Exchanging your week is one of the best ways to maximize timeshare ownership. Many times, you can exchange your owned week for other properties that are nicer and more in demand than your own week.
Exchanging is great but availability is sporadic and you need to be very flexible with your travel plans in order to get highly desirable weeks and resorts. I have previously explained the benefits of doing an ongoing search with RCI or a Request First or Deposit First with Interval International. Another great way to quickly access what exchanges are available using Interval International's search tool. The search tool allows you to search current inventory by destination, all destinations or by Resort Name or code. As shown in the attached image, you can choose by Resort Name. One great tip in using this search is that you can input ALL the highly sought after resorts in one search and Interval will bring up the matches. Even if you are looking for a specific week, I generally put in the earliest travel date as the current date and the latest travel date for as long as Interval allows which is generally 12 months in advance. The reason for doing so is that Interval's system can be a bit buggy and I have seen additional inventory come up for a specific week when doing a broad search only to find that the inventory does not show up when I do a narrow search. Doing a broad search requires a little more review of the result but can result in you seeing more available weeks. Additionally, even if you are set on traveling one week, seeing availability for a highly sought after destination or resort for an alternative week can get you thinking on revising the initial plans. INTERVAL INTERNATIONAL RESORT CODES: In order to simplify the process, I have included the following list of resort codes HRP, HNS, HWP, HYS, HSH, HYK, HYN, HBK, HMS, HSL, HYP, HYA, HCC, HYB, HYI, HRA, LFP, SXP, STW, SDI, VTA, PGA, PGN, SRM, FSA, SCT, VIO, VO1, VIT, SVV, VKW, VVM, VCC, VIS, VS1, WDL, KAA, KA1, KAN, KA1, WKV, WLR, WMH, WPV, WV1, WRF, WEJ, WSJ, MAW, MFC, MGO, MMB, MPU, MKO, MOW, MAO, MCP, MBY, MMC, MSE, MSF, MDS, MPD, MGR, MSK, MCV, MMO, NCV, MSU, MKW, MPB, MUZ, MGA, MG1, MG3, MG5, MOU, MCU, MGC, MC1, MGK This list includes most of highly sought after resorts in Interval International. This list includes most Marriott properties, Hyatt Properties, Four Season properties and Vistana properties (Formerly Westin and Sheraton). There are other high quality resorts within Interval but this list is good overview of the top quality resorts. In order to perform this search, simply copy and paste the above codes and place them in the search box. You can then see the results. In performing this search, I found over five pages of availability for these prime properties. A couple of things to note.
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If you have any interest in exchanging your timeshare through RCI or Interval International, the concept of trading power becomes of utmost importance.
Generally, trading power is the concept of the value assigned to your deposited week or points that will allow you to see certain inventory within the exchange company. Basically, the exchange company wants to take in high demand weeks and resorts and in exchange will give you the ability to trade into other high demand weeks or points. The exchange companies generally want to limit the ability to deposit a low demand week and have that timeshare owner receive a high demand week. RCI defines trading power as: "The value assigned by RCI to Vacation Time upon a Deposit and used by RCI to fulfill an Exchange Request." Interval International uses the concept of Comparable Exchange for its trading power. Comparable exchange attempts to match the quality of the week deposited with the quality of the inventory shown to that user. While the terminology for the concept of trading power differs between exchange companies, both of the major companies utilize various factors to determine the appropriate trading power of the week you own and then filter the inventory you see when you are searching for an exchange. While not inclusive, the various factors are generally taken into consideration: 1. Supply and Demand; 2. Quality of the facilities; 3. Unit type and sleeping capacity; and 4. Amount of time between the date of the deposit and the date of the week. Trading Power is a elusive concept since none of the major exchange companies will disclose the actual trading power of the deposited weeks or explain what inventory you can see and what inventory you cannot see. There are many theories on how these are calculated but nothing concrete has been disclosed that has actually shown the specific calculations. Overall, in the event that you want to own a timeshare, good trading power is essential in order to be able to see prime inventory. I would recommend the following: 1. Review the resorts that have the highest ratings within both systems. Interval's highest tier rating is now called Elite and RCI used the gold crown award standard. Those resorts with those ratings will generally be given the highest trading power even if the week is not a prime week. 2. If you know that you will not be using your home resort, deposit the week or those points as early as possible. The earlier you deposit the better the potential trading power. 