Ripoff - Marriott Vacation Club Destinations Program - New Point System

How much in total maintenance dues, club dues do you pay per year? 19,000 points appears to equate to maybe over $10,000. Dollars before you get your feet wet at the beach. I get a little tire of making the beds, cleaning the bathrooms as a timeshare owner you don’t get that on a daily basis or at all. Then what’s included in maintenance dues?

kathryng11 wrote:

I don't know what you mean about I'm 100% Marriott.....I've owned timeshare since 1979, long before Marriott got involved with it, and I've been a Marriott owner for over 25 years, I have over 19,000 points available to me if I "Elect" to turn in my weeks to Destination Points with my current ownership, and have sold three other weeks I owned through Marriott Resale.... I have cashed in over 7,000,000 Hotel Reward Points and enjoy the "travel packages with air/hotel" and yes, I HAVE TAKEN IT UPON MYSELF TO LEARN ABOUT WHAT I OWN, because of the financial investment I've made to my "401 Vacation plan". I have recouped my initial investment on all of my weeks at least four-five times over the years, including Maintenance Fees. I even rent some out on Redweek at times....Sorry, It is NOT a ripoff

I 100% agree with the happy Marriott owner!

We have owned at the Marriott in Maui since 2000. We upgraded our 2 bdr to a 3 bdr in the Napili building right before they switched to points. We love it but rarely need 3 bdrs so we often opt for the vacation club points, 10,225 to be exact. We also purchased 3,000 vacation club points to move us to Chairman's level. They increased the number needed recently but grandfathered us in. We are retired and have a flexible schedule. It's a great program if you like to vacation and know how to use.

I totally agree! If you're flexible, do your homework and don't have unrealistic expectations, you can make it work! I'm afraid those who complain either don't fully understand what they own, aren't realistic OR just complain about everything that doesn't go their way!

Hello Michael B......your math is very good, and yes, my maintenance fees and club dues were about $9,600 last year. I was successful in renting five of my six weeks out thru Redweek and privately last year for $10,700. My Three Bedroom I own at the Grand Chateau I converted to 4,650 Destination Points, and stretched it into 18 days of vacations, 3 to 5 days at a time, going Sunday thru Thursday nights, and because I'm Chairman VIP Club Member with Marriott, I get an additional 30% discount of points when I book 60 days or less, and also took advantage of their new Destination Escapes program. I also still have over 1.5 million Marriott Bonvoy points for my international travel with the Hotel and Air Packages. I also have a full time job, which has curtailed my travels down to only about six weeks a year (since I've been with my company for over 19 years) and of course take advantage of my days off and take an extra one or two days for a "long weekend" ......it all works for me for now.

Congratulations.....you sound like you have taken the time to LEARN how to "work their system".....it is a fabulous program. I'm a VERY HAPPY MARRIOTT OWNER since 1994. Kathy W.

You absolutely spot on.....

Glad it works for you. I own two Marriott Aruba Ocean Club weeks. I have been trying to rent one week in Marco Island and I have changed the dates once already. So for the first time I try Interval International for a cruise exchange. They offer me the Bermuda cruise I want for $2,500. plus the week exchange. If I purchased to the cruise myself incl all the "free" items the cost is $3,400.Add back the Interval International exchange fee and for a week's trade I get the pay $2,700. for a $3,400. cruise. With booking myself I'm in charge of making changes, if necessary. I again asked Marriott if they would rent for me and they said not for Aruba using points. The ownership of my Marriott two weeks at the Aruba Ocean Club no longer works for me. I can rent a condo in Marco Island for one month being the $3,205. Marriott maintenance fees I now pay. I see how easy it is for someone to rent in Marco Island or Aruba and get a great price from the hundreds of rentals available. At best in the future I may just rent the two weeks for the price of maintenance fees and any assessments that come along.

We were members for @ 10 years and, as time went by, maintenance fees increased from around $600.00 to this last year, $3400.00. We have paid a company to get us out, but we had about 500,000 points, of which they took away. Those were out points that we acquired through the years by staying at places and paying out of pocket for those rooms. I think that is a huge rip-off so watch out because they make it sound so good.

Don't feel like you are missing out because Marriott says they won't rent out your week for you. In the US, they make you an upfront offer and the only ones that even approach MF's are the ones that you could easily rent for 150-200% of your MF's- like a platinum ocean front Hawaii or SC week.

I inquired about a platinum Orlando week that has a MF's of $1400 and the offer if they took my week was $800.

Years and years ago they took 30 then 40% commission but gave you the actual rental income for your reservation after the commission once the rental was complete. I believe in Europe they still may do it that way. In the US they make an offer based on your resort, season and view and if you already have a reservation they make you cancel it. The good thing is it doesn't matter if it actually rents or not. The bad thing is they really low ball on the offer so they typically only need to rent two nights or so of your week and they have made back what they paid the owner.

