How Big Is Yours?

[lawren2 Malibu Beach Barbie & A Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close lawren2]

There is a third explanation, albeit not one that I put a very high factor of being the truth.

The on-line searches are grabbing these weeks before they even get to on-line status.

I know....I must be smoking my socks this morning to even try to float that balloon but it must be considered.

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

There is a third explanation, albeit not one that I put a very high factor of being the truth.

The on-line searches are grabbing these weeks before they even get to on-line status.

I know....I must be smoking my socks this morning to even try to float that balloon but it must be considered.

That would mean a massive and sudden increase in on-line searches. Why would this happen and why would it so neatly coincide with the disenhancements?

[lawren2 Malibu Beach Barbie & A Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close lawren2]

I misphrased. Matches to on-going searches are being made and we are not seeing what we used to see on manual on-line searches because of it.

The disclaimer that I must be smoking my socks to believe this to be the case stilll stands.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

Wow! Steve used one of my funnywords.

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

I misphrased. Matches to on-going searches are being made and we are not seeing what we used to see on manual on-line searches because of it.

The disclaimer that I must be smoking my socks to believe this to be the case stilll stands.

They're actually not. Just the other day, when I had one of my rare ongoing searches employed for ONE specific resort number during a very narrow time period, I logged onto ex-ops, to see that very resort number in that very time period had been posted in a sighting here, several hours previously.

I went right to RCI, certain that if it had been available to me and my spacebank, it would long be gone by then, but lo and behold, there it was, sitting in inventory. So I got it, no thanks to RCI, but yes thanks to bnoble and TS4MS.

BTW, this was Ram's Horn Village for July. Exchanges for July are so rare that when I phoned the resort to inquire about something, the desk guy couldn't believe I had an RCI exchange because only 1 owner deposits to RCI in that month. He knew exactly which week it was, without my telling him, and he was correct.

So, smoke away.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

BTW, this was Ram's Horn Village for July. Exchanges for July are so rare that when I phoned the resort to inquire about something, the desk guy couldn't believe I had an RCI exchange because only 1 owner deposits to RCI in that month. He knew exactly which week it was, without my telling him, and he was correct.

So, smoke away.

As one who searched for Ram's Horn for June for years, without success, congrats.

But, since we really love EP and RMNP, we did not mind the quirky and quaint Golden Eagle/Crags.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

Along with the oft-chanted mantra that I will never get anything for SW FL for January without submitting to an ongoing search (despite the fact, and knowing, that I have gotten the last 25 or so including three yet-to-be-taken by searching online and have never gotten one by submitting to an ongoing search), was th following statement:

"For space to be deposited and be hidden from the subscriber would make no sense at all as that is how we generate our income."

The answer is a well, duh, so you can make more money doing something else with it (which they have admitted, have they not?).

As in recent posts I still lean toward the employees being as mis/uninformed as the members. I believe they just say what they are told to say. After all, what choice do they have?

In any event, I sense the end of this little flurry of helpfulness, and that the answer to what happened to the disappearing inventory, will not be forthcoming.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

The Charter Club of Marco Beach (#0613) 1 available unit
Marco Island FL, 34145
USA
2 BR (6 max)
Check-In Date
19-Sep-2009

The explanation for this HGVC stuff appearing in the 14-45 Day Window is:

"Yes, you sure will see availability in the 14 day window as that is either left over, last minute deposits or cancellations."

We already knew that, but that is just avoiding my original question, "Where did all the HGVC inventory disappear to during the enhancement?"

Southern Gulf Coast is at 245 available units today, when it was regularly running 590-620 before the disenhancement.

How can you rely on any statement when the same message also contains the statement in my previous post, implying that member deposits also go only to the enchange pool? Has the classaction suit not confirmed that that is not the case?

So why would they keep saying it is? What is to be gained by that?

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

A quick minute with a calculator, searching FL-SGC for all units, exchange plus extra vacation plus last call, yields 435 total units in 25 resorts. Still a couple hundred down. I suppose they could be offered only through other rental channels, and not EV, but why? RCI is not shy about its rental business, so it seems unlikely that they would limit exposure just to keep a secret. Some could be going over to Points, but only 5 of the 52 resorts in the region are Points resorts, so that doesn't seem like it could account for them all either.

The one theory I keep coming back to is that during the switch, there was a short period when if you *could* get through on the website, many weaker weeks could see many units they usually could not see. It is possible that a lot of "good stuff" got snapped up when the trade power computations were tuchas-over-teakettle. That would explain the sudden drop of "good stuff" that can't seem to be found anywhere, in any exchange or rental outlet that RCI controls. Furthermore, if this theory is correct, then by a year from now, we should be "back to normal", but it will take that long to replenish. If we don't get "back to normal" a year from now, then this theory is hogwash.

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

As one who searched for Ram's Horn for June for years, without success, congrats.

