Wyndham Fairfield Fairshare question?

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

I'm a little confused, hoping someone can help.

I am looking at a few listings and trying to find a biennial unit and found one at Wyndham Palm Aire formerly called Fairways of Palm Aire by Fairfield.

My question is, are there two developers at this resort?

How does it work if you purchase Fairfield Fairshare Plus points?

Are they the same as Wyndham points or will I be stuck in another system?

The listing says that Fairfield is the resort management company.

I also see weeks listings for this resort so not sure what is up at this place?

What is up with this resort, anyone own there or know?

Thanks.

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

The FF points should be Wyndham points. Whoever wrote the ad didn't do their homework (seldom do). They have fixed weeks in the older buildings, points in the newer ones. Probably converted points as well. It is a nice resort, especially if you like golf. It is at least a 15 minute drive to the beach.
MF's are rather high at Palm Aire.

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

Fairfield is the old name. When they decided to build a point program, they form a trust call Fairfield, then they sold themselves to Cedant. Cedant decided it is too big to make stock attractive, and decided it need to split itself, so in hope its stock will look attractive. They believe Wyndham is a high class name, so they purchase the name right. Then they spilt itslf, and give Wyndham to its Hotel/RCI/Timeshare child. And Wyndham decides it is good to have all its children companies call Wyndham. So now Fairfield is renamed to Wyndham.

Wyndham has several TS developing child companies, they all has named as xxx something Wyndham. But Wyndham point generally is called for Fairfield point program.

Jya-Ning

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

Thanks Marge,

I'm just looking for a bienniel with maintenance fees around $40 a month so this seemed to be a good deal although I saw a nice one in Vegas with cheaper maintenance fees, but since I live in Miami I usually try to buy my timeshares near my home and don't want anymore in Orlando. (already have 2 in Orlando including my DVC).

Thought this one might be a good trader if I deposited it with RCI if I got a winter week. What do you think about this plan?

I don't plan to ever use the resort just have enough points to deposit high season weeks to trade for other things that I want or just use the points internally with Wyndham.

Is this a good resort to do this with?

I know it's not on the beach but it does have a golf course and I'm sure that golfer snowbirds would seek out places like this in winter, at least that is what I am assuming but of course I could be wrong. Any opinions from the snowbird crowd?

Thanks.

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

Fairfield is the old name. When they decided to build a point program, they form a trust call Fairfield, then they sold themselves to Cedant. Cedant decided it is too big to make stock attractive, and decided it need to split itself, so in hope its stock will look attractive. They believe Wyndham is a high class name, so they purchase the name right. Then they spilt itslf, and give Wyndham to its Hotel/RCI/Timeshare child. And Wyndham decides it is good to have all its children companies call Wyndham. So now Fairfield is renamed to Wyndham.

Wyndham has several TS developing child companies, they all has named as xxx something Wyndham. But Wyndham point generally is called for Fairfield point program.

Jya-Ning

So is there any danger of Wyndham selling off the Fairfield resorts and then leaving them out of the Wyndham umbrella? I don't want to buy something that they are not going to keep long term as I like the Wyndham resorts and want to buy something that I will not use myself but have access to internal use of the points for city stays. What do you think?

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

No. Club Wyndham Plus == Fairfield Fairshare Plus.

Wyndham points ownerships are mediocre traders in RCI---and you do not yet appreciate how a Wyndham ownership works with RCI. In particular, you don't deposit "your week" in Wyndham, so it doesn't matter what or where you own for the purposes of RCI trading.

You should read the External Exchange document and the Primer at forums.atozed.com before you go any farther in buying Wyndham.

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

No. Club Wyndham Plus == Fairfield Fairshare Plus.

Wyndham points ownerships are mediocre traders in RCI---and you do not yet appreciate how a Wyndham ownership works with RCI. In particular, you don't deposit "your week" in Wyndham, so it doesn't matter what or where you own for the purposes of RCI trading.

You should read the External Exchange document and the Primer at forums.atozed.com before you go any farther in buying Wyndham.

I was trying to understand the forums for Wyndham owners but it looks like if I understand correctly they let you reserve a unit with your points and then you deposit it with RCI. Am I understanding it correctly?

Or that you can give them 28,000 points for an equivalent to a studio deposit white week deposit?

I guess since I don't own yet I'm not understanding things since I can't see the website like they can.

My only points references are RCI and DVC and I don't think they work the same so maybe I am getting confused.

I know that RCI doesn't give great trades for Wyndhams and I'll probably end up doing more internal use than exchanging them like I do with DVC so I'm not too concerned with getting stuck with Wyndham use only but in case I can't use all my points I wanted to be able to give RCI 28,000 points and at least be able to "bank" so to speak what otherwise would expire with my Wyndham.

