Can someone give me a brief "Idiots Guide to trading into Int. International"?

[bounceliketigger]

I'm new to DVC & know little about this aspect of it. Can someone give me a brief guide? (Honestly I trust you guys more than Disney!)

Thanks!

 

[dianeschlicht]

You contact MS about a trade and give the perameters of your search. They then search II for something that matches your request, and when they find one, they contact you and if you accept it, the accompanying points are removed from your account and you pay the exchange fee and they make the reservation for you.

If you are trying to trade, I would reccomend being VERY open. If you have a specific location in mind, leave the resort or the time of the trip open. If you have a specific time frame for the exchange, leave teh specific resort open. For example: When we traded into Hawaii, we requested ANY island, ANY resort ANY time between Jan. and May 2 years out. We accepted an exchange after just one week, but it can sometimes take 2 years.

 

[bounceliketigger]

So does someone else have to want our home resort?

 

[dianeschlicht]

Not necessarily. The trade is from DVC, and the resort accommodations etc traded are determined at the time you accept your trade. When we did the HAwaii exchange, our points were used for a HHI reservation.

 

[dianeschlicht]

There is another way of doing it too. You can deposit points into II for a trade later on. I don't know too much about the particulars about that, I'd have to go read that part again.

 

[bounceliketigger]

So you're essentially trading your points, not necessarily your home resort. Right? Sounds like you might save points by doing it this way as opposed to maybe---booking Hawaii via the Concierge Collection?

 

[dianeschlicht]

So you're essentially trading your points, not necessarily your home resort. Right? Sounds like you might save points by doing it this way as opposed to maybe---booking Hawaii via the Concierge Collection?

I would never book Hawaii with the Concierge COllection, because I think it is too many points. The only way I would do this is if I was trying to round out a vacation with some extra days, and then I would do a day or two that way. In my opinion, it is too point costly for a whole Hawaii trip. I can book lots of resorts in Hawaii direct that I think make more financial sense than the CC. I don't go to Hawaii for less than 2-3 weeks at a time anymore. If I have to endure that long flight, you better believe I'm going to stay longer than a week. We usually start on Oahu for a day or two and then spend a week each on two different islands. We then spend a few more days on Oahu before returning home. I wish I was there right now, because we have a snowstorm going on here!

 

[bounceliketigger]

Great advice. I wish I were there--never been. Here it's too warm to ski & too cold for much else. Sounds like II is the way to go for a trip like that.

 

[dvcnewgirl]

Thanks for asking this question I needed to know this too! To add to this question can you only trade to the resorts that disney lists?

 

[callnamegrumpy]

we were able to use ii for one bedroom stay on ocean front resort sands of kahana, but what we learned about time share trades i would like to share, while staying at the resort we decided to take the tour (sales pitch) for their resort, after a number of times thanking the sales person for the info. we learned that the sales person was taking his family on the disney cruise that fall and had deposited his week in hopes of trading into wdw on property i think bwv after the cruise, he wanted to know was it true we could trade to go on the cruise? was bwv as nice as it looks in the ii catalog, and he said dvc is very powerful in the time share trade arena, there are alot of folks wanting to vacation on property at wdw.

 

[Dean]

Rather than trying to fill in the blanks, I'm just going to start from scratch. The process should start with you deciding when and where you want to go. As noted, the more choices you give DVC and II, the better your chances of success. You should then look at the DVC-II websites to see what resorts are available where you want to go and start to research them prior to calling DVC. One you know what resorts and where and what unit size you need, simply call DVC and put in the request. You will need to pay the exchange fee up front which may be non refundable and you need to have the points available that match the trade you are looking at. DVC will then start looking for your trade and call you if anything comes up that matches.

It's funny to me what many people think is flexible and the amount of flexibility generally required to match tough requests. For high demand times I'd say 6-10 weeks and 6-10 resorts would be the minimum flexibility neededin most cases to be successful. However, the DVC exchange system is amenable to the "shoot the moon" philosophy. That is you ask for the tip top options and if you get it great, if not, no harm done. The deposit first is a specialty situation when it comes to DVC, though it is the primary method for non DVC II trades. I won't discuss it further in this thread unless pressed.

 

[Lisa1976]

I like the idea of the II Exchange but you can only do it for a week, what if you just want a long weekend somewhere. The points for concierge collection are too high. Thats the only downside I can think of.

 

[Danthesand]

Rather than trying to fill in the blanks, I'm just going to start from scratch. The process should start with you deciding when and where you want to go. As noted, the more choices you give DVC and II, the better your chances of success. You should then look at the DVC-II websites to see what resorts are available where you want to go and start to research them prior to calling DVC. One you know what resorts and where and what unit size you need, simply call DVC and put in the request. You will need to pay the exchange fee up front which may be non refundable and you need to have the points available that match the trade you are looking at. DVC will then start looking for your trade and call you if anything comes up that matches.

It's funny to me what many people think is flexible and the amount of flexibility generally required to match tough requests. For high demand times I'd say 6-10 weeks and 6-10 resorts would be the minimum flexibility neededin most cases to be successful. However, the DVC exchange system is amenable to the "shoot the moon" philosophy. That is you ask for the tip top options and if you get it great, if not, no harm done. The deposit first is a specialty situation when it comes to DVC, though it is the primary method for non DVC II trades. I won't discuss it further in this thread unless pressed.

