Weeks vs Points

[Mjasp]

Can you tell me the advantage of owning points over a weeks ownership?

For those who have converted, are you happier. Do you think it has given you many advantages?

My husband is still trying to understand the advantage of us buying points or converting our week to points. He has yet to find one. He says, we will always have a week and have had much luck trading, so why would he pay more money for something that is paid off and he owns.

 

[AwayWeGo]

Taking The Timeshare Points Plunge.

2 things got us interested in (RCI) timeshare points -- (1) partial-week reservations & (2) Instant Exchange reservations (getting full week reservations for no more than 9,000 points when we reserve within 45 days of check-in).

2 things held us back -- (A) not understanding the ins & outs of getting & converting & using timeshare points on the 1 hand & on the other hand (B) the high cost of converting to points.

Eventually we figured it out well enough to take the plunge in a dinky & penny-ante kind of way.

Mainly, we completely finessed the conversion issue. Instead we sprang for an el cheapo eBay timeshare week in the USA heartland that had already been converted to points & that stayed converted upon completion of the sale to us. Winning bid = $152.50 -- but with closing costs & RCI Points initiation fee & 1st year's maintenance fees it came close to $1,000 when the dust settled.

After we had already gone for that, we later discovered an even cheaper way to get a toe-hold into timeshare points -- by leasing a points timeshare 3 years at a time (renewable). Who knew ?

Once we were into points, we had the option any year we chose to do Points For Deposit with our regular (i.e., non-points) timeshare weeks we already owned in other foreign & domestic locations. Points For Deposit is what RCI calls depositing a straight-weeks timeshare at a non-points timeshare resort into RCI Points instead of banking it with RCI Weeks.

Instead of banking a week for a future straight week-for-week timeshare exchange, Points For Deposit gets us the points-equivalent value of our old timeshares added to our timeshare points account.

Points For Deposit is a 1 year at a time deal & is not the same thing as conversion to points -- & when we understood that distinction we were well on our way to catching on to some of the elusive ins & outs of the timeshare points system.

RCI now charges us $26 every time we do Points For Deposit -- just another step down the path of nickeling & diming the RCI members, I suppose.

Since plunging into points in our small potatoes way, we have done Instant Exchange several times but have not yet gone for a partial-week reservation. Go figure.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[reddiablosv]

Either way will work.

An astute timeshare owner can do well with either points or weeks. The key is paying attention and searching and reserving early with weeks, or trying to get the 45 day specials with points. I use the PFD program frequently. I own a white SA resort. It is only worth 30K points with the PFD program. With weeks I have reserved a 2 bedroom GC resort in Cabo and a full one bedroom school vacation week at the Manhatten Club in NYC. I followed the tug sightings posts and snagged the great weeks by using weeks. Likewise I own a Hawaii week which yields over 80K point in the PFD program. The MF is about 630 per year. If I reserve within 45 days, everything is 9k points or less. Also, 80K points is a lot. It will trade for two weeks in most cases and most places, even outside the 45 day window. I guess its a little bit like advise given by Dr. Ruth, "its not what you have but how you use it!""

 

[Conan]

The main difference is that in Weeks, the quality of the week you own (location and time of year) has a great effect on the quality of trades you can obtain.

Points compete equally for reservations at Points-affiliated properties starting 10 months before the date. They also can be used to reserve non-Points affiliated properties in RCI Weeks, and there they have above-average trading power.

 

[AwayWeGo]

Timeshare Points Raiders.

They also can be used to reserve non-Points affiliated properties in RCI Weeks, and there they have above-average trading power.

Using points to get reservations at non-points timeshare resorts is sometimes referred to as Raiding The Weeks Inventory.

I suppose that's exactly what it is if the points used to snag the weeks reservation all come from points timeshares.

But if the points come from Points For Deposit -- depositing straight-weeks timeshares into the points system instead of banking them for conventional week-for-week trades -- then it's not so much Raiding The Weeks Inventory as it is an oddball form of straight-weeks exchange in which the week being exchanged takes a detour into & then back out of the points system.

Just an odd little twist in the way timeshare exchanging works, no ?

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[bogey21]

Simple. Points are more flexible; Weeks are more certain. I use them both depending on the situation.

GEORGE

 

[vacationhopeful]

I too have both RCI Weeks and RCI Points. Throw in my Wyndham points, and I get just about any vacation situation covered.

Of course, I spent ALL LOT of time learning and keeping uptodate on the rules for 3 systems. TUGs helps by reading these posts and asking questions. My rule #1 is Plan way ahead OR Go last minute.

