Is this good or bad for me???

[baumer64 Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close baumer64]

Hello all. My wife and I bought 4000 points at Desert Canyon with the Great Links Resorts. Purchase price was $2 per point. Our anniversary date is Jan. 2010. With our purchase, we received an additional 4000 points to use for the first year. We plan on banking the combined 8000 points with Interval and using the upcoming year's 4000 points (total of 12000) for a trip to Disneyland or World. The real selling point of Great Links for us was the Bonus Time resort usage. We were told that we could call up to 2 weeks in advance and stay at any Great Links Resort for very low rates if a room is available. (2 bedroom 2 nights for $60) The fee was a maid fee and varied depending on room size but was in incriments of 2 days. Also the yearly maintenance fee for Desert Canyon was fairly low at around $170 per year for my 4000 points. Well we're now one year in and all but one attempt at using bonus time has been unavailable. And now I'm notified that Vacation Internationale has merged (bought out) Great Links Resorts. Now for every 69 Great Links points, I have 1 VI point. This converts my 4000 to 57.97 owned VI points. I'm just beginning my research on VI but from what I've been reading, my maintenance will now be $7.03 per point which will cost me $407.52 per year which is more than double what I first signed on for.
Since I'm new to all of this, can some of you give me your assessment of whether I'm getting a good, bad or absolutely horrible deal?
Thanks for any help or advice you can give me!

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

Tell me about it.

My fiance and I bought into this same timeshare and we only had 2000 points! Any info anyone has would be most helpful!

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

Hello all. My wife and I bought 4000 points at Desert Canyon with the Great Links Resorts. Purchase price was $2 per point. Our anniversary date is Jan. 2010. With our purchase, we received an additional 4000 points to use for the first year. We plan on banking the combined 8000 points with Interval and using the upcoming year's 4000 points (total of 12000) for a trip to Disneyland or World. The real selling point of Great Links for us was the Bonus Time resort usage. We were told that we could call up to 2 weeks in advance and stay at any Great Links Resort for very low rates if a room is available. (2 bedroom 2 nights for $60) The fee was a maid fee and varied depending on room size but was in incriments of 2 days. Also the yearly maintenance fee for Desert Canyon was fairly low at around $170 per year for my 4000 points. Well we're now one year in and all but one attempt at using bonus time has been unavailable. And now I'm notified that Vacation Internationale has merged (bought out) Great Links Resorts. Now for every 69 Great Links points, I have 1 VI point. This converts my 4000 to 57.97 owned VI points. I'm just beginning my research on VI but from what I've been reading, my maintenance will now be $7.03 per point which will cost me $407.52 per year which is more than double what I first signed on for.
Since I'm new to all of this, can some of you give me your assessment of whether I'm getting a good, bad or absolutely horrible deal?
Thanks for any help or advice you can give me!

Welcome. There's not been any discussion of this here at TS4Ms as there aren't too many VI owners active on the boards and no other Great Links owners prior to you guys. VI owners have not been apprised of this move!

Dear Great Links Owners:

We have put off sending this update as we were hoping to have more of a timeline available for you for the upcoming merger with Vacation Internationale. These things take time and we ask for your patience as Vacation Internationale is in the process of loading all the Great Links Owners and Homestead Inventory into their system.

Here is what we do know:
(For the MOTION TO MERGE Great Links Resorts with Vacation Internationale)
The final count after auditing each and every ballot and ownership was:

In FAVOR of the Merger 2,278,691
OPPOSED to the Merger 429,475

The motion required a 2/3 majority vote in favor of the merger or 1,805,444 votes. The motion passed with 82% of the vote.

At least for the next week or so we will continue taking phone calls at the Great Links Corporate office in Lynden. You may continue to make Bonus Time Reservations at Desert Canyon , Dungeness, Homestead and The Windjammer. You may also continue to make Points Reservations at Homestead for up to 2 years in advance and at Desert Canyon for up to 1 year in advance.

Vacation Internationale (VI) will begin contacting the Great Links Owners in the next few weeks. They will begin with those Owners that have a December or January Anniversary Date. This process will take time so again we ask for your patience.

PLEASE NOTE!!! If you have any upcoming POINTS reservations that you have made to simply “hold your points” and keep them from expiring you NEED TO CALL Great Links ASAP. VI will honor any existing future reservations but no changes or cancellations will be honored if you need to change dates or resorts you will simply lose your points and your pre-paid housekeeping fee. Again, if you have made a points reservation for the future with the intention of changing it at a later date you MUST call Great Links ASAP. We will try and help you determine if you should change your dates and book at a Great Links Resort for a time that works for you or if you should put weeks into Interval or go over other options.

We will continue to update you via email as we know anything more.

NEW SATURDAY HOURS!!!
Beginning next Saturday, December 12 we will be closing the office at NOON on Saturday’s.

