Yes and there are no reviews and no Gold Crown rating like it had previously. When I first called RCI I was told by the call center person and her supervisor to contact the resort which is illogical since it is RCI reviews and ratings not the resorts!! When I wouldn't accept that answer I was told to write to RCI about this and I did not receive a reply. While I have gotten a lot of nice vacations from RCI for exchanges as well as Extra Vacations, I believe their customer service when it comes to the difficult or unusual questions or concerns leaves a lot to be desired. It seems that they have a lot of call center and entry level people working there, but they don't have, or don't pay enough to recruit or retain, top people to supervise and guide those entry level people.
There are many resorts on rci and ii that do not have a rating that are great resorts. I own a few, hidden gems. What they all have in common is they are small resorts with no activities.My opinion as an owner at Lifetime in Hawaii for more than 15 years is that I really could not care less about RCI Gold Crown ratings!!!
The P/HOAs of timeshares frequently set that as the bar to achieve for guest services and amenities offered, in order to keep the trading power up. This resort has excellent trading power, so expending a lot of time & effort to juice the RCI rating up is pointless to me
As for buying there, that too would be an individual choice. Staying there, I can tell you it is a fine resort, ESPECIALLY given the price to purchase and the very reasonable MFs. Sure you can buy for literally 10's of thousands more, and pay upwards of $800 to $1,000 a year for MFs . . . but I doubt your "experience" at the higher priced resort would be significantly better enough to warrant the high costs to acquire and maintain. Hell, the free parking at LTIH makes it "Gold Crown" in my book!
One last thing about the RCI ratings . . . they require a pretty high volume of responses from exchange guests to be statistically valid. Too many cranky exchangers can bomb ratings just because they have very high and unfulfilled expectations. It's all subjective.
Being on this TUG forum, I'm going to assume you are a TUG member, but maybe not. If you are, you have feedback and reviews available to you. Frankly, who gives a rip what the RCI exchange community has said or rated a resort when you have TUG?
All of that said, here are just a few of my personal opinions as to why LTIH might not have Gold Crown status . . .
. . . units are all studios 4/2 in terms of exchanging
. . . WiFi is available for a fee (I believe this is still the case)
. . . the location is in a very busy urban area . . . you can hear street noise even 23 stories up
. . . the swimming pool on the 7th floor is in the shade after about midday
. . . there is a community laundry facility on the 7th floor . . . no individual laundry machines in each unit
. . . there are generally no resort hosted activities
. . . you must get your unit keys from the night guard when checking in after hours
. . . being in a mixed use high rise, there are factors beyond the control of the LTIH POA which could affect ratings (like the stinky fish that is cooked by year-round residents - some floors are worse than others)
On the upside . . . you will NEVER receive a lot of hassle about attending a timeshare presentation by LTIH! That alone should make it RCI Gold Crown status!
Supply & demand will continue to keep this timeshare resort at a high value for owners.
P.S. You very may have exchanged for the week I deposited into RCI for 2019, as I did deposit this year's use as week #52. Be thankful someone owned at LTIH and had a week to deposit so you could vacation in Hawaii over the Christmas holiday.
My opinion as an owner at Lifetime in Hawaii for more than 15 years is that I really could not care less about RCI Gold Crown ratings!!!
The P/HOAs of timeshares frequently set that as the bar to achieve for guest services and amenities offered, in order to keep the trading power up. This resort has excellent trading power, so expending a lot of time & effort to juice the RCI rating up is pointless to me
As for buying there, that too would be an individual choice. Staying there, I can tell you it is a fine resort, ESPECIALLY given the price to purchase and the very reasonable MFs. Sure you can buy for literally 10's of thousands more, and pay upwards of $800 to $1,000 a year for MFs . . . but I doubt your "experience" at the higher priced resort would be significantly better enough to warrant the high costs to acquire and maintain. Hell, the free parking at LTIH makes it "Gold Crown" in my book!
One last thing about the RCI ratings . . . they require a pretty high volume of responses from exchange guests to be statistically valid. Too many cranky exchangers can bomb ratings just because they have very high and unfulfilled expectations. It's all subjective.
Being on this TUG forum, I'm going to assume you are a TUG member, but maybe not. If you are, you have feedback and reviews available to you. Frankly, who gives a rip what the RCI exchange community has said or rated a resort when you have TUG?
All of that said, here are just a few of my personal opinions as to why LTIH might not have Gold Crown status . . .
. . . units are all studios 4/2 in terms of exchanging
. . . WiFi is available for a fee (I believe this is still the case)
. . . the location is in a very busy urban area . . . you can hear street noise even 23 stories up
. . . the swimming pool on the 7th floor is in the shade after about midday
. . . there is a community laundry facility on the 7th floor . . . no individual laundry machines in each unit
. . . there are generally no resort hosted activities
. . . you must get your unit keys from the night guard when checking in after hours
. . . being in a mixed use high rise, there are factors beyond the control of the LTIH POA which could affect ratings (like the stinky fish that is cooked by year-round residents - some floors are worse than others)
On the upside . . . you will NEVER receive a lot of hassle about attending a timeshare presentation by LTIH! That alone should make it RCI Gold Crown status!
Supply & demand will continue to keep this timeshare resort at a high value for owners.
P.S. You very may have exchanged for the week I deposited into RCI for 2019, as I did deposit this year's use as week #52. Be thankful someone owned at LTIH and had a week to deposit so you could vacation in Hawaii over the Christmas holiday.
I haven't stayed there but I have been on property and seen a couple of rooms though it's been a few years. These properties with different systems in the same building which have different ratings are always an enigma. I don't put a lot of stock in Gold Crown with RCI but I do tend to be uncomfortable once we're below Silver Crown. I look at multiple ratings and review options including TUG, Timesharing Today, etc. I'm not a big fan of Trip Advisor but their sheer volume can be helpful. When I visited my judgement at the time was I didn't want to stay there unless I had a specific reason to, I see no reason that would change. I'd look at a condo rental and compare if it seemed like the right choice otherwise. The problem with GC or similar is there are technical qualifications thus I've seen many Silver Crown properties that to me were better than many GC and a large variation between GC (or II's ratings from a similar thought process).
I don't think I consider those Royal Kuhio reviews compliments or accurate of the Lifetime in Hawaii section of this building that I recall. There are about 4 different timeshare systems in that building and Lifetime is one the best or the best. While I am not an owner perhaps owners or others that know the building better than I should address this issue further. I know years ago there were reviews of just Lifetime in Hawaii that were much better and RCI rated it Gold Crown. Perhaps something has changed and it is now as mediocre as the the Royal Kuhio reviews suggest.
I believe RCI considers the information proprietary. Talking to management at the resort will likely give you a better insight.