Marriott points and internal exchange program - the latest info

[Eric]

Mark this post. I think all 4 of your bullet points will be wrong
1. It will be successful
2. price will be minimal
3. Resale owners allowed ( higher price )
4. Within a reasonable amount of time, the will get over 50% of their market

This is great!

Too many folks here are scared out of their whits by the economy, government, and real estate. I humbly suggest we give them a pep talk to keep them from dumping their weeks on the resale market and make things even worse.

I fully expect the new Marriott Internal Exchange System to be a colossal failure for the following reasons:

• Poor timing - bottom of the real estate market is a stupid place to introduce this system - stupid
• Gouge owners - I expect the fee to be 10% of the current sales price to join
• Screw owners - resale owners will NOT be allowed in - forget grandfathering
• Poor selection - Most exchanges will still be done on II since most won't convert

 

[Dean]

This is great!

Too many folks here are scared out of their whits by the economy, government, and real estate. I humbly suggest we give them a pep talk to keep them from dumping their weeks on the resale market and make things even worse.

I fully expect the new Marriott Internal Exchange System to be a colossal failure for the following reasons:

• Poor timing - bottom of the real estate market is a stupid place to introduce this system - stupid
• Gouge owners - I expect the fee to be 10% of the current sales price to join
• Screw owners - resale owners will NOT be allowed in - forget grandfathering
• Poor selection - Most exchanges will still be done on II since most won't convert

I fully expect Marriott to do the bull through the china shop introduction and when the word gets out that spending all that money results in fewer exchanges the system will languish as a disaster.

Can't wait....

Marriott is not dumb, I'm sure they'll be successful in anything they do if the underlying product holds up. If it doesn't all of us in timesharing are screwed anyway. While I don't want to make light of anyone's situation or the economy in general, it is an opportunity for some. I've taken the lower prices to add on several weeks, all Marriott. And I understand it is a gamble but everything I own is platinum and 6 of the 8 weeks are at very high demand locations. If I owned Bronze or Silver, esp at a lower demand location, I'd be worried about it and more worried about any possible negative changes. That wouldn't change the appropriateness, only my risk and situation. Thinking back, didn't Fairfield exclude certain off season weeks/locations from being able to convert even at the jacked up prices?

 

[PerryM]

Marriott is not dumb, I'm sure they'll be successful in anything they do if the underlying product holds up. If it doesn't all of us in timesharing are screwed anyway. While I don't want to make light of anyone's situation or the economy in general, it is an opportunity for some. I've taken the lower prices to add on several weeks, all Marriott. And I understand it is a gamble but everything I own is platinum and 6 of the 8 weeks are at very high demand locations. If I owned Bronze or Silver, esp at a lower demand location, I'd be worried about it and more worried about any possible negative changes. That wouldn't change the appropriateness, only my risk and situation. Thinking back, didn't Fairfield exclude certain off season weeks/locations from being able to convert even at the jacked up prices?

3 years of 24/7 rumors touting a system that doesn't exist is NOT a sign of super intelligence - we have a slogan in St. Louis that Marriott might want to remember:

You can't sell anything from an empty cart

I don't expect Marriott to be anything but a timeshare developer and gouge/screw the owners. If Marriott has become a kinder/gentler timeshare developer the rumor sure doesn't support that notion.

Assume the worst, hope for the best....

 

[timeos2]

Skim the cream and the leftovers are easily dismissed to oblivion

Marriott is not dumb, I'm sure they'll be successful in anything they do if the underlying product holds up. If it doesn't all of us in timesharing are screwed anyway. While I don't want to make light of anyone's situation or the economy in general, it is an opportunity for some. I've taken the lower prices to add on several weeks, all Marriott. And I understand it is a gamble but everything I own is platinum and 6 of the 8 weeks are at very high demand locations. If I owned Bronze or Silver, esp at a lower demand location, I'd be worried about it and more worried about any possible negative changes. That wouldn't change the appropriateness, only my risk and situation. Thinking back, didn't Fairfield exclude certain off season weeks/locations from being able to convert even at the jacked up prices?