Office Hours will be
8:30 – 5:30 Monday through Friday
9:30 – Noon on Saturday’s
We will remain closed on Sunday’s

Marissa Postma
Director of Owner Services
P. 800-640-3370 F. 360-318-8031
Email: marissa@greatlinksresorts.com

Homestead Northwest Family of Resorts and Amenities
www.greatlinksresorts.com
www.homesteadnw.com
www.homesteadfarmsgolf.com
www.cjsbeachhouse.com
www.birchbaywaterslides.net

Above is an update sent to Great Links owners.

I think you will like VI, but it is not cheap in the MF department as you have indicated. Your MFs may have been held artificially low by your developer to stimulate sales while VI has been around for ages (in timeshare years) and their MFs mus support the actual ongoing costs.

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

The real selling point of Great Links for us was the Bonus Time resort usage. We were told that we could call up to 2 weeks in advance and stay at any Great Links Resort for very low rates if a room is available. (2 bedroom 2 nights for $60) The fee was a maid fee and varied depending on room size but was in incriments of 2 days. Also the yearly maintenance fee for Desert Canyon was fairly low at around $170 per year for my 4000 points. Well we're now one year in and all but one attempt at using bonus time has been unavailable.

BONUS TIME is one of those things where you have to be extremely flexible, extremely lucky, or willing to go when no one else wants to. In any points system, if there is lots of bonus time or lots of 1/2 price points time, then the system did not do the right job in valuing there points in the first place.

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

(For the MOTION TO MERGE Great Links Resorts with Vacation Internationale)
The final count after auditing each and every ballot and ownership was:

In FAVOR of the Merger 2,278,691
OPPOSED to the Merger 429,475

The motion required a 2/3 majority vote in favor of the merger or 1,805,444 votes. The motion passed with 82% of the vote.

My guess is that there is a lot of unsold Great Links inventory and the developer 'carried' this with their votes.

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

Now for every 69 Great Links points, I have 1 VI point. This converts my 4000 to 57.97 owned VI points. I'm just beginning my research on VI but from what I've been reading, my maintenance will now be $7.03 per point which will cost me $407.52 per year which is more than double what I first signed on for.

My fiance and I bought into this same timeshare and we only had 2000 points! Any info anyone has would be most helpful!

Unfortunately, owners of relative small numbers of points may have to buy more as a Studio generally costs an average of 70 VI points, a 1BR about 91. The good news is that you've found us for advice and that VI does not penalize those who buy on the resale market!

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

So what if those of us with small points packages don't want to or can't afford to buy more points through VI? Is there some way for us to opt out of this merger and give up our timeshare points - ours are not paid off yet we are still making monthly payments. Our main reason for buying into this timeshare was for the golf benefits at such an inexpensive price. Or are we going to have to try to sell our points on our own? I really wish we could be more informed on this.

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

So what if those of us with small points packages don't want to or can't afford to buy more points through VI? Is there some way for us to opt out of this merger and give up our timeshare points - ours are not paid off yet we are still making monthly payments. Our main reason for buying into this timeshare was for the golf benefits at such an inexpensive price. Or are we going to have to try to sell our points on our own? I really wish we could be more informed on this.

I'm not a professional in the timeshare industry and I don't pretend to be one. All I know about your situation is in this thread, if you have a contract that spells out golf benefits, then you should have golf benefits; if golf benefits were just an oh by the way, then you may not. If your timeshare group voted this thing in, then it's in, you do not necessarily get to opt out. I don't know what 2000 points used to get you at Great Links resorts but at VI resorts 35 of their points annually gets you a week in a Studio every other year.

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

Great Links Owners ripped off

The VI transfer is definitely NOT a good deal for Great Links Owners. We too bought in to Great Links mainly for the bonus time, so we could have weekend getaways at driveable golf courses. We never intended to purchase points in a system like VI where you go off on a trip to Hawaii once every two years or so.

The reason VI is not a good deal is that you can have the same kind of vacation without joining a time share. You don't have to pay $800 plus per year and thousands of dollars up front to have a quality vaction! There are many beautiful resorts that don't require membership.

Great Links offered us bonus time that we could drive to, so it was very a good deal, and inexpensive. Now we are getting a few worthless points in VI instead of what we signed up for. I have no intention of purchasing more points in VI and will get rid of the points I've been given ASAP.

The developer of Desert Canyon is keeping the property. It is not part of the VI trade. Nor is Dungeness or Moses Point. This whole transaction is a complete ripp-off, and I'm wondering if it's even legal. The vote was rushed through two days before Thanksgiving when they knew people would not be available to attend. I'm angry and feel cheated, as should all Great Links owners. I think we should take legal action.

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

I would love to know if you find out anything more on this VI thing and if it was a legal transaction. I have tried to contact both the regular Lynden number and the toll free number and the e-mail addresses I have and none of them are working anymore, I just get busy tones on the phone lines and the adresses are undeliverable. If anything we are going to try to sell our points as quickly as possible.