3. Some types of units are considered lock-off units. Generally, it is a 2 bedroom unit that consists of a one bedroom unit and studio unit with connecting doors. The exchange companies can value these types of units higher than other types since they can rent the 2 bedroom or it can be split into a 1 bedroom and a studio. Generally, the exchange companies will give more "trading power" to these types of units due to the flexibility. 4. Own a desired week. This can be during a holiday, festival, certain events or any desired summer week. The more desirable the week, the more the exchange company will value the unit and the better trading power you will receive. Trading power is an important concept if you want to exchange your unit. Exchanging your timeshare is an important method to use if you want to maximize your ownership. Make sure to subscribe below and follow me on Twitter and Facebook
Many timeshare owners have become disgruntled with the lack of flexibility of timeshares. Once you exchange through an exchange company, you are stuck with that particular unit or resort. While they indicate that you can cancel, you forfeit your exchange fee of either $179 for online bookings or $189 for over the phone. Depending on how far advance you cancel will depend on what type of replacement week you will be offering. Some replacement weeks have restrictions that only allow their use within 60 days of check-in. This can be severely limiting. In addition, you are then required to pay a new exchange fee. As you can see, cancellation can be costly.
Sometimes, a better unit becomes available at a better resort, airfare changes occur, family issues occur or some other item comes up where you need to change or cancel your reservation. In order to provide more flexibility to timeshare owners, Interval International came up with a feature called E-Plus. This is truly a fantastic addition to Interval International. In addition to your exchange fee, you can pay a fee of $54 in order to be able to exchange your confirmed reservation up to three additional times for no additional fees. I have taken advantage of this program by completely changing destinations or changing resorts. It has been extremely advantageous and gives you much more flexibility that what you had in the past. Additionally, if you confirm into a studio unit for a particular resort but really wanted a one bedroom unit, if one becomes available you can exchange into the 1 bedroom unit. If you are on points, you will be required to deposit the additional points but will not be responsible for an additional exchange fee. You can elect to purchase E-Plus at the time of exchange or within five days after confirmation. If you use Request First or Deposit First, you can elect to pay for E-Plus at that time or within 5 days of confirmation of your week. In order to utilize E-Plus, you will need to go into your exchange history, "My History" and navigate to the Exchange tab. If you purchased E-Plus, you will click on "Start E-Plus Retrade" in order to search within the current inventory. There is a box on this page that also indicates how many retrades remain for that particular deposit. While E-Plus does provide a tremendous value since it opens up flexibility, one thing to consider is that you no longer have the opportunity to put in an ongoing request for a certain week or resort. Once you are confirmed into a week, you can exchange into other weeks through E-Plus but you are confined to current inventory and cannot set up an ongoing request that would automatically book you into the desired week or resort. Inventory constantly changes so you need to be diligent and constantly search. Alternatively, you can sign up here and be on the lookout for fantastic exchange opportunities! Overall, E-Plus is definitely an enhancement to timeshare exchanges as flexibility is becoming more and more of the norm. In the past, timeshares became to be viewed negatively since you were locked into the same week and resort year after year. The industry responded with the introduction of points and hybrid systems and continues to evolve in order to meet the demand of today's timeshare owners. E-Plus is another step in the right direction to provide greater flexibility. The Trials and Tribulations of Travel Planning with Timeshares: "Fail to Plan is a Plan to Fail"8/31/2016
As my father tells me, Fail to Plan is a Plan to Fail.
