Question on Fairfield week and RCI points

I own a fixed week at a Fairfield resort.

I rarely use it, rent it or trade it. It's basically a drag on my pocketbook. I let my RCI membership lapse because we weren't using that either.

I'd like to change it into points but Fairfield wants a hefty fee to convert and I'm not in the mood to be throwing vast quantities of good money after bad.

Is it true that if I rejoin RCI I can convert my fixed week to points to trade? Points would be more useful with our travelling style.

I don't really understand how this all works and would appreciate some info. Thanks.

If your Wyndham resort is affiliated with the RCI points program then you can deposit your week with RCI and RCI will give you RCI points for your exchange. If you don't use your timeshare and wish to just be rid of it, then you might want to consider donation of the timeshare. Last option would to be renting your time at your home resort if your not using it. That way you wont be eating all those maintenance fees.

kathym52 wrote:

I own a fixed week at a Fairfield resort.

I rarely use it, rent it or trade it. It's basically a drag on my pocketbook. I let my RCI membership lapse because we weren't using that either.

I'd like to change it into points but Fairfield wants a hefty fee to convert and I'm not in the mood to be throwing vast quantities of good money after bad.

Is it true that if I rejoin RCI I can convert my fixed week to points to trade? Points would be more useful with our travelling style.

I don't really understand how this all works and would appreciate some info. Thanks.

kathym52 wrote:

I own a fixed week at a Fairfield resort.

I rarely use it, rent it or trade it. It's basically a drag on my pocketbook. I let my RCI membership lapse because we weren't using that either.

I'd like to change it into points but Fairfield wants a hefty fee to convert and I'm not in the mood to be throwing vast quantities of good money after bad.

Is it true that if I rejoin RCI I can convert my fixed week to points to trade? Points would be more useful with our travelling style.

I don't really understand how this all works and would appreciate some info. Thanks.

What is the name of your resort, unit size, and week number?

Let me say that after a recent timeshare tour I learned of a program called RCI Weeks. I have been in the RCI Weeks program for a few yrs.

If for some reason I could not use all 308,000 points from Fairfield (Daytona Beach) I could bank the points with RCI Weeks and through RCI Vacation Counselors book a week at another resort within the RCI system.

That really left me dissatisfied for a number of reasons. It seemed as though there were no desirable resorts. The one or two times we did an exchange it was as though our points were greatly diluted in value, i.e., so many pts are equiv to a red week, so many for a blue week, so many for a white week.

The last tour guide we talked with (a Vacation Village salesman in Kissimmee, FL) spoke of something called the Bucket. Under RCI Weeks the bucket is always empty (i.e no choices for you and I to swap our weeks) To have a choice of another resort there has to be lots of owners willing to bank their points, thus the bucket remains empty.

Well RCI Points is the new system whereby you are buy a week at a participating resort. You are assigned a week and you are supposed to view it as a 'piece of inventory' no more. It guarantees you a place at your home resort for that particular week. The sales people would prefer that you not get hung up about the week they present you with (at closing) because, under the new RCI Points system, on Jan 1 all the resort owners have their weeks deposited into the bucket. Unless you opt out! In which case you will be staying at your home resort during that week forever - hope you like that 'piece of inventory' for that particular time of the year. I personally would visit Florida during a hurricane if I could steer clear of whiny brats and drunken college students. Anyway, you also receive an allotment of points at closing (and every year that you pay your M dues) that you use for making reservations at other resorts within the chain (Vacation Village, in this example, or RCI catalog resorts, plus rental cars, cruises, Disney, hotels, u name it).

We were given the strong impression that: 1. Fairfield resorts (and FF owners) were about to be left out in the cold with regard to RCI for being stubborn/difficult, i.e. being late to recognize the failure of RCI Weeks exchange system. And FF Owners would not have much luck in the future selling their timeshares, people were going to have 'fire sales' with their FF timeshares and flock to resorts within the RCI Points system.

We actually managed to buy a (third) timeshare at Vacation Village, out of sheer appreciation for the Fabulous, Improved RCI Points system (over the RCI Weeks system) then cancelled out one day after the closing. I kinda enjoyed that part - plus it served the greedy b**tards right. Yes, there was mention of RCI collecting a huge fee to allow us to be part of the next generation of timeshare ownership. It's pure windfall profit. The whole idea sounded good enough to buy a THIRD Timeshare. Maybe I do need a hole in my Head.

