Tom, I don’t think they actually charge the fees at check in; we haven’t been there as an RCI exchange under the current scheme of $30 pppd, but under the old one, the $11 pppd showed up as a charge to the room each day. Otherwise, I completely agree with your analysis.
For us, in RCI points, getting a GL NV 2 BR week would be 52,000 points for most of the year, though there are some weeks that are listed at 45,500. With a decent points trader it costs us just under $6 for 1,000 points, which makes the week cost $300 MF + $239 exchange fee + $315 resort fee less the rebates credit, for a total of $854. If I give up half a day for an update, I can get it down to ~$700 with the typical resort fee discount for doing those. Of course, that doesn’t get us there between January and March, but is between 1/3 and 1/2 the usage fee for a week I own there. I can be pretty happy going down there in the off season, which strikes me as a good move for the Mayan World since this lets them manage there capacity better through differential pricing without actually setting different usage fee prices. I can see why they’re getting a bit of bad publicity from some other owners for exchangers being treated so well for less $ or from exchangers in RM not being treated as well as owners. I’m hoping they find additional ways to sweeten the pot for owners (e.g., offer senior certificates again), but can live with monitoring what changes they make and adjust my choices to them.