If money was not an issue, travel planning would not be an issue at all. You choose flights, irregardless of costs, and choose accommodations, irregardless of cost. Unfortunately, I do not have that luxury and most people do not as well. Exchanging your timeshare can unleash tremendous value and you can end up staying in properties that far surpass the quality of your own timeshare or those available to you through the internal exchanges. While there are opportunities to make great exchanges, availability for specific weeks and destinations can be extremely hard to come by and may never become available. The issue with vacation planning with timeshares is that you need to plan very far in advance. Some timeshare systems allow you to reserve weeks 2 years in advance of the actual week. Most people do not plan ahead and typically only plan vacations a few months in advance. As I will detail below, if you plan to exchange into prime weeks, this strategy may not work very much and you will quickly become disgruntled with timeshare ownership with the claim that your desired week, destination or resort never becomes available. The goal of my site is to help you avoid this fate and get the maximize value out of timeshare ownership. Further complications with travel planning with timeshares involve airfare if you are traveling to a destination outside of driving distance from your home. Airfares fluctuate and destinations during prime travel weeks can easily far exceed the budgeted amount for the vacation. I personally use frequently flyer miles to get airfare for free but frequent flyer miles can be even more complicated than timeshare exchanging and having availability with free airfare along with the desired week and resort can be next to impossible. However, I have successfully navigated this system for many years and it is doable with diligence, planning, patience, flexibility and websites such as mine! In order to get the two goals to meet up requires a ton of time, work and flexibility. My goal is to give you some tips on how to navigate timeshare exchanging in order to get the desired weeks. I will also detail some basic tips on how to get frequent flyer miles and use them to get airfare for free! TIP ONE: PLAN AHEAD, WAY AHEAD AND BE FLEXIBLE: The first tip is that you must plan ahead. One of my vacation rules is to always have a trip planned. This keeps me motivated to work and keeps me excited to see new destinations and spend quality with my family. Generally, I plan one year in advance and put in a Request First with Interval International or an internal request with one of my timeshare programs. (i.e Hyatt, Marriott, Hilton, etc.) I put in a request with various top quality resorts around the world that I would like to travel to. You need to make sure that you choose the specific resorts that you want and not just put in a destinations. There are some crummy timeshares out there so you need to make sure that you choose the high quality luxurious ones. I make sure that the potential destinations have decent flight paths from my home airport so that I can make sure to only have one stop and to make sure that there are no overnight stays. We travel with young children so an overnight stay or more than one stop can be more difficult than desired. Request First with Interval International is a great tool and highly recommended since their system will constantly check their system and automatically confirm you into the desired resort for the specific week. I always make sure to use E-Plus which provides three free exchanges for a one-time fee of $54. This is absolutely necessary for added flexibility as without E-Plus, the reservations are non-cancellable except for a large fee for cancellation as well as the re-booking fee. I will discuss E-Plus in more detail later but this is an absolute must to give you the needed flexibility to change destinations Many times I change destinations because nicer resorts become available or fantastic airfare deals become available. SECOND TIP: HAVE A PLAN B The second tip is that you always need to have a Plan B. Most hotel reservations allow you to make reservations and cancel up to 24 hours before check-in. Once I put in a Request First, I also review hotel options in the desired areas of travel. I will make a few speculative bookings for the desired weeks so that there are options for accommodations in the event that the timeshare accommodations do not come through. Booking directly through the major chains is preferable as they generally make it easy to reserve and cancel your reservations with a few clicks. While I highly prefer timeshares for many reasons, you need to make sure that there are viable hotel options. One of my favorite ways to have a Plan B is to use hotel points to reserve a week in the desired location. I can reserve a hotel room that is fully cancellable with hotel points so that the week will be free in the event that the timeshare option does not become available. I will explain in later posts how to arm yourself with hotel points so that you too can have this option. THIRD TIP: USE INTERVAL GETAWAY ALERTS: As discussed in this post (Getaway Alerts), I explained how to use Getaway Alerts on the Interval International App. I routinely populate various dates and times and become alerted when a desired resort and destination becomes available. As discussed, many times it is economically beneficial to reserve a week with cash instead of using your deposited weeks or points. In addition, there are some fabulous deals with Interval Getaways so a deal at a great resort may end up dictating the ultimate destination for your vacation. A great deal for accommodations may open up the budget for an increase