Bluegreen Newbie and MFs

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

Hey all...real quick...

We just bought 8k biennial points on ebay through resort closings. Trust fund E, Even Inventory, Odd usage. So far, I've had a great experience with them BTW. Very quick response to my emails and questions. Here's my issue. MFs are 330+percentage (whatever it will be) RC estimated it around 550 total. Does this sound reasonable? And considering hindsight is 20/20, would I have been better off buying 8k annual points? would I have ended up paying the same in MFs? After all, I'm effectively getting 4k per year and still paying what seems to be the same annual dues. What am I missing?

[gandalf252002 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gandalf252002]

It really depends on what you already own and what you intend to do who the points.

On EOY packages you pay roughly have per point that you do on the annual. There are pro's and cons to both.

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

Sorry, I should have been more specific. we bought them just for our own family usage. In fact, where we vacation and the Monday-Thursday night is our best travel time, we can probably vacation just fine on those points. Once I understand the timeshare system a little better, we may acquire more points one day as we can travel more. I'm assuming that many people collect points to "rent" out to friends and family. I wouldn't be surprised if one could make a little side income doing this. I have a friend who pays his RCI MFs by selling time to people and then travels on what he has left. I just wondered if the EOY was the best way to go, and whether I should consider adding more yearly points and trying to offset my fees like my friend does.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

Sorry, I should have been more specific. we bought them just for our own family usage. In fact, where we vacation and the Monday-Thursday night is our best travel time, we can probably vacation just fine on those points. Once I understand the timeshare system a little better, we may acquire more points one day as we can travel more. I'm assuming that many people collect points to "rent" out to friends and family. I wouldn't be surprised if one could make a little side income doing this. I have a friend who pays his RCI MFs by selling time to people and then travels on what he has left. I just wondered if the EOY was the best way to go, and whether I should consider adding more yearly points and trying to offset my fees like my friend does.

Don't overestimate what you can do with timeshares, find you can't, and then have too many. You may think you can rent them out and make $$$, and when you try, you discover lots of other owners doing that to try to recoup their fees, and that is driving down the market price of rentals.

Next, you think, "Hey. We coulda just rented ourselves."



FWIW, 25 years ago we started with EOY. When we used it the next year, we bought the "other half" because they had quite kindly guaranteed their price until that time.

Was I dumb, or what??? No need to answer, folks.

In any event, since we had bought 2 EOYs, we got one, full MF bill each year.

Then, we bought two more full weeks at the same place.

Then, a few years hence, we got rid of all of those, giving the last EOY to charity (when you could still do that).

[GrayFal Silver Contributor and supermoderator Find all posts View Profile Close GrayFal]

Hey all...real quick...

We just bought 8k biennial points on ebay through resort closings. Trust fund E, Even Inventory, Odd usage. So far, I've had a great experience with them BTW. Very quick response to my emails and questions. Here's my issue. MFs are 330+percentage (whatever it will be) RC estimated it around 550 total. Does this sound reasonable? And considering hindsight is 20/20, would I have been better off buying 8k annual points? would I have ended up paying the same in MFs? After all, I'm effectively getting 4k per year and still paying what seems to be the same annual dues. What am I missing?

I tried to look on the yahoo group but could not figure this out. I used the maint. fee calculator on the Bluegreen Yahoo Group.
All my contracts are annual.

8,000 EOY = $330 base fee + 129 Club fee + 8,000 x 1/2 $0.0502 $200.80 = $660 every year $0.1661 per point
8,000 yearly = $330 base fee + 129 Club Fee + 8,000 x $0.0502 $401 = $861 $0.1077 per point
16,000 yearly = $330 base fee + 129 club fee + 16,000 x $0.0502 $802 = $1263 $0.0790 per point
24,000 yearly = $330 base fee + 129 Club fee + 24,000 x $0.0502 $1207 = $1666 $0.0694

