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Okay, first of all I want to establish that we have owned Marriott (Grand Ocean on Hilton Head Island from Marriott) for 13 years, and have owned Marriott (Kauai and Maui) from resale for several years. Here's what I know: Regarding your statement, "I WAS TOLD THAT MAKE YOUR RESERVATION A YEAR IN ADVANCE, AND REQUEST THE LOCATION AND IT WAS A FIRST COME FIRST SERVE BASIS, AND THAT YOU WOULD BE GIVEN THE BEST AS TO WHEN YOU CALLED IN," with all due respect to gblotter's statement that this is "definitely not true," there actually IS truth to your statement. Here's what makes it confusing - You can put your request in one week before your arrival and get your choice ahead of someone else who requested a few months earlier IF your actual reservation for the week was made ahead of others. We have been told over and over that the room assignment DOES have to do with when our reservation was made, so we always make reservations one year in advance and we always get the view we own and the placement or approximate placement that we want. We have been told many mistruths over the years, and so I've learned to ALWAYS go to Owner Services to find out the truth. We were told some of the same lies you have been told by a salesman that was ticked that we were even considering resale. We asked to speak to his boss, and his boss helped him squirm right out of the lies. Thankfully, he is no longer in sales! (We heard a year later that there were several complaints about him.) In the mean time, we bought resale and have been extremely happy with it. We have looked into the "mark" by our name, as we have heard that from an irritated salesman as well. Owner Services told us that the mark is to let them know that they can not accept the week to be traded for points, and that the resort itself doesn't really care if we bought it through Marriott or resale - Marriott doesn't have to give 200,000 bonus points for a resale so they figure they break about even. Please remember that Marriott has right of first refusal - if they didn't want the units selling on the resale market, they would be buying them all back, as they have that right! The ONLY reason to buy Marriott FROM Marriott is to be able to trade it for points and use the points. (Resale purchases don't allow points.) We love our points (traveled to such places as Australia) from our Grand Ocean, but since we don't need more with points, we will continue to buy resale. We are looking at buying a fourth Marriott week in the next couple of years and it WILL be resale. No marks are against us...no problems with the views and locations....no different treatment than Marriott owners who bought through Marriott at the resorts we bought resale - Kauai and Maui. Hope this helps and that it makes sense.....I'm hurrying, but I wanted to try to help you, as we also struggled before we bought our first resale unit. Good luck! You will love it - just remember to reserve early and then to put in your room request whenever you want....no hurry on that part.