"I believe Marriott will aggressively acquire weeks into Points Trust" by Bocabum

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

I believe Marriott will aggressively acquire weeks into Points Trust - Timeshare Users Group Online Community Forums

Very informative info/opinion from a TS points expert....lots of food for thought.....

I have posted a link but will also quote a few posts....follow link for the full discussion.

The more I think about this Marriott point system, the more I conclude that the early actions of Marriott with respect to resale weeks owners is simply to get the program started. What I mean by that is on day one, there is no inventory available outside of what is in the current trust, but Marriott will be selling as if it has availability everywhere. At first, I thought they created a clever way to claw back weeks from II and to trick owners into giving control of weeks to Marriott by signing up. However, after thinking about it some more, I don't think those actions alone are going to work to make the Marriott Vacation Club Points system successful over time.

Points systems are successful when the inventory is predictable and owners can easily learn when to try to get reservations they want for peak season. So, those points systems where there is lots of inventory that gets deposited in advance provides that attribute. Disney has it because all resort units are in the system. Same with WorldMark. Bluegreen has it for resorts that started off completely as points resorts. So will Marriott with those resorts they initially put into the system.

So, to get critical mass of inventory at any current resorts outside of the Trust, they will have to acquire inventory into the Trust or they will never have critical mass. An exchange relationship just doesn't do it.

So, given that, I will predict that Marriott will indeed NOT allow new exchange relationships to enroll, rather they will acquire units via ROFR and via equity trade ins into the program. In this way, they can acquire new inventory at the same time they are moving current points inventory.

The points program will only be as strong as the inventory in the Trust. This will occur only when the current inventory levels at Marriott are worked down sufficiently. But, when that happens, I expect Marriott to be buying. But, they will be buying weeks, not points.

Using this approach, they will back into becoming a point system at all of the current Marriott resorts. If this indeed does happen, then it will be good to own those resale weeks that Marriott needs. And, it means that the resale market for points will be weak for a long time.

In addition to the skim debacle that Marriott created with this program introduction, Marriott made a huge mistake with the maintenance fee program.

First, they should have subsidized it down to around $.25/point for the period of 5 years. After the 5 years, they would add several percentage points to the MF until it came out in balance.

Second, they should have included a base rate plus a low point value. Example. Instead of $.40/point, they should have done something like $500 + $.30/point. So, 5000 points would both have $2000 MF. But, 10000 points would have $3500 instead of $4000. An incentive for having more points than less.

If they did this, they could create a huge incentive for owners to convert into the system via equity trade ins with straight economics. And, there would be an incentive to add points later.

Instead, they introduce skim and immediately put their sales teams on the defensive justifying point skim. It's got to be one of the all time biggest mistakes in point program history.

If Marriott did the above, the smart Tuggers on this board would be all over the trick they are using and panning them for such a ruse. But, owners would be converting in masses.

For completeness, I think that Marriott should also create a bonus time / open season program for last minute availability 30-45 days prior to check in.
Make it either discounted points or great cash rate. Either one is fine.

It will make it easier to sell as some owners will chase that feature. They can actually make it available only to points trust owners and exclude exchange enrollees.

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

Thanks for posting these Pat. There is a lot of good insight on the Marriott program being discussed.

There are those who are vehemently opposed to it. Most just don't understand it and just need some advice on what they should do. Some are for it.

I sense the tide turning from total negativity to more acceptance that it's something that needs to be considered if they want to be a Marriott owner.

My biggest issue is that I don't know where inventory is and how it is likely to be managed. In other words, how good or bad is II going to be going forward? Time will tell.

So, given the unknown, and the cheap cost of enrolling, I am going to put one foot in both camps.

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

Just to clarify my own understanding: skim is only an issue for existing owners considering conversion, correct? New resale owners can't convert. New developer purchases can't buy "weeks".

If that's so, then I *don't* think other timeshare systems can use this as a competitive advantage in their own sales---the person considering a new acquisition can only buy points or unconverted weeks, and will have to judge them own their own merits.

Or am I missing something?

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

If a potential buyer is doing due diligence, and stumbles across blogs, forums, individuals, etc who are *current* Marriott owners and are going 'whoa!, WTF?', then they'll want to drill down deeper and gather more information to make an informed buying decision. OTOH, if 'Marriott timeshare problem' returned few results, and none related to points, the buyer *might* not investigate more thoroughly (which they should).

If I had come here (had TS4M's existed back then) and heard the 'buy resale', 'developer is a ripoff' story *before* I bought at NCV, I would have looked at things more thoroughly than I did. IMO, that's all we're doing now, and suggesting to potential enrollees/buyers; look thoroughly and make an informed decision. WRT points 'skim', it won't affect a pure points buyer directly, *but*, if sources of inventory beyond the trust owned property doesn't substantially appear because *current owners* don't like the skim and either don't enroll their weeks or, if they do enroll, don't convert to points, that dynamic *will* affect a pure points owner's vacation experience, whether they're aware of *why* or not.

Fun stuff

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

Just to clarify my own understanding: skim is only an issue for existing owners considering conversion, correct? New resale owners can't convert. New developer purchases can't buy "weeks".

If that's so, then I *don't* think other timeshare systems can use this as a competitive advantage in their own sales---the person considering a new acquisition can only buy points or unconverted weeks, and will have to judge them own their own merits.

Or am I missing something?

You are right about that. It's hard to figure that out by all the posts flying around. All someone sees is all the posts and threads related to Skim and they wonder if they are effected at all. No matter how you cut it, it's bad PR.