So as you can see 4,000 (8,000 EOY) is $660 - picking up another EOY 8,00 would only increase your yearly fee by $200
OR
by going from 4,000 (8,000 EOY) a year to 16,000 a year, your fee would go from $660 to $1263.
You can get a LOT more milage from 16,000 a year versus 4,000

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

Grayfal, I just threw up a little in my mouth when I read your MF breakdown of various points. I should have done my homework. Fortunately its a lesson learned and now I can see why the owners may have given them up just to get them off their hands. I only paid 11.00 on ebay for them through resort closings, and had 0.00 costs transferring them to my name so overall, the acquisition of them was literally nothing. But .1661 per point on fees is pretty crappy when you consider what one can do with more yearly points. Anyway, we will use all of them for sure, but we would never be able to use 16k per year. we just don't travel that much. If we ever decide to upgrade, maybe I'll sell them on ebay myself! Or more likely, i will seek yall's advice on consolidation. Thanks again for the help.

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

one more thing. suppose I did find a way to add another 8k EOY, and seriously, I could never use all those, can they be combined into one account?

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

Grayfal, I just threw up a little in my mouth when I read your MF breakdown of various points. I should have done my homework. Fortunately its a lesson learned and now I can see why the owners may have given them up just to get them off their hands. I only paid 11.00 on ebay for them through resort closings, and had 0.00 costs transferring them to my name so overall, the acquisition of them was literally nothing. But .1661 per point on fees is pretty crappy when you consider what one can do with more yearly points. Anyway, we will use all of them for sure, but we would never be able to use 16k per year. we just don't travel that much. If we ever decide to upgrade, maybe I'll sell them on ebay myself! Or more likely, i will seek yall's advice on consolidation. Thanks again for the help.

See Post 4.

[GrayFal Silver Contributor and supermoderator Find all posts View Profile Close GrayFal]

one more thing. suppose I did find a way to add another 8k EOY, and seriously, I could never use all those, can they be combined into one account?

As long as your new contract is in Trust Fund E, they will combine with one base fee. I suggest you look for another 6-10K EOY to go with your current ownership - Bluegreen charges $450 to transfer a deed so those ebay buys are really great..look for a resort where you might want to use bonus time to stretch your ownership.


Because honestly, I don't know where you think you are going with 4,000 points per year???
http://bluegreenonline.com/points.pdf

You can only get bonus time at your home resort.
So for your $660 a year fee, you will be getting 3-4 midweek nights someplace.

A week at La Cabana Aruba in a studio is 5,000-9,000
Daytona Seabreeze off season 1BR 6,000 - high season 9,000
The Fountains Orlando 2BR low season 13,000
Solara Surfside Miami off season 1BR 8,000 2BR high 15,000
Hotel Blake Chicago studio Jan/Feb 8,000 High 21-23,000
The Soundings Cape Cod January 1BR 4,000 High 14,000
Falls Village studio sleep 2 Jan-March 2,000
Wilderness Club Big Cedar 2BR lodge High season 15,000 Cabin 18,000
Suites at Hershey 2BR high 15,000

See Post 4.

yup

[gandalf252002 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gandalf252002]

Not sure where it would be best to post it, but I had put all the resort points charts into a spreadsheet at one point. It was broken down by day of the week, so you could filter by points and see exactly where you could go. There are resorts that are 50 and 100 points Monday to Thursday and if that works for the o/p it might still work for them.

[GrayFal Silver Contributor and supermoderator Find all posts View Profile Close GrayFal]

Not sure where it would be best to post it, but I had put all the resort points charts into a spreadsheet at one point. It was broken down by day of the week, so you could filter by points and see exactly where you could go. There are resorts that are 50 and 100 points Monday to Thursday and if that works for the o/p it might still work for them.

Yes, it could work.
But I feel the unhappiest of BG. Owners are those that are promised the world of wonderful vacations and then sold 4,000-8,000 EOY point packages. If midweek stays require such low points as you stated, they can also be rented for a lot less then maint fees.
OP also mentioned "family" so if you are traveling with 4 people, it can get very cozy in those bargain studios.
JMHO

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

If midweek stays require such low points as you stated, they can also be rented for a lot less then maint fees.

