Dear Greensprings Owner

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

From: MemberInfo@diamondresorts.com
To: spence@ts4ms.com
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 7:59:39 PM
Subject: 2008 Reservations Reminder

Dear Greensprings Owner,
We look forward to welcoming you to your home resort during your owner's week. Please remember:

• There is a $100 refundable credit card deposit required at registration.
• Pets are not allowed on the resort, however, seeing-eye dogs and other similarly trained animal companions are permitted.
• You are responsible for all incidental charges.
• 2008 is a leap year, so check-in dates may vary for fixed-week owners. Verify your arrival date via e-mail at Irene.Lopez@diamondresorts.com or call 757-253-1177 to speak with a Front Desk Agent.

If you have delinquent maintenance fees, or have space-banked your unit/week, your reservations have been cancelled.

Travel Safely!

Other than canceled being spelled wrong, anyone see a problem with this email I just received?

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

Dear Irene

Other than canceled being spelled wrong, anyone see a problem with this email I just received?

Irene,
Leap Year has nothing to do with varying check-in dates for fixed week owners. Check in dates 'vary' and people get confused when the FIRST of JANUARY is a Saturday or a Sunday.

When 1Jan is a Friday everyone's happy
Week 1 Friday weeks start 1Jan
Week 1 Saturday weeks start 2Jan
Week 1 Sunday weeks start 3Jan

When 1Jan is a Saturday
Week 1 Saturday weeks start 1Jan
Week 1 Sunday weeks start 2Jan
but Week 1 Friday weeks start 7Jan

When 1Jan is a Sunday
Week 1 Sunday weeks start 1Jan
but Week 1 Friday weeks start 6Jan
and Week 1 Saturday weeks start 7Jan

This year 1Jan was a Tuesday
so Week 1 Friday weeks started 4Jan
Week 1 Saturday weeks started 5Jan
Week 1 Sunday weeks started 6Jan

No one should get confused by 2008 except people who try to figure out what the people at MemberInfo@diamondresorts.com meant when they said "2008 is a leap year, so check-in dates may vary for fixed-week owners."

The same people at MemberInfo@diamondresorts.com may think that the occurrence of Week 53 correlates to Leap Year. It does not.

It's 2008, a leap year, and there's no Week 53 on the calendar. Week 53 happens when one of the start days (Fr/Sa/Su) occurs on the FIRST of January thus since 52x7=364 and there are 365 days in a normal year there will be 53 occurrences of whatever day of the week happened on 1Jan.

In Leap Year 2008 there are 366 days so there are 53 Tuesdays and 53 Wednesdays, this doesn't make the timeshare weekly calendar 'vary.'

Happy New Year!

A Greensprings Owner
Founding Member Club Sunterra, now THE Club

Of course, chances of there being a Week 53 are greater in a Leap Year because there are two days of the week that happen 53 times.... 2008 is not one of those leap years with a Week 53.

[sb1070 Member Find all posts View Profile Close sb1070]

I received this email and deleted it..... My fixed weeks at Greensprings are in club now


Scott

[Ryne08 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Ryne08]

Spence, who is the new manager at Greensprings ???

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

Spence, who is the new manager at Greensprings ???

Don't know, have they hired one yet? Still listed:

Job #: 1109
Position: RESORT MANAGER
Location: VA, GREENSPRINGS
Department: OPERATIONS

Responsibilities:
OVERSEES THE DAY-TO-DAY OPERATIONS OF THE RESORT, ACTS AS A LIAISON BETWEEN THE MANAGEMENT COMPANY/ CORPORATION AND THE HOME OWNERS ASSOCIATION AND FOSTERS AN EXCELLENT RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE TWO PARTIES. MAINTAINS AND UPHOLDS THE CORE VALUES OF THE CORPORATION, SETTING THE EXAMPLE FOR THE RESORT STAFF. WORKS CLOSELY WITH SALES/DEVELOPER.

Qualifications:
HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA OR GEDBA DEGREE IN ANY DISCIPLINE, FROM A COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY PREFERRED 5, 7-10 RELATED EXPERIENCE AND/OR TRAINING OR EQUIVALENT COMBINATION OF EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE RESPONSIBLE FOR MAINTAINING THE RESORT BUDGET AS APPROVED BY THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS EXCELLENT WRITTEN/VERBAL COMMUNICATION SKILLS BILINGUAL SPANISH PREFERRED PROFICIENT KNOWLEDGE OF MS PRODUCTS (WORD, EXCEL) MUST HAVE A WORKING KNOWLEDGE OF THE TIME SHARE INDUSTRY

[dougp26364 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dougp26364]

I received this email and deleted it..... My fixed weeks at Greensprings are in club now


Scott

I have a fixed week at Polo Towers that is in the club. I noticed my points for that week did not show up so I made a phone call. I was told that my fixed week was automatically reserved for me until I called to release that week (was not going to use it). Once I did that the points for that week were deposited into my account.

Do not assume that just because your week is in THE Club that DRI did not automatically reserve that week for you to use. I know that was my assumption and they proved me wrong.

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

Polo Towers usage in THE Club - Polo owners need to know this

I have a fixed week at Polo Towers that is in the club. I noticed my points for that week did not show up so I made a phone call. I was told that my fixed week was automatically reserved for me until I called to release that week (was not going to use it). Once I did that the points for that week were deposited into my account.

Do not assume that just because your week is in THE Club that DRI did not automatically reserve that week for you to use. I know that was my assumption and they proved me wrong.

Good info to know, but this is the first recorded instance, I think it relates to Polo only and relates back to their fixed/float policies from original regime.

