New Members - Please Introduce Yourself!

[ordleo Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close ordleo]

New owner from Chicago

Hi, I am Leo. New to TS but have been reading various TS forum for over 7 months. I just purchased a Wyndham points at Smoky Mountain and fixed week at Wyndham Mountains at Lake Lure. Still trying to gain more knowledge about TS and looking forward to trading. I have and enjoyed stay at Glacier Canyon with rental before and it is how I found out about TS and retail/resale purchase.

[rikkis_playpen Diamond Club Contributor Find all posts View Profile Close rikkis_playpen]

Sorry I'm late!

Hi my name is Debbie and have been married for 17 years (tomorrow). We have 3 children. We purchased our first timeshare in Hawaii, came home and cancelled it. It was $25,000, 10 years ago. Then we went to Cabo, bought 1 week at the Villa del Palmar. I just don't feel like we are using our timeshare effectively. So I found this forum and I'm hoping to learn some tricks. I'm already confused. Hope to learn and then share with another newbie.

Congrats on your anniversary!



Welcome to the forums...

[jmbklj Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close jmbklj]

Hi! I've been on the forum here for a while but I don't think I've introduced myself before. I live in Ohio. I inherited a Hawaii weeks timeshare, my one & only (a floating week). So I've been trying to learn how the TS systems & RCI work, how to maximize my trade value, and if I should be using an exchange system other than RCI. There is much to learn!

I have a little TS experience prior to the ownership transfer, using an RCI guest certificate and enjoyed TS weeks in Costa del Sol, Portugal and South Africa. Although I love Hawaii and plan to use the week there occasionally, I am interested in seeing countries I've not been to.

[HannahR Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close HannahR]

introduction

I'm Hannah from NJ and I own a week at Silverleaf's Oak'N'Spruce resort in the Berkshires in Mass. I came upon this forum in the course of trying to do research on a time share resale company I found advertised in the local classified ads. I emailed them for info and they've been emailing and calling ever since, and asking for my credit card info so I can get in on the limited time one time special deal rates. So, I won't be doing time share resale with this outfit. Sorry!
But I am contemplating selling my week because it just doesn't seem to fit the way we travel. We generally take shorter, 4 days trips and don't plan ahead. I've never been able to trade with RCI at a time and in a place I wanted to go even though Silverleaf deposited a week with higher trading power into my RCI account. I really like Oak'N'Spruce - it's kind of quaint and funky and the area is great, but only for 3 or 4 nights at a time. Not sure it's worth $771 in maintenance a year, and then having to trade my week for an additional fee, etc. Just went up there for an "Owner update" and asked if they'd buy my week back. Of course they wouldn't. Then again, I'm thinking maybe I should keep Oak'n'spruce and just dump RCI, though I have two weeks banked with them.

[chriskre Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close chriskre]

Hi Hanna,
Welcome to the forum.

RCI just went to a new points system.
It might be worth keeping them and learning a little about the new points system before you scrap the Timeshare.
RCI may give you enough points for your week to be able to do several short notice trips for your one week.
Example they may give you 20 points for your week and in return you could do e or 4 or trips for 5 points each.

Please feel free to post on the other areas for any newbie help questions on how to maximize your timeshare use.

We love newbies.

[Georgia632 Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Georgia632]

Hello, We are new to timeshares, but I am thinking this just might be the way for us to go since we are planning on taking MANY vacations for as long as we physically CAN.

We live in East Central Florida very near the Ron Jon Caribe Resort. We decided to stop spending thousands and thousands per year traveling and have some fun and see what we can do with traveling using the timeshare experience.

I am 62 and retired from the communications industry and my partner is a retired psychology teacher of 40 years. We are both single now, share a home, I have never been married and my partner is a widow. Neither of us have children and our last pet of 13 years has passed on so that gives us more freedom to travel without having to be concerned with having our dear "Felix" taken care of while we travel as much as we can.

I am looking forward to the opinions of experience timeshare folks and I've found that the best place to get advice and opinions are on forums such as this. I may not always agree with the advice, but I still look forward to getting it.

