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Letters went to over 2800 Bluegreen employees today
Sales and Marketing centers around the country will be closing soon
FYI
Sales and Marketing centers around the country will be closing soon
FYI
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I thought the 800 employees that were announced last month was the extent of it. It seems like the reports coming out from all over the country suggest that the cuts have been far deeper than the initial rumour mill indicated.
I have seen many reports from all over the country like this one. It seems like this particular announcement is related to sales and marketing. I heard a ton of people in the marketing division in Indianapolis were hit as well.
Resort Title lost about 1/2 of its people working on transfers. I hope this doesn't significantly slow down the closing interval. We shall see. -
All segments of timeshare operations are hurting. Sales are being pummeled with losses but even operations are getting clobbered. RCI is hurting, management only organizations are tightening their belts but developers that depend on sales are taking the biggest hit. The gravy train has screeched to a halt - it will be interesting to see who can remake themselves and survive. I'll bet some will fail and be bought up cheap by the survivors. The big 4 or 5 are probably safe but after that....Comment
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In this economic,. big one probably is more dangerous than small one, since they level more.
Jya-NingJya-NingComment
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The biggest issue is the availability of credit to finance timeshare purchases. Ironically, the credit crunch may be creating rules of qualification that prevent consumers from making bad purchase decisions.
Hopefully, this will result in reform of the sales and marketing approaches of timeshare developers. They need to find a way to market their product with only 10-20% sales and marketing cost of sales. If they did that and could fund the companies business activities with sufficient sales, then the timeshare industry would improve dramatically.Comment
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What ones are the 4 or 5 big ones you are referring to?Originally posted by timeos2Comment
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In no order Marriott (hotel revenue can carry them over), Wyndham/Worldmark (ditto), Hilton, Sheraton. See the link? Big income from non-timeshare sources to fall back on. DVC (despite lower park revenue they have the cash) then it gets murky. Diamond? Big, but can they live on low sales and high annual fees? What do they owe to lenders? Westgate? 80% sales base drying up- can they survive the credit crunch? OLCC? Family money keep them afloat or a sell out to the Holiday Inn group as already partially planned? As the names get smaller the risk goes up if they depend on timeshare revenue alone and low name recognition in the market. It will be interesting to watch but I'm betting on consolation and maybe a few failures.Originally posted by swirg53 View PostComment
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Thank you for your educated reply! What is OLCC?Originally posted by timeos2 View Post
Do you think DRI will be back scouting out Bluegreen again? or do you have any hunch who else might be interested in Bluegreen? Dave Siegel and is it Westgate?
The word "failures" caught my eye. Do you think Bluegreen would be more apt to fall into consolidation or failure? If it were to become a failure, what would happen to the owners of the Vacation Club? What about owners of UDIs?
I thought I was going to be all set into retirement with the timeshare; never thought of this problem; of course, we are losing our shirts in our financial investments as well. Pretty scary and I'm pretty concerned on both ends but also hold to being a Christian and the Lord will provide for us and take care of us all the way around. AND that in any ten year period in history, there has not been one where the stock market didn't gain. There is ALWAYS hope!Comment
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Fortunately failure of a timeshare developer normally doesn't translate to failure of the timeshare resort(s) themselves. Since most are based on a deeded/RTU type ownership and recurring fees the resorts themselves can survive if they have reached critical ownership mass. They may not be maintained as well or have all the features promised but they most likely can cut back and remain open. The Club systems - especially those with high overhead trust type operations where the buyers don't own specific resorts but a part of multiple resorts - may be more at risk. The ability to default out as a money saving move with little consequence that they wanted to enjoy when times where good and the developer/operator could resell the use make them more vulnerable when times go bad. Owners looking to save can just stop paying. The model requires high management fees as well as the underlying true cost of resort operations. If too many members simply opt out and sales dry up they could face serious problems and no one feels like a true owner in the system to bail them out.Originally posted by swirg53 View Post
There have been very few outright failures/closures of timeshare resorts and it isn't likely there will be many now. The risk really lies with the developer/operators and if one fails another or an independent management firm is most likely to step in at the resort level. If a club fails the resorts may simply operate as independents. You are most likely safe with your vacation holding(s).Comment
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OLCC is Orange Lake Country Club, I believe it is one of the biggest private owned timeshare (Hilton is also private owned)Originally posted by swirg53 View Post
BlueGreen is one of the biggest public trading TS company. The other business is unfortuantely commuity developer, which does not help them that much.