in the price of airfare. FOURTH TIP: USE HOPPER TO TRACK AIRFARE The fourth tip is to populate the airfare searches using Hopper. Hopper was discussed in this post here and is a great way to easily monitor airfare. Since at this stage, you will not necessarily know the ultimate destination, you can put in multiple itineraries and Hopper will constantly monitor the cost for the flights. If one destination is significantly cheaper than another, you can opt in to booking the airfare at that time. Once you book airfare, you are generally locked in to the destination as change fees can be as high as $200-$300 per ticket so you need to make sure things are lined up with the timeshare or have a reasonable Plan B that you are prepared to use in the event that the timeshare availability does not become available. Once your airfare is locked in, I would revise the request first to make sure that only the resorts in your request are for the destination desired. While you will have 24 hours to cancel it free of charge, if you miss this window, it can be problematic. FIFTH TIP: USE SOUTHWEST AIRLINES IF POSSIBLE Alternatively, if you are in destination that is serviced by Southwest, I highly recommend booking tickets with Southwest. Southwest is the only airline left that allows changes and cancellations free of charge. Southwest even allows you to receive travel credits if the price of the airfare goes down. Southwest will give you travel credits to use at a later date in the event your flight cost went down from the date you originally booked. However, there are a few issues with Southwest that should be understood. Southwest only opens its flight schedule for approximately six months in the future. Therefore, if you confirm into a resort a year in advance, you may not be able to book airfare with Southwest until six months from the trip. You will also be subject to the price of the trip once it opens up. While Southwest is known for its low fares, the prices for some trips and high demand weeks can be extremely expensive. The second issue with Southwest is relating to cancellations. Southwest does allow cancellations but the do not provide refunds. They provide you with a travel credit that must be used within one year from the initial reservation date. They also require you to keep the reservation number in order to access those travel funds. This does require a bit of record keeping and organization. The best method for Southwest is to use their Rapid Reward Points. Instead of booking with cash, you can use Rapid Reward Points and if you needed to cancel or change destinations, the points are immediately redeposited to your account. I will explain this in later posts but for the purpose of this post, Southwest is a great airline to use when timeshare planning. SIXTH TIP: USE AUTOSLASH As discussed in this post here (autoslash), Autoslash is a great tool for rental cars. You can make reservations using Autoslash without any credit cards and they will track your rental to ensure that you receive the lowest price on your car rental. Since it is conceivable that you have many potential destinations for the trip, you can make multiple reservations for the same week. Do it as far in advance as possible and autoslash will do the rest to make sure that the cost of your rental car is the lowest. SEVENTH TIP: CONTINUE MONITORING AIRFARE, HOTELS AND TIMESHARES AFTER CONFIRMING Going through these various steps seem exhausting but once you get a system in place and have alerts set, it becomes on autopilot and just requires monitoring. The key is that once everything is booked, that you continue to monitor everything to make sure that there are no unintended surprises. I try to book my airfare 330 days in advance which is when most airlines open their schedules. When I book this far in advance, airlines continue to make schedule changes throughout the year. Many times, the reserved flight path changes, times are altered or non-stop flights all of sudden require a stop. These can completely derail all the travel planning put forth above and could require a complete re-do of everything above. This is why is is highly beneficial to continue to monitor all these items to make sure everything is on track. You do not want to be surprised on the check in date that your flight now requires an overnight stay. Also, while schedule changes with airlines can be problematic, most if not all airlines allow you to re-book or cancel your flights for no charge or fees if the airline make a schedule change that impacts the travel time by greater than two hours. In other posts, we can discuss schedule changes and how to use them for your advantage but for the purpose of this post, you need to monitor your airfare. Airlines will generally inform you of schedule changes but those e-mails may go to spam or simply be missed. In writing this post, I realize that travel planning can be daunting and difficult. Working with timeshares adds even more complexity. These tips are meant to allow my readers to begin using these tools and becoming informed on how these tools can help alleviate these issues and obtain the desired weeks and resorts within a reasonable budget. I highly recommend that you subscribe to my Guru Deals below so that you can be alerted to various exchange opportunities, travel deals, flight deals and other opportunities to allow you to travel to luxurious destinations for a fraction of the retail cost. Travel planning as described above may not be for everyone so when airfare deals become available, I will try to include some options for timeshares and see how you can easily book quality weeks for reasonable costs and avoid all the steps above! Subscribe below so you don't miss out!