No, Marriott is not dumb. And they will set things up at the start to be certain that THE most demanded weeks at every resort are the most likely to join the new program. There are many ways they can accomplish that with the goal being that those highest value weeks will be for owners likely use / rent OR the new system - NOT II - ASAP. The leftovers after that first push will pay more if they are mid-tier - even more, or they may even basically be excluded, if they are low demand time. Wyndham did that and it made orphans out of many offseason weeks at many resorts that now are poor weeks traders and some can't be converted to FSP at any price. A new system can be used to basically weed out some of the swamp weeks and prevent them from cluttering up the higher value system being created. II would be left with a majority of those near worthless carcasses to pass among others owners left in the same lurch. See the Wyndham FAX (week for week) system for an example of the low end leftover trading system that can evolve from such a move.

It's easy to do and nothing owners or II say will change it (except simply not joining the new system but Marriott can nearly assure the needed numbers will join with careful planning). As those in the Wnydham system who held out found the developer holds the cards in this case.

 

[Dean]

3 years of 24/7 rumors touting a system that doesn't exist is NOT a sign of super intelligence - we have a slogan in St. Louis that Marriott might want to remember:

You can't sell anything from an empty cart

I don't expect Marriott to be anything but a timeshare developer and gouge/screw the owners. If Marriott has become a kinder/gentler timeshare developer the rumor sure doesn't support that notion.

Assume the worst, hope for the best....

I think you are exaggerating the issue. While there may have been rumors over 3 years, it hasn't been anything near 24/7. It's been occasional at best and may have picked up lately. I've personally been on 7 or 8 tours with Marriott in that period of time and not only has it been mentioned, I asked about it AFTER giving them a chance to bring it up on their own. NO ONE took the ball and ran with it. At most, a couple mentioned they'd heard rumors and moved on. You're overstating what has happened. We've seen consistent info coming from sales staff in the past that certain perks were not available to resale buyers which in fact were. Things like no internal trading preference, can't talk to the II Marriott desk, no advisor, etc. These rumors were more consistent and more pervasive than has this rumor been from what I've seen and they were blatantly wrong at the time.

Marriott may or may not pursue a points option. It makes sense they'd like to but the issue is getting from point A to point B, as we've discussed ad nauseam in the thread. Such a conversion is a MAJOR undertaking but one that has potential rewards as well as risks. It seems to me that it's likely IF this were to happen, that Marriott and II would likely be a matched set. That if one does it, the other is very likely to as well, and it's very likely they would plan it together to a degree. And if Marriott does so and II doesn't, it's very possible Marriott would change to RCI in a similar fashion as has DVC. As Eric mentioned and I have said, they need a certain amount of participation to make it work. I do agree with him they're likely to make us an offer we can't refuse. I'm not convinced it'll be as cheap as he seems to think but we'll see.

One thing to mention is that IF they do make such a conversion and also convert future resorts to points only, it's very likely those new resorts will not be very accessible to existing non points owners other than possibly in a limited way through II or other exchange companies.

I'm

 

[PerryM]

Harvard bound...

I think you are exaggerating the issue. While there may have been rumors over 3 years, it hasn't been anything near 24/7. It's been occasional at best and may have picked up lately. I've personally been on 7 or 8 tours with Marriott in that period of time and not only has it been mentioned, I asked about it AFTER giving them a chance to bring it up on their own. NO ONE took the ball and ran with it. At most, a couple mentioned they'd heard rumors and moved on. You're overstating what has happened. We've seen consistent info coming from sales staff in the past that certain perks were not available to resale buyers which in fact were. Things like no internal trading preference, can't talk to the II Marriott desk, no advisor, etc. These rumors were more consistent and more pervasive than has this rumor been from what I've seen and they were blatantly wrong at the time.

Marriott may or may not pursue a points option. It makes sense they'd like to but the issue is getting from point A to point B, as we've discussed ad nauseam in the thread. Such a conversion is a MAJOR undertaking but one that has potential rewards as well as risks. It seems to me that it's likely IF this were to happen, that Marriott and II would likely be a matched set. That if one does it, the other is very likely to as well, and it's very likely they would plan it together to a degree. And if Marriott does so and II doesn't, it's very possible Marriott would change to RCI in a similar fashion as has DVC. As Eric mentioned and I have said, they need a certain amount of participation to make it work. I do agree with him they're likely to make us an offer we can't refuse. I'm not convinced it'll be as cheap as he seems to think but we'll see.

