Worldmark/Fairfield Direct Exchange Resorts

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

The good news is that if we have a very active Bluegreen, WorldMark, Fairfield direct exchange board, then it will reduce most trades of other resorts to 2 degrees of separation vs. 5-10.

Here's how. The assume there is a market maker in the exchange. Someone who will exchange immediately for any Bluegreen, Fairfield, WorldMark resort to any other Bluegreen, Fairfield, WorldMark resort just via an exchange rate table.

Then, let's say that someone wants to trade from Hyatt Coconut Plantation, 2br, week 12, sat checkin to Marriott Ko'Olina, 2 br, week 6, Fri checkin.

In a normal exchange situation, it may take the exchange company 4 or 5 exchanges before an exchange chain is created. For simplicity, let's say that the Marriott owner wants an HGVC. The HGVC owner wants Disney. The Disney owner wants Four Seasons, the Four Seasons owner wants that Hyatt.

It would be a chain of 5 exchanges in order to complete the Hyatt to Marriott exchange. And, the Hyatt, Marriott, HGVC, Disney, and Four Seasons owners have to deposit or request.

Here is how a direct exchange system such as the one I am envisioning would reduce that direct exchange system to 2 degrees of separation.

The Hyatt owner puts in a request for a Marriott. The direct exchange org finds a Marriott owner and offers a direct exchange to ANY AVAILABLE Bluegreen, WorldMark or Fairfield resort. They make the exchange. Then, the direct exchange is made between the direct exchange and the Hyatt owner.

As long as the Direct Exchange org has access to all BG, FF and WM resorts and owners at various resorts are appealing enough, it's possible to create a full fledged exchange company. Now, all this is theoretical and it would take a lot of effort to get techology and operational processes set up so that this could be automated. And, it would require for people to go out and search for the required inventory. But, it certainly is theoretically possible.

[love2fly Member Find all posts View Profile Close love2fly]

Please help me understand

Boca

Assume someone opens an account at the worldmark/fairfield direct exchange (WFDX). He/She is an FF owner wanting to go to an HGVC resort. Assume their desired accomodation is available, and it costs X points in HGVC.

Is the goal of your market maker to say "Give me Y of your FF points and I'll make a guest HGVC reservation in your name"?

Now I know there will be many market makers for any combination of buy/sell between any 2 "currencies", where currency is $ or credits/points in any of the systems you support.

So my understanding is that WFDX will be like a currency kiosk at an international airport. "We buy and sell any point system". Is this correct?

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

Boca

Assume someone opens an account at the worldmark/fairfield direct exchange (WFDX). He/She is an FF owner wanting to go to an HGVC resort. Assume their desired accomodation is available, and it costs X points in HGVC.

Is the goal of your market maker to say "Give me Y of your FF points and I'll make a guest HGVC reservation in your name"?

Now I know there will be many market makers for any combination of buy/sell between any 2 "currencies", where currency is $ or credits/points in any of the systems you support.

So my understanding is that WFDX will be like a currency kiosk at an international airport. "We buy and sell any point system". Is this correct?

Close. Your idea is an extension of the same model I described. It would be cool to do. Maybe some day.

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

deleted by mshatty.

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

My thought about direct exchanges at least among the point systems was much more simplistic. I want a 2BR at Big Cedar or WM Vancouver. You want a 2BR at FF Las Vegas. I get the reservation and guest certificate ($25 with FF). You do the same with Bluegreen or WM. Viola, we're done.

The only paperwork I see that we have a simple agreement about not damaging the unit and agree to abide by all rules of the resort.

No money except the guest certificate.

My vision was that as long as I am fine with the resort you give me and vice versa, we are happy.

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

My thought about direct exchanges at least among the point systems was much more simplistic. I want a 2BR at Big Cedar or WM Vancouver. You want a 2BR at FF Las Vegas. I get the reservation and guest certificate ($25 with FF). You do the same with Bluegreen or WM. Viola, we're done.

The only paperwork I see that we have a simple agreement about not damaging the unit and agree to abide by all rules of the resort.

No money except the guest certificate.

My vision was that as long as I am fine with the resort you give me and vice versa, we are happy.

Yep. That was my original thought as well. Very easy and simple to do.

What some of us did is extend that model to other resorts as well.

Now that we've finished with the mental exercise of creating a new exchange company, I think we need to kill that idea and go back to the original simple direct exchange model.

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

The inventory for the 12 Fairfield resorts was loaded into WorldMark last week. They loaded through April 27, 2007.

WM owners have been told that going forward, a new week of inventory will be loaded for each of the 12 resorts every Friday. Today, after 4 pm PDT, the week of April 28 - May 4, 2007 was loaded into inventory.

We have not been given an explanation for the "one week every Friday" method.

Has WM inventory been loaded into Fairfield yet? How far out can FF owners book the WM inventory? How often are new weeks added?
Just curious.

Best regards,
Maria

[Mark @SFX Industry Representative Find all posts View Profile Close Mark @SFX]

Mike,

It just dawned on me that we could use this sight as a direct exchange vehicle between many different resort groups.

Fairfield owners could direct exchange with WorldMark owners and vice versa. Then, there is no artificial limit of inventory. What do you think?

Hi BocaBum99 - this is nothing new. SFX has been specializing in direct exchanges between resorts /mini-systems for the last 14 years, it's part of our business model which has been on the innovative cutting edge as part of a dynamic away from the conventional exchange component. A lot of this and more has been going on for many years without public exposure and behind the scenes.

Have a great weekend...

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

Hi BocaBum99 - this is nothing new. SFX has been specializing in direct exchanges between resorts /mini-systems for the last 14 years, it's part of our business model which has been on the innovative cutting edge as part of a dynamic away from the conventional exchange component. A lot of this and more has been going on for many years without public exposure and behind the scenes.

Have a great weekend...

Well, after going through the mental exercise of what it would take to do, I decided we couldn't do it because it couldn't be free which was the original intent.

[Jya-Ning Silver Contributor Find all posts View Profile Close Jya-Ning]

The inventory for the 12 Fairfield resorts was loaded into WorldMark last week. They loaded through April 27, 2007.

WM owners have been told that going forward, a new week of inventory will be loaded for each of the 12 resorts every Friday. Today, after 4 pm PDT, the week of April 28 - May 4, 2007 was loaded into inventory.

We have not been given an explanation for the "one week every Friday" method.

Has WM inventory been loaded into Fairfield yet? How far out can FF owners book the WM inventory? How often are new weeks added?
Just curious.

Best regards,
Maria

Yes, they get loaded into FF. I did check 2 to 3 resorts, Look like they loaded upto 4/22/07 check in date. I did not hear any annouce about how often they plan to load it, but if it is based on some equal situation, I will guess they load every week exact one week inventory just like WM will see FF's inventory.

Jya-Ning

[Debbyd57 Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Debbyd57]

We own both FF and WM and would definately be interested in trading some of our FF points for WM points. Debby