I hope I don't scare away too many people with this economic analysis but I hope that I can clarify some of the mystery around timeshare ownership and the economics of ownership.
First, my analysis will avoid discussing the initial purchase. In economic terms, I view the initial purchase price as a sunk cost. According to investopedia, a sunk cost is a cost that has already been incurred and thus cannot be recovered. The purchase price of the timeshare should be considered a sunk cost. In other posts, I will explain why this is the case but the majority of fees incurred by timeshares are not the initial purchase price but rather than ongoing maintenance fees. In this post, I discussed some of the basics of maintenance fees. While ignoring the purchase price as a sunk cost in my analysis may be controversial, I argue that this is the proper way to assess timeshare ownership. In this post, I want to examine the economics of a Hyatt timeshare. While Hyatt has a small footprint, the quality of accommodations are generally excellent and most units are able to exchange into very high quality units through Interval International. As discussed in my guide to Hyatt found here, Hyatt's are sold in week intervals and are based on the amount of points. Generally, the strategy is to purchase the highest point week with the lowest maintenance fees. The maintenance fees will be same for each same sized unit regardless of the season so you get the most bang for your buck but getting the highest point week. However, as with most purchases, getting the top tier product is not always attainable. In this post, I will explore the economics around a 1300 point week. 1300 points is provided for a 2 bedroom unit or 1 bedroom premier unit during bronze season. This is fairly low season as the only other two seasons are Mountain and Copper. I am picking this type of week because these weeks are generally priced well and 1300 points is able to be exchanged through Interval International for a 2 bedroom unit during high season. Therefore, without much analysis, an owner of a low demand 1300 week can exchange through Interval International and receive a high demand week for the same 1300 points. THE FIRST SCENARIO: While maintenance fees vary by different resorts, one of my Hyatt units is a 1300 week and has a maintenance fees of $1,207.46 for 2015. In my earlier example, I am assuming that I simply pay my maintenance fees and instead of exchanging through Hyatt, I exchange through Interval International in order to take advantage of the high demand week. In fact, I did do this in 2015 and we ending up staying at the Londoner at the Morritt's Club in Grand Cayman island in a newly constructed 2 bedroom unit. In this example, I paid 1,207.46 for my maintenance fees and a fee of $179 to Interval International (online exchange fee instead of a phone fee) for a total of $1,386.46. Based on this, I paid a price of $198.06 per night for a 2-bedroom unit. Not exactly a bargain per night but the same accommodations through an online travel agency was $430.97 per night. Therefore, simply using my timeshare instead of booking with an online agency resulted in a 54% savings. THE SECOND SCENARIO: While I have two young kids at the moment, my wife and I purchased the timeshare before kids. At the time, a studio unit was more than sufficient for a couple. Studio's units are basically hotel rooms but are slightly larger and usually have a microwave, fridge and sometimes a hot plate. For a couple who are comparing timeshares to a hotel room, a studio is perfectly fine. Exchanging through Interval International requires 430 points for a studio unit it high season. With 1300 points, I can reserve three high season weeks (430 x 3 = 1290) and still have 10 points leftover. Again, with my maintenance fees of $1207.46 and 3 exchange fees for Interval International ($179 x 3 = $537), I can reserve a total of 21 nights in studio units during high season. My total cost per night for a studio unit is $83.06. At just over $83 per night, it is hard to find comparable hotel room properties. Additionally, since these are high season weeks, these weeks can be during prime season. For example, here a few of my historical transactions where I was able to utilize this strategy. Four Seasons Residence