Thanks Jim! I know how hard this one was - I closed my eyes and made a wish for a major b-day trip, the kind that ends in a zero. I was assuming I'd need to open up that search to include Crags Lodge & Worldmark, and would have been fine with either.

Since we'll want to hit the ground running without wasting time outside RMNP, and won't be able to resist driving the 12,000 altitude road probably the first day, I'm contemplating another TS week preceding this one at a slightly lower altitude than the park road (I once went from sea level to over 11,000 in a few hours, and felt kinda bendy) - maybe Vail - any advice?

How can you rely on any statement when the same message also contains the statement in my previous post, implying that member deposits also go only to the enchange pool? Has the classaction suit not confirmed that that is not the case?

So why would they keep saying it is? What is to be gained by that?

What's that long river in Egypt? and there's that saying about fooling all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time ...

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

That would explain the sudden drop of "good stuff" that can't seem to be found anywhere, in any exchange or rental outlet that RCI controls. Furthermore, if this theory is correct, then by a year from now, we should be "back to normal", but it will take that long to replenish. If we don't get "back to normal" a year from now, then this theory is hogwash.

As an aside, the "fruit fly" deposit cycle of DVC, where they do mini-bulk deposits roughly weekly, seems to suggest that this might have been true. Immediately after the Great Unpleasantness, there were no 2010 DVC units anywhere. None. Not in exchange, not in rentals, nowhere. We went from dozens/hundreds to three-to-five, literally overnight. But, within about a month or two we were back to more-or-less normal levels of DVC units in the exchange pool, and seeing more or less exactly what we used to see before the Great Unpleasantness. If anything, they seem to hang around a little bit longer than they used to, because fewer depopsits are seeing them now.

Edited to add: JLB, I thought of one more thing that you might want to ask your Friends In High Places---if there was an unusual spike in ongoing search confirmations during the Great Unpleasantness, that would be strong evidence that this theory is correct.

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

Another theory

Could they be holding 20,000 of the most desirable units for points-only exchanges? (part of a plan to eventually kill off weeks?)

For example, see ex-ops for Lakes District. That first resort listed is never available as an in-season weeks exchange - or should I say, I have checked often and have never seen it (aside from expensive rental) except in the dead of winter.

Here's another mystery: Alpin Palace in Switzerland. Can anyone see any exchanges avail? There always used to be some. I only have a 2011 spacebank so maybe I'm missing earlier deposits, but for years I have seen multiple weeks, and now, zip for moi. Nothing in rentals, either.

[lawren2 Malibu Beach Barbie & A Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close lawren2]

Could they be holding 20,000 of the most desirable units for points-only exchanges? (part of a plan to eventually kill off weeks?)

For example, see ex-ops for Lakes District. That first resort listed is never available as an in-season weeks exchange - or should I say, I have checked often and have never seen it (aside from expensive rental) except in the dead of winter.

Here's another mystery: Alpin Palace in Switzerland. Can anyone see any exchanges avail? There always used to be some. I only have a 2011 spacebank so maybe I'm missing earlier deposits, but for years I have seen multiple weeks, and now, zip for moi. Nothing in rentals, either.

When you look at some resorts and areas that always had buckets of inventory and you see next to nothing ( ie. 11 Arroyo Roble units for the next 24 months, FOUR 2BR units in Williamsburg for all summer 2011 ) it makes no sense. None at all as I wouldn't consider these to be the best most exclusive units/resorts to rent and with the exclusion of the WYN Patriot Place they are not points resorts. Those are two of the bread and butter exchange markets for families and they are decimated. Williamsburg was getting that way a year ago.

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

I was just going to say---the WBG thing is nothing new. I think that one is more to do with the fact that most RCI WBG resorts are in mini-systems (Wyndham, Diamond) both of which have become a lot more strategic about managing deposits, reserving more in-demand time for internal bookings and (in Wyndham's case) removing the ability for owners to book and deposit specific weeks.

[JLB Please excuse me, I'm a Dick. Not a moron just a Dick Find all posts View Profile Close JLB]

Since we'll want to hit the ground running without wasting time outside RMNP, and won't be able to resist driving the 12,000 altitude road probably the first day, I'm contemplating another TS week preceding this one at a slightly lower altitude than the park road (I once went from sea level to over 11,000 in a few hours, and felt kinda bendy) - maybe Vail - any advice?

When you do that, and pop out the other side, the west entrance to RMNP, go a few miles further and you will find SilverCreek (Inn and Mountainside). A few miles further you will find Winter Park.

We did June in Winter Park and Vail, before we discovered EP and RMNP, and we don't care for any other location. If I had to pick one, it would be Vail/Beaver Creek, cuz there's slightly more to do, including a daytrip to Leadville and the site of the WWII Army training camp where our Alpine troops trained. It was some of those troops returning after the war that led to the development of Vail.