Thinking about buying Marriott TS at Surfwatch

Anyone currently own with Marriott have any pro's and con's to share.

We really like the option to convert to reward points, which from what we were told is not available if I buy resale. Is this true?

Also, we are considering buying the silver week at Surfwatch because we always travel the week of Christmas and have the intention of returning to Hilton Head in the future. Are we making a mistake by buying 3 BDR silver week?

Any downsides to purchasing Marriott from personal experiences?

Is it fairly easy to trade within the Marriott family?

How about trading through II?

Are the Marriott points system a good value and easy to use? We were offered 150,000 incentive points to purchase and can trade EOY for 85,000 points instead of using the week.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreicated.

Surfwatch

stpindell said:

Anyone currently own with Marriott have any pro's and con's to share.

We really like the option to convert to reward points, which from what we were told is not available if I buy resale. Is this true?

Also, we are considering buying the silver week at Surfwatch because we always travel the week of Christmas and have the intention of returning to Hilton Head in the future. Are we making a mistake by buying 3 BDR silver week?

Any downsides to purchasing Marriott from personal experiences?

Is it fairly easy to trade within the Marriott family?

How about trading through II?

Are the Marriott points system a good value and easy to use? We were offered 150,000 incentive points to purchase and can trade EOY for 85,000 points instead of using the week.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreicated.

Click to expand...

For an offseason week like that, you can rent outright as a non-owner and save thousands over the years, given both the purchase price and the annual maint. fee, which for an off-season week is the same as a summer week. The maintenance fee alone is fast approaching $800+, if not already there, and will soon be close to $1000 within a few years. I would NEVER pay that maint. fee, then turn it in for points (or even get an offseason week, period, with THAT maint. fee---we did a decade ago, BUT we also got huge incentive points, much more than today....and we probably would do different today by buying resale). Trading for points results in a "loss of value"---i.e., 85,000 points won't even get you a full week at a category 6 or 7 hotel , and you'll therefore need 1.5-2 weeks to get a full week, and then you'll still only get a one-room hotel stay.) That's a net loss of value! Dec is easy to get anyway, even renting as a stranger, or trading a non-Marriott week. Most of us longtime Marriott owners realize that the points system is much devalued nowadays, compared to what we could do with it a decade ago. It's simply NOT worth buying anything but RESALE, and i'll bet the argument from experienced Marriott owners will be 10 to 1 in favor of that approach. We bought 5 weeks from Marriott, and we love it (we're huge Marriott fans, no doubt), and we got tons of points back then for incentive-to-buy, but we've never traded for points, and never will! We get them by other means, like using the Marriott card and taking resort tours. jme

buy resale - save thousands

I agree. You really shouldn't buy from Marriott direct.

We bought 2 weeks resale Marriott and am waiting for FROR to go thru for my 3rd
Marriott week.

Marriott MF are high - but to me they are worth it.

It is not worth it (to me) to ever buy from the developers.

JMO.

Don't be blinded by the points. You can buy a Silver week at one of the other Marriott HHI oceanfront resorts for considerably less that a developer week. Silver weeks sell at substantial discount. You won't be able to get a 3 bedroom at the other resorts, as I believe they only have 2 bedrooms. You could probably by two Silver 2 bedroom weeks for a lot less than a developer 3 bedroom Surf Watch.

I sent a private e-mail.

Instead, I'd buy a resale at one of the Marriotts with lockoffs, and you can just deposit one side and exchange into HHI during a winter week, yes, even Christmas. Since the 2 and 3 brs at SurfWatch do not lockoff you're paying top price for maint fees without being able to turn your purchase into a week of use and a week to deposit/exchange. And like Marty said, points is not a good reason to pay all that money. JMO but if I were you I'd be on the lookout for a resale at Marriott's Manor Club Sequel or another lockoff in the MVCI system.