Club Aviara in November Marriott's Kauai Beach Club for Christmas week Marriott's Aruba Ocean Club for Thanksgiving week. These are all very luxurious accommodations that I reserved during peak season at a cost of just over $83 per night. In reviewing the current rates for the same seasons for this year, I find that these stays would cost the following when reviewing the times and dates on Priceline. Four Seasons Residence Club Aviara (November 5-12, 2016): Total cost: $2,164.68 Marriott's Kauai Beach Club for Christmas week: Total cost : $2,033.64 Marriott's Aruba Ocean Club for Thanksgiving week: $2,499.90 These three weeks would have cost me approximately $6,698.22 instead of $1744.46 saving me approximately 74% off the regular cost. THE THIRD SCENARIO: Exchanging through Interval International provides some significant advantages especially when trading with a 1300 point week. Due to the favorable exchange rates, a 1300 low season week can result in many weeks through interval as discussed above. The problem with the above strategy is that you will never be able to stay at Hyatt properties. This may or may not be a problem but Hyatt's do have some very nice properties and I think that they are worth a visit. In this next example, I assume that you can trade your 1300 points week within the Hyatt system instead of using it at your owned week. For example, you can use 750 points to stay at a Hyatt during Diamond season (the top tier season). Hyatt charges a fee of $39 for each reservation. As I have done in the past, we have reserved one week at the Hyatt Mountain Lodge in Beaver Creek. Diamond weeks are ski weeks and this was a very nice property. In reviewing the upcoming ski season, a week in a studio for January 7 through 14 is $659 per night for a total price of $5,314.22. After using 750 points, I still have 550 points to use for additional nights. Hyatt's system favors 4 night midweek stays which go from Tuesday to Saturday or Sunday through Thursday. We have used these 4 night stays various times as the points values are usually great. For example, a stay in a studio unit at the Hyatt Coconut Plantation in Bonita Springs, Florida only costs 140 points. Week 21 is the start of Bronze season for Hyatt Coconut Plantation. A reservation for May 23 through May 27th, (Tuesday to Saturday) would cost a total of $1849.36 for the 4 night stay. After both of these trips, you would still have 410 points to use. You can use 400 points in many ways but in my example, we have used points for a long weekend for a 3 night stay. A three night stay in a studio during Platinum season can be used at Hyatt Wild Oak in San Antonio, Texas. For example, a 3 night stay for March 31 - April 3 in a Studio would cost a total of $1,218.32. With the above examples, we would still have 10 points left over which actually can be used for a 2 night stay in Mountain season but we will assume that all points have been extinguished for these examples. Using these examples, we were able to book a total of 14 nights in a Studio unit during fairly high season. The total cost for these reservations would have cost $8,381.90. In comparison, using the Hyatt timeshare, I paid my maintenance fees of $1207.46 plus $39 for each reservation fee for a total of $1324.46 for a total of 14 nights or $94.60 each night. The various computations are almost endless but there are tremendous ways to maximize the value of the timeshare instead of purchasing hotel accommodations or purchasing directly. The examples above are dependent on availability and availability tends to be the biggest issue. However, with enough advance planning, flexibility, and diligence (not to mention following me on Twitter, Facebook and through e-mail), you can also score these types of weeks and exchanges. Make sure to subscribe below for further updates, travel deals and exchange opportunities. Exchanging your timeshare can be done through multiple methods. Internal exchanges occur when you own a specific week or points with one particular company and you would like to exchange that week or points for other units at other resorts. Hyatt, Marriott, Hilton and others are all timeshares that allow owners to exchange their own deeded week or points for other weeks at other resorts within their own system.
