Well, This is a Fine Kettle of Fish - Festiva takes over Escape! Resorts

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

Seriously, why would you want to be a part of that? It will only get worse. If they take your week, you will save yourself their $1750 transfer fee.

What do we want? We want our fixed, deeded week, to use every year in early August. We had been to the resort twice, liked what we saw and bought it 3+ years ago. We live on a lake. Have a 2nd home on a waterfall in the Smoky Mountains. The only thing missing was the beach. So we bought it. Just want what we bought.

What we don't want is a points program, where they take your week and hopefully you will be able to get something, at additional cost and trouble. And I will never pay a transfer fee to give what we own back to them. Of course if we could have foreseen any of this we would not have bought it. No one knowingly buys a lawsuit. For 2 years we just reserved our week in advance, paid the maintenance fees and enjoyed. The change is now they will not do that.

The lawsuits involved high pressure sales tactics. Feels like that to us.

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

I did not ask what you want.

I want stuff, too.

But . . .

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

Guest 04:05 PM Viewing Thread
Well, This is a Fine Kettle of Fish - Festiva takes over Escape! Resorts

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

Anyone else get their Maintenance Fee bill, annual meeting notes, and yet-another letter trying to defuse the Festiva mess?

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

Excerpts from the maintenance fee letter:

"Your Association has continued to experience increases in operating costs, delinquencies, foreclosures and bankruptcies. These continue to take a toll on the Association's cash flow."

"A major collection effort was started in 2011, and is ongoing in an attempt to clear up our delinquent accounts."

"We continue to be dedicated to maintaining our highest distinction awards with the exchange companies. In 2013, we were awarded our 20 Year Gold Crown Award from RCI, and in 2014 we have continued to maintain this coveted Gold Crown status."

Bad debt expense is 9% of total operating expense.

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

The weeks we own there come with golf rights written into the Covenants, like property owners who live inside the gates, but I had not golfed there in a couple of years.

Monday a couple of golfers at my other place were looking for a place to golf Tuesday, so I took them there. Everyone was very cordial and it refreshed my memory of how nice the place is, including the golf course, which was in great condition. We a nice lunch at the restaurant, which was pretty busy for a country club restaurant.

Then, yesterday I played with my regular group at my other place, and the conversation somehow turned to the course at Fine Kettle. A member at my other place said something like, "I was told that place went private again." What he meant is that they do not offer annual memberships to the general public . . . only if you own in the development. Well, yes, that has always been the case, and that is a large part of the value of owning in one of 15 units that have golf rights.

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

http://www.redweek.com/forums/messag...d=19590&page=1

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

Well, lookie here . . . someone dragged it into the 21st Century.

Sorta vague about what this is, who it is, and what they do.

But, if you dig deep enough, you will find an email address, with the name of the person who called and chewed me out, and told me there's no way they could afford stuff like this, and that if I want to know what's going on I can come to the annual meeting.

There's even a place to click if you wanna sell!

Hmmmm!

http://sbmllc.net/

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

& it only took a year-and-a-half:


02-25-2014, 11:15 AM
#51

JLB
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Join Date:Jul 2005Posts:13,646

A person whose name I recognize as being one of the Board of Directors just called.

She did not really want to listen to anything I had to say; she just wanted it on the record I asked someone to call, and she did.

As to all the questions I have asked since all the changes started in December, 2013 (14 months ago), her answer was that all of that is covered in the Annual Meeting. I asked how many owners there are, and she said 4400. I asked how many were at the annual meeting and she said, "Not enough to have a quorum." As to there being no website, or email address, or any mailing to the general membership to explain any of what has transpired, her answer was, "You gonna pay for that? If you don't care enough to come to the annual meeting . . . "

So, nothing has been explained to 4400 owners except for this recent, vague letter, with a phone number that did not work, that she says works just fine.

As for the marketing and sales company mentioned in the letter, they were hired to market developer weeks the association acquired, and the association has no interest in helping owners get rid of their weeks in any way. No bulletin board, no newsletter, no nothing. She said we are free to do anything we want with our weeks. I offered two weeks, free, to the association, for the marketing company to sell, and she said, "We don't do that."

Well, there's my answer . . . one less loose end, which is a good thing.

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

There's even a place to click if you wanna sell!

http://sbmllc.net/

Which doesn't appear to work.

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

Funny how these things work.

I got an email from Festiva (Patton Hospitality) today instructing how to pay our maintenance fee, not long after I received our maintenance fee billing from SBV Condominiums. This is exactly the type of thing that prompted me to report to SBV, which resulted in the brouhaha phone call from the lady whose email address is now on the website.

She replied saying no one else that she checked with got that email.

Of course, I told her I am a special person.

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

There's even a place to click if you wanna sell!

Hmmmm!

http://sbmllc.net/

Anyone have any idea how this site will help owners who want to sell?

https://home.timeshareproplus.com/

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

That can give your timeshare a value to local folks. Most resorts on the OBX, except those who have lost their pools to storms, have at least a couple of local owners who own their timeshares primarily for pool access. One resort has actively marketed locally on that basis.

There was also a resort in the UK that primarily marketed to local people as ''a country club that is also a timeshare''. Unfortunately, a major timeshare chain bought out the original developer and staged a takeover campaign against other owners, ending in them being forced out with options of either surrendering their ownership or taking weeks at a timeshare in another part of the UK that they had no interest in. The new developer wanted an all points resort and the local owners had not the slightest interest in timeshare points.

The weeks we own there come with golf rights written into the Covenants, like property owners who live inside the gates, but I had not golfed there in a couple of years.

Monday a couple of golfers at my other place were looking for a place to golf Tuesday, so I took them there. Everyone was very cordial and it refreshed my memory of how nice the place is, including the golf course, which was in great condition. We a nice lunch at the restaurant, which was pretty busy for a country club restaurant.

Then, yesterday I played with my regular group at my other place, and the conversation somehow turned to the course at Fine Kettle. A member at my other place said something like, "I was told that place went private again." What he meant is that they do not offer annual memberships to the general public . . . only if you own in the development. Well, yes, that has always been the case, and that is a large part of the value of owning in one of 15 units that have golf rights.

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

That can give your timeshare a value to local folks.

Fine Kettle has local owners for golf privilege, which is why we own there.

Down here there is limited beach access and a resort has local owners for that. Same in the Sarasota area.

I guess I don't see that in that site. I don't see how it helps owners who want to sell.

I entered the resort name and it returned no results.

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

If I did not report it, when I went to check-in last year, they had added a second counter. After checking in, you had to go to that counter to "get your parking pass." The person at that counter asks some hardly-disguised qualifying questions, so you know it's not about a parking pass.

I did a check-in today, for an RCI rental, and the guy behind the second counter really had a problem with the fact that I am an owner, and came in through RCI. Finally, he said something about needing to schedule a few minutes for an owner update. I politely said, "I do not believe I need an owner update, but thanks for offering."

FWIW, they had upgraded the "hotel unit" I had reserved to a very nice 1-bedroom. $254.92 total.

The resort appeared to be about 90% empty.