see no difference in trading within II since points. I started an II facebook group 3 years ago and while I often send people to TUG, It might be a few years since I posted the link to the facebook group on TUG. There some members frustrated with II, new II members, members that feel cheated with their resort/point ownership but there are many II knowledgeable members.

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Is there an advantage to depositing first, or do you do it simply because you know you are trading the Grand Chateau? Always doing an instant search, really helps. Thank you.

 

[remowidget]

Yeah, me too, minority. Once I decide on a place (region) to go, I just check daily/weekly (depends how far out) until I find it. One time ever I did a request first. While I am checking manually, sometimes I see places I had not thought about or was not looking for, and I'll pick those up. As I am retired, flexible. So, for example, when I went to Spain, I wanted a second week somewhere near Spain, no idea where. I kept looking on II until a Canary Islands came up, which I hadn't even thought of and pounced on it. Loved that trip.

Awesome. I really appreciate the response

 

[remowidget]

Thanks everyone for the responses. You have confirmed for me what I probably should have already figured out, because it is what I do with VSE. Its wonderful having people willing to pass on advice.

 

[Steve Fatula]

Well, I have not seen them chime in, but, most people do not manually search. They do an automated ongoing search where II does the matching. The theory is they get first pick, and us manual searchers get the remains, however, that is not always the case. The main advantage of manual is if you are someone who likes to find gems.