Alternatively, all major timeshares are usually affiliated with one of the two major exchange companies. RCI and Interval International (II) are the two most popular exchange companies. RCI was the original exchange company and currently has approximately 8,000 resorts throughout the world. Their resort directory can be found here: http://www.rci.com/resort-directory/landing. Interval International is the other large exchange company. Interval has approximately 2,500 resorts in their program. Two other exchange companies are Trading Places International and SFX Preferred Resorts. These are two smaller companies which we will further discuss in later posts. I have just completed the Complete Guide to Interval International found here: Interval International We will go over specific functions in more detail but this is a good start to get to understand exchanging through II. One fantastic perk of owning a timeshare is the ability to reserve additional weeks through the various exchange programs. RCI and Interval International both have programs where you can reserve a week with cash instead of exchanging your timeshare. You have to be a member of RCI or Interval International to be able to reserve a week but it is well worth it. Today, I want to review the Interval Getaways. Interval Getaways allows you to reserve a week in a studio, 1, 2, 3 or more bedroom units at timeshare resorts throughout the world. The inventory that they make available is different that if you exchanged your timeshare. The pricing for these getaways can be absolutely fantastic. They have some weeks that you can reserve for as little as $277 a week. Yes, $277 PER WEEK, ONLY $40 PER NIGHT. I challenge anyone to find a better deal that this for a hotel room. Interval Getaways have recently changed so that you can reserve a week up to 18 months in advance. Inventory constantly changes so it pays to constantly check. In order to be able to reserve a getaway week, you need to be a member but it does not take any points from your account. Here are some current deals that I can locate at the moment. Westgate Las Vegas Resort and Casino Apr 07 2017 - Apr 14 2017 0 2 2 $399.00 $374.00 $349.00 Marriott Grand Chateux in Las Vegas Mar 25 2017 - Apr 01 2017 1 4 4 $857.00 $832.00 $807.00 The Grand Bliss in Riveria Maya, Mexico Aug 28 2016 - Sep 04 2016 0 2 2 $329.00 $304.00 $279.00 There are tons of other opportunities available at 5 star resorts throughout the world. Many times a week vacation will cost as much as one night in a 5 star hotel. Interval Getaways offer fantastic opportunities to stay in great resorts around the world and could offer better opportunities than exchanging your timeshare. It is definitely worth it to check out Getaway options before exchanging your unit to see if you can save money by using a Getaway instead of exchange options. Exchanging into any timeshare during Christmas vacation is difficult since it is the most popular week to travel. While it is difficult, it can be possible with enough planning and flexibility.
We were just informed that I was able to exchange one of my timeshares into a one bedroom unit at the Westgate Park City - a ski-in / ski-out timeshare during Christmas Week. We have stayed at this timeshare before and it is located on the base of the mountain. The facilities are top notch. Due to the construction, the property is quite a maze and it takes a few days to orient yourself but it is a vice nice property with all the amenities you would expect from a 5 stay hotel. I was able to trade my timeshare using the request first option which I will cover in more detail in later posts. In reviewing the applicable prices on Priceline, the same accommodations would have cost over $7400!!! Summary of Charges Room Cost (details)$926.14 Rooms1Nights7Room Subtotal$6,482.98 Taxes & Fees$758.52 Total Priceline Charges$7,241.50 Resort Fee*$174.65 Total Cost$7,416.15 For the particular timeshare that I traded, I pay maintenance fees of approximately $1200 for a 2 bedroom unit. I only had to trade enough points for a one bedroom unit so I still have enough points to reserve a full week in a studio. Basically, in doing the math, the portion of my maintenance fees was about $800 for this week plus interval international's exchange fee of $239. For basically $1000, I was able to reserve a unit where the going rate is over $7400 resulting in over $6000 in savings for this week. This is just one of many examples of a successful exchange and an example of how timeshare ownership can really save you tons of money. Please reach out at theofficialtiemshareguru@gmail.com to share your exchange successes. |
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