Reasons to buy- or not
Are you asking if people are happy visiting the resort or happy owning at the resort.
You indicated that you plan on exchanging at least half of the time.
Based on rough math you spent ~$50k to buy at a property that you don't even plan on staying at more than half the time for EXCHANGE purposes. On top of that you will have your MF costs.
My understanding is that the terms of those contracts make it next to impossible to sell or get rid of even if you were trying to give it away.
Let me put this another way:
Imagine you are staying at the resort and there are two units right next to eachother. Both are IDENTICAL in every way, except that the person in the unit on the right paid $50k and the person on the left paid next to nothing.
Are you ok being the person on the right or would you rather be the person on the left?
Jason brings up good points as do others .
more thoughts
Is the " trade in " written as an addendum to the contract - stipulating that the deal does not close until .. the transfer out of your name occurs .
If your trading in a Marriott I am sure it goes through but if it is no name resort xyz you better make sure this promise is in writing .
There are TUG threads on this - re Vidanta resorts and it seems (now) that they do have a legit system in place to wholesale used TS - but make sure you have details IN THE CONTRACT .
Their are some who always say " don't buy from the developer " and it generally makes sense - but Vidanta has been structuring contracts so that benefits do not transfer on resale and the " pay on use only" clause is a benefit.
That said - you list Ottawa as home so I will presume you want to be in Mexico Jan / Feb - how far in advance can you book your 3 weeks ? I would want min. 1 year in the contract .
TUG poster MIKENK who upgraded to Grand Luxxe about ? 2010 has said he made sure that an addendum in his contract states that one of his "100" year weeks takes on all the benefits of the 10 year " residence" week after it expires.
I believe he also has it listed in his contract how this can then be transferred
to family ( children) with out incurring a contract transfer fee ,< most Vidanta contracts are now 10 x MF if sold ( to discourage E Bay $1 sales)>
With this in place- you have bought 100 ( its really cold in Ottawa ) weeks at a per week cost of $ 470 Prepaid + MF / usage fee when used .If you or your heirs use it for 100 yrs.
ie You do not want to find out that after the 10 year week expires that the resort only lets you book the (2) 100 year weeks - 45 days out - which means May & June are available ( not Jan /Feb) and at that time of year you would rather be at your cottage in the Ottawa River Valley drinking a Labatt 50. ( and you paid $ 5000 USD per week for 10 -Jan/ Feb usable weeks )
The Vida dollar thing has been discussed on TUG and while they have some use value it is unclear how much of their existence is just so the TS sales force has another "benefit" to sell ( and confuse ) . I am not sure what " Ambassador " program is ?- perhaps a GL owner who has it can explain.
Some have posted " that buying Grand Luxxe to trade means your always trading down " and / or paying a higher MF to trade somewhere with a lesser. MF
Since Vidanta is RTU and is structured so that the developer is not competing with resales{see above} - ask yourself how many guaranteed PRIME TIME weeks am I partially prepaying now and at what cost- and can I use them -- or is trading , renting etc to get to that resort system occasionally a better option .
for disclosure <I own Mayan Palace (1+ VF wk pre 2010 contract) with the " no go -no pay" / 5% max increase MF/yr renew 25 yr / extra reno MF every 5 yr .- all good > bought from the developer before I found TUG - that said -if I had bought used some of those benefits do not transfer .
If you rescind - DO NOT TALK TO SALES -