But I believe Marriott / Hilton's occupancy rate is now below 60%, which means that branch is lossing money every day it is operating. Although you can estimate it will loss say few million here or there in a month, it is better than guess the loss of TS loans, which can not be estimate at this moment.
At this moment, I think Westgate is trying very hard to survive. But I also don't believe a lot of TS will failed in next 2 or 3 months. And after that, who knows who can get credit to expand or to survive.
The 10 year things can not be true. Up to last year, the stock market is not yet be able to break 2000's value. Now, all the index are lossing about 40% to 60%, and it is 2008, so it is not going to happen.
But American is still the only super power in this time frame, and other countries will take at least more than 10 years to be able to in any position to pass it, so you can still expect its market go back. Even when Britsh loss its super power status, its companies still perform good in the last centuary.
BG as a club should be much better situation, the cash flow is constant (unless majority of owner bankrucpt), unless the company has misused your reservation funds, or use the club's hold to back up some loans, it will not be a big issue. And I believe some owners is on the board, although I am not BG owner, so could be wrong on that. The question is always that if the company bankrupt, it will not doing any expansion on the resorts. So you may feel the staturate on reservations (i.e, you will not see bonus time). It would not happen or matter when the economic still in a bad state like we have now.
It will only happen when the economic come back, but the developer is still in bankrupcy.
Jya-NingJya-NingComment
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May be at more risk? Do you just make this stuff up? I know you don't like Vacation Club trusts, but you should really learn more about how they actually operate before you make judgements about them.Originally posted by timeos2
In the case of Bluegreen, which is the subject of this thread, the entire vacation club operation is funded by the $129 annual dues. With about 200,000 owners, that is a budget of $25M to run the reservation system, call centers, owner services, billing operation and G&A. And, that includes the management fee. If Bluegreen went belly up, it would NOT be hard take over that operation and manage the Club operations for a profit.
As long as the $129 fee is being paid by owners, there is sufficient liquidity to keep the operation running since they are paid in advance of the use year. The delinquency rate for annual dues is about the same as the delinquency rate for maintenance fees. So, the risk is about the same.
The layoffs for Bluegreen are in the areas they said they were going to change for the 2009 fiscal year. Lower planned sales and dramatically lower inventory acquisition. So, that means the sales and marketing teams are being dramatically scaled back. It also means that construction teams are being disbanded. And, with lower sales, you have a smaller support staff required. These actions that we are reading about are mostly about the anticipated slow down of sales due to the lack of available financing.
I do agree that there will be consolidation in the industry. Bluegreen has obviously positioned itself for such a suitor. But, I think it will happen first with resort developers who have the worst balance sheets.Comment
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I'm not picking on Bluegreen - although this is a thread about them - but stating that the emotional tie to the ownership tends to be less with the trust type ownership than a single resort. I fully agree that the real issue is on the sales side - the operations are far less likely to suffer any type of shutdown as they tend to be self supporting rather than having dependence on new sales.Originally posted by BocaBum99
I do think Bluegreen wants to be absorbed by someone but with the credit crunch that may not be possible. I'm pretty sure it won't be Wastegate! If I were a member in the trust I wouldn't be overly concerned either way for the reasons you point out.Comment
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I think it depends on the ownership type. In WorldMark, owners there identify themselves with WorldMark, not with an individual resort. Nobody owns a specific resort. They just own credits.Originally posted by timeos2 View Post
Also, I think that WorldMark is in a very good position for weathering the economic storm. Not so sure that Wyndham is, but WorldMark the Club should be fine. I'm sure if Wyndham went belly up that the wmowners group would find a way to take it over and probably run it better than it is running now.Comment
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Originally posted by Jya-Ning
What I don't understand is that you are not a Bluegreen Owner but you are always posting on this forum, and I have a hard time ever understanding what you are saying in your comments.
What timeshare do you own?Comment
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TUG member
I have been a member for a while now, and I have learned plenty. I do believe that once you are a member youcan use any feature that is available. I don't own Blue Green, yet. If I want to comment on something I have to have approval. If I feel strongly about a given situation or event I should hope that it would not scoffed at just because I don't or use a particular timeshares or company.
We all have opinions and sometimes we can become a pain or irritant to others on the site, I'm sure that Time Eos2 is trying release some unfulfilled timeshare aggrivation he has encountered.
I can understand people frustrations when new people populate a site with limited knowledge, but have seen over two hundreds time on TS4MS we're here to learn and help one another.
As far as B& G goes I hope they recover enough to present a continued good product. Thanks to Boca, for all the great info on blue green.
Dave
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