Wanting to get into the RCI system

[rsackett]

I have been thinking of getting into the RCI system for some time. In the past I owned two Marriott's that only trade in the II system. This summer i sold one of them and have been looking to add something else.

My question for all you RCI experts is, if you had it to do all over again would you get into RCI Weeks or Points, and why?

Thanks, Ray

 

[DaveNV]

I think it depends on how you intend to use it. They both have their place. In either case, RCI holds the cards.

Points gives you more flexibility, but may be adjusted at some point, so could possibly be devalued. A week is seven nights, no matter what. But the TPU of the week can be adjusted, which may give you less exchanging bang for the buck.

If you buy to stay where you own, it's a non-issue. And of course, then RCI doesn't come into the picture.

Dave

 

[rsackett]

I think it depends on how you intend to use it. They both have their place. In either case, RCI holds the cards.

Points gives you more flexibility, but may be adjusted at some point, so could possibly be devalued. A week is seven nights, no matter what. But the TPU of the week can be adjusted, which may give you less exchanging bang for the buck.

If you buy to stay where you own, it's a non-issue. And of course, then RCI doesn't come into the picture.

Dave

Thanks Dave for your thoughts, I am looking for something mostly for trade, however I would only buy someplace I would like to go. Your post brought up something I was unaware of. I did not know that RCI could change the the points value of weeks that had been converted to points. I thought the the RCI Points value was fixed. How often does this happen?

Thanks, Ray

 

[DaveNV]

Thanks Dave for your thoughts, I am looking for something mostly for trade, however I would only buy someplace I would like to go. Your post brought up something I was unaware of. I did not know that RCI could change the the points value of weeks that had been converted to points. I thought the the RCI Points value was fixed. How often does this happen?

Thanks, Ray

I can't answer that. I've never owned points. I own weeks, because I like having the seven-day guaranteed stay. (My vacations are planned a long time in advance, so the versatility of points doesn't work well for me.) The larger reason i've stayed away from points is that the points rosters I've seen say you need X or XX or XXX number of points to stay at some place. It all seems very arbitrary. Who set that number, and who's to say it can't be adjusted at some point?

I keep hearing people say they need to buy more points to get what they want, because they don't own enough. Is there a guarantee that the week you can reserve for 126,000 points this year won't turn into 154,000 points next year, or maybe 212,000 points later on? It all just seems very hit or miss.

Full disclosure: I've become increasingly disenchanted with RCI over the last few years because I don't care for their greedy business model. They keep adding fees on top of fees, raising the costs of exchanges, and assessing arbitrary "resort fees" when staying at certain places. (Example: The Manhattan Club in NYC charges a $30 a day "convenience fee" to RCI exchangers that they do not charge people who exchange through other companies. Why is that?) It smacks of usury, and I'm tired of it.

RCI's most recent fee increase was just this month, when the cost of making an online exchange went up by another 10% - from $199 to $219, for no specific reason. When my RCI membership expires next year, I will not be renewing it. I've had better luck using the alternate exchange companies, and if I want to exchange in the future, I'll use one of those. Not certain how often that'll be needed - I have lately been reducing my ownerships, passing along my weeks timeshares to others, and I'm down to only one remaining. It's a biennial week in an oceanfront condo at a Hawaii resort I enjoy staying at. I don't plan on doing much exchanging in the future.

Dave

 

[stanleyu]

I've had II, RCI Weeks, and RCI Points. the main reason I went with RCI is the access to Disney. If that changes, I may re-evaluate. Basically there are two types of RCI resorts:those in points and those in weeks. If you have a weeks account you only get trading access to the weeks resorts. If you have points you get access to them both. If I log into RCI weeks I can see both types. The weeks units are only available in week units, but they all have a points equivalent, so there is no problem seeing what they "cost" and doing the trade.

I really like the Points setup. I would not want to go back to weeks.