I'm considering purchasing Marriott VC in addition to DVC

[Disney On The Bayou]

We are currently DVC owners and have been for the past 12 years. I'm interested in purchasing maybe another timeshare such as Marriott, but I'm try to figure out what would be a good resale option for me and hoped those who have both can share their experiences. We are a family of 5, so condo type rooms appeal to us when we travel. We also have the option to travel by private plane (don't get any ideas, its a 1969 plane and most of your luxury cars are worth more)) and do so when we travel to HHI, WDW and VB. We live in New Orleans so staying in the southeast helps since our comfortable flying range is about 600NM. I was thinking Marriott because if I'm correct they have a point system as well and I would like the ability to make long weekend trips in the summer. I'm also interested in hearing about Club Intrawest, since they have a location in Destine, FL. Any help or advise is appreciated.... DEAN where are You?

 

[theOCdisney]

We own both DVC and Marriott VC. We own weeks. I recommend you go to tug2.net (Timeshare users group.) Go to the BBS and then to the Marriott board. You will find a wealth of info.

We joined the destination club with our weeks, but did not purchase additional points. This gives us the option to use our week, trade through interval or convert our weeks to points and use those to book other properties. The points have some flexibility and the system is similar to Disney. I think Disney has a better pure points program. We really enjoy Marriott properties. We have been to so many either by trading through II or booking with points.

Good luck to you.

 

[myxdvz]

I went thru the same thought process. Am on the phone right now but I have a thread here discussing the same and a detailed thread at Tug on the Wyndham vs Worldmark comparison.

I looked at all points based system: HGVC, MVC, Wyndham, Worldmark and Bluegreen.

MVC's points system is too new, you won't see a lot from resale and the inventory is not quite there yet. My issue with HGVC are locations.

Final two for were Worldmark and Wyndham and I ended up with Wyndham using the Buy where I can/want to go mantra.

 

[Cinderpamela]

You should check with one of the timeshare experts on this board- "OhioDVC".
He has a great thread right now on how he is living in his timeshares for most of the year and has rated them all. I can't remember if he has Marriott but he has a lot of the different clubs in his collection and has lots of experience staying at each.
Check out his thread here:
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=3121140

 

[arthur06]

I am looking for another non Disney TS. I had the notion that Marriott would be good for us, but upon further review I am finding that I actually like HGVC better. I was finding that Marriott resales are more limited to full week stays and HGVC is more point based with flexibility to travel for shorter times.

I just subscribed to the site over on Tug, its $15, but the knowledge and information make it worth every penny.

Do your research and make sure you make a smart and informed decision. It's easy to buy and not so easy to sell.

 

[taaren]

We own Marriott as well, bought it several years before we had our DVC. (Weeks, obviously.) We only use it at our home resort (the same way we only use our DVC points at our home resort until this year), so I'm not really familiar with trading options .... every time I've even considered it, we would always be trading down because of the resort/season we bought into (ski week in Park City), plus we just like our resort a lot, especially since the kids all like the familiarity of it.

We've gone to the points conversion presentation twice now ... almost bought a few extra points to convert them all, but when we crunched the numbers we just couldn't make them work for us in comparison to picking up another week resale as far as MFs, etc (it helps that we never trade, so having those fees included is pointless, and we buy the long-term [5 year] membership to Interval International, so getting that included would also be pointless for us).

What I can comment on is the resorts are well maintained, the rooms tend to be spacious and beautiful (we have bought extra weeks at other resorts in Vegas and Hawaii through II), the service is always great, and for what we get out of the weeks we own its a very good value. Friends have done well with trading out their Marriott Palm Springs week regularly, and other friends own at Newport Coast Villas (where DVC once owned the land) and they like their usage of the unit a lot; if I was in the market for another week I'd probably go for Marriott because I like the system and units (either Newport or Tahoe perhaps).

However, buy where you want to stay is something I think applies almost as much outside of DVC as in it for timeshares ... unless you want to invest a lot of time into understanding how to trade out and maximize your value, or have a lot of flexibility and therefore can wait to get lucky on trades. So if there's a Marriott resort you have in mind, go stay there and see the pitch.

 

[myxdvz]

Back on a desktop vs phone/tablet... here are the links to the previous threads I have for the same topic:

Best TS to supplement my DVC

Also some discussions on Tug:

Looking into MVC

Wyndham vs Worldmark

 

[lilpooh108]

I recently went through the same analysis and ended up with Wyndham. Very low buy in cost, chose a place with (currently) low MFs.

HGVC was my 1st choice but I thought the buy in was too high (since we already own a bunch of DVC) and I didn't like their requirement to essentially pay to book at any resort which was not your home. It was more like a week/points hybrid which didn't work for our needs.

Good luck!