VRI bill arrived

Just received my VRI bill for Cape Cod Holiday Estates. The charges include operating costs, tax, capital improvement, AND a special assessment for a grand total of $2,795!!!!!

Are they kidding??

Can someone tell me what capital improvements are vs. special assessment - adding insult to injury.

Any outraged owners out there like to comment?

Capital improvements includes such things as replacing all the sewer lines
@ a resort or they are adding or upgrading roads/highways, side walks, at the resort.

What were last years MFs? That MF times 52 weeks a year is over $145,000 per unit. WOW! I hope you were sitting down when you read that.

Figured you call the resort for an explaination. RCI lists this as a Silver Crown resort and you are 3 miles from the beach. How many units are there?

I am not an owner, but have read other threads involving resorts in the Cape Cod area that are incurring their own special assessments. After doing a little digging via google, it appears that their is a major sewer/septic project for all of the Cape to protect the waters surrounding it.

....or, I am completely wrong! At any rate, I feel bad for anyone opening up an unexpected bill such as yours.

This website seems to have some good info....
http://www.capekeepers.org/

Sewers are on the way

dmbrand said:

I am not an owner, but have read other threads involving resorts in the Cape Cod area that are incurring their own special assessments. After doing a little digging via google, it appears that their is a major sewer/septic project for all of the Cape to protect the waters surrounding it.

Click to expand...

There is one coming but it has been planned for years (for example the Cove @ Yarmouth already has a $500,000 environmental fund set aside to pay for it when/if it occurs in 2013 as promised). I doubt they would be special assessing now for that.

Keep in mind that VRI is not the bad guy here. VRI does as the HOA directs, and if they are setting aside money for some big projects, the decision wasn't made without a great deal of thought and anguish.

Being on a board of a timeshare will really open your eyes.

Time to bail out. Not on the beach! Even a summer unit would not bring that amount, resale.I kick myself in the butt because I didn't bail out on Oceancliff when their SA was levied

Great...I just bought Cape Winds.

In my VRI resort FLB we had a special assessment of about $950 after a hurricane. I thought that was bad but this place must have no reserves.

I must say that after the assessment the resort is really nice now.
I have enjoyed staying there since and was the first to break in my unit
after the remodel which was great.

Made me feel I got my moneys worth. Hope that makes you feel better.

You have to look at the history

chriskre said:

In my VRI resort FLB we had a special assessment of about $950 after a hurricane. I thought that was bad but this place must have no reserves.

Click to expand...

When you see a special assessment - especially a huge one- it is a clear indication that past management/Boards did not properly fund operations and/or reserves. Often you will see it happen when a new management steps in and they have to try to fix years of neglect and underfunding. The worst, IMO, is when the same management that helped create the problem is left in charge to "handle" the fix. Usually they aren't capable of that work or they would have handled it properly to begin with. Of course there can be the occasional situation where a management has recommended funding and collection levels that would support the resort but were ignored by a Board that insists on holding down fees. That is often a very false economy and ends up in the type of massive special assessment we may be seeing here.

All properties require adequate ongoing operational funds as well as reasonable collection of future funding for upgrades, maintenance and repairs. Refusing to acknowledge those needs or stretching the existing buildings, furnishings and fixtures beyond reasonable life spans doesn't save money it leads to large, one time (or, in extreme cases of poor planning multiple large) assessments to rebuild.

In many cases it is not the current Board or Management that is at fault but years of bad management, all too often Developer based management that hold fees artificially "low" to spur sales, that finally cannot be ignored any longer if the resort is going to remain viable. Yes it makes the current management and Board look like the heavies but they are really only doing the work at the going cost that must get done.

Seems like a condo problem everywhere these days. I live in a condo and we have a 100K deficit and no one wants to cut back services or lay any workers off. I don't know how long we can continue but people just love to put their head in the sand and not deal with the issues. We have 10 delinquent owners owing more than 100K and we are almost powerless to do anything until the banks foreclose on them which they seem to not be doing these days.

I know it's frustrating for me because I am on the board and I'm the heavy when it comes to bringing to light reality. Everyone thinks I'm being unreasonable because I want to cancel the pool service and have an employee go to the pool store and take a water sample with him. I used to have a house with a pool and I did this myself so I don't see the big deal. The community did manage to listen when it came to painting and we saved $100K and only spent 10K by paying the employees we already have a little extra to paint.

I guess when we have no water and the trash is piling up the chutes then they'll vote to do the hard things that need to be done to get our budget back in line with reality.

It's not easy these days. No one wants to face reality. I'm afraid with so many timeshares that I own I may become a victim of more than one poorly managed resort or the victim of the economy when no one wants to pay their maintenace fee bills. I can only hope for the best. I guess we're all in the same boat.

