Buying points through BG versus resale

[midwest mike Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close midwest mike]

Can someone please give me some pros and cons between going through BG to buy points versus buying resale on an auction. I just bought 7000 points at CMV on Saturday and I found out that I have 5 days to rescind that agreement. Would you recommend me opting out and buying resale points. It looks like what I paid at BG is way higher than what I can get through an EBAY auction, but on EBAY they seem to be assigned rather than deeded. Should I worry about that? Please advise. I need to act fast if I want to for-go my splurge this past weekend.

Thanks in advance!!

[BocaBum99 Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close BocaBum99]

Mike,

In general, timeshares purchased from the developer are significantly higher prices than on the resale market. The prices range from about 30% cheaper for hotel brands like HGVC, Hyatt and Marriott to 50-80% or more for off brands like Bluegreen and Fairfield and WorldMark. This is due to the fact that resort develpers spend about 50% of the purchase price on sales and marketing. Someone has to pay for all those free gifts and heavy commissions they pay the timeshare sales guys. So, buying from the developer is rarely a good deal relative to resales.

So, Resort developers have tried to partial combat this by withholding certain benefits when a person transfers ownership from one party to another. Most developers have such a non-transferrable aspect. Marriott and Starwood don't allow you to convert your timeshare into their hotel rewards points, as an example.

In the case of Bluegreen, here is what MAY not transfer when you purchase resale. I say MAY not transfer as opposed to WILL NOT transfer because there are NO DOCUMENTED cases of anyone being denied most of these benefits at transfer. As soon as we get a documented case, I will change what I post in these topics.

Here are the benefits that are developer benefits:

1) Bonus Time. This is a great feature that I personally use all the time. Today, all Bluegreen points owners appear to get unlimited access to this feaure. To test whether or not you have it, just call reservations and ask if there is any bonus time availaibility at the Fountains and try to book it. You will see that you will NOT be denied.

2) Preferred Member status. Today, if you obtain 20000 or 35000 Bluegreen points, you will become a Silver preferred or Gold preferred member, respectively. Again, I do not know any owners who have bought on the resale market ending up with the required number of points and have been denied these privileges.

There is a thread in this forum to help you understand the benefits you get from preferred member status. Here are the features I believe have good value:

a) no cancellation fee for reservations. That saves about $35/cancellation if you tend to cancel your reservations a lot.

b) Getting on wait list 12 and 13 months in advance of check in. Every night, reservations are booked from the wait that was created started 2 months from that date. Those owners who are the highest on the list have the best chance of getting prime holiday and hard to get weeks. I use this all the time.

c) Paying maintenance fees with points. This is good if you have a lot of points and you don't want the hassle of renting your weeks. You get a decent rate from Bluegreen.

3) The last benefit is Traveller's plus. I have never used this feature. I think the only feature that is worth it is hot weeks. This allows you to book available weeks at multiple resorts outside of Bluegreen for only 2000 points.

To date, everyone I know gets benefits 1 and 2 on resale transfer. But, the rules say you are not entitled to these benefits, so even if you get them today, you could lose them tomorrow.

I hope this helps. It's completely up to you to decide if the money savings is worth the potential loss of these features.

[midwest mike Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close midwest mike]

Thanks for the great info! Would you buy timeshare with an assignment instead of being deeded? Also where is my best bet for buying BG resale points?

[BocaBum99 Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close BocaBum99]

Thanks for the great info! Would you buy timeshare with an assignment instead of being deeded? Also where is my best bet for buying BG resale points?

Mike,

Are you talking about a Warranty Deed vs. Owner Beneficiary Rights?

If so, let me explain what each means. A Warranty Deed is a vehicle used for transferring title of real property from one person to another. All Bluegreen timeshares (with the possible exception of Aruba and Kauai due to specific laws related to who can own real property there) are deeded at a specific resort as is represented by an underlying deed that is recorded with the county records just like any real estate. This is true whether it is points or deeded weeks.

When these deeds are converted to Bluegreen points, the underlying deeds are held in the Bluegreen Vacation Club trust. Technically, the club owns them. The club then creates what are called Owner Beneficiary Rights that are tied to those deeds which are in trust which they then offer to other customers. This is how Points systems in Florida are created. This allows the resort developer to create a reservation system allowing first come, first served bookings.

A warranty deed provides owners a bit more protection since all property rights afforded US citizens protect you. When you buy Owner Beneficiary rights, you are at the mercy of the resort developer because they create the rules which you must live by. Fortunately, many of the past transgressions by unscrupulous developers have been curtailed through state real estate laws governing the creation of such multi-site timesharing plans. Florida took the lead in the creation of these statutes and many timesharing plans are based in Florida because of it.

In Bluegreen, if the Club gets disbanded for any reason, you get back your warranty deed as spelled out in your owner beneficiary rights.

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

Great information, Boca! Can you put all of this information together and make it into a sticky? It's really helpful for BG beginners like me.