One thing to mention is that IF they do make such a conversion and also convert future resorts to points only, it's very likely those new resorts will not be very accessible to existing non points owners other than possibly in a limited way through II or other exchange companies.

I'm

This is a great point!

Marriott is about to get into a new business - the timeshare reservation exchange business. They know little about this business.

On top of that, the new Marriott Internal Exchange System is a sales tool - it will be used as a carrot and a stick on the front line of sales.

However, their new business venture still boils down to offering what II offered - the ability of Marriott owners to exchange reservations among themselves and then to exchange with 2,000 other timeshare resorts.

Marriott will be barred from the 2,000 resorts - this is a HUGE disadvantage and the reason many Marriott owners must belong to BOTH systems. Hello Marriott??

Finally, I'm guessing that 1 year after introduction 50% of Marriott owners won't convert and the owners who do will be ticked off - all that money spent and its worse than II.


This is going to be a disaster that will make it into the Harvard Business School's Case Study books - how to get into a business that you don't know what the hell you are doing.

 

[Bill4728]

Originally Posted by PerryM

This is great!

Too many folks here are scared out of their whits by the economy, government, and real estate. I humbly suggest we give them a pep talk to keep them from dumping their weeks on the resale market and make things even worse.

I fully expect the new Marriott Internal Exchange System to be a colossal failure for the following reasons:

* Poor timing - bottom of the real estate market is a stupid place to introduce this system - stupid
* Gouge owners - I expect the fee to be 10% of the current sales price to join
* Screw owners - resale owners will NOT be allowed in - forget grandfathering
* Poor selection - Most exchanges will still be done on II since most won't convert

Mark this post. I think all 4 of your bullet points will be wrong
1. It will be successful
2. price will be minimal
3. Resale owners allowed ( higher price )
4. Within a reasonable amount of time, the will get over 50% of their market

If Marriott sets up their system like the starwood system, then it may not be a colossal failure, but it will be a failure.

I just hope that it doesn't cause me to regret buying a Marriott TS this past spring.

 

[JimIg23]

Mark this post. I think all 4 of your bullet points will be wrong
1. It will be successful
2. price will be minimal
3. Resale owners allowed ( higher price )
4. Within a reasonable amount of time, the will get over 50% of their market

Eric

What is your definition of "price will be minimal?" 2k, 4k per week?

When you say "Resale owners allowed - high price" do you think this will be at the initial offering or after the program gets up and running?

I think that survey Marriott did last year they was trying to gage what price they could get from owners. It would be interesting to tell the owners the results of it, since they did ask the owners their opinions....

 

[UK Fan]

"I just wanted to say, that when we bought resale, the ONLY thing we knew we were giving up was the conversion of our week to points, nothing else."

Since you are a direct purchaser, when you attended the sales presentation, the sales person didn't mention not having any restrictions on your unit if you bought direct? The sales person didn't mention that you'd have an "R" next to your unit in the system if you bought resale? Just curious but what did you take this to mean?

I just did a tour and no one mentioned anything about an "R" next to my unit in the system. The only thing that was said was that we would not be able to convert our weeks to points. In fact, I inquired with the salesperson regarding the new system and she said that it was a rumor that had been circulating for many years and that it would not happen. I will say that if Marriott implement a system that puts resale purchasers at a disadvantage, I will discourage everyone I know from purchasing from them in the future. One of the reasons that I bought from Marriott was because it wasn't a "point system" and that it was deeded. I have hopes of purchasing more weeks in the future, but if this change happens, I will not.

 

[Dean]

On top of that, the new Marriott Internal Exchange System is a sales tool - it will be used as a carrot and a stick on the front line of sales.

However, their new business venture still boils down to offering what II offered - the ability of Marriott owners to exchange reservations among themselves and then to exchange with 2,000 other timeshare resorts.

Marriott will be barred from the 2,000 resorts - this is a HUGE disadvantage and the reason many Marriott owners must belong to BOTH systems. Hello Marriott??

Finally, I'm guessing that 1 year after introduction 50% of Marriott owners won't convert and the owners who do will be ticked off - all that money spent and its worse than II.


This is going to be a disaster that will make it into the Harvard Business School's Case Study books - how to get into a business that you don't know what the hell you are doing.

