Question about Grandview and RCI points

[GrandviewExit]

Hello, I am new to the forum here and have found lots of helpful information but still have a few questions. My in-laws have a fully paid off timeshare in Grandview Las Vegas that they have had for about 20 years and basically never used. They want to stop paying the maintenance fees, and I read the best way to do that is to give away the timeshare and they are okay doing that. In order to best help them advertise it though I have some questions about RCI in particular.

I have read several places that Grandview timeshares that come with RCI points are the most desirable and thus hopefully easiest to give away haha. My in laws let their RCI ownership lapse many years ago, but their paperwork mentions RCI points (I'll include a pic at the end, I do have all their paperwork with me). Their account through Vacatia (they did pay all maintenance on time so that is up to date) does have an option for depositing their week with an exchange company. They have a 2BR lockout, which I understand means they can for instance choose to deposit one bedroom for points and use the other bedroom separately if desired?

If I am reading their documentation properly, it should be a 2BR lockout for week 31 at the Grandview with 98k RCI points and 4 bonus weeks. I assume this means that if they deposit the 2BR with RCI, they would get 98k RCI points in exchange, is this correct? Or are the RCI points on top of the week? Since they don't have an active RCI account, I can't check anything on that end. I am assuming that if the potential new owner gets a new RCI account they can get the same points, or do my in-laws need to recover their old RCI account (I do see it is possible but costs money)? Also are the bonus weeks something that the new owner would also get? I see it says they aren't transferable, but I don't know if that means they aren't transferable to a friend or family member to use or if they aren't transferable to a new owner.

I see it costs $250 to transfer the timeshare directly through Vacatia. Is there any reason to hire a company to do the transfer instead? It looks fairly straightforward, but should there be a separate title company involved or anything or will Vacatia's transfer take care of that? It doesn't really say, so hoping someone has experience.

Thanks in advance for any help! I've done a lot of reading up on this but it is a bit overwhelming.

 

[AwayWeGo]

Possible fly in the ointment will be if for some reason the points status of the unit has lapsed. Grandview charges major money to convert non-points units over to points, so much so that converting (if applicable) might not be worth the cost. There ought to be some way to find out what’s what with that old points unit, but I don’t know how to go about it. Maybe call owner services and see if someone there will give you the straight story.

 

[GrandviewExit]

Possible fly in the ointment will be if for some reason the points status of the unit has lapsed. Grandview charges major money to convert non-points units over to points, so much so that converting (if applicable) might not be worth the cost. There ought to be some way to find out what’s what with that old points unit, but I don’t know how to go about it. Maybe call owner services and see if someone there will give you the straight story.

I'll have them call and ask, thanks! Hopefully it won't be too hard to figure out.

 

[Jan M.]

I'll have them call and ask, thanks! Hopefully it won't be too hard to figure out.

On the Fees and Forms section for points accounts on RCI website it lists a reinstatement fee. My guess is that if the week was originally in points and the owner let their RCI subscription lapse, they could pay the fee to reinstate their week in points. I haven't searched for details so can't say if there's conditions attached to doing it.

 

[chriskre]

I will say that I bought a unit that was supposed to be in RCI points and the owner let the points account lapse and I tried to get it reinstated after I bought it and I was never able to do it. I tried thru RCI, the PCC that sold it to me and thru Grandview and Vacation Village and no one was ever able to help me get it reinstated so I just let the unit go after purchasing it because it wasn't what I wanted. It was supposed to be a triennial with 14K points and I ended up with a weeks account that I did not want. In the end it was a waste of money and time. Lesson learned was to not bother with these RCI accounts at Vacation Village because they are less than helpful if something goes wrong transferring them on the secondary market and your only option is to just let it go. They will NOT help you get it straightened out sad to say, they have zero incentive to do so.

 

[GrandviewExit]

I will say that I bought a unit that was supposed to be in RCI points and the owner let the points account lapse and I tried to get it reinstated after I bought it and I was never able to do it. I tried thru RCI, the PCC that sold it to me and thru Grandview and Vacation Village and no one was ever able to help me get it reinstated so I just let the unit go after purchasing it because it wasn't what I wanted. It was supposed to be a triennial with 14K points and I ended up with a weeks account that I did not want. In the end it was a waste of money and time. Lesson learned was to not bother with these RCI accounts at Vacation Village because they are less than helpful if something goes wrong transferring them on the secondary market and your only option is to just let it go. They will NOT help you get it straightened out sad to say, they have zero incentive to do so.

Good to know, thanks. Fingers crossed my in-laws will be able to get it reinstated since they are the original owners and not purchased on the secondary market, but my expectations are low. They did talk to RCI who said that since their account was lapsed more than a couple years ago they have to talk to a special department to recover it, but it sounded possible. It is unclear if that would fix the points vs weeks thing though. I'm having them check with Grandview and VV first so they don't spend a couple hundred dollars recovering their RCI account only to find it is now a weeks unit and they can't do anything.

By let it go I'm assuming you sold or gave away your unit? From what I read it sounds like it is a lot harder to get rid of a weeks unit than a points unit.

 

[chriskre]

Good to know, thanks. Fingers crossed my in-laws will be able to get it reinstated since they are the original owners and not purchased on the secondary market, but my expectations are low. They did talk to RCI who said that since their account was lapsed more than a couple years ago they have to talk to a special department to recover it, but it sounded possible. It is unclear if that would fix the points vs weeks thing though. I'm having them check with Grandview and VV first so they don't spend a couple hundred dollars recovering their RCI account only to find it is now a weeks unit and they can't do anything.

By let it go I'm assuming you sold or gave away your unit? From what I read it sounds like it is a lot harder to get rid of a weeks unit than a points unit.

I let it go into foreclosure.
It took about 5 years but they finally took it back.
It never showed up on my credit so FYI although they will send it to collections they won't do anything if you just owe MF's and have no mortgage.

 

[BennyBoy00]

On the foreclosure front, My brother had a unit that went into foreclosure - I was not associated with that unit in any way. However, when I was buying and and later when refinancing my primary home, apparently his foreclosure was flagged during the title search even though I had no connection to it and it never showed up on my credit report. I had to provide a statement that I did not own any interest in that timeshare in order to complete the purchase of my home. So apparently it can follow you or other family members in other ways even if it's not on your credit report.