Great words of wisdom from Dean. To summarize what he said, the Interval element of the DVC program really only works for people who are:

(a) true long-term advance planners
(b) willing to do a serious amount of relatively in-depth advance homework
(c) comfortable casting out a "speculative net" as broad as Dean describes (ergo, a large number of resorts across a large number of dates). The latter is a big adjustment for most people, not being the way most of us are used to planning vacations.

How so? Well, for the last two years, I've been tryng to get my family to sit down and do this. Why so drawn out? Well, I can state that most difficult element to grapple with (and what has prevented us to date with actually moving forward with an exchange request) is getting everyone to agree on the breadth of resorts and dates, and the prioritization within both lists (when putting in your search with DVC, you have to state 1st choice, 2nd etc. on both resorts and dates). That in essence involves getting people to think in terms that I can best analogize to that of a professional commodity speculator. Not easy!!!

Whatever, I'm optimistic we'll resolve our "debates" within the next few months, and finally be putting in a search request an exchange (for the Caribbean in spring 2007 or winter 2008 or winter or spring 2009, etc.)

So, my bottom line walk-away? Trust me, the "spontaneous wing-it" crowd need not apply to the Interval exchange option!!

 

[bounceliketigger]

Thanks for all the advice given here. We're pretty much wide open for timeframes and have so many places we'd like to go--I think II will work well for us now that I know more about it!

 

[Dean]

I like the idea of the II Exchange but you can only do it for a week, what if you just want a long weekend somewhere. The points for concierge collection are too high. Thats the only downside I can think of.

Same can be said for timeshare in general. DVC is by far the exception, but not the only one. One might want to look at some of the other points systems for this type of option.

 

[mwehttam]

I just received my paper work yesterday and while I have done a lot of research about DVC itself, I am in the process of understanding the trading into II. My main question has to do with the two ways to trade. The “Request First” method makes sense. In the DVC paper work it’s two short paragraphs. On the other hand, the “Deposit First” method is three long “legalese” paragraphs that have my head spinning. When I first read it last night I was “Why would anyone do that.” But there has to be a benefit to that method that I can’t put my finger on just yet. Dean, I know you said you would only go into it if presses so I guess I am pressing.


Thanks for the help.


-Matthew

 

[Dean]

The “Request First” method makes sense. In the DVC paper work it’s two short paragraphs. On the other hand, the “Deposit First” method is three long “legalese” paragraphs that have my head spinning. When I first read it last night I was “Why would anyone do that.” But there has to be a benefit to that method that I can’t put my finger on just yet. Dean, I know you said you would only go into it if presses so I guess I am pressing

OK, remember, you asked. Deposit first is more like most II members work. You tell DVC you want to do so and what size and season you want to deposit. They then tell you the expiration date AFTER you commit. That means you will have something over 2 years and 2 months but less than 3 years to COMPLETE your travel. Remember that in order to search, you must have an eligible deposit. Basically you can't deposit a mid season 1 BR and then search for a high season unit. So IF one decides to deposit first, you better either be darn sure you know what you want to search for and what the season is for what that search will be OR deposit a high season for the unit size you want. Even then, if you only need a 1 BR but the resort only has 2 BR, you must have a 2 BR deposit to search for that resort.

IMO, deposit first is only when you would otherwise not use the points. And given the other options including renting, only for points that you have little time to deal with. And one should really plan out the search BEFORE depositing unless there is no other choice. I hope that wasn't confusing, it's hard to explain unless one is pretty versed in regular timeshares.

 

[mwehttam]

Thanks Dean! Let’s see if I get this. I will use the situation my DW and I are in now. Since we are new members from the F&F, we have our 2005 points that we are getting a grace period with and have till the end of the month to bank (Aug use year).

We could bank them with DVC like normal and use them by the end of July 2007. That’s the easy part, lol.

Or if we wanted to use them with II we could deposit them with MS before the end of the month and they could be used to travel up to 2+ years? If that is the case, you can get more life out of expiring points, which I think it great.

Please correct me if I am misunderstanding this and thanks for the help!! This is board is the main reason my DW agreed to buy into DVC. She knows I did my homework or the last 18 months. The F&F promo helped a little too.



-Matthew

 

[CALNEVA DISNEYFANS]

I have a completely different approach to trading thru II.

Try the TUG http://www.tug2.net (timeshare users group) for trading direct with other TS owners. I think you can get a better deal than trading thru II. I own a full ocean view condo in Kauai (Cliffs Club, an five star II resort) and I would gladly trade out my Hawaii week for less points than what you could trade for thru II.

TUG is a GREAT site and is only a few dollars ($10 I think) a year to join.

 

[greenban]

Okay, here is a tangential thread.

Specifically as regards to cost effectiveness. Is it better to rent out the points needed for an II trade, and purchase an II week (either through TUG, or directly from the resort - similar to DCL economics), or is the II trade the most economical use of points?

TIA

-Tony