The more time you spending learning before you buy, the cheaper in $$$$ cost your "education" will be (wrong buying w/o getting important stuff for you). So, be too hard don't DH.

 

[e.bram]

If you want an oceanfront TS on Cape Cod in the summer, you are probably can't get it with points.

 

[AwayWeGo]

I Think You've Got It.

Plan way ahead OR Go last minute.

I'm sure that is exactly right.

We're starting to get the hang of those last-minute reservations, but so far we haven't even tried longer-range vacation planning.

Then again, at our advanced age the horizon for long-range planning may not extend all that far out -- i.e., we better keep snapping up those last-minute opportunities while we still can.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[Picker57]

We own (Shell) points. Due to airfares, we recently added a week at a non-Shell RCI property to our upcoming Hawaii vacation. One of the advantages of points is availability of mid-week check-in. But since all the 'weeks' properties have weekend check-in, we were still in the old mode. And it appeared that all of RCI's Maui sites are weeks. So mixing a points / weeks vacation has it's limitations. Am I missing something?

---Zach Kaplan Fort Collins, CO

 

[vacationhopeful]

Different vacation planning:
Get a Last Call Vacation for 7,500-9,000 PTs and throw away the end of the week ... ouch, throw way nights? Yep, as Last Call is only available for 7 nights, but on the Points Reservation, you would be paying full price for each night you want (and most likely MORE for two nights, than the whole 7 night Last Call reservation). You can try and do the same for the start of the vacation -- just be real sure the resort KNOWs you are checking in days (not hours) late. But Last Call is only 45 days before checkin - so drive 'as a make my plane reservation at the last minute person' might use up all their savings with skyhigh fares.

Make the Points reservations at a Home Group Resort tied to where your RCI Points are deeded at -- you can do that at the 11 month mark, gaining a bigger advantage over ALL the other RCI Points members at the 10 month mark ... or be the first 10 month RCI reservation person . Of course, you should have booked your Weeks vacation 2 years out.:annoyed:

You should be as I don't have any idea how the Shell system works and how to reserve within or when to reserve within your system.

Others, have done the bid on Priceline or Expedia or other web based sites for hotel nights to wrap around their extended vacation weeks.

Still trying to fugure out all this stuff, too. Good thing I am flexible.

 

[Picker57]

Thanks Linda - Yep, this timeshare thing sure has a lot of moving parts. And flexibility seems to be the key to making the most of them ('Last Call', 'Dashaway Deals', etc). Will do some more research through both Shell and RCI.

--Zach

 

[vacationhopeful]

Zach-

Do you have RCI Points and an account? Most of us use the "old" RCI Last Call a little wrongly when talking about 'cheap weeks' or 'discounted vacations45 days or less before checkin'.

In RCI Weeks, those cheap, last minute deals were/are a discounted purchase price of between $199 and $249, found in the "Last Call" section.

In RCI Points, those same deals are also purchase at the cash prices also, in the "Last Call" box. The discount point deals (between 7500-9000RCI pts) can be found in the RCI Weeks Reservation Box - looking for them as the low point value and 45days or less check in. If you go to the Points Reservation Box, you only get the "full price" Points deal.

Sorry, but the use of the terminalogy is only confusing to newbies ... we do try to explain when asked ...

 

[fsmith2845]

Zach-

Do you have RCI Points and an account? Most of us use the "old" RCI Last Call a little wrongly when talking about 'cheap weeks' or 'discounted vacations45 days or less before checkin'.

In RCI Weeks, those cheap, last minute deals were/are a discounted purchase price of between $199 and $249, found in the "Last Call" section.

In RCI Points, those same deals are also purchase at the cash prices also, in the "Last Call" box. The discount point deals (between 7500-9000RCI pts) can be found in the RCI Weeks Reservation Box - looking for them as the low point value and 45days or less check in. If you go to the Points Reservation Box, you only get the "full price" Points deal.

Sorry, but the use of the terminalogy is only confusing to newbies ... we do try to explain when asked ...

When you talk about purchasing through the "last call" box, when i use that it gives me a $$$ amount vice point amount. Of course i got to this through the vacation offers tab. We are points owners.. not sure how i woudl go about doing what your are talking about.. seems like a great wayt to save points and get good resorts, assuming you can make plans last minute like that..

 

[philsfan]

When you talk about purchasing through the "last call" box, when i use that it gives me a $$$ amount vice point amount. Of course i got to this through the vacation offers tab. We are points owners.. not sure how i woudl go about doing what your are talking about.. seems like a great wayt to save points and get good resorts, assuming you can make plans last minute like that..

