The long goodbye to DRI

azfamily · Sep 20, 2015

Hmmmm....

We were ILX and paid the extra (originally $170 per year, now $220 per year) to join the "Club Select".

If you opted not to join the Club, maybe you don't get II included.

I suppose that I assume everybody received this. Since I never saw/don't have the documents for people that opted not to join the club, there is no way that I can verify.

I guess call diamond just to confirm you're not getting a double membership. However I have to assume you are correct that your membership does not include it.

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post-it · Sep 20, 2015

gerena said:
azfamily said:

People that remain ILX have a few basic options (for travel):

Diamond does give you Interval International membership already though, included with your maintenance fees.

I was not aware of this? I have been paying Interval Membership separately. Yuck. Can you tell me where this information is. I thought I had read everything. We are not Club members--we opted out. Just have the Diamond membership, I guess. We trade the weeks through II.

Click to expand...

Interval is in your Club membership fees.

azfamily · Sep 20, 2015

GERENA is saying that when Diamond took over ILX they did not join a club, so they are not getting II included.

I have not heard of that either, but it might be possible.

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T_R_Oglodyte · Sep 20, 2015

azfamily said:
GERENA is saying that when Diamond took over ILX they did not join a club, so they are not getting II included.

I have not heard of that either, but it might be possible.

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II only comes if you are part of the Club. If you are not part of the Club you can join any exchange company that will accept the unit for deposit.

That's how Diamond resorts wind up being available from other exchange companies.

friedshrimp · Oct 4, 2015

Passepartout said:
Sorry for your difficulties. DRI SUX! Not the resorts, but their business practices. Buying troubled resorts and jacking up MFs on owners is a pi$$poor way to expand their business.

But clearly, your best option is.....drum roll..... option B. Pay them the $500 and be done with it. It is worth a few hundred at best anyway on today's market.

If timeshare has not turned you off entirely, a nice usable sub $1000 with annual use and sub $1k MFs (honestly, MFs have gone up across the board that renting is very viable with no buy in)

Welcome to TUG. We truly feel for you and others in the same leaky boat. Pay them their blood money and kiss DRI goodbye.

Jim

You do understand the reason most resorts get into trouble to begin with is by having undervalued MFs?

friedshrimp · Oct 4, 2015

azfamily said:
I hope that ILX (now DRI) people who read these posts, take all the opinions posted here with a grain of salt.

There are a lot of opinions here but too many facts are being omitted.

I'm not saying that people shouldn't be disappointed by some of the changes that occurred when DRI took over, but be honest with yourselves about the circumstances.

Ultimately DRI did "save" the ILX owners from having NOTHING (due to ILX bankruptcy).

DRI does cost more, because DRI is a more expansive and expensive/quality timeshare than ILX was.

I too was disappointed by the fee increases. Yet I factually understand them.

If anyone has questions about the DRI takeover, feel free to ask and I will be happy to give an unbiased, non opinionated account of what changed and why.

It seems that a lot of the posts here are simply opinions and not the actual what and why of what happened.

If you are just someone that does not want your timeshare, this is a bad place to be under DRI. If you want to use your timeshare, DRI actually has a pretty decent infrastructure.

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Agreed. And DRI has never forced anyone to join the Club or convert to points when they take over a company (I used to be with Sunterra). Yes, they can raise the MFs quite a bit but if the higher MFs had been on place all along by the original company, those companies may not have gone into bankruptcy to begin with (IMO, the super low MFs is what caused the trouble).

friedshrimp · Oct 4, 2015

gerena said:
azfamily said:

People that remain ILX have a few basic options (for travel):

Diamond does give you Interval International membership already though, included with your maintenance fees.

I was not aware of this? I have been paying Interval Membership separately. Yuck. Can you tell me where this information is. I thought I had read everything. We are not Club members--we opted out. Just have the Diamond membership, I guess. We trade the weeks through II.

Click to expand...