My wife and I reconsidered the stories we had been told over a nice Kobe steakhouse meal ($100) and decided we'd rather take a disciplined approach to eliminating our sizable and not insignificant investment in Fairfield Points, NOT through a fire sale.

If you rent your points at any of the excellent rental websites out there (Redweek.com and hotstays are both terrific for traffic) don't shortsell yourself. $10 per thousand is reasonable, you can do quite well. Let me know if this helps you or if I can be of further assistance. Luke

luke6 wrote:

Let me say that after a recent timeshare tour I learned of a program called RCI Weeks. I have been in the RCI Weeks program for a few yrs. ... We actually managed to buy a (third) timeshare at Vacation Village, out of sheer appreciation for the Fabulous, Improved RCI Points system (over the RCI Weeks system) then cancelled out one day after the closing. I kinda enjoyed that part - plus it served the greedy b**tards right. Yes, there was mention of RCI collecting a huge fee to allow us to be part of the next generation of timeshare ownership. It's pure windfall profit. The whole idea sounded good enough to buy a THIRD Timeshare. Maybe I do need a hole in my Head.

...

Thanks for the educational heads-up.

BTW, if you ever do get a hole in your head, be sure to put in one of those vibrating mole stakes. It keeps the rats away. hahahahaha

luke6

Well RCI Points is the new system whereby you are buy a week at a participating resort. You are assigned a week and you are supposed to view it as a 'piece of inventory' no more. It guarantees you a place at your home resort for that particular week. The sales people would prefer that you not get hung up about the week they present you with (at closing) because, under the new RCI Points system, on Jan 1 all the resort owners have their weeks deposited into the bucket. Unless you opt out! In which case you will be staying at your home resort during that week forever - hope you like that 'piece of inventory' for that particular time of the year. I personally would visit Florida during a hurricane if I could steer clear of whiny brats and drunken college students. Anyway, you also receive an allotment of points at closing (and every year that you pay your M dues) that you use for making reservations at other resorts within the chain (Vacation Village, in this example, or RCI catalog resorts, plus rental cars, cruises, Disney, hotels, u name it).

Fascinating information on RCI Points, Luke! I did not realize that they automatically deposited your owned week with RCI every January unless you opted out. That explains why RedWeek exchange information indicated that RCI Points owners can't exchange through RedWeek. Their week is already "spoken for" by RCI!

However, you need not worry about the Fairfield/Wyndham folks being "left out in the cold". We already have Plus Partners and RCI Nightly Stays which seem to offer pretty much what RCI Points does without the automatic deposit to RCI.

MD

adahiscout

luke6 wrote:

Well RCI Points is the new system whereby you are buy a week at a participating resort. You are assigned a week and you are supposed to view it as a 'piece of inventory' no more. It guarantees you a place at your home resort for that particular week. The sales people would prefer that you not get hung up about the week they present you with (at closing) because, under the new RCI Points system, on Jan 1 all the resort owners have their weeks deposited into the bucket. Unless you opt out! In which case you will be staying at your home resort during that week forever - hope you like that 'piece of inventory' for that particular time of the year. I personally would visit Florida during a hurricane if I could steer clear of whiny brats and drunken college students. Anyway, you also receive an allotment of points at closing (and every year that you pay your M dues) that you use for making reservations at other resorts within the chain (Vacation Village, in this example, or RCI catalog resorts, plus rental cars, cruises, Disney, hotels, u name it).

Fascinating information on RCI Points, Luke! I did not realize that they automatically deposited your owned week with RCI every January unless you opted out. That explains why RedWeek exchange information indicated that RCI Points owners can't exchange through RedWeek. Their week is already "spoken for" by RCI!

However, you need not worry about the Fairfield/Wyndham folks being "left out in the cold". We already have Plus Partners and RCI Nightly Stays which seem to offer pretty much what RCI Points does without the automatic deposit to RCI.