For a 9000 point (or less) reservation, sign on to your points account. Click on the RCI Points Vacations tab, then click on RCI Weeks reservation. Choose your Region and Sub Region. Leave the date at whatever it came up as because this is the earliest date the points system will let you search with online. Leave the number of weeks at 5. Everything that is available when you click on Continue should be 9000 points or less.

You still have to pay the weeks exchange fee so you are paying more than a straight weeks exchanger would pay in the big picture. Depending on what your mf's are for your points, if the same accomodations are available as a Last Call rental, that could be a slightly cheaper option, especially for smaller units.

 

[AwayWeGo]

Here's How To Do That.

We are points owners.. not sure how i woudl go about doing what your are talking about.

Click here for help in finding those 9,000-point full-week bargain Instant Exchange reservation opportunities at RCI Points.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[Sandy VDH]

I too have both RCI Weeks and RCI Points. Throw in my Wyndham points, and I get just about any vacation situation covered.

Of course, I spent ALL LOT of time learning and keeping uptodate on the rules for 3 systems. TUGs helps by reading these posts and asking questions. My rule #1 is Plan way ahead OR Go last minute.

Ok I have the same TS addiction. I have both RCI Weeks and RCI Points, I still have an II membership (but don't how much longer I will keep it), I also have Wyndham Points, however I added Hilton Points in there as well. I am also enrolled in DAE and in SFX. Boy I have a lot of things to keep juggling, but if I am good at it, I can get what I want, when I want, for the cheapest Point or week currency.

I use all the systems to compare inventory. If I can get the same type of inventory in multiple system I figure out which system in the cheapest MF used to obtain the exchange I want.

Hilton works for harder to get RCI inventory, and for Hilton Hawaii. Open season for cash is also a nice member perk. Wyndham works for planning in advance and for last minute inventory (I use my VIP discounts for and free upgrades). Wyndham also works for cheap deposits into RCI and for internal trades back into Wyndham via RCI. (I scored a Wyndham Kona Hawaiian Village thought RCI using a 28K deposit, that would have cost 231K if I would have booked it directly in Wyndham.)

Point system in general are great because you want 3 day in a studio or 1 BR for a quick getaway on trip, the next you want a 3 BR for a week for you family. You pick and choose the size and style of unit, and length of stay. It is not fixed like a fixed full week exchange.

I keep DAE and SFX for a cheap alternative, with usually at most 1 week a year deposited.

Also be flexible, rules change, economy changes, resorts change, so just roll with it. Don't buy anything just for trading, buy what you would like to use, that way should things not work out the way you, others, companies plan you still have something you can use.

 

[UWSurfer]

Alan: Thank you!!! That link with how to find the 9000 point instant vacation made my day. It certainly opens up another piece to RCI I hadn't known about.

Sandy: Your post might be suitable for as a sticky as an example of how someone uses and values mulitiple ownership in multiple systems. Bravo!

 

[AwayWeGo]

Is This A Great Web Site Or What ?

Alan: Thank you!!! That link with how to find the 9000 point instant vacation made my day. It certainly opens up another piece to RCI I hadn't known about.

You're welcome.

But it's pretty much the same as the how-to information provided by philsfan.

Just 1 more example of TUG people trying to help other TUG people.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[AwayWeGo]

Hooray For Timeshare Points.

Point system in general are great because you want 3 day in a studio or 1 BR for a quick getaway on trip, the next you want a 3 BR for a week for you family. You pick and choose the size and style of unit, and length of stay. It is not fixed like a fixed full week exchange.

A 3-day points reservation may well take more points than a full week Instant Exchange reservation.

We'd rather spend 9,000 points (max) on a full week via Instant Exchange than sign up for a straight-points partial-week reservation -- even if we "waste" a few days of the full week.

We've done Instant Exchange & Last Call several times, a straight-points reservation once, & a partial-week points reservation never.

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​

 

[Sandy VDH]

A 3-day points reservation may well take more points than a full week Instant Exchange reservation.

I would have to agree if you were talking RCI Points. It would be cheaper to take a weeks resort inventory for 9000 points for a week vs a points resort for full value. Which is great if the resort you want is RCI Weeks only

What I was talking about however was for specific points systems NOT the RCI point system in that case. I can find inventory in my Hilton or Wyndham point system that is not available via RCI. Plus with these mini systems the exchange frees are $0 for Wyndham (for me at least) or $39 for Hilton (with Elite Discount). Much cheaper than RCI's $164 fee and I have to account for that in my pricing of the exchange.