Depositing Vistana Villages into II

Hi all
I am new here. I have been an owner since 2004. We have timeshare at Vistana Villages 2 bedrooms on the odd years. In 2005 we went to Sheraton Plantation, MB. It was beautiful we loved it!! We were supposed to use it again in 2007 but couldn't so we deposited it with II. I really don't understand this whole thing. We put in two resorts... Harborside & one in the Cayman Islands with a few dates but we really haven't heard a word yet. Should I add more resorts or more dates? How long should we wait before we get worried that we won't get anything this year?
We were considering selling because this is all so confusing. They make it sound so easy at the sales pitch but we are lost here. I had a few great people from a yahoo group recommend this forum while helping me so here I am.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Sue

Sue,

Most all owners at Vistana Villages, are members of the Starwood Vacation network SVN and instead of using II to trade into other Starwood resorts they use the internal SVN exchange system. Maybe that is why you're not having the success in trading with II which you expected.

Good Luck

What is this? I don't think I have heard of it.

saw said:

What is this? I don't think I have heard of it.

Click to expand...

Start by reading this information...link

Then read this article on trading with II ......link

Welcome to TUG! There are a couple issues here:

First of all, it looks like you are requesting two very high demand resorts. Maybe your deposit doesn't have enough "pull," to trade for these resorts. The exchange companies put a value on weeks (but they don't provide that info. to owners.) Maybe the week you are depositing has far less value than what you are requesting.

Also, how far in advance are you depositing and requesting? You need to do it a year out.

3rdly, are you searching II online? Owners make some fantastic exchanges by checking what's available everyday and jumping on it as soon as they see something they want.

If you exchange directly through Starwood, instead of going through II, you should have more luck getting Harborside, because it's also a Starwood timeshare. However, since your unit is worth fewer Staroptions (your Starwood trading value) than Harborside, you may only be able to get a 1 bdm., or maybe a 2 bdm. during the off-season. There is a link to the Staroptions chart on the Advice Page that Tom posted above.

We have a member's only board here on TUG called "Sightings," where Tuggers post available exchanges that they see online. If you join TUG (become a paid member) you can access this board.

Also - as far as selling goes, you would be lucky to get 10% of what you paid. Timeshares are like used cars - they depreciate tremendously. So learning to get the most from your timeshare might be a better option.

The two links that Tom posted are great resources for you. After you have a chance to read them, come back and ask your questions.