[dougp26364 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dougp26364]

Good info to know, but this is the first recorded instance, I think it relates to Polo only and relates back to their fixed/float policies from original regime.

It sort of surprised me. I had just assumed that when I joined THE Club, I gave up my fixed week in my fixed unit. At Polo Towers you actually owned the week and unit, not just the week. By contract if you elected to stay on your alloted week and time you were supposed to be assigned the same unit every year.

In the beggining, they didn't do things that way. If you wanted your exact unit you had to request to be placed in the unit on your contract. For that matter in the beggining you didn't even have to stay on the week you purchased but could "float" your week any time you wanted. The salesman even told us when we purchased our first week that we could reserve any week available.

As time went on and the resort was getting close to selling out, this changed and they started enforcing the contract as it was written. For us this was a dissapointment as we had become accustomed to floating our week. From that point forward we started exchanging our fixed week as the week we owned no longer worked for us.

Part of the attraction of joining the club was to get that floating week back. Once MGM's new project is completed across the street staying in tower 1 at Polo Towers might be an attractive option for us again. I just don't want to be in Vegas the first part of September, which is our fixed week. We prefer to be there a few weeks later in October when it's cooled down a little bit.

[richardr Member Find all posts View Profile Close richardr]

Polo towers Fixed -Floating weeks

Some of the recent E-Bay Polo Towers listings are for floating weeks. Are those representations incorrect?

[dougp26364 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dougp26364]

Some of the recent E-Bay Polo Towers listings are for floating weeks. Are those representations incorrect?

If it's for the Suites at Polo Towers, it's deceptive but not a complete lie. You can float you week within a 59 day period of your arrival date based on availability. Most people say this isn't a hard thing to do but I've never attempted it. We live to far and Vegas flights sell out to fast for me to risk that a unit would be available on short notice. They are not true floating weeks and I feel sorry for anyone that buys them thinking they can float there week as easily as most resorts like HGVC or Marriott.

The Villa's at Polo Towers are all floating weeks.

[richardr Member Find all posts View Profile Close richardr]

Polo towers -Floating -Fixed weeks

Doug : Thanks for the information . We have in escrow from an E-Bay purchase a one bedroom week 19 in the Villas which was listed as floating & which we hope to use in November.

With that one bedroom & a couple of E-Bay Florida Trust points contract purchases we should have enough to take us from silver to platinum. It will be interesting to see what they now want to convert/join THE Club for the combination of the Polo Towers week & the Florida Trust points contracts .

It would seem to me that DRI is getting a further windfall on the increased mf's on the higher point value the weeks have once they become points in The Club[$595 for the one bedroom week at the Villas as compared with the fees on 10500 points in The Club].

[dougp26364 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dougp26364]

Doug : Thanks for the information . We have in escrow from an E-Bay purchase a one bedroom week 19 in the Villas which was listed as floating & which we hope to use in November.

With that one bedroom & a couple of E-Bay Florida Trust points contract purchases we should have enough to take us from silver to platinum. It will be interesting to see what they now want to convert/join THE Club for the combination of the Polo Towers week & the Florida Trust points contracts .

It would seem to me that DRI is getting a further windfall on the increased mf's on the higher point value the weeks have once they become points in The Club[$595 for the one bedroom week at the Villas as compared with the fees on 10500 points in The Club].

As it stood when I converted my weeks to THE Club, you still pay your MF's to the HOA/BOD at Polo Towers just like I've always done. I also pay an annual THE Club membership fee.

I have seen on these forums that Polo Towers is suppose to be part of the trust now as well. I believe trust MF's are based on the number of trust points and that is the overall cost of all the trust resorts divided by the number of trust points that are owned by all members. From what I've seen the MF's of belonging to the trust would be considerably more than what I presently pay for MF's at Polo Towers. Therefore, I have no interest in putting my weeks into the trust if they ever offer me that option.

We converted our weeks into THE Club, I think, last September. We were charged $2,995 to convert both Polo Towers weeks we own. I am uncertain of what they will offer you in way of price to convert all of the resale units you might own to THE Club. The latest I've read is that they require resale owners to make a small purchase of points from the developer at developer pricing. If memory serves me correctly this has been in the neighborhood of $5,000.

Spence will likely have more detailed and accurate information on what DRI is charging and allowing for resale buyers to convert their units into THE Club membership. DRI seems to be getting considerably tighter than what Sunterra was in the past about allowing resale owners to transfer multiple units into THE Club for one price.

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

It is still a moving target as far as what price/deal you can get, there is no 'better' or more detailed information than can be surmised from reading the sticky on conversions.

Just because a resort is in the Trust doesn't mean it has Trust maintenance fees or that you'll be paying them. As has been covered before, when you convert you may keep your deed and sign an Assignment Agreement to give your use to THE Club or you may give up your deed and receive a points contract from the Trust. The fact that Polo is now being included in the Trust makes the second option available.

[richardr Member Find all posts View Profile Close richardr]

Polo Towers -the Trust

I noticed that in first sentence of the 3rd paragraph of the Nov 07 Press Release in the Thread DEAR CLUB MEMBER THE POLO TOWERS RESORTS? are called THE NEWEST AFFILATES TO THE CLUB.I thought AFFILATES are Non -Trust Resorts?

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

I noticed that in first sentence of the 3rd paragraph of the Nov 07 Press Release in the Thread DEAR CLUB MEMBER THE POLO TOWERS RESORTS? are called THE NEWEST AFFILATES TO THE CLUB.I thought AFFILATES are Non -Trust Resorts?

While an 'affiliate' is usually a non-DRI managed resort, the term 'affiliated' does not obviate the resort being included in the Trust (now called Diamond Resorts U.S. Collection).