We've gotten many invitations to "look over" and check out various timeshares over the years, and since we live in a pretty nice area that would be desirable for other folks who want to trade time and enjoy our beautiful state, we took them up on their offer and bought a week every other year (just to start I hope) experiencing the timeshare world.

I certainly hope it pays off for us and I know I LOVE planning vacations, so I'm hoping I'm going to have a lot of fun learning and "playing around" with the "ins and outs" of "timesharing".

So far I've enjoyed reading the many posts on this forum and I look forward to joining this "club".

We decided to purchase our timeshare directly from Ron Jon's Caribe Resort because we are first timers and at least wanted to get our feet wet by purchasing it the way we did. Perhaps later, after having so much fun and gaining experience in this, we may purchase MORE timeshares through other avenues.

I HOPE this is the beginning of a "FUN" experience.

The pleasure is all mine meeting you all. Thank you for your time and future forum conversations.

[alaskacie Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close alaskacie]

Hi,
I live in Sedona and bought a one week timeshare at Los Abrigados for guests and also day use to spa/gym.

Diamond has bought out, M/F fees are up and I haven't decided whether to convert to points or give it away. So I'm on the forums learning more about what people are doing with their timeshares.

[PfaffKitty Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close PfaffKitty]

Aloha!

Hello my DH and I have owned a timeshare for several years. We originally bought a week at what was Embassy Vacation Resort on Maui (now Ka'anapali Beach Resort) then we bought another week there and then a few years later bought into the points system with a purchase at the Point of Poipu on Kauai.

We LOVE LOVE LOVE both resorts and have used points in Arizona and Florida. But by far we love Hawaii the best! I should mention that we live in the very land locked Panhandle of Nebraska, where it is actually above freezing for the first time today in over three weeks! Praise the Lord!

While our maintentance fees / ownership dues are high (just over $2300.00) we know we could never stay at any of the resorts we enjoy for a week or two for less than that. Yes, we could find less expensive resorts, but being older we enjoy being spoiled . Plus we bought it as an investment to leave to our daughters. We spent ten days on Kauai with our daughters and their families two years ago. Our three Grandsons were 10 and 6(twins) at the time and they had the time of their life at the Point of Poipu. We are planning a trip with them again in June of 2012 to the Big Island.

That is the reason we switched to the point system. We can save one years points use the current years and borrow from the next if necessary to allow us to take our kids along. One of the greatest joys of this Grandmas life is sharing Hawaii with her kiddos!

Anyway ... I just ran across this site, I have belonged to TUG for years as well as cruisecritic.com - gotta do something when saving points, ha! I am looking to learning many new things from all of you!

My DH is a golf and scuba fiend and I love to sew and I love my furry children. So that is me (PfaffKitty) in a nutshell

[bmunsell Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close bmunsell]

Hello from Alaska

We have been timeshare owners since 2003 at the Villa Group with resorts at Villa del Mar and Villa del Palmar Flamingos in PV, Villa del Palmar and Villa del Arco in Cabo and now resorts in Cancun and Loreto. We look forward to great warm vacations during the Christmas Holidays every year but love living and playing in Alaska.

[TCRNY Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close TCRNY]

New TS Owner

Hi everyone...We bought our first timeshare last month - Westgate in Orlando week 51. My husband and I are very new to timeshare and we figured this would be a good way to make sure we vacation. However, I'm a little concerned about all the bad press I've read here on Westgate ... but we bought it, and I want to learn how to use it and make the best advantage of it. Is there anyone else out there that owns WG in Orlando? I'm hoping that I can do some research on this site to figure it all out. If anyone has info or can steer me in the right direction on this site, I would greatly appreciate your help. Thanks and Happy New Year to all! Cathy

[puppymommo Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close puppymommo]

Hi everyone...We bought our first timeshare last month - Westgate in Orlando week 51.

Hi, Cathy, welcome to the forums! You will find much useful information here.

Which Westgate Orlando property did you buy? We stayed at Westgate Lakes Resort & Spa a few years ago and we really loved it.