It can also be a real challenge to get some of the cheaper-point weeks. There aren't many units for most of them, and I think a lot of Gold and Silver people (who can get on the wait list) snap those up before they're available to the rest of us. Going on availability eleven months out, I suspect there are some Gold and Silver owners who essentially winter in Florida using their Bluegreen points, just moving from resort to resort, and generally going for the cheapest option they can get.

I don't mean to complain or to condemn that practice; just pointing out that it can be tough to get some of the cheapest units, even reserving eleven months out. OTOH, a lot of them we can get a good deal somewhere similar using RCI's cash reservations; since our price-per-point is kind of high, sometimes Extra Vacation is cheaper, and nearly always Last Call is. Last Call is not so useful busy times, but since we can go off season, we do fine with those. Our original plan was to get more points, but we've found we have more flexibility at less cost sticking with our small points ownership and then getting cash RCI reservations, so that is another approach to consider for the small points owner. We've rented from other Bluegreen owners, as well; since our price-per-point is high, we can save money that way without the mega-points owner losing money (although we've also gotten rentals on rolled-over points that must have lost somebody money -- but the points were going to expire, and at least they recouped something).

[GrayFal Silver Contributor and supermoderator Find all posts View Profile Close GrayFal]

It can also be a real challenge to get some of the cheaper-point weeks. There aren't many units for most of them, and I think a lot of Gold and Silver people (who can get on the wait list) snap those up before they're available to the rest of us. Going on availability eleven months out, I suspect there are some Gold and Silver owners who essentially winter in Florida using their Bluegreen points, just moving from resort to resort, and generally going for the cheapest option they can get.

I don't mean to complain or to condemn that practice; just pointing out that it can be tough to get some of the cheapest units, even reserving eleven months out. OTOH, a lot of them we can get a good deal somewhere similar using RCI's cash reservations; since our price-per-point is kind of high, sometimes Extra Vacation is cheaper, and nearly always Last Call is. Last Call is not so useful busy times, but since we can go off season, we do fine with those. Our original plan was to get more points, but we've found we have more flexibility at less cost sticking with our small points ownership and then getting cash RCI reservations, so that is another approach to consider for the small points owner. We've rented from other Bluegreen owners, as well; since our price-per-point is high, we can save money that way without the mega-points owner losing money (although we've also gotten rentals on rolled-over points that must have lost somebody money -- but the points were going to expire, and at least they recouped something).

And does OP only want the cheap, off seasons weeks? Again, because family was mentioned, I assume they have school age kids so need to travel when school is out = high season.

That is why I suggested another freebie contract - 8,000 EOY would only increase fees by $200 per year but make a world of difference …or 8,000 yearly - also a small increase but with 8,000 one year and 12,000 the next they could do a nice vacation 1-2 X's a year.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

At what point does renting, at fairly low if not lower prices, make more sense than trying to figure all this stuff out?

Oh yeah, I remember how fun it was.

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

hey guys, thanks for all the input. To clear up a little, we have two small age kids and we live just a few hours from Branson. we bought points at Falls Village. We also like Big Cedar (who doesn't). I am a pastor of a small church so we are very choosy about the weekends that we are away. so a monday night-thursday night stay are perfect for us. fortunately, they are also the cheapest nights to use. so far, we are lucky to manage one decent vaca per year, sometimes every other year. the rest of the time I have off of my other job in retail, we spend with family away from the use of any resorts. so actually, 4k per year will actually be fine for us. If we wanted to do any larger trips we would have to bank/borrow. this was our first little step into timeshare life and so we wanted to try out one of the smallest packages possible. i always keep an eye out on ebay and craigslist for people giving up their points cheap or free, so if this works out, we may do like has been suggested and add another 8k eoy. except for selling to other people, we will probably never use more than that.