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

Great Links

What I do know is that the developer of Great Links is also a lawyer. Evidently he felt that it was legal to collect our money, start building a mini-empire, then take it all back and tell us that we now have a few piddly points in some other system (VI).
I have not been contacted by VI to authenticate this point exchange. I tried calling VI just before Thanksgiving and no one there knew anything about it. Great Links had not given us any contact information for VI. Sounds like a scam to me.
Of course, Thanksgiving/Christmas/New Years is the worst possible time for Great Links owners to try go figure this all out because everyone is so busy with holiday stuff. I'd bet that there are some Great Links owners who don't even know about the transaction yet. I'm sure they planned it this way.
After New Years, I hope to set up a website where Great Links owners can contact eachother with information and perhaps a plan of action.
My email address is Please use PM

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

After New Years, I hope to set up a website where Great Links owners can contact eachother with information and perhaps a plan of action.
My email address is please use PM.

You can certainly do that or just direct everyone here. When this thread was started, I called around, got the copy of the Great Links email and sent it to my contact at VI, she knew about Great Links but had never heard any conclusions or specifics.

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

copy of email?

You said you called around and got a copy of the Great Links email. When I tried to get a copy of the Great Links owners email list, the staff would not give it to me. How did you manage to get it and will you share it with us Great Links former owners? Or tell us where to get it?

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

Today's article in the Lynded Tribune

Here's the article published today:

Homestead's Great Links nears sale

Submitted by the Tribune on December 30, 2009 - 8:25am. Business
Tim Newcomb
Tribune assistant editor

  LYNDEN — Homestead Northwest’s Great Links Resorts is in the process of being sold to Bellevue-based Vacation Internationale, according to timeshare shareholders and Vacation Internationale.
  A spokesperson for the points-based timeshare company said, “The deal is not complete at this point. It is still in the works.”
  Shareholders of Great Links resort had to approve the sale during a meeting in late 2009, but were told that if they didn't, the company would go under, according to shareholder Blaine Bailey of Abbotsford, B.C. Shareholders were left with no choice on the matter.
  Also, the Homestead Farms Golf Resort, which was being listed for sale by Snapper Shuler Kenner Real Estate, now has a sale pending, according to agent Julie Shumate. However, the prospective buyer told the Tribune that the deal is still far from being solid.
  Homestead’s financial woes surfaced in April of this year. Since then, Homestead owner Jim Wynstra has put all the holdings of the Lynden company up for sale, including development property across the state (some of which has reportedly been sold). Local properties include Homestead Farms Golf Resort, the Birch Bay Waterslides, Homestead’s Farmhouse Hotel and Great Links.
  Great Links is a vacation timeshare company that owns resorts in Lynden at Homestead Farms, on the Olympic Peninsula, at Desert Canyon east of the mountains near Orondo, and at Moses Lake. However, shareholders in Great Links have access to other companies vacation properties through joint agreements.
  Vacation Internationale has 33 properties, with six in the Northwest, nine in the Southwest, 10 in Hawaii, five on the East Coast, one in Whistler, B.C., and two in Mexico.
  Bailey said that the Great Links board was ill prepared to answer shareholder questions and brought a "trust me" attitude to the standing-room-only crowd in Lynden.
  Bailey said it wasn't made clear why Great Links would go bankrupt without the deal, other than that Great Links was no longer able to pay for maintenance on its properties.
  A completely new structure on allocating time for properties accompanies the sale, but those details haven't been given to shareholders, Bailey said. Also, the annual $350 maintenance fee has been doubled to $700, without explanation.
  On the plus side, Bailey expects a bit better selection on member properties and the same exchange program.
  Homestead’s waterslide and hotel remain for sale.

My comments:

We were told that The Desert Canyon, Moses Point and Dungeness properties would "go back" to the developer, and would not be transfered to VI. These properties are the reasons I joined Great Links. So the above article is either misleading or they have information we owners don't have.

When I asked the staff at Great Links Resorts (when they still answered thier phones) how property that was Deeded to the GLR owners could just "go back" to the developer, I was told, "They can do whatever they want with the property".

Since the OWNERS had legal rights to the properties, and since there was a fake "vote" just berfore Thanksgiving as to how to proceed with the properties, I'm guessing that the whole VI thing will be deemed illegal.

The vote in November was fake because it was held without much notice and we were not given any information about the financial situation of OUR properties. Nor did they hold discussions about alternative options.

[aliikai2 Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close aliikai2]

Now it makes sense

Homestead was one of the largest new home builders in the northwest for the last 10-15 years, and with the total collapse of the New Home Market, they failed like many over extended businesses.
As to how your points were owned, did you receive a deed?
Most don't, simply a right to use x amount of points per year for x amount of money.
I wish there was something you could do, but to be honest, you bought something because it had some bonus golf time, and the company that sold it is defunct so whoever picks up the pieces will be the ones in charge of what you will receive.
fwiw,

Greg