The Gold II membership is for members of the Club only (and is paid by the additional $250 Club membership fee). If you are not a member of the Club you must maintain your own RCI or II membership.

nuwermj · Oct 4, 2015

Members of Premiere Club Connection, Monarch Club Connection, and Florida Club Connection are not members of THE Club. Diamond does provide them II accounts.

friedshrimp · Oct 4, 2015

nuwermj said:
Members of Premiere Club Connection, Monarch Club Connection, and Florida Club Connection are not members of THE Club. Diamond does provide them II accounts.

Sorry but I disagree. Those are simply other collections within DRI the same as the US, Hawaii, California, and Europe collections. Some members in the collections you mentioned most certainly are in THE Club otherwise no one in DRI could make reservations into those resorts.

nuwermj · Oct 4, 2015

They are also Clubs similar to THE Club, but not THE Club. Here are the member guides for each.

Premiere Club Connection Booklet
https://cmstest.diamondresorts.com/sites/default/files/PCC_2014_2015_BOOK_0.pdf

Monarch Grand Vacations Club Connection Booklet
https://cmstest.diamondresorts.com/...ch-Grand-Vacation-Club-Collection-Booklet.pdf

Florida Club Connection Booklet
https://cmstest.diamondresorts.com/sites/default/files/florida-club-connection-booklet-test.pdf

friedshrimp · Oct 4, 2015

nuwermj said:
They are also Clubs similar to THE Club, but not THE Club. Here are the member guides for each.

Premiere Club Connection Booklet
https://cmstest.diamondresorts.com/sites/default/files/PCC_2014_2015_BOOK_0.pdf

Monarch Grand Vacations Club Connection Booklet
https://cmstest.diamondresorts.com/...ch-Grand-Vacation-Club-Collection-Booklet.pdf

Florida Club Connection Booklet
https://cmstest.diamondresorts.com/sites/default/files/florida-club-connection-booklet-test.pdf

Interesting. What I find unusual (I only looked at the first one) is that many (if not most) of those resorts are in the US Collection (in fact, my home resort of Powhatan Plantation is listed and that was a Sunterra Resort that had nothing to do with Premiere). So while members who moved to that collection/club may not be full DRI members with access to all DRI Club inventory, I'll bet dollars to donuts that pay a Club fee to that collection which includes the II membership. Versus say a fixed week owner at one of the old Premiere resorts that doesn't belong to one of the new mini-clubs within DRI.

nuwermj · Oct 4, 2015

friedshrimp said:
... So while members who moved to that collection/club may not be full DRI members with access to all DRI Club inventory,

Owners do not move into these collections or clubs. Diamond acquired existing clubs and replaced them with these Club Connection programs. Diamond does not sell VOI in these Clubs. They try to sell Club Connection members full THE Club membership. When these sales (or conversions) are successful, intervals backing the ownership are moved from the Premiere/Monarch/Florida collection to the US or Hawaii or Latin American Collection.

friedshrimp said:
I'll bet dollars to donuts that pay a Club fee to that collection which includes the II membership.

Of course, and that is what azfamily meant when he/she wrote "Diamond does give you Interval International membership already."

tschwa2 · Oct 4, 2015

Resale owners in the trust collections are not eligible for Club membership (without an additional hefty points buy in). These resale owners do not pay any club dues that include exchange fee membership. They do pay a line item in their MF for management of the trust based on the number of points they own. I believe Club members pay this in addition to their club fees. In fact with the exception of resale points owners of the Monarch collection most resale points owners are not eligible to use their points with either II or RCI even if they were willing to pay for their own individual membership. My understanding is resale owners can only use their points to book within their trust. They are not given any other option to bank or use their week with an exchange company.

Even if an owner with membership in the Club sells, the points revert back to being good only in the trust collection where the points are deeded. This is another reason why unlike Marriott or other high end clubs that DRI aspires to be like, resale DRI points are worth $0.

mysticah · Oct 5, 2015

azfamily said:
I hope that ILX (now DRI) people who read these posts, take all the opinions posted here with a grain of salt.

There are a lot of opinions here but too many facts are being omitted.

I'm not saying that people shouldn't be disappointed by some of the changes that occurred when DRI took over, but be honest with yourselves about the circumstances.

