Should I agree to inherit Wyndham points?

[amerikrainian]

Thanks for chiming in Jan M. Do you really think that they would do anything about it after all this time? What incentive do they have to fix it?

If gold was reinstated, what was the discount back then? It has changed, right?

Somebody else mentioned renting some of the points on Airbnb to pay for the rest of the points. And I've heard people talk about renting them some other way too. But I'm still trying to find out how to research the numbers on that.

It surely would be a shame to let them go. Similar to what J Man said about his daughter, the vacations we've taken over the years have been a huge blessing to us too, and they would have been impossible otherwise. Yet, if i can't afford to keep them, that's life, and they seem to have high MFs compared to others.

Last question, without the VIP silver, there's no type of discount window or any way to play the game to save points, right? Like with resale points. There are no specials or discounts, just the options of smaller rooms and off-season vacations, right? Or am I missing something?

Thanks so much everybody.

 

[Grammarhero]

Time-Share does indeed have a "learning curve," but those willing to learn the in's and out's can really log some great vacations! Our youngest daughter passed away a bit over 2 years ago (32 yo) and I have never, ever regretted one vacation we spent together as a family. We went somewhere (or multiple places) each year and I used my RCI connection, a very-helpful RCI concierge, and timeshare points to send her and her husband to Hawaii for a 2-week honeymoon that was the highlight of her life.

My advice: Take the points, ask lots of questions, resist the 'pitch' to get into a new arrangement, learn about your options, and Go Make Memories! Good Luck!

So sorry to hear about your daughter.

 

[Sandi Bo]

Hey, Sandi Bo. We're in the same situation with my folks - they have 1.6M points, and we recently retitled their deeds to a family vacation trust. Currently having a problem getting Wyndham to show the owner as the trust, which is important when the trustee and trust beneficiaries change in the future. Am curious how your ownership appears in the Wyndham system...as the trust, or with the name of the trustee?

When I look at ownership details (on myclubwyndham), the owners are the trustees.

The trustee name(s) is added to the account (so for the John Doe Trust dated 1/1/2001, with a trustee of John Doe, John Doe Trustee is what appears in the owner drop-down (and only John Doe can register). For my husband and I, as I have titled my resale contracts in our trust, John Doe Trustee and Jane Doe Trustee show up.

Over my head now, but if yours is a business trust, I think you can only list 2 trustees. Seems I asked about that long ago. And totally out of my league, as trustees change, you should be able to provide a new certificate of trust to Wyndham, and the trustees listed on the account should be updated (not the deeds themselves, so I would hope no fees). Beneficiaries are not added to the account (at least not in our case).

That is where our small resale contract helped us out. On that we have the name of the trust and us five kids. That allows us five kids to be in the owner drop-down (name for guest confirmation) when booking a reservation. Otherwise, the only names available are the trustee(s). You could have done something similar by adding all of your names to one of your contracts (along with the name of your trust). If you don't want to purchase another contract, my guess is you can spend $299 to update just one of your contracts to have the name of the trust and everyone's names. Understanding they could now be financially responsible for the contract (defeating the purpose of your trust, perhaps)?

 

[stumahlin]

RE: Should I agree to inherit Wyndham points?

Absolutely not. Sign that letter of disclaimer and bid Wyndham goodbye.

 

[T-Dot-Traveller]

RE: Should I agree to inherit Wyndham points?

Absolutely not. Sign that letter of disclaimer and bid Wyndham goodbye.

Suppose Mom & Dad had a fund set up to pay MF for the next 20 years / would you still say no ?

 

[Echocabin]

Someone posted that it's best to NOT deal with salespeople on questions of point levels and other issues but they did not state who to ask or how to access them for the best information. Now I can't find that statement... Do you or anyone else have insight on how to get accurate information for the conversion of points from SVC to Wyndham during the upcoming transition to Wyndham Plus? Thanks for any help.

 

[amerikrainian]

Suppose Mom & Dad had a fund set up to pay MF for the next 20 years / would you still say no ?

They don't. No offense, but dealing with the reality of the choice is complex enough without introducing hypotheticals.

 

[Jan M.]

Thanks for chiming in Jan M. Do you really think that they would do anything about it after all this time? What incentive do they have to fix it?

If gold was reinstated, what was the discount back then? It has changed, right?