MD

mike1536

adahiscout wrote:

luke6 wrote:

Well RCI Points is the new system whereby you are buy a week at a participating resort. You are assigned a week and you are supposed to view it as a 'piece of inventory' no more. It guarantees you a place at your home resort for that particular week. The sales people would prefer that you not get hung up about the week they present you with (at closing) because, under the new RCI Points system, on Jan 1 all the resort owners have their weeks deposited into the bucket. Unless you opt out! In which case you will be staying at your home resort during that week forever - hope you like that 'piece of inventory' for that particular time of the year. I personally would visit Florida during a hurricane if I could steer clear of whiny brats and drunken college students. Anyway, you also receive an allotment of points at closing (and every year that you pay your M dues) that you use for making reservations at other resorts within the chain (Vacation Village, in this example, or RCI catalog resorts, plus rental cars, cruises, Disney, hotels, u name it).

Fascinating information on RCI Points, Luke! I did not realize that they automatically deposited your owned week with RCI every January unless you opted out. That explains why RedWeek exchange information indicated that RCI Points owners can't exchange through RedWeek. Their week is already "spoken for" by RCI!

However, you need not worry about the Fairfield/Wyndham folks being "left out in the cold". We already have Plus Partners and RCI Nightly Stays which seem to offer pretty much what RCI Points does without the automatic deposit to RCI.

MD

You should be able to contact your home resort and book a week with them BEFORE RCI automatically deposits the units for points. I bellieve you have 11-12 months prior to your week to do this. The way I understood it, is that the unit is deposited in the RCI points bank 10 months prior to the usage week. I'm not sure how they determine the 10 month window if you have a floating week.

The latest, directly from RCI, is that owners at RCI POINTS resorts can NEVER rent out either their home resort unit or the time they reserve with their RCI POINTS. This is not a problem if you own no more RCI POINTS than you can and will use, but if you have dreams of sometimes renting out your vacation villas to compensate for your costs, forget it. This is not for you.

If in addition to owning at an RCI POINTS resort you also own at resorts that are not in the RCI POINTS system, you can still rent those out. As long as they are in neither RCI POINTS nor the RCI WEEKS space bank, they are still yours to do with as you like.

I am not trying to bad-mouth RCI POINTS here. That is a more flexable system than RCI WEEKS. It just excludes the rental option. MD

adahiscout

mike1536 wrote:

adahiscout wrote:

luke6 wrote:

Well RCI Points is the new system whereby you are buy a week at a participating resort. You are assigned a week and you are supposed to view it as a 'piece of inventory' no more. It guarantees you a place at your home resort for that particular week. The sales people would prefer that you not get hung up about the week they present you with (at closing) because, under the new RCI Points system, on Jan 1 all the resort owners have their weeks deposited into the bucket. Unless you opt out! In which case you will be staying at your home resort during that week forever - hope you like that 'piece of inventory' for that particular time of the year. I personally would visit Florida during a hurricane if I could steer clear of whiny brats and drunken college students. Anyway, you also receive an allotment of points at closing (and every year that you pay your M dues) that you use for making reservations at other resorts within the chain (Vacation Village, in this example, or RCI catalog resorts, plus rental cars, cruises, Disney, hotels, u name it).

Fascinating information on RCI Points, Luke! I did not realize that they automatically deposited your owned week with RCI every January unless you opted out. That explains why RedWeek exchange information indicated that RCI Points owners can't exchange through RedWeek. Their week is already "spoken for" by RCI!

However, you need not worry about the Fairfield/Wyndham folks being "left out in the cold". We already have Plus Partners and RCI Nightly Stays which seem to offer pretty much what RCI Points does without the automatic deposit to RCI.

MD

You should be able to contact your home resort and book a week with them BEFORE RCI automatically deposits the units for points. I bellieve you have 11-12 months prior to your week to do this. The way I understood it, is that the unit is deposited in the RCI points bank 10 months prior to the usage week. I'm not sure how they determine the 10 month window if you have a floating week.

===========

The latest, directly from RCI, is that owners at RCI POINTS resorts can NEVER rent out either their home resort unit or the time they reserve with their RCI POINTS. This is not a problem if you own no more RCI POINTS than you can and will use, but if you have dreams of sometimes renting out your vacation villas to compensate for your costs, forget it. This is not for you.

If in addition to owning at an RCI POINTS resort you also own at resorts that are not in the RCI POINTS system, you can still rent those out. As long as they are in neither RCI POINTS nor the RCI WEEKS space bank, they are still yours to do with as you like.

I am not trying to bad-mouth RCI POINTS here. That is a more flexable system than RCI WEEKS. It just excludes the rental option. MD