Ultimately DRI did "save" the ILX owners from having NOTHING (due to ILX bankruptcy).

DRI does cost more, because DRI is a more expansive and expensive/quality timeshare than ILX was.

I too was disappointed by the fee increases. Yet I factually understand them.

If anyone has questions about the DRI takeover, feel free to ask and I will be happy to give an unbiased, non opinionated account of what changed and why.

It seems that a lot of the posts here are simply opinions and not the actual what and why of what happened.

If you are just someone that does not want your timeshare, this is a bad place to be under DRI. If you want to use your timeshare, DRI actually has a pretty decent infrastructure.

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Azfamily you are obviously very happy with your relationship with DRI, and you seem to be well versed on how they work, good for you! Have you ever considered a career with DRI? Perhaps you should ;-)

Allow me to make some things perfectly clear:

1- The information I have provided here, as relates to MY SITUATION, are FACTS, they are NOT opinions. Frankly, I couldn't care less about the "actual what and why of what happened" because that is all water under the bridge and not relevant to my situation.

2- "Ultimately DRI did "save" the ILX owners from having NOTHING (due to ILX bankruptcy)."

^^^^^ that would be an 'opinion' since the bankruptcy didn't fully playout, no one can say what the end result would have been. But I will concede your opinion that ILX owners would have been left with nothing, and in MY case, that would have been preferable to a DRI takeover. Who knows? I may have even been able to write the loss off on my taxes.

3- "Did the contract you originally bought change, yes."

And there's the rub! In order for a contract to be valid there has to be an offer, an acceptance and a meeting of the minds. What we bought may "no longer exist" but I can damn sure guarantee you that there was NO acceptance or meeting of the minds when DRI materially changed our contract!

4- "This is what you originally bought, so how upset can you be? Diamond retained what you originally bought)."

In case you haven't been keeping up on current events, the points required for a weeks stay at MY DEEDED RESORT far exceed the number of points DRI arbitrarily assigned to my deed. Setting aside the loss of flex weeks that I have previously addressed, I bought and paid for a deeded week that I can't use unless I buy more points - so NO this is NOT what I originally bought!

Look at it like this: Say I bought a fully loaded Ford car. In addition to paying for all those extras, part of what I paid for was a bumper to bumper, lifetime warrantee that carried an annual deductible. But then Ford filed bankruptcy and they were taken over by Lincoln. Lincoln informs me that they have removed all the extras I paid for because they don't fit their business model. In addition, my deductible has tripled, but I should be grateful because without them I would have to maintain my own car (at a fraction of the cost). And last but not least, they took the engine out of my car, but that's ok, I can buy it back from them.

Maybe the DRI cheerleaders can understand it now.

friedshrimp · Oct 5, 2015

mysticah said:
In case you haven't been keeping up on current events, the points required for a weeks stay at MY DEEDED RESORT far exceed the number of points DRI arbitrarily assigned to my deed. Setting aside the loss of flex weeks that I have previously addressed, I bought and paid for a deeded week that I can't use unless I buy more points - so NO this is NOT what I originally bought!

I'm sorry but this is what I disagree with. I owned at Powhatan Plantation which at the time was an independent timeshare. It was then bought by Sunterra. Yes, they tried to get me into their points but I said no and continued to use my fixed week as I always had. Then along comes Diamond and same thing. Yes, I eventually, voluntarily, converted to points and now, depending on time of year, it costs more or fewer points to get into the same unit but I voluntarily converted to points.

To get one other thing off my chest, as a 21 year, retired USAF MSgt myself, you are using your husband's job as your excuse to not use the timeshare the first 10 years. I can state emphatically that your husband was not deployed/TDY for 10 years straight nor were you or any possible children tied down to base without the option to leave without your husband. Was I able to timeshare every year due to my military commitment, no. But we did take many vacations timesharing, also my wife and the kids went to some on their own when I was unable, and family an friends got to use it as well. You had ample opportunity to use the timeshare but for your own reasons, chose not to.......but don't blame the USAF for your decision to not use your timeshare.

mysticah · Oct 5, 2015

friedshrimp said:
I'm sorry but this is what I disagree with. I owned at Powhatan Plantation which at the time was an independent timeshare. It was then bought by Sunterra. Yes, they tried to get me into their points but I said no and continued to use my fixed week as I always had. Then along comes Diamond and same thing. Yes, I eventually, voluntarily, converted to points and now, depending on time of year, it costs more or fewer points to get into the same unit but I voluntarily converted to points.

