Just went to an owner's update meeting at Westin Desert Willow.
Was told the following:
- With few exceptions, they are basically only selling Flex (I was offered the "West Coast" Flex which included Ka'anapali, Princeville, Nanea, Desert Willow, Mission Hills, Riverfront, Kierland and the "promise" of Steamboat - sorry don't know all the shorthand codes off-hand)
- Marriott does not do retros
- Vistana may no longer be able to do retros soon as the merger moves ahead and Marriott imposes it's practices on the Vistana team
- Incidentally, I did talk to some of the resort staff (outside of sales) and they said that Marriott was tightening up some of their practices
- Marriott is buying more defaults, resales, etc. - implying that it was getting harder to get well-priced resales to go through
- They tried to get me to convert my resale EOY WKV to Flex - told them not interested (my MF
ption ratio is too good to give up)
- They offered me the ability to retro by buying at a lower minimum Flex buy-in, $10k worth of Flex
- Previously I had understood one had to buy a developer week, or a minimum of $20k in Flex points to retro
- They said that by retro-ing, I would be able to use my Vistana points at Marriott properties (soon) and Hyatt properties (later) -
- They said the process would be seamless from the dashboard - not involve a trade into Interval, etc.
- The also said that this would obviously involve some type type of conversion factor between Vistana and Marriott points
- I know it is separate and I'm certainly not counting on this but I felt that the 1;3 SPG to Bonvoy ratio was more than fair so I'm not anticipating an "unfair" conversion factor
- The $10k is for 44,000 EOY Flex - MF including VSN charge is under $500/year (so under $1,000 for use of the 44,000) - not great as a ratio but not going to break the bank in total
My conclusion is that if you like what you have and it's working keep it. It also makes sense to me that they are trying to create the mother of all networks with the merger (22 Westin/Sheraton properties, ~70 Marriott Vacation clubs plus about 20 Hyatt locations) so if you want "easy" access to all properties in the mega-network without doing exchanges, etc. we may have to pay up at some point. I know that peak weeks at best properties will be difficult (impossible?) to get, etc. but my wife and I will soon be entering a phase where we can be a bit more flexible. I took the offer plus the incentives but still within my CA rescission period so would love any input on my thinking. Other obvious approach to access all these properties would be at some point to buy a Marriott and/or Hyatt resale week and hope it goes through.
BTW, WDW villa, pool facilities and grounds were immaculate, Staff friendly and restaurant food/service excellent. No degradation in the experience to-date.