I would love to have "kathryng11" teach me (us) how she was able to learn to be such an organized and productive owner? She seems toj have made her ownership WORK. Nick

Kudos to Kathy W.! We're also very happy with the Marriott program and have figured it out to maximize our usage- and still be able to "gift" some to veterans, family or a worthy "Silent Auction" fundraiser- we get plenty of vacation with our points, always go to their seminars while at a property because we always learn some new tidbit that helps us manage our ownership- like everything else in life, it's not for everyone but it HAS worked for us and we've worked hard at making it work! Asking questions of other owners, like this site here, really helps you make good decisions! Sad when I read all the negativity on here, but that's life these days! Some people just want it all without doing the work- it DOES take educating yourself, some flexibility and some good planning- but it works for us for 15 years!

We attended presentations this year and last. We didn't learn anything to improve our experience other than that we must buy more points to improve our Chairman's Club sized portfolio. We did, however, reconfirm that you need to spend $50,000 to get enough points for a prime season week at a better resort and then pay the maintenance fees of $2,900 each year.

So, when we returned home from each of these two vacations we bought a prime season week at a prime resort through Redweek. We spent less than $11,000 for each week with annual maintenance fees of about $1,400 per week.

What did we gain? We spent $22,000 for two weeks with $2,800 in maintenance fees rather than $50,000 for points for one week with $2,900 in maintenance fees. And, what did we give up? Well, we need to either use our week at the owned resort; or, rent it out and use cash to acquire a rental through Redweek (pretty easy with great weeks). An exchange through Interval is still an option (difficult to get anything good). The only downside, I see, is that we cannot exchange for points to access short stays (so, good to have a few enrolled weeks to exchange for points).

I agree with those who advise "you just need to know how to use the vacation club program."

I am a completely upset owner. Marriott Vacation Club is practicing deceptive trade practices through its poorly designed website that facilitated mys losing vacation points with no notification, knowledge nor communication.

The Vacation Club website showed that I could still exchange recently expired points for Bonvoy points good at Marriott related hotels. The vacation club rep was on the phone as I did it, and said that these points had not yet reached expiration date. I printed a confirmation that 4500 vacation club points had been accepted as transferred to Bonvoy. I asked to speak with a supervisor about the lack of communication regarding expiring points. She relayed that I had actually used 2000 of my current year points for Bonvoy points. I relayed that the web site did not communicate this at all, and requested that the vacation club points be restored. She relayed that the transaction could not be undone. This despite the false information conveyed on the web site and lack of clarity. She said that she would go back and listen to the recording of the call, but said in any case nothing would be done to restore the vacation club points. I have the print out showing what I requested is different from what they did.

Further recent issues:

The process for re-establishing access to the owner portal is a mess. Confusing, not intuitive, took me two hours.

When I did get back on I see 3650 points that say end date 9/2019 but "available." I tried to call the vacation adviser number and was disconnected twice because there was heavy call activity and told to call back later. On try 4 after a two hour wait the next day, I reached a representative.

The vacation club rep relayed that indeed the 3650 points had recently expired with only spam looking emails to alert the owner. My Worldmark, Wyndham and RCI time share ownerships are much better at helping owners not accidentally lose points.

Finally, I recently purchased 2000 more points, and had been told at sales it could charge my card monthly like my other 3 timeshare companies do. I made an on line inquiry and was told i could pay monthly manually through the site but might lose access to my points and incur late fees. The vacation club rep I reached said there is a form that one fills out to do this, but that it is not available on the website in the pay your dues area.

I've been a member for nearly 20 years and have never once regretted it - except when all those maintenance fee bills come at once. I have over 15,000 points and have used and successfully rented out some points when I decided to do other things. You need to do your homework. Marriott doesn't take your points, you lose them because you neglected to do your homework - not the fault of MVC. I don't believe the offerings outside the program are worth it. You'd be better off renting out your ownership and paying for guided tours on your own. I also own Disney Vacation Club and this is true for them as well. If you stay within the vacation club resort offerings it is a very good value.

Bonnie, thank you, so happy to hear you are also an informed owner happy with the Destination program. Kathy

Nonnie, thank you, so happy to hear you are also an informed owner happy with the Destination program. Kathy

Hello Michael, Yes my maintenance fees and Club Dues last January was just under $10,000. A few years ago, after a horrible accident and numerous broken bones, I started to rent out four of my six weeks (thru Redweek) and that generated slightly more than all maintenance fees....now that I'm healed and travelling again I still rent out at least three and use the others rto travel, so it makes it very manageable. My ownership is part of my retirement fund.... 😍😎

Same here

I find it interesting that we are supposed to be ok if we 'lose our points or weeks' due to expiry. In Canada, we are told that if you have a credit it can not expire because it is like cash. Why are we ok with Marriott having an expiry date on your weeks. If you pay for it in maintenance AND ownership why should it EXPIRE at all. Air miles no longer have expiry dates as they are considered value/$$ owners have earned or paid. The other thing not seeming to mentioned to Maui owners is that if you are renting out weeks that you have already paid for in purchase and maintenance, the island of Maui is saying you have to pay a further tax on renting.....which you already have paid!! A DOUBLE tax!

To say that the people unhappy with this are not informed is just pathetic.