First Timer - Need Some Direction

Hi,

My wife and I are from North of Toronto, Canada. We are wondering about a timeshare in Florida that we can take our two young boys to from time to time. Any help on the following questions would be great - thanks!

1 - Any recommendations for a timeshare in or around Fort Myers?

2 - How exactly does renting and buying work? Is renting as simple as it sounds and what is all involved in buying a place?

3 - Do you have to use point systems or is that for select properties only?

Thanks in advance and take care,

Merrick

I would recommend that you rent off a site like Redweek. Why commit yourself to a lifetime of increasing fees and assessments when you can rent for less than an owner pays in maintenance fees. There are no guarantees but Redweek staff has suggestions for safe rentals. Just ask and they will guide you through the system.

The Orlando area is the highest concentration of timeshares anywhere. You should have no trouble finding one available. The market is saturated in that area which is an advantage for renters. The competition to rent is enormous and some people will take what they can get.

You did the wise thing by asking before jumping. I'm sure you will receive plenty of responses to your post. Good luck.

Don is right on , rent in Florida, less hassle , no fuss, go where ever you want.

Perfect !

I have just came from a Hilton timeshare presentation. When I asked about the resale market the guy said do not buy it because you will lose all benefits. Is it true? I am interested only in Hilton timeshare. Can someone who bought a Hilton from resale market tell us more details about it? Thank you

The only benefit you will lose is that your points won't count toward premier/elite level ownership. Using your week at your resort or using your points to exchange to other HGVC properties will not be affected by owning resale. You will still have the option to use RCI. I believe with Hilton you can still convert your week to Hotel points but the conversion usually isn't a good value. Most other hotel affiliates do not allow you to convert vacation club points to hotel reward points so if they were going to pull another benefit from resale owners, my guess would be that one will go next.

Thank you for answer. I also heard you can not update later on if you buy resale. Let's say from 1 bedroom to 2 bedrooms. Any advice is welcome. Thank you

They may not. But really is overpaying $15,000-$20,000 on a one bedroom and then being able to apply that full amount to overpaying $20,000-$30,000 for a two bedroom worth spending the extra $15,000 today. If you want a two bedroom, buy that now for less than $10,000 and take the extra $5000-$15,000 extra that you would have spend on the 1 br toward MF's for the next 5-10 years.

Hilton sale person said there is a cap of 3% for maintenance fee increase , means they cannot increase it more than 3% each year. Is it true ? Can somebody check the contract you have with Hilton timeshare? Also , I would like to see how is the trend for maintenance fee during let's say the last 10-15 years. Any help in this is welcome. Thank you

I was thinking of buying a timeshare, because I see so many people earn points and stay at nice places; but after reading this. I am having second thoughts. maybe renting would be better for me. I cant rent a 4/3 for 200 a night and not have to worry about anything. Where can I find rentals on here?

donp196 wrote:

I would recommend that you rent off a site like Redweek. Why commit yourself to a lifetime of increasing fees and assessments when you can rent for less than an owner pays in maintenance fees. There are no guarantees but Redweek staff has suggestions for safe rentals. Just ask and they will guide you through the system.

The Orlando area is the highest concentration of timeshares anywhere. You should have no trouble finding one available. The market is saturated in that area which is an advantage for renters. The competition to rent is enormous and some people will take what they can get.

You did the wise thing by asking before jumping. I'm sure you will receive plenty of responses to your post. Good luck.

Rent or sale timeshares at the top of this page. We Rent extra weeks we might not be able to use for example at our Holiday Inn Vacation Club see here

http://corporate.orangelake.com/ourResorts_ccr.php

has the following area's that can be reserved to vacation.

All brands have a number of choices in there systems. Pick a area and see what you find.

Nadia -

To start your search for a rental, you can go to the homepage: RedWeek Home Page

Enter the location you would like to rent at, then after the list of resorts come up, you can use the filters on the left side of the page to narrow your results by price, date, etc.

If you need further assistance, please Contact Us.

Phyllis

Hyatt has the same benefit of converting points to their Hotels and also cruises. Their point system is great also, use a week, 4 days, or a weekend, points last for about a two year window. Good luck in your sesrch

tracey75 wrote:

The only benefit you will lose is that your points won't count toward premier/elite level ownership. Using your week at your resort or using your points to exchange to other HGVC properties will not be affected by owning resale. You will still have the option to use RCI. I believe with Hilton you can still convert your week to Hotel points but the conversion usually isn't a good value. Most other hotel affiliates do not allow you to convert vacation club points to hotel reward points so if they were going to pull another benefit from resale owners, my guess would be that one will go next.

Thank you!

Buying resale points strips points of all benefits.

karal51 wrote:

Buying resale points strips points of all benefits.

But those benefits can likely be purchased with the money you saved by buying resale, and then some.

karal51 wrote:

Buying resale points strips points of all benefits.

As a blanket statement it is false that buying resale points strips all the benefits.

It depends on the system. Some strip all of the benefits and in fact you lose the ability to use points and exchange internally. Some systems do that in general but have a few mandatory resorts that retain the points and some to most of the benefits. Some strip some of the benefits while keeping others upon resale and even then some systems keep more benefits than others upon resale.