PA-
TUG Member
One of the fundamental principals on which ALL timeshares is based is that you are "locking in the price of tomorrow's vacations with today's dollars". Yes, operating costs (maintenance fees) go up, but your acquisition costs are done. If they add new units at a floating unit resort, you don't have to pay another acquisition cost.
Since Worldmark is a non-traditional timeshare, with never-ending development of a points based system, the ability to violate this fundamental principal exists, merely by increasing the number of points required to use their new resorts. Over time, as the number of resorts requiring higher point values increases, there will be increased competition among owners for the lower value resorts, and more owners will also be unable to book the new resorts without another acquisition cost for more points.
Fortunately, the founders of Worldmark included a very important protection against this. They put a clause in the declaration that required the developer to base point values on "relative use" as opposed to cost. Relative use means a 2 bedroom during red season built one year will charge the same points in general as another resort built 10 years later. Of course, the acquisition cost of those points will rise over time, but not the number of points needed.
This model worked exceedingly well for many years. But about 3 years ago, the developer began disregarding this clause in the declaration. Most new resorts now cost more credits. The Worldmark Board of Directors is the only defense that the owners have; and they are mostly current or recently retired employees of the developer. They claim they have no ability to enforce this clause. Now, at the last board meeting, they stated publicly for the first time that they are no longer going to use relative use value as a basis due to "the economic realities of today". The price of resorts has risen drastically over the last 20 years. So why are the realities any different today than they were over the previous 20 years? They aren't.
This opens the doors to major abuse of current owners. Worldmark owners will soon be faced with either selling their ownerships or buying more credits or seeing diminished benefits. The developer justifies this by saying that the owners can still use the old resorts; but over time, as a greater percentage of resorts charge more, it's going to be increasingly difficult to book into the lower value resorts.
I believe this is the beginning of a long, downhill slide for Worldmark. The developer may disagree with that logic, but one thing is for sure. They are violating the declarations, and our board is responsible to enforce them. If you're an owner, I suggest you contact our board and tell them your feelings on this violation.
Since Worldmark is a non-traditional timeshare, with never-ending development of a points based system, the ability to violate this fundamental principal exists, merely by increasing the number of points required to use their new resorts. Over time, as the number of resorts requiring higher point values increases, there will be increased competition among owners for the lower value resorts, and more owners will also be unable to book the new resorts without another acquisition cost for more points.
Fortunately, the founders of Worldmark included a very important protection against this. They put a clause in the declaration that required the developer to base point values on "relative use" as opposed to cost. Relative use means a 2 bedroom during red season built one year will charge the same points in general as another resort built 10 years later. Of course, the acquisition cost of those points will rise over time, but not the number of points needed.
This model worked exceedingly well for many years. But about 3 years ago, the developer began disregarding this clause in the declaration. Most new resorts now cost more credits. The Worldmark Board of Directors is the only defense that the owners have; and they are mostly current or recently retired employees of the developer. They claim they have no ability to enforce this clause. Now, at the last board meeting, they stated publicly for the first time that they are no longer going to use relative use value as a basis due to "the economic realities of today". The price of resorts has risen drastically over the last 20 years. So why are the realities any different today than they were over the previous 20 years? They aren't.
This opens the doors to major abuse of current owners. Worldmark owners will soon be faced with either selling their ownerships or buying more credits or seeing diminished benefits. The developer justifies this by saying that the owners can still use the old resorts; but over time, as a greater percentage of resorts charge more, it's going to be increasingly difficult to book into the lower value resorts.
I believe this is the beginning of a long, downhill slide for Worldmark. The developer may disagree with that logic, but one thing is for sure. They are violating the declarations, and our board is responsible to enforce them. If you're an owner, I suggest you contact our board and tell them your feelings on this violation.