Mike, let me be the first to say:

Rescind! Rescind! Rescind!

Do it now. Follow the instructions in your contract to the letter. Send it both via fax and via an overnight service.

Why do I suggest rescinding? Because if you decide later that you really did want that deal after all, the resort will almost always still give the same deal to you. (Maybe not with Marriott or Disney, but almost all other resorts will.) But if you decide later that you don't want the deal (which is far more likely with most timeshares), and you didn't rescind in time, then you're stuck with it.

Also, (although Boca is the expert here), I think 7000 points isn't enough to do much with. Some of the BG resorts are more like 15000 a week.

[midwest mike Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close midwest mike]

Thanks, Judy.

Today I sent my letter to rescind by way of fed-ex and also via registered mail. I plan on calling tomorrow afternoon to confirm their receipt of it and to find out how long until I get my deposit back. Then it's time to shop for some resale points! You may be right that 7000 is a bit low. Maybe 8000-10000 would be better. But I have to agree with Boca that the bonus time is a great benefit. We are just about a two hour drive from Christmas Mountain so I could see taking advantage of my bonus time for that and using my points for something more beach like. To me it makes the most sense to use points for week day stays and your bonus time for weekends because of the way the system is set up. Is anybody else in agreement about that?

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

Can I ask???

Can I ask what they were charging for 7,000 points? I was just down there last Sunday and my friend went to an owner update. They tried to get him to upgrade and wanted $2 a point!!

Is this the "going rate"?

[midwest mike Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close midwest mike]

Pretty close to $2/point. They wanted $12,300. $1.75/point. Quite a difference from resale.

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

...Today I sent my letter to rescind by way of fed-ex and also via registered mail. I plan on calling tomorrow afternoon to confirm their receipt of it and to find out how long until I get my deposit back. Then it's time to shop for some resale points! You may be right that 7000 is a bit low. Maybe 8000-10000 would be better. But I have to agree with Boca that the bonus time is a great benefit. We are just about a two hour drive from Christmas Mountain so I could see taking advantage of my bonus time for that and using my points for something more beach like. To me it makes the most sense to use points for week day stays and your bonus time for weekends because of the way the system is set up. Is anybody else in agreement about that?

Glad you rescinded, Mike!

About bonus time, Boca is again the expert here, but my understanding is that resale buyers are currently able to book bonus time, even though Bluegreen says that bonus time is only available if you buy from them.

Even if Bluegreen changes its policy and only gives bonus time to those who buy from them, you will still probably be able to buy a small package from them, and be treated as someone who bought from the developer. For example, people who own fixed weeks (which were sold prior to the Bluegreen point system) are generally able to convert their ownership to BG Points by buying a small package of BG Points -- 3000 points at $4600 was the most recent figure that I heard. If you bought 7000 points resale and 3000 points at $4600, you would still save a lot over BG's $12,300 price, and you'd have more points.

As for using bonus time on the weekends, Boca would again be the expert, but there may be a problem that weekends tend to book up outside the 45 day bonus time period. I'm not sure about this. I know that with the Disney Vacation Club, weeknights cost less points than weekends, and tend to book up first, even though Disney's point discount for weeknights is much smaller than BG's. However, I think many BG resorts attract far more weekend travelers than Disneyworld does, plus many DVC members are happy to stay at a deluxe Disney hotel for a couple of nights. So, I can see reasons why weekends might be popular in BG, even with their high point cost.

[SEI BG Member Find all posts View Profile Close SEI BG]

I'm just tossing out an idea here because I've never used my bonus time feature or booked a "last call" vacation with RCI, but it appears to me from the RCI web site that using their last call feature might be just as good or better. It probably offers you more resorts, it's often cheaper ( I found a studioe at Big Cedar for $19 a night or $136 for a week), and it too books 45 days out of less. I did once try to make a point reservation at Falls Village that was 45 days out and there was nothing available because of the season. If you're trying to use bonus time in a busy season you may have more difficulty booking. I want to say again, that I've learned more reading posts on here in the past few days than I every did reading on my own or listening to any kind of owner update at a Bluegreen resort.

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

Thing is, RCI only has what RCI has, Bluegreen has all their own network of unused inventory. If you want to stay in a BG resort, I'd go Bonus Time. If you don't care where, Last Call is a decent value but with sporadic availability.

Question is, for how long?? They keep raising the prices, so please don't count on Last Call as economically viable over the long haul.

As with all other things timeshare-related, use the whoever delivers what you want at that point in time.

[PRASADV1 Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close PRASADV1]

conversion Fees to convert multiple fixed BG weeks

Judy,
You wrote
For example, people who own fixed weeks (which were sold prior to the Bluegreen point system) are generally able to convert their ownership to BG Points by buying a small package of BG Points -- 3000 points at $4600 was the most recent figure that I heard.
I want to know If I own three fixed weeks at the same resort ,
Will BG convert all three fixed weeks into points by buying a small package of
BG points or shall I have to buy a package for each week?
Prasad