At CCHE this has nothing to do with sewers, etc.
For the last few years the MF has been just short of $700. The buildings have been kept in a reasonably good state of repair, but the BOD wants to do a complete remodeling job, presumably to make it more attractive for exchanges, which it already is. It is a MAJOR overhaul.
The resort has been in operation for about 25 years and for most of that time has been run by the owners.
VRI may not be the heavy in this, but I bet they put the bug in the ears of the BOD.

IMHO - one strength that VRI brings when it is brought on board as a management company is a realistic assessment of reserves funding. VRI has lots of experience managing resorts, and they have a good idea of what the expected life is for various facilities and the replacement costs.

In almost all cases VRI will report that reserves have been significantly underfunded.

At that point it is up to the Board to decide how to respond. Some boards stick their heads in the sand. Some boards shoot the messenger. Some boards examine the VRI report carefully and decide where they agree and where they disagree.

But in the end it's the board's decision as to how to resond.

***

Also, as others have mentioned, the fee you receive is not set by VRI. It's set by the Board of Directors for the resort. VRI is not assessing you the amount in your statement; your resort - and the Board elected by you and your fellow owners - establishes the amount.

If you have a beef, it should be directed to your board and not to VRI.

BAIL!!! No sense putting good money after bad especially if you don.t have a prime red week. You can take the SA moiney and buy an oceanfront T^S. See if the BOD will tell you how many units the HOA now owns and what it will own after SA. All thev money in the world will not put the TS on the ocean where the value of Cape Cod lies.


ps: This SA will cause a lot of owners to bail out leaving the rest with higher MF. Good luck.

It all depends how you "walk"

e.bram said:

BAIL!!! No sense putting good money after bad especially if you don.t have a prime red week. You can take the SA moiney and buy an oceanfront T^S.

Click to expand...

With VRI watching the store I can guarantee that the OP can't just "walk away" from the resort by simply stopping payments without the appropriate serious consequences. If they sell it, pay someone who accepts it or give it away to a new owner then "walking away" would be fine as someone picks up the responsibility.

timeos2 said:

With VRI watching the store I can guarantee that the OP can't just "walk away" from the resort by simply stopping payments without the appropriate serious consequences. If they sell it, pay someone who accepts it or give it away to a new owner then "walking away" would be fine as someone picks up the responsibility.

Click to expand...

Don’t walk away! Ask the Board to take your unit back.

They will gladly take it back, and then give it to VRI or more correctly VRI DEVELOPMENT & SALES INC. (VDS). VDS will sell it to the VI club and it is a WIN WIN for everybody.

The remaining owners pay for the resort improvement and get a better resort, VRI gets a nice profit on the sale of your unit, VI Club members get more units in their club, and VRI gets a non-cut lifetime management contract at your resort.
It was already done at Riverview and The Cove @ Yarmouth on Cape Cod and everybody is happy.

Fact or possibility?

jbercu said:

Don’t walk away! Ask the Board to take your unit back.

They will gladly take it back, and then give it to VRI or more correctly VRI DEVELOPMENT & SALES INC. (VDS). VDS will sell it to the VI club and it is a WIN WIN for everybody.

The remaining owners pay for the resort improvement and get a better resort, VRI gets a nice profit on the sale of your unit, VI Club members get more units in their club, and VRI gets a non-cut lifetime management contract at your resort.
It was already done at Riverview and The Cove @ Yarmouth on Cape Cod and everybody is happy.

Click to expand...

Are you sure that the resort is accepting weeks back at this time - especially if there is a SA pending? VI stopped taking weeks into their system over a year ago (don't need more inventory) at the Cove and another resort I know they had been taking. It is true that the program helped everyone as, at least at The Cove @ Yarmouth. It has helped get all the always tough to sell blue week time sold and placed with paying owners, thus eliminating one of the big issues with seasonal area resorts. And they did it by being creative, giving value to time that usually has none (and without involving RCI/II or other resorts to get unfair trades to create artificial value) so this has been an extremely positive program. If it is underway at CCHE then by all means do what you feel serves you best but if not you can be sure that VRI is doing their best to work with the Board and get value for owners as well as a beautiful resort owners want to use and that has a great trade value. That type of progressive management is what VRI does extremely well.

You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Only smoke and mirrors can give value to off season non oceanfront Cape Cod.

Making everyone have value should be the goal. Not to disband timeshare as a concept

e.bram said:

You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Only smoke and mirrors can give value to off season non oceanfront Cape Cod.

Click to expand...

