Sunset Harbor Club Dues, and Maintenance fees getting crazy high

[almost retired]

If I am using my fix week every year at Sunset Harbor and not putting it into points,, Is there a way to get out of paying club dues? Maintenance fees are getting out of hand and eliminating the $157 could be helpful. Sunset Harbor had a huge increase in maintenance fees, This year my 2 bedroom is $2,554.75. I have 3 back to back weeks I use every year and paying $157.00 for each week in Club dues which I am not even utilizing that part of the program. $471.00 when I add the 3 together. I understand this is still not bad considering the cost to stay at Key West, But then, I own a week at Galleon and it is only $1,400 for the week, and that is also a 2 bedroom.. A overall big difference when you don't have a big name Management company running this. The last 2 years the fees have gone up tremendously. It does not seem like it was very long ago and I was paying around $1,300 a year for my Sunset Harbor weeks. I understand inflation and rising cost, and higher wages. But when I google, and I could be wrong, I am going by just going by what loaded up... And what came up was the salary of the CEO of Hyatt Residence Club at 24 million a year. And that is just the start, many other big paying executives with this company as well. Is this corporate greed or are these employees worth that much? I could go on and on about this. Just frustrated that our maintenance fees can keep increasing more than ever so when it gets ridiculously high we will be put in a spot where we have no choice but to hand it back. because owning it will no longer be a benefit but a huge liability.

 

[rdc]

Over an $1100 difference between the two timeshares!
Expenses has certainly gone up over the years, while II (Marriott) has weakened Hyatts trading power requiring more points should one decide to do a trade.

 

[mjm1]

The salary of the executives does not factor into the maintenance fees. The company takes a percentage of the maintenance fees as their fee for managing the property. So their take does increase as the MF’s increase, but the percentage stays the same.

I don’t know of any owners who are happy with the increases in MF’s, especially over the last few years. However, the vacation experience at these resorts is still very good/outstanding and the MF’s are still less than renting a unit would be (in most cases.)

 

[AJCts411]

If I am using my fix week every year at Sunset Harbor and not putting it into points,, Is there a way to get out of paying club dues? Maintenance fees are getting out of hand and eliminating the $157 could be helpful. Sunset Harbor had a huge increase in maintenance fees, This year my 2 bedroom is $2,554.75. I have 3 back to back weeks I use every year and paying $157.00 for each week in Club dues which I am not even utilizing that part of the program. $471.00 when I add the 3 together. I understand this is still not bad considering the cost to stay at Key West, But then, I own a week at Galleon and it is only $1,400 for the week, and that is also a 2 bedroom.. A overall big difference when you don't have a big name Management company running this. The last 2 years the fees have gone up tremendously. It does not seem like it was very long ago and I was paying around $1,300 a year for my Sunset Harbor weeks. I understand inflation and rising cost, and higher wages. But when I google, and I could be wrong, I am going by just going by what loaded up... And what came up was the salary of the CEO of Hyatt Residence Club at 24 million a year. And that is just the start, many other big paying executives with this company as well. Is this corporate greed or are these employees worth that much? I could go on and on about this. Just frustrated that our maintenance fees can keep increasing more than ever so when it gets ridiculously high we will be put in a spot where we have no choice but to hand it back. because owning it will no longer be a benefit but a huge liability.

I also have bought to use my weeks in Key West. Never use the point to trade and would be happy to see the Club fees removed. One of my pet peeves is the ridiculous comparison, comparing the rack rate a Key West hotel to our maintenance fees. This is a apples to oranges comparison, the hotel guest has not spend thousands of dollars to buy into the hotel system! Another at HSH is when owners are told of improvements to address the "hotel guests" complaints. WE are NOT a hotel! Owners should never be funding this type of improvement UNLESS it algins with OUR (owners) maintenance schedules and reserve spending plans. Owners should never be paying for any BRAND image or branding, Marriot can pay for this themselves out of their marketing budget.
I advise all owners to go to the HSH association page and read the letter from the BOD President where he speaks to the rising costs and the costs such as electricity, water that are out of HSH control. And if you are not a member of Owners Only - Sunset Harbor Key West, join. Be involved.
About the galleon maintenance fees, in the past 10 years what is the total of the special assessments you have had to pay? I do know of a few, but that is second hand info.

 

[almost retired]

The salary of the executives does not factor into the maintenance fees. The company takes a percentage of the maintenance fees as their fee for managing the property. So their take does increase as the MF’s increase, but the percentage stays the same.

I don’t know of any owners who are happy with the increases in MF’s, especially over the last few years. However, the vacation experience at these resorts is still very good/outstanding and the MF’s are still less than renting a unit would be (in most cases.)

Please don't be comparing as to be cheaper than renting. If I am renting, I expect to pay more. I am a "Owner" and we invested a lot of money into our timeshare weeks at the Hyatt. We bought these to be able to vacation with the promise of overall being a value once we paid the initial cost. That was at first spending thousands of dollars per week. Maybe you were one of the lucky ones and got yours at pennies on the dollar rate. So when you figure out overall cost and add the maintenance fees and all the other fees that go into it, it is now at the dollar where perhaps for us and many others renting is becoming overall cheaper because you are not including the initial cost.

 

[almost retired]

I also have bought to use my weeks in Key West. Never use the point to trade and would be happy to see the Club fees removed. One of my pet peeves is the ridiculous comparison, comparing the rack rate a Key West hotel to our maintenance fees. This is a apples to oranges comparison, the hotel guest has not spend thousands of dollars to buy into the hotel system! Another at HSH is when owners are told of improvements to address the "hotel guests" complaints. WE are NOT a hotel! Owners should never be funding this type of improvement UNLESS it algins with OUR (owners) maintenance schedules and reserve spending plans. Owners should never be paying for any BRAND image or branding, Marriot can pay for this themselves out of their marketing budget.
I advise all owners to go to the HSH association page and read the letter from the BOD President where he speaks to the rising costs and the costs such as electricity, water that are out of HSH control. And if you are not a member of Owners Only - Sunset Harbor Key West, join. Be involved.
About the galleon maintenance fees, in the past 10 years what is the total of the special assessments you have had to pay? I do know of a few, but that is second hand info.

We has one assessment for a new roof. I believe it was around $380 in full, that was just billed earlier this summer. This is all I remember from the last 10 years