I don't want another yearly timeshare as I have too many and just want to have access to Wyndham so am looking for a biennial but it looks very confusing to pool and borrow with Wyndham. It seems easier with my RCI points account than with Wyndham.

I'll try reading the Wyndham stuff again on a to z and see if I can figure it out.

[Lisa P Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lisa P]

Thought this one might be a good trader if I deposited it with RCI if I got a winter week. What do you think about this plan?

I don't plan to ever use the resort just have enough points to deposit high season weeks to trade for other things that I want or just use the points internally with Wyndham.

Is this a good resort to do this with?

Chris, a few thoughts here. First, when comparing maint fees with other resorts, remember that most resorts include the taxes in your maint fees. However, most FL resorts (outside of DVC) do not and you will be billed for the taxes separately with this property. Verify the amount of the taxes and include it in your comparisons.

Next, if you buy a fixed or floating week, then you could deposit it with the exchange company to get the trade power associated with that week. But in my experience, exchanging into this resort is not that difficult, even for Easter break. It's quite large and not at the beach. So it may not be a power trader.

If you buy a contract that's in points (a converted week or UDI points - either is possible at this particular resort), then you cannot deposit a particular week with RCI. It would trade the same as points from any other Wyndham resort from a generic grid with averaged trade power. In other words, not a power trader - decent for most stuff but not even close to a tiger.

If you really want the points for basic RCI trading or internal Wyndham reservations, then as long as the maint fees and taxes are not too high, it would work fine. HTH.

I was trying to understand the forums for Wyndham owners but it looks like if I understand correctly they let you reserve a unit with your points and then you deposit it with RCI. Am I understanding it correctly?

No. You tell them the unit size and season that you'd like to deposit and you give up the amount of points that the exchange chart says that unit size/season is worth. This is identical to how DVC does it. Your generic deposit is not currently searchable online with RCI even though you will see it as available in your online RCI account - just can't select it to search against. You call RCI to make your search request at a designated Wyndham phone#/desk manned by RCI staff.

Or that you can give them 28,000 points for an equivalent to a studio deposit white week deposit?

28K = blue studio
42K = white studio
70K = red studio

I know that RCI doesn't give great trades for Wyndhams and I'll probably end up doing more internal use than exchanging them like I do with DVC so I'm not too concerned with getting stuck with Wyndham use only but in case I can't use all my points I wanted to be able to give RCI 28,000 points and at least be able to "bank" so to speak what otherwise would expire with my Wyndham.

That would work.

...it looks very confusing to pool and borrow with Wyndham.

That part's easy. You must decide BEFORE the first day of the use year if you want to pool any points for the coming use year. Pool as many as you want. The pooled points will then expire 3 years (to the day) later. When you need points for a reservation, they use up whichever points will expire soonest, from the use year which is current to the reservation requested or from the pooled points. Pooled points from different use years may be combined for reservations. Really, it's pretty easy. There's a small fee associated with pooling your points if you have used up your free "transactions" for that year - the process counts as a transaction so do it on the same day, late in your use year and just before the new use year will begin, when you also call Wyndham to bank a deposit using up expiring points. All transactions within a calendar count as a single transaction for the purpose of considering transaction fees. HTH.

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

Wyndham deposits has 2 different path. A generic one you will not be able to do any on-line search and has to depend on a RCI VC search for you. It is a pure book entry. RCI recognize you deposit something worth x points. At some point, RCI will work with Wyndham to ask them deposit weeks worth the point RCI has received. Since it is just pure book entry, in theory, the supply side is infinite, and you will not get penalty when you actually ask for them.

A visible one is a real work, you can do search yourself. If you deposit to RCI, Wyndham will control the process. They will decide from a pre-deposit pool of weeks which to give you. And for their convenient, they only make those deposit at certain time, for certain number of units they believe is O.K. for them to deposit based on their preset rules. Since it is a real week, when Wyndham deposit them, which week is kind important.

I have yet to see Wyndham get rid of a resort. I do know cases where resort get rid of Wyndham. On the other hand, most resort are not that old compare to a lot of other TS ones, so it has to be seen when they become non-operatorable, what will happen.

Unless you want to stay in south FL during the winter president day, or some special events, you usually don't need to be the owner there since ARP is not that important.

Pool is like saving account. You put it in. Except you don't get determine when you use it, which one get to use, As Lisa said, it is based on who expired first. And since as TS, they are in theory can not get over crowded, so you can not use your pool point if there is no enough points for the year you trip. Just like if no insurance, bank will not be able to allow you to pull your saving out if they don't have enough cash in hand to cover it.

Most tricky part is when people do care about which set of point to use, these usually happen like when need it for ARP, or if you are x VIP and can pool the unused regular points later, or in old days, they allows you to transfer only the unused regular points. If that is the situation, you need to call Wyndham VC. Otherwise, you don't really need to worry about it.

Jya-Ning

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

Am I understanding it correctly?

