Use StarOptions to book Hotels

[Sea Six]

This must be new - I never heard of this before. I got an e-mail that tells me I can now use StarOptions to book certain Sheraton and Westin Hotels. Here is the body of the e-mail:

"Vistana Signature Network™ Owners now have even more exciting ways to use StarOptions®. Through VSN Select, you can use StarOptions for stays at select Sheraton® and Westin® hotels in a variety of destinations — without converting to Starpoints® from the Starwood Preferred Guest® program.

Plus, new hotel offers are added each season, providing even more destinations around the world to explore, including Boston, Los Angeles and Grand Cayman.

Choose your hotel and reserve using 2018 StarOptions. Starting at 67,100 StarOptions, you can even combine StarOptions from multiple Vacation Ownership Interests toward your stay. Simply go to your Dashboard on vistana.com to access the VSN Select Hotels and More widget. "


I LOVE THIS! My biggest complaint was that I sometimes had a problem booking all my Options, but now I can book hotels. Most of these (and the list is short) I will never even consider, but I just happened to be looking into the Westin on 7 Mile Beach, Grand Cayman, and it's on the list. I hope they expand this.

 

[tschwa2]

This part seems a bit confusing.
ELIGIBILITY
As an Owner, you can redeem a minimum of 67,100 StarOptions* and up to 200,000 per year. You can even combine StarOptions from the year of and the year after your booking transaction date. Redeem your StarOptions as early as January 1st prior to your Use Year and your booking deadline is March 31st.

67.000 gets you 3 nights in the lowest category room during the off off season. I checked several locations and only saw summer availability in Georgetown, near Washington DC.

 

[clsmit]

I did some math. It's an OK deal, not a great deal. This might get confusing but I hope you can follow along. I'm a 5* so YMMV. Also I only did 1 example and other hotels may have better deals.

In our portfolio Cancun is the cheapest options at $.0093/option for 2018 maintenance fees (we consider purchase price a sunk cost in this example).
Therefore 67,100 options equals $623.90.
To stay at the Westin Peachtree costs 67,100 + $65, or in our case $688.90 for Jan 15-18 (one of the available dates).
The cheapest room rate for Jan 15-18 is $891, so this option is cheaper than reserving a room by just over $200.
However, you only need 30,000 Starpoints to stay those 3 nights.
If I convert all 148,100 Options to Points as a 5* I get 79,200 points, which comes to $.017 per point.
Therefore 30,000 Points is $521.61, an even better deal.
But you have to have 148,100 Options of a week to convert, so, again YMMV.

 

[alohakevin]

On top of mainteance fee cost there is the additional cash outlay as described above. I think there is a “transaction fee” associated with conversion that is pro rated depending on star status. 59$ 5* etc.

ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTS

 

[Sea Six]

In my case, when my wife is diagnosed with cancer and we have to cancel vacations, and then on top of this she shatters her shoulder and needs replacement surgery and another vacation has to be cancelled, we are just thrilled to have more ways to use our Options.

 

[Helios]

In my case, when my wife is diagnosed with cancer and we have to cancel vacations, and then on top of this she shatters her shoulder and needs replacement surgery and another vacation has to be cancelled, we are just thrilled to have more ways to use our Options.

Exactly my take. Good luck to your wife!

 

[controller1]

In my case, when my wife is diagnosed with cancer and we have to cancel vacations, and then on top of this she shatters her shoulder and needs replacement surgery and another vacation has to be cancelled, we are just thrilled to have more ways to use our Options.

You need to read the fine print and be sure you will be "thrilled" with these reservations. The use of StarOptions to reserve the select Sheraton and Westin properties is an irrevocable transaction as to the StarOptions. If you need to cancel for any reason, including the reasons you listed, you are unable to re-establish the StarOptions in your Vistana account.

 

[Sea Six]

You need to read the fine print and be sure you will be "thrilled" with these reservations. The use of StarOptions to reserve the select Sheraton and Westin properties is an irrevocable transaction as to the StarOptions. If you need to cancel for any reason, including the reasons you listed, you are unable to re-establish the StarOptions in your Vistana account.

Makes no difference to me. We can make these reservations on short order and at least get something for our options as opposed to having to cancel and reschedule the long term reservations all the time due to health issues. We can't even schedule at 8 months out now due to health issues, and we don't tend to get what we want. This at least gives us some more options, like it or not

 

[DavidnRobin]

Here’s a scenario...
VSN needs SOs in the system to account for the discounted SOs that VSE so graciously gave to WSJ Owners in 2018 in lieu of using their Home Resort.

Overall - not a good deal unless you have cheap SOs.
IMO


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[bizaro86]

I wonder if those who have mandatory resales (and thus have star options but no starpoints) can use this.

 

[alohakevin]

This definetly could be a good option if sitting on SOs needed to be used in short order assuming you have a minimum of 67,100 in inventory. Does this conversion allow banked options to be used?

 

[EnglishmanAbroad]

I can see where this might appeal in special circumstances but as stated above not a great deal to those paying high MFs. Also the limited offer of 3 nights (although I suppose you could double up etc.) and the limited availability (both time frame and location) is not that appealing although that might change. I'd much rather spend 67,100 options on 7 nights in April/May in a studio at one of the Maui resorts (valued at $3K-$3.5K on SPG/Expedia etc.) than 3 nights at any of the hotels currently listed for this offer.

 

[DavidnRobin]

I wonder if those who have mandatory resales (and thus have star options but no starpoints) can use this.

I would think so as they may be trying to gather SOs for VSN short comings in the near/mid term.

Not interested in this deal, but can see usefulness to both the customer and VSE/VSN.
IMO




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