I doubt it'll be a disaster but suspect we'll see our share of unhappy thread's just like when FF converted over. I'll point out that IF this happens, it won't bar members from exchanging with other owners, I'd expect a relationship with II or RCI or something similar going forward. The issue is whether it'd be directly using points like Starwood or DVC or indirectly as a parallel system like the Royals or Bluegreen (all of which are different), etc.

I'd also disagree about any new system NOT offering more than II currently offers. A well done points system definitely offers more than Marriott or II currently offer but it also changes the playing field in many ways. Ways that you might like and I may not or vice versa. As I've tried to point out, the choices with a points system are almost infinite. There WILL be winners and losers, that is the nature of any and all major change to any system.

 

[Dean]

Eric

What is your definition of "price will be minimal?" 2k, 4k per week?

When you say "Resale owners allowed - high price" do you think this will be at the initial offering or after the program gets up and running?

I think that survey Marriott did last year they was trying to gage what price they could get from owners. It would be interesting to tell the owners the results of it, since they did ask the owners their opinions....

I can't speak for Eric and I don't have a price in mind. What I do know is that I can't make any interpretation of what's appropriate or what interests me until I see what the ground rules are.

 

[PerryM]

Moving the status quo is hard to do...

I doubt it'll be a disaster but suspect we'll see our share of unhappy thread's just like when FF converted over. I'll point out that IF this happens, it won't bar members from exchanging with other owners, I'd expect a relationship with II or RCI or something similar going forward. The issue is whether it'd be directly using points like Starwood or DVC or indirectly as a parallel system like the Royals or Bluegreen (all of which are different), etc.

I'd also disagree about any new system NOT offering more than II currently offers. A well done points system definitely offers more than Marriott or II currently offer but it also changes the playing field in many ways. Ways that you might like and I may not or vice versa. As I've tried to point out, the choices with a points system are almost infinite. There WILL be winners and losers, that is the nature of any and all major change to any system.

I love Point systems but the new Marriott Internal Exchange System will only work with the weeks deposited. Existing owners are going to ask why all the cost to join a new system and the low inventory.

Ma and Pa walking into the sales gallery won't know the difference and will sign up. But I'd expect a tough sell to existing members. I can guess the tricks Marriott will use to cause a panic and that will convert many right away.

But Marriott will have to demonstrate that spending thousands of dollars and learning a brand new system is worth the few units deposited into it.

Point systems are very flexible and completely different than the existing II system - don't assume that folks will gladly spend thousands of dollars and days of work to figure out how the new system works. People love the status quo and hate change as a general rule.

I don't expect II to sit by with it's thumb up it's butt - they can fight for their exchange system and point out how flawed Marriott's is (no units to speak of to exchange). Marriott can't get by without II now or in the future. Marriott is the one taking away customers and dollars from II.

All those happy II members, like me, who believe they are getting a good deal from II will be hard to convert to a system where little advantage exists.

The whole idea of this exchange system is to help Gold, Silver, and Bronze weeks sell easier - buy a couple of them and combine the Points for a Platinum week. These same owners will quickly realize that their weeks are worthless in this system when you throw in the MFs they pay which are identical to Platinum week owners.

Let's hope II has some guts.

 

[Eric]

This is MY opinion. owners 1k max

Eric

What is your definition of "price will be minimal?" 2k, 4k per week?

When you say "Resale owners allowed - high price" do you think this will be at the initial offering or after the program gets up and running?

I think that survey Marriott did last year they was trying to gage what price they could get from owners. It would be interesting to tell the owners the results of it, since they did ask the owners their opinions....

 

[Eric]

I agree 100%. Without knowing the rules, you can't even come close to decide if its worth the money

I can't speak for Eric and I don't have a price in mind. What I do know is that I can't make any interpretation of what's appropriate or what interests me until I see what the ground rules are.

 

[Dean]

I love Point systems but the new Marriott Internal Exchange System will only work with the weeks deposited. Existing owners are going to ask why all the cost to join a new system and the low inventory.

Ma and Pa walking into the sales gallery won't know the difference and will sign up. But I'd expect a tough sell to existing members. I can guess the tricks Marriott will use to cause a panic and that will convert many right away.

But Marriott will have to demonstrate that spending thousands of dollars and learning a brand new system is worth the few units deposited into it.