Nope.

As I said, you need to (re-)read the Primer, and the Worldwide Exchange document. You've got several misconceptions, some major (you can no longer choose a week to deposit with RCI), and some minor (28K is a blue studio, not a white). And, the Wyndham website won't help you much more---pretty much everything on the website not related to an individual's accounts is replicated on forums.atozed.com.

If it were me, I would buy Wyndham only for internal bookings through the points system, or to use it to efficiently exchange into "easy" exchanges---over-supplied areas or off-season/shoulder-season time. I would not plan to use Wyndham to make "hard" exchanges.

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

No. Club Wyndham Plus == Fairfield Fairshare Plus.

Wyndham points ownerships are mediocre traders in RCI---and you do not yet appreciate how a Wyndham ownership works with RCI. In particular, you don't deposit "your week" in Wyndham, so it doesn't matter what or where you own for the purposes of RCI trading.

You should read the External Exchange document and the Primer at forums.atozed.com before you go any farther in buying Wyndham.

Okay Brian,
I guess I had been reading old posts or wrong posts that were talking about reserving first and then depositing weeks into RCI or II. I read both documents and it looks to me like RCI is probably the better way to go with Wyndham if I am reading the documents correctly. The choices seem to be too limited with II or am I wrong?

I'll probably stay within Wyndham mostly but judging by others great trades using the 28K deposits maybe I should be looking to do that more than I was thinking. What do you think? The external trade document says she got a Manhattan Club for 28K deposit. Granted it was in March but I still think that was a good trade. I'd go to New York any time of year. And her 28K deposit for HGVC in Marco is one of my top choices for vacationing so I'd go anytime there too. Even during prime hurricane time.

Which exchange company do you use for Wyndham?

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

The FF points should be Wyndham points. Whoever wrote the ad didn't do their homework (seldom do). They have fixed weeks in the older buildings, points in the newer ones. Probably converted points as well. It is a nice resort, especially if you like golf. It is at least a 15 minute drive to the beach.
MF's are rather high at Palm Aire.

Thanks Marge,
Where do you suggest a biennial resort with lower maintenance fees and a package of 154K to 200K points? What do you think about Vegas? Would that be a better choice? I'm trying to keep my fees down as I've got too many timeshares already but like what Wyndham offers too.

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

Fairfield is the old name. When they decided to build a point program, they form a trust call Fairfield, then they sold themselves to Cedant. Cedant decided it is too big to make stock attractive, and decided it need to split itself, so in hope its stock will look attractive. They believe Wyndham is a high class name, so they purchase the name right. Then they spilt itslf, and give Wyndham to its Hotel/RCI/Timeshare child. And Wyndham decides it is good to have all its children companies call Wyndham. So now Fairfield is renamed to Wyndham.

Wyndham has several TS developing child companies, they all has named as xxx something Wyndham. But Wyndham point generally is called for Fairfield point program.

Jya-Ning

Well that is very interesting. Kind of like Trump does with his name.

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

Nope.

As I said, you need to (re-)read the Primer, and the Worldwide Exchange document. You've got several misconceptions, some major (you can no longer choose a week to deposit with RCI), and some minor (28K is a blue studio, not a white). And, the Wyndham website won't help you much more---pretty much everything on the website not related to an individual's accounts is replicated on forums.atozed.com.

If it were me, I would buy Wyndham only for internal bookings through the points system, or to use it to efficiently exchange into "easy" exchanges---over-supplied areas or off-season/shoulder-season time. I would not plan to use Wyndham to make "hard" exchanges.

I guess I was not expressing myself correctly. I was just looking to get maximum use out of the points as opposed to trying to pull say a DVC with a 28K deposit. I'm not that unrealistic but the Exchange document did say she got some great exchanges if truthful and I don't know why she'd lie.
Sorry about the blue vs. white. I'm still rusty on those terms as supposedly everything I own is "red" since I live in FL and all my TS's are in FL although I know better.

And actually I was going to do exactly what you suggest and use the exchanges internally for big city stays like San Fran, DC, San Anton etc. I was contemplating Marriott purchase but I think Wyndham has more of the places that I want to go to including the Dominican Republic too. Marriotts seem to be a little too resorty for me right now although I know they are adding more cities. But I guess with either Wyndham or Marriott resale I don't get the points perks for hotels and short stays so that is why Wyndham makes more sense to me at this point in time. Plus it seems to be a more flexible system.

Anyway, thanks for the info. I saved it for future reference.

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

Thanks Marge,
Where do you suggest a biennial resort with lower maintenance fees and a package of 154K to 200K points? What do you think about Vegas? Would that be a better choice? I'm trying to keep my fees down as I've got too many timeshares already but like what Wyndham offers too.

Wyndham Fairfield Glade, Nottingham Village section
Wyndham South Shore (Tahoe)