Again, welcome.
Susan

[deblikestimeshare Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close deblikestimeshare]

Need Maui

I am new to Timeshare Forum, I have been a Wyndham owner about 5 years.
Only exchanged with RCI once and they didn't give me a big choice of exchanges for the Bahamas. I had a very bad experience with them. I gave them the week I needed and then gave them several exchanges I was interested and they basically told me no availabiltiy to all of them and then told me their only availability. I was booking this 10 months out.
So I was not happy with the system. Now I am going to Hawaii in November 2011 and deposited a one bedroom Wyndham points for Maui. I begged them to tell me if I had a chance for Maui, they said they would do a search and keep me on the waiting list. It has been two weeks and I have called them several times to broaden the search and still no match. With your experience, do I even have a chance for the first or second week of November in Maui?

[puppymommo Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close puppymommo]

Now I am going to Hawaii in November 2011 and deposited a one bedroom Wyndham points for Maui. I begged them to tell me if I had a chance for Maui, they said they would do a search and keep me on the waiting list. It has been two weeks and I have called them several times to broaden the search and still no match. With your experience, do I even have a chance for the first or second week of November in Maui?

When did you make the deposit? That makes a difference as there was a big change on January 11.

Let us know what kind of deposit and someone may be able to help you.

Here is what is listed for Maui in November through the Wyndham portal. Only this one resort. This requires a deposit after 1/11. I can't check on rci.com because my deposit expires before November.

Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Thu 03-Nov-2011 Thu 10-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Fri 04-Nov-2011 Fri 11-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Sat 05-Nov-2011 Sat 12-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Sun 06-Nov-2011 Sun 13-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Thu 10-Nov-2011 Thu 17-Nov-2011 143,000
Studio 2 (2) Full Thu 10-Nov-2011 Thu 17-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Fri 11-Nov-2011 Fri 18-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Sat 12-Nov-2011 Sat 19-Nov-2011 143,000
Studio 2 (2) Full Sat 12-Nov-2011 Sat 19-Nov-2011 143,000
1 Bedroom 4 (2) Full Sat 12-Nov-2011 Sat 19-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Sun 13-Nov-2011 Sun 20-Nov-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Thu 24-Nov-2011 Thu 01-Dec-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Fri 25-Nov-2011 Fri 02-Dec-2011 143,000
Studio 2 (2) Full Fri 25-Nov-2011 Fri 02-Dec-2011 143,000
1 Bedroom 4 (2) Full Fri 25-Nov-2011 Fri 02-Dec-2011 143,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Sat 26-Nov-2011 Sat 03-Dec-2011 143,000
Studio 2 (2) Full Sat 26-Nov-2011 Sat 03-Dec-2011 143,000
1 Bedroom 4 (2) Full Sat 26-Nov-2011 Sat 03-Dec-2011 143,000
2 Bedrooms 6 (6) Full Sat 26-Nov-2011 Sat 03-Dec-2011 224,000
Hotel 2 (2) No Kitchen Sun 27-Nov-2011 Sun 04-Dec-2011 143,000

[TCRNY Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close TCRNY]

Hi, Cathy, welcome to the forums! You will find much useful information here.

Which Westgate Orlando property did you buy? We stayed at Westgate Lakes Resort & Spa a few years ago and we really loved it.

Again, welcome.
Susan

Hi Susan, we purchased the Westgate Palace - they are 2 towers. I have a great deal of info to understand with timeshares. I am happy to have found this forum, and hopefully can navigate myself around to figure it all out. We do not plan to ever stay in our Orlando TS but did it mostly to trade it for other places to visit. We are hoping that with week 51 in Orlando this is the most traveled time for Disney at Christmas break, and we're told we will easily be able to trade in this week because it is a prime week. We;re still waiting for our additional paperwork so we can read through everything. Thanks so much for your welcome ... hope to chat more with you. Where do you own?

[puppymommo Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close puppymommo]

Thanks so much for your welcome ... hope to chat more with you. Where do you own?

We own Wyndham points based in Mexico (where we have never been) and Silverleaf's Ozark Mountain Resort in Branson, Missouri. We have free bonus time with Silverleaf (1-6 nights on availability) so we usually deposit our Silverleaf with RCI and use our Wyndham points at Wyndham resorts.

Susan