To get one other thing off my chest, as a 21 year, retired USAF MSgt myself, you are using your husband's job as your excuse to not use the timeshare the first 10 years. I can state emphatically that your husband was not deployed/TDY for 10 years straight nor were you or any possible children tied down to base without the option to leave without your husband. Was I able to timeshare every year due to my military commitment, no. But we did take many vacations timesharing, also my wife and the kids went to some on their own when I was unable, and family an friends got to use it as well. You had ample opportunity to use the timeshare but for your own reasons, chose not to.......but don't blame the USAF for your decision to not use your timeshare.

We did not voluntarily change to points and were not given the same options you were.

Please re-read what I said. "... we did NOT have the luxury of planning our leave well in advance..." I refuse to get into the specifics of my husbands career, suffice it to say, his time was less his own than many and we lost more leave than we took. I never said, nor did I imply, he was deployed or on TDY for ten years. I said the availability and advance booking were not compatible with his duties and schedule. It is what it is, I am not blaming the USAF.

azfamily · Oct 5, 2015

Mysticah,

There is quite a bit that I could reply to your post, but you're absolutely correct, at this point it's water under the bridge.

Regarding your bullet point #1:
Trying to apply what happened with the Diamond takeover to your situation is impossible. There is no viable scenario under which an owner can stop paying maintenance fees and there be any usable outcome.

Bullet point #2:

You mention that in YOUR case bankruptcy would have been preferable.

I suppose this is accurate. Because what would've happened, is the same amount of bills would've been due by the club, and without money or Diamond saving ILX, special assessments would've been issued on top of maintenance fees and things would've really gotten out-of-control.

Again, in your situation this might have been preferable since you weren't paying your bills anyway.

However, those of us that were paying our debts, and trying to maintain use of our timeshare, would've paid the extra assessments. This certainly would've been way worse than maintenance fees going up.

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azfamily · Oct 5, 2015

To your last point (#4), how many points were you assigned?
I believe the point conversion was very accurate/fair.

Diamond DID change the way that usage was delivered.

I was EOY but was converted to 4,250 points ANNUALLY.
The design of this was to use those Diamond points all at once (EOY), if you still wanted a week at a time.

Currently a week at Los Abrigados runs about 6,300 points.

I also owned at Los Abrigados. It seems that we had the same/similar original contract.

As far as Flex Weeks, what is that exactly?

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youppi · Oct 6, 2015

Hi,
This is an equivalent of 8500 EOY (2 bdrm family mid season or a 1 bdrm peak season at Los Abrigados) that you have now in DRI points (4250 pts EY).
What did you own with ILX ? Sorry if you already posted the answer but I can't find the info in your previous posts. I'm blind.

thanks

azfamily · Oct 6, 2015

This is exactly what I had, every other year two bedroom. Which is why I say I think the conversion rate was fair.

My question is, what does MYSTICHA think flex weeks are?

Are you just considering this floating weeks and not a fixed week?

Because I had the same thing too.

Also she alludes to the fact that Diamond took this away somehow.

With the Diamond point system, you couldn't be more flexible than with points.

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youppi · Oct 6, 2015

Thanks.
I'm just curious.
How much they charge you to convert ?
Did they propose you a rebate if you bought more points at the time of conversion ?