Point systems are very flexible and completely different than the existing II system - don't assume that folks will gladly spend thousands of dollars and days of work to figure out how the new system works. People love the status quo and hate change as a general rule.

I don't expect II to sit by with it's thumb up it's butt - they can fight for their exchange system and point out how flawed Marriott's is (no units to speak of to exchange). Marriott can't get by without II now or in the future. Marriott is the one taking away customers and dollars from II.

All those happy II members, like me, who believe they are getting a good deal from II will be hard to convert to a system where little advantage exists.

The whole idea of this exchange system is to help Gold, Silver, and Bronze weeks sell easier - buy a couple of them and combine the Points for a Platinum week. These same owners will quickly realize that their weeks are worthless in this system when you throw in the MFs they pay which are identical to Platinum week owners.

Let's hope II has some guts.

Actually I think Marriott can get by without II and that IF Marriott were to jump to RCI, all the rhetoric about II being the higher quality evaporates. II is the one at risk unless they are in a plan with Marriott to make a conversion, assuming anything actually happens. I would agree that a points system is potentially more beneficial to none high demand week owners and does potentially increase the profit overall for a given resort, esp since I made that point a ways back. But I do think there is a potential for a win-win situation, time will tell if it goes that route or not. As for how hard to convert the owners, it depends on what they're giving up and what they're getting in return which we don't know yet what that will be or if all of this is simply hype.

 

[UK Fan]

I am new to all of this (certainly not an expert like most of you are), but I really hope that this works out well for all involved. IMO, all owners (direct or resale) should have the same basic rights. I don't feel as though an owner's basic rights should be distinguished by who they purchased from. With the state of the economy, as an owner I hope that there are people willing to buy resales from those who have had misfortune. I would much rather someone purchase a resale than MF's, etc. to go unpaid and passed down to everyone else. An owner is an owner, regardless of how you got to that point. Personally, I do not feel as though the change in the MRP awhile back was fair to the direct purchasers and one reason I didn't purchase direct is that I knew the points wouldn't get very much with the recent changes.

Again, hopefully things will work out for all.

 

[JimIg23]

This is MY opinion. owners 1k max

I could live with that if the benefits were decent. We will have to wait and see.

 

[Clemson Fan]

I haven’t read all of this thread, but I’d thought I’d throw in my 2 cents. I do think Marriott uses this board as a free focus group. When it comes to the TUG BB, the Marriott board is one of the busiest and most active probably on the whole internet with typically over 20 people watching it at any one time. Also, DaveM seems to have several inside contacts at Marriott. So, IMO, it makes sense for Marriott to feed DaveM some information like this to generate a free focus group discussion for them to look at. That being said, here’s my opinion to the Marriott execs who I believe will be reading it.

If you’re going to make this change to a point based system, be very very careful and make sure it’s done right. Right now Marriott is very well thought of in the TS market and IMO is probably the second best only behind Disney and it’s the best weeks based TS system. If this is done poorly, then the product will see a great devaluation like a great many of the other point based systems. I’m going to use Disney as a comparison since that seems to be the most well thought of points based system. Here are my points that I’d like to get across.

1. Do not create any sort of caste system between owners who purchased through Marriott and resale owners. Doing this will greatly devalue the product for ALL owners because everyone will probably want to sell their TS eventually. If you look at Disney, they make NO differentiation among points owners regarding where they got their points. This in large part is why IMO the Disney points retain the most value from the original price of any TS on the market.

2. Plan on maintaining a very active ROFR system to support the value of your product. Again, Disney does this the best through their very active ROFR system which IMO really maintains the value of their product. Also, by doing this, Disney is able to not have any caste system based on how you acquired your Disney points and they treat all their “owners” the same. Also by doing this it protects your own TS salespeople who won’t then feel compelled to use unscrupulous and nasty sales tactics that have long given the TS industry a bad name. Just check out this thread for an example: http://www.tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=103525 Would you ever think of a Disney salesperson acting like this? Your salespeople may actually encourage people to check out TUG and educate themselves instead of calling us “wackjobs” and just relying on a purely emotional spur of the moment decision to buy. Disney does a heck of a lot of sales over the phone well after the TS sales pitch has taken place. Marriott can greatly enhance their over the phone off-site TS sales by acting like Disney by not creating a caste system and by strongly supporting their product through an active ROFR system. It’s of quite a bit of concern to me that Marriott has suspended their ROFR with the current state of the economy. Disney has not suspended their ROFR system and as such the underlying value of their product has stood up much better through this really bad economy then Marriott’s product has stood up.