Somebody else mentioned renting some of the points on Airbnb to pay for the rest of the points. And I've heard people talk about renting them some other way too. But I'm still trying to find out how to research the numbers on that.

It surely would be a shame to let them go. Similar to what J Man said about his daughter, the vacations we've taken over the years have been a huge blessing to us too, and they would have been impossible otherwise. Yet, if i can't afford to keep them, that's life, and they seem to have high MFs compared to others.

Last question, without the VIP silver, there's no type of discount window or any way to play the game to save points, right? Like with resale points. There are no specials or discounts, just the options of smaller rooms and off-season vacations, right? Or am I missing something?

Thanks so much everybody.

The difference between the silver and gold benefits are significant. If your parents were at one time gold and it got lost when they bought more points, although that wasn't supposed to happen, then they would get whatever the current gold benefits are if you can get it reinstated for them.

I suggest sitting down with your parents and have you help them talk to owner care when you make the call. Don't be discouraged into giving up if the first, second or even third person tells you no. Keep requesting to speak to someone at the next higher level.

If either of your parents were 60 years old or older when they made the purchase that didn't keep their gold as it was supposed to have done then you can claim they were taken advantage of and it constitutes elder abuse. If there may have been a language issue involved don't hesitate to use any advantage to press your case.

The difference between silver and gold is that the discount at 60 days increases from 25% to 35% and the upgrade window goes from 30 days to 45 days. The extra 10% savings on the number of points needed can make a lot of difference in what a reservation costs you in the maintenance fees on the number of points you use for a reservation. What you see for upgrades is significantly better at 45 days than 30 days.

Silver doesn't get unlimited transactions but gold does. Those transaction fees are $19 each after the couple of free ones you get with silver. When you are making reservations hoping to get a stay to come together having unlimited transaction fees is a big deal. At many resorts it can be fairly easy to get the Sunday through Thursday stays with the discount and upgrade too. You can book the Friday and Saturday at full points or book the larger unit you need in the discount window if a smaller unit isn't available for the discount and upgrade. Many people are very successful at making stays come together to use as few points as possible. People will build a stay in two to four day increments and that takes more transactions fees if you are having to pay for them on the chance you can make the stay come together. As long as all the pieces of the stay are in exactly the same unit size and type most resorts will do everything they can to keep you in the same unit to keep their housekeeping expenses down.

The number of free guest certificates increases from 5 to 10. At $99 each that is a savings of $495 a year if you are using guest certificates.

Gold can also request specific units when they make a reservation. There are certain resorts we stay at that I want a unit that gives us a view of the ocean, lake, mountains, etc. If you aren't familiar with the unit numbers at a resort you can call the resort to ask them. It helps if you don't call at a time when they are busy checking people in, like don't call between 2pm-6pm.

 

[kaljor]

I will give you my opinion of your original question only. If there is any way that you and your sibling together can afford the Maintenance Fees, and if you have a good and respectful enough relationship to not get bogged down in petty differences of opinion, you should eagerly embrace this legacy.

Notice I wrote about a couple of very important factors that only you two can evaluate.

Getting a Wyndham VIP account for free is a very nice thing, either Silver or Gold. I won't try to sell you on the Wyndham resorts, you have to look that up and see if the locations are desirable to you. Figuring out an equitable use of the points each year shouldn't be that difficult, there are several ways to do that.

I'm looking for a solution to a situation that is similar to yours but not exactly the same. It's worth doing whatever is possible to keep an ownership like this. Buying it now would cost you about $100k. Or a bit more.

A lifetime of 1 or 2 or 3 week vacation stays for $3000 or $1500 per year (if you split the cost) in near luxury condos instead of hotel rooms is an awesome thing.

 

[bnoble]

It's worth doing whatever is possible to keep an ownership like this. Buying it now would cost you about $100k. Or a bit more.

That's what it would cost to replace, but I'm not sure that's what it is worth. For the OP, the question is try to keep this in the family, or let it go and (maybe) someday replace it with a resale Wyndham (or other) ownership. True, you'd lose whatever VIP benefits you would otherwise have, but those might not be all that big of a deal. In my own case, I am normally booking things that are in high demand, so there would be no discount opportunities. Would there be upgrade chances? Maybe, but again I can't count on those so I'd have to book a unit at least large enough to comfortably hold everyone anyway---and we don't use the pull-outs if we can help it.