In my case I was a Sunterra Point owner. So, when DRI took over Sunterra, nothing changed except that DRI increased the MF but improved the resorts quality. I had nothing to pay to join the Club because The Club points system was Sunterra and DRI just continue it. So, no conversion in my case. Number of points at each Sunterra resorts didn't change. DRI was a week system before they took over Sunterra. They add their Polo Tower in the Club and after that they started many acquisition and added more affiliation resorts. The only problem is the number of point requires at each new resorts that is often too high compared to the rental value at those same resorts for a week. Depending how much you pay up-front for your points, the saving cost by using point compared to renting must be enough high to recover quickly your investment. There is why today with all the rental by owner close to MF makes owning a timeshare less desirable.

T_R_Oglodyte · Oct 6, 2015

azfamily said:
I was EOY but was converted to 4,250 points ANNUALLY.
The design of this was to use those Diamond points all at once (EOY), if you still wanted a week at a time.

The potential problem with that conversion is that the early reservation window (10 to 13 months before checkin) can only use current year points; i.e., So if you are only getting 4250 points per year, you can't reserve that 8500 point week until the 10-month window when it becomes open to all Club members.

The way around that is to get a grandfathering letter at the time of conversion that gives you a right to use two allotments with the home resort advantage period.

youppi · Oct 6, 2015

No. At the beginning of 2015, you bank your 2015 points (4250) to 2016 and you pay 75% of your 2016 MF and you can use the full 8500 pts 2016 at 13 month in advance (book in Jan 2015 for a Feb 2016 reservation).

In Jan 2014, I paid 75% of my MF for my 15000 pts 2015. I booked 2 weeks at KBC (13000 pts) for Feb/Mar 2015 (13 months in advanced). In Jan 2015, I banked my remaining 2000 pts 2015 to 2016 and I paid 75% of my 2016 MF (15000 pts) and I booked 2 weeks at Poipu (17000 pts) for Feb/Mar 2016 (13 months in advanced)

mysticah · Oct 6, 2015

azfamily said:
Mysticah,

Again, in your situation this might have been preferable since you weren't paying your bills anyway.

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Lol You might want to start reading this post from the beginning.

DRI assigned 3500 points to our EOY deeded week, to be doled out at 1750 per year. As you can plainly see, it would take 3-4 years of banking points to be able to stay for ONE week.

Do I even need to point out the obvious re: time limits for banked points? Or that this effectively rendered our timeshare useless? You said it yourself: "Currently a week at Los Abrigados runs about 6,300 points."

I believe I explained flex weeks early on and it has nothing to do with floating/fixed. It was an up-sell item that allowed us the option of purchasing 6 or 8 (IDR) additional weeks EY at a drastically reduced rate. The purchase of this option was precisely why we bought EOY instead of EY.

azfamily said:
"You mention that in YOUR case bankruptcy would have been preferable.

I suppose this is accurate. Because what would've happened, is the same amount of bills would've been due by the club, and without money or Diamond saving ILX, special assessments would've been issued on top of maintenance fees and things would've really gotten out-of-control."

Ummm, No. That is not how bankruptcy works. You wouldn't have paid anything, the debts would have been discharged in the bankruptcy.

As simply put as possible:

1- ILX goes under with no bailout

End result: A-I lose my deed B-No Vacations for Life®

2- ILX gets bailed out, I take issue with DRI breaching my contract and rendering my timeshare useless so I stop paying them. I become a reluctant 'David' vs 'Goliath'

End result: A-I am out even more $ and potentially my good credit
B-I lose my deed and DRI gets to resell it, Cha-ching for them! C-No Vacations for Life®

3- ILX gets bailed out, I take issue with DRI breaching my contract and rendering my timeshare useless BUT I keep paying their ever increasing fees (because....???)

End result: A-I am out @ $1000 a year for the REST OF MY LIFE
B-I still have my (useless) deed! Woohoo! C-No Vacations for Life®

It should now be abundantly clear to all but the intentionally obtuse or DRI shills, why we have taken the position we have. Therefore, I will no longer engage.

azfamily · Oct 6, 2015

Scratch that, the "copper"/smaller unit which you bought ranges from 3,000 - 3,300 points. I was looking at a 2 bedroom before. So the conversion rate was acceptable.

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The long goodbye to DRI

TUG Review Crew: Veteran