3. Be careful on how the yearly MF’s are calculated. Most people, like myself, bought very expensive platinum weeks. We were willing to pay the very high upfront initial price knowing that we would get our beautiful 2 bedroom TS during a very desirable time for only the yearly 700-1K MF’s each year. This especially applies to places like ski resorts where there is clearly a huge difference between a platinum and a bronze week. Bronze week owners pay the same MF which is why their initial cost is usually pretty dirt cheap. They buy in hopes of playing the “trading” game successfully and are quite flexible which are completely different to why most platinum owners buy in. With most, if not all, points based TS systems including Disney, the MF’s are directly tied into the number of points one has. If this happens it’s going to make the weekly MF’s for a premiere 2 bedroom TS during a premiere ski week probably triple or quadruple which is not going to make those owners very happy and it will devalue their weeks by bringing the MF’s a lot closer to the price for just renting the week. This, IMO, is the biggest dilemma a weeks based system has when they want to convert to a points based system. I don’t know the solution to this dilemma, but IMO it’s a huge dilemma which you should not take lightly.

All in all, I really hope you Marriott guys scrap these plans for a points based system. You guys chose to make your system a weeks based system and in actuality it’s IMO the premiere weeks based TS system in the industry. I would not recommend blowing up your system which can have disastrous consequences and really destroy the value of the underlying Marriott product and TS brand. Instead I would focus your energies on enhancing the weeks based system you already have in place to make it better and better.

Again, everything I have stated is strictly my opinion. Enjoy the free focus group reading.

 

[Latravel]

"That scenerio might well cause some direct purchasers to snicker - until for whatever reason they themselves one day have to sell. Then it ceases to be funny."

Incorrect. People who purchased from Marriott were informed by sales management to NOT expect any resale value. If I sell, I am aware I may not (and probably would not) get my money back.

 

[Clemson Fan]

"That scenerio might well cause some direct purchasers to snicker - until for whatever reason they themselves one day have to sell. Then it ceases to be funny."

Incorrect. People who purchased from Marriott were informed by sales management to NOT expect any resale value. If I sell, I am aware I may not (and probably would not) get my money back.

Are you serious? :hysterical:

I've never had a Marriott salesperson come out and say that what they were proposing to sell me would in the end have no resale value and essentially be worthless. I'd dare say that that is a statement nobody has ever heard from a Marriott salesperson because it would be sales suicide for them to say anything like that. When asked directly what the potential resale value would be (I know b/c I've asked this question many times to Marriott salespeople), they spin it and flip the question around to something like, "Consider it an investment in your families future vacations" or "Your buying your future vacations in todays dollars rather than tomorrows dollar" etc etc.

They also like to hype that Marriott will sell your week for you if you needed to sell it and they DO say that Marriott's prices are always INCREASING. They neglect to mention the 40% commission and that Marriott will really only take back premium weeks to sell and they won't bother with a bronze or silver week.

 

[FlyerBobcat]

Are you serious? :hysterical:

I've never had a Marriott salesperson come out and say that what they were proposing to sell me would in the end have no resale value and essentially be worthless. I'd dare say that that is a statement nobody has ever heard from a Marriott salesperson because it would be sales suicide for them to say anything like that. When asked directly what the potential resale value would be (I know b/c I've asked this question many times to Marriott salespeople), they spin it and flip the question around to something like, "Consider it an investment in your families future vacations" or "Your buying your future vacations in todays dollars rather than tomorrows dollar" etc etc.

They also like to hype that Marriott will sell your week for you if you needed to sell it and they DO say that Marriott's prices are always INCREASING. They neglect to mention the 40% commission and that Marriott will really only take back premium weeks to sell and they won't bother with a bronze or silver week.

Now that makes a lot more sense to me than below...

"That scenerio might well cause some direct purchasers to snicker - until for whatever reason they themselves one day have to sell. Then it ceases to be funny."

Incorrect. People who purchased from Marriott were informed by sales management to NOT expect any resale value. If I sell, I am aware I may not (and probably would not) get my money back.

