Hilton affiliates vs hilton Owned

What are the potential drawbacks from owning a Hilton affiliate resort vs. Hilton owned resort? I am looking to add more points and was wondering if buying an affiliate would be a good idea if I could get it for less?

flexonguy said:

What are the potential drawbacks from owning a Hilton affiliate resort vs. Hilton owned resort? I am looking to add more points and was wondering if buying an affiliate would be a good idea if I could get it for less?

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These issues have been discussed here:
1. One day, in a far-away time, Hilton could jettison its contract with your affiliate or as happened in one case recently, in a hissy-fit, the affiliate could terminate its contract with Hilton. The least likely candidate is Bay Club, Hawaii, which seems to have been adopted by Hilton as a favorite stepchild.

While your personal membership in HGVC might not be affected (grandfathered in), you would not be able to sell it and your resort may need to arrange another trading partnership to remain viable.

2. Reservations using next year's point allottment may be restricted until you've paid your next year's membership dues. This is designed to prevent folks from tying-up units, not-paying, and still having use of their home resort... not that anyone would actually do this.

I own 7000 points at LV on the Strip (purchased from HGVC) and 7000 Bay Club points that I just purchased resale. Here are a couple of differences that I've noticed.

1. Points are stored in separate accounts due to separate rules with affiliated resorts.

2. There is definitely a difference in how you can borrow points with the affiliated account. I haven't figured it out exactly, but from statements about not being able to use the points until maintenance fees are paid seems correct.

3. RCI access is not available through the portal on the Bay Club account (I have to call the HGVC reps). HGVC confirmed this difference, but could not tell me why. My guess is that this has something to do with the Bay Club losing their Gold Crown status. We'll see if this changes when/if they get it back.

Hope that helps

- E

SDtwins said:

RCI access is not available through the [HGVC] portal on the Bay Club account (I have to call the HGVC reps). HGVC confirmed this difference, but could not tell me why.

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Gold or not, points are points, and I'd think that, if you are signed onto your "Bay Club" account, HGVC should be able to pass these thru the portal. My guess is that its an issue for HGVC's system which their IT-peep ought to fix.

I'm a Bay Club owner and have through the HGVC website been able to get onto RCI. I'm surprised to hear you are having trouble. I have not booked anything, but it appears that I would be able to on the website.

Thanks. I called again and got it corrected. I now have RCI portal access on both the LV and Bay Club accounts.

- E

I have a seaworld (SW) and a bay club (BC) account. My SW account is Elite status. So I only use my SW account for all my activities.

BC has the restriction that you must pay your MFs before you use the points for that year. When I am ready to pay my MF and use my BC points, I simply pay online, then call HGVC and transfer all my points into my SW account.

My SW account, you need not pay your MFs in advance, but rather just when they are due. You just need to be a member in good standing in order to use your points before the MFs are paid.

Not a problem, I use my SW points first and if I have run out I then pay my BC MFs and get the points transfered. Usually that is only a month or two before the MFs are due. In a way I don't mind it as it forces me to spread out the MF payments and that way they are not all paid around the same time period.

I never actually book anything from my BC account.

Additional restriction at MarBrisa

I don't think this will probably impact you as there are probably not many MarBrisa resales out there yet, but the HGVC membership does not transfer with sale. I believe this is the first affiliate resort to have that caveat, but a resale buyer of my MarBrisa week would only own the MarBrisa week and could not participate in HGVC.

Emily

I'll just add that apparently not all affiliates are treated the same. Bay Club seems to be treated differently than my 4 Southwest Florida affiliate weeks (at 3 different resorts). My affiliate weeks and my HGVC developed resort weeks are all in a single account. And I routinely make reservations using my affiliate week points before the mf's are paid.