ask-redweek-marriott-points-or-weeks-better-buy

We own a legacy week at the Maui Ocean Club. The points have created a situation in which we can't get weeks at our resort when we can travel with the kids in summer or on break. They want to charge me $2,500 to convert and keep up with the times. They compared it to an upgrade on a phone.

I currently own 26,000 Marriott Vacation Club destination points. My wife and I are interested in selling the points bur have found no way to effectively get this done. I was under the impression that MVC would buy the points back that would include a hefty brokerage fee that I would be willing to pay. But as I found out this is not the case. Do you have any advice?

@frankn107, I may be able to help you before you sell. The potential tax value from structuring the deal properly is worth more than the sale price. I don't want to ask you about your use history, cost basis, tax bracket and unrealized gains you might have in other investments in a public forum, but I don't see a way to do a private message here. You can reach me at jduncanwilliams@gmail.com and we can exchange contact info. I would be happy to help you quantify the value of a couple of strategies that might take some of the sting out of your loss.

If you are already a destination club points member when you buy a resale legacy week does that get around where they won't let you convert it?

We have owned a legacy Oceanfront condo for 10 years and love it. We do not like the point system they aggressively try to sell us. All you have to do is compare the percentage increase in dues to increase in Destination point dues. If you own the property outright, the dues increase is much less. On the points, guess who profits from the faster rate of increase in dues? Destination Points are full of rules, dates, availability issues...who needs the complication. If you own the legacy week outright, you don't deal with any of those issues. You know when you are booked, and which condo you get. Simple and relaxing.

Whatever you do do not use the points system. Keep your week! If you switch to points it will only be good enough for 4 days. I even attended one of those sales events to get points. In that meeting I asked the lady to try it out., She went to a NON busy time in our favorite resorts. IN each case, the points we would get for our 7 day week were only enough for 3-4 days - and that was when travel frequency and traffic was LOW. It is for them just a way to shuffle things around more and MAKE MORE MONEY. Capitalism is at work. If you own a week you also have a DEED. Stay away from Points. You may be stuck with it but at least with the week you can use it.

Thanks for the information. Following for answers to this post. Will welcome any feedback and tips for purchasing. (although seems like I shouldn't under the current point system)

I agree with the comments about the point systems being a poor value. I own a red Christmas week at Marriott Royal Palms and when I asked the saleswoman how many points I would need to get a red week at Christmas at Royal Palms, the saleswomen, kept showing me off peak weeks. I asked her to put in Christmas week, and the chart showed I would need to buy more points just to just to use the red week I had if I had converted it to points. This ts a complicated system to the benefit of Marriott and remove owners from actually owning a week.

Wow! Really glad I read this post. Currently staying at Marriott Newport Coast. Gorgeous resort. Was looking into resale and the points program looks like a terrible deal. It’s a huge resort so there is often weeks available to rent for the cost of maintenance fees for the points. If I buy anything it will certainly be a resale legacy week.

We have an “enrolled” week that allows us to use it as a full week or convert to points. Not a bad gig because it’s a Hawaii week and get substantial number of points. I’m wondering how common that is and could I buy a similar “enrolled” week, add it to my inventory and be able to use the week or get the points with it, too.

Do not buy points! It’s a shame. The only way you can effectively use points for top designation in peak seasons is a deeded owner transfers ownership weeks into the points system basically opening his unit to a first come first serve opportunity for point users. Good luck trying to get in. Especially when Marriott Vacation site crashes.