It can never be a summer, prime time value anymore than my Wastegate can be a desirable organization/resort to own. But it (and Wastegate) can be a value for the amount of money paid annually thus helping to preserve the owners value and the financial stability of the resorts - a true win for everyone that I would think you would applaud rather than denigrate. Unless all you want to do is try to say any timeshare has no value in which case proving that they do disproves your theory. If that's the case sorry to disappoint you!

I'm conflicted because I love the resort. It isn't beach front but only 3 miles from the beach, plus each unit is a stand alone house.

The units need some upgrading but not a TOTAL overhaul as proposed.

My fear is that the dependable owners will have to bail out due to this high assessment, leaving CCHE and VRI with more delinquent units.

Corky said:

I'm conflicted because I love the resort. It isn't beach front but only 3 miles from the beach, plus each unit is a stand alone house.

The units need some upgrading but not a TOTAL overhaul as proposed.

My fear is that the dependable owners will have to bail out due to this high assessment, leaving CCHE and VRI with more delinquent units.

Click to expand...

I'll throw in one more though based on those comments.

I have lived through three very similar (for those times) high SA's at resorts we loved. In all cases after we got over the shock (and yes, disappointment) over the extra cost the end results were greatly improved resorts and, to my surprise, virtually no drop off in owner payments due to those SA's. Long term all three have been a positive and fees have stabilized after the work was done. In at least two cases the resort has been careful to plan for future improvements to avoid anymore SA's, while the third (under Developer rather than owner control) has yet to prove they learned a lesson. If they have then all three will be well worth the costs.

Cape Cod Holiday Estates Bill / Special Assessment

Corky and Others,


We are Members of Cape Cod Holiday Estates....About two weeks ago we got a letter as usual from the codo board. It did mention doing a total overhaul of the units.
We shot off an email right away, due to the fact that we want to know was this just a thought , was this something we voted on? We were not asked to vote. We got a response...we have sent your concerns to the board and you will receive a response...we did this 3 times now and still as of Today No Response.

The information for example they had in there was 8,000 dollars to paint the inside of each and every unit. Thats 8,000 each unit. My husband a painter and last year we painted our house inside and out for 3,000 dollars. Right away we knew 8,000 just to paint inside one unit is way way too much money.

Also let me tell you that each year, same thing we would get a review of the year just as we did two weeks ago and It would list this is why your fee is going up AGAIN.... And it showed the improvements. In 25 years we have totally rebuilt almost these units. IT's been mattresses, to curtins, to microwaves, to decks...the list goes on and on..and to be honest they we would go down there and see now difference and the answer would be well we are doing it over the year so your unit may be done at a later date, etc.

SO, to tell us now we need a major overhaul after we have been paying and told update have been done year after year is the sin on their part. Also their update are almost a wish list, they asked if we wanted to vote on one thing, should we take out the sliders in the units and replace them with sliders or would we like to see a picture window.

Hey when people are at war, some are not working, taxes are going up just to live in our home...do we really care.......leave the sliders that are there!

If this were for roads or a natural disaster I could maybe see it, But this is a total makeover for a unit I use once a year. Would we all love to totally do our homes over right now.

My concern is that members are not organizing and asking questions. Someone needs to.
I wonder Corky what you will do..?

Thanks
Tree
tree1a@aol.com

Yup. Wonder why it takes $100,000.00 to do a $25,000.00 renovation? Who is hiring the contractors? Been there, had it done to me. Only good thing is that they sprung it on you before '10 MF. Walkers can save both.

Double check that one. It can't be that high.

TREE said:

The information for example they had in there was 8,000 dollars to paint the inside of each and every unit. Thats 8,000 each unit. My husband a painter and last year we painted our house inside and out for 3,000 dollars. Right away we knew 8,000 just to paint inside one unit is way way too much money.

Click to expand...

Read it again or ask the Board to clarify that line item. It almost has to be an error or a misread of the budgeted amount. That CANNOT be correct (if it is then you have a real valid complaint and should question the whole renovation very closely!)

Corky said:

I'm conflicted because I love the resort. It isn't beach front but only 3 miles from the beach, plus each unit is a stand alone house.
The units need some upgrading but not a TOTAL overhaul as proposed.
My fear is that the dependable owners will have to bail out due to this high assessment, leaving CCHE and VRI with more delinquent units.

Click to expand...

Been there, had it done to me.

VRI has a lot of experience with this method of renovations. The percentage of defaulting units has already been projected. Does it matter if the painting is $4000 and everyone pays, or $8000 and only 50% of the owners pay? The remodel will be completed and successful, and it will leave CCHE with high assessments and more delinquency.
If you walk, you most likely will have two options or a combination of both:

1) You will be able to buy a unit back for $1 on e-bay, you most likely will be the only bidder, after the remodel is complete.

2) You will be able to rent the unit for half the annual dues, after the remodel.