Quite a generalization here. As Clemson mentioned, we can all be quite certain that their sales pitch was not focused on this topic.


Yes, you may had initialed something related to that topic at the end of the sale, but that's just another data point showing the pitch was not as up-front as you seem to claim all the time, IMO..

Also, there a HUGE potential difference between the two sentences in your paragraph:

People who purchased from Marriott were informed by sales management to NOT expect any resale value.

If I sell, I am aware I may not (and probably would not) get my money back.

 

[PerryM]

What planet are you from again?

Some of the comments here must be from folks from another planet - maybe an alternative universe.

In the past 10 years I've been to 20 Marriott sales presentations - NONE have brought up residual value of the timeshare; that would be insanity on their part.

I've only been to ONE timeshare sales presentation out of the 50+ I've been to that brought up residual value and resales - Disney. No other developer has ever brought up the topic of resales on their own but Disney.

Residual value and resales then open the door for the analysis of the complete cycle of owning a timeshare - buy it, use it, and sell it. All other developers, but Disney, leave out the reselling part. Resales are a verboten topic at the sales presentation - why in the world bring up that topic by the salesrep? The developer bypasses residual value and resales by simply saying "That deed lets you pass down your timeshare to your heirs" (Like saddling them with MFs for the rest of their lives is a great thing for you to do; it is for the developer)

If you plan to actually use your timeshare ONLY at the resort then resales are perfectly OK to buy. However, the majority of owners now look at timeshare ownership as exchanging first and usage at the resort second. That's where the developer muddies up the waters - they start to control what you can do with an exchange - that's what Marriott is doing right now with their new future system - control access to exchanges.

Exchanging opens the door to usage of the timeshare outside the resort where the deed is deeded to. Marriott's new wonder system leaves out the other 3,000 timeshare resorts in the world - a very very stupid mistake if you want to gouge owners into submission.

Maybe on the next sales tour the salesrep will bring up resales and residual value on his/her own - I'll let you guys be the first to know that I've been transported into an alternative universe.

P.S.
Last night I took another timeshare tour - this time I was given a HUD brochure which I got to read before taking the tour. The HUD brochure was 20 pages long and had all kinds of tips on buying timeshares - work sheets and helpful phone numbers of government agencies to call to help with buying a timeshare. One of the spreadsheets dealt with the residual value of the timeshare and the complete buying-using-selling cycle. Resales were brought up many times. It looked like this.

Then I woke up.....

 

[Eric]

There is nothing more informative than a person giving opinions on a points program that hasn't even been rolled out yet. Your posts tend to have that " look at how smart I am " kind of spin. It's actually pretty comical.

Some of the comments here must be from folks from another planet - maybe an alternative universe.

In the past 10 years I've been to 20 Marriott sales presentations - NONE have brought up residual value of the timeshare; that would be insanity on their part.

I've only been to ONE timeshare sales presentation out of the 50+ I've been to that brought up residual value and resales - Disney. No other developer has ever brought up the topic of resales on their own but Disney.

Residual value and resales then open the door for the analysis of the complete cycle of owning a timeshare - buy it, use it, and sell it. All other developers, but Disney, leave out the reselling part. Resales are a verboten topic at the sales presentation - why in the world bring up that topic by the salesrep?

If you plan to actually use your timeshare ONLY at the resort then resales are perfectly OK to buy. However, the majority of owners now look at timeshare ownership as exchanging first and usage at the resort second. That's where the developer muddies up the waters - they start to control what you can do with an exchange - that's what Marriott is doing right now with their new future system - control access to exchanges.

Exchanging opens the door to usage of the timeshare outside the resort where the deed is deeded to. Marriott's new wonder system leaves out the other 3,000 timeshare resorts in the world - a very very stupid mistake if you want to gouge owners into submission.

Maybe on the next sales tour the salesrep will bring up resales and residual value on his/her own - I'll let you guys be the first to know that I've been transported into an alternative universe.

 

[PerryM]

There is nothing more informative than a person giving opinions on a points program that hasn't even been rolled out yet. Your posts tend to have that " look at how smart I am " kind of spin. It's actually pretty comical.

Thanks, appreciate the plug.

 

[CMF]

Who is considering buying resale in the face of this uncertainty? And, if so, why?

Just curious.

Charles