Key West Trade???

[Dizma]

Has anyone been successful with trading thru Interval International with properties in the Keys? If so please share your experience. How far out did you put in your request? When were you called? How was the property? How difficult was parking? etc. I know it's probably a long shot, just wondering if there is a glimmer of hope.
Thanks!!!!

 

[Dean]

I haven't traded DVC. All on the list are good except the Banyan is certainly below DVC standards but in a good location. Only the Sunset Harbor and Galleon are in a central location other than the Banyan, the other two Hyatt's are not. You should start looking a full 12 months out or further, preferably 2 years out. Give them as many resorts and weeks as you can live with and be prepared to wait until 2 months or so before abandoning. If you can avoid Xmas to easter and mid summer, you're chances will be MUCH better.

 

[Dizma]

Thank you Dean!

Anyone else have any experience?????

Thanks!

 

[bpmorley]

I have had absolutely no luck trading with II. I've given them an almost 2 year window that is about to end and over 15 resorts. And I've gotten nothing. The Galleon & Banyan in KW were among those.

 

[Dizma]

.....I'm sorry to hear that it didn't work out for you. Were you looking for a holiday week?
I'm sending you some pixie dust

 

[bpmorley]

.....I'm sorry to hear that it didn't work out for you. Were you looking for a holiday week?
I'm sending you some pixie dust

Thank you Dizma.
Not really a holiday week, but we gave them all of april and some of May. I'm going to cancel that search today, because now it's too late for me to get off. I have one for all of next april in too, haven't heard anything from that yet.

 

[dznyacct]

I put in for 4 different weeks (2 in June and 2 in July) for 3 different Key West resorts. I started my search at 8 months. Nothing came through and I was really disappointed. My DVC guide had assured me that something would come through since we were travelling during Key West's off-season. I finally gave up at 3 months out and rented out some points to pay for a 2 BR condo in Truman Annex (2 blocks from Duval St., great location!). I am a planner, but it sounds like even 2 years out may not be enough.

 

[Dean]

I put in for 4 different weeks (2 in June and 2 in July) for 3 different Key West resorts. I started my search at 8 months. Nothing came through and I was really disappointed. My DVC guide had assured me that something would come through since we were travelling during Key West's off-season. I finally gave up at 3 months out and rented out some points to pay for a 2 BR condo in Truman Annex (2 blocks from Duval St., great location!). I am a planner, but it sounds like even 2 years out may not be enough.

Summer is fairly high demand time as is April. I am surprised though that May didn't match. I can't remember if bpmorley was looking for a 2 BR as that would definitely affect the chances. Unfortunately I've come to the conclusion that DVC doesn't have nearly as much trading power as we have been led to believe. But if you learn nothing else, don't take exchange advice from the guides, in general they know little about the system, your chances of success or what's a good trade value.

 

[bpmorley]

I was looking for anything. It's only for 2 of us. I even said I'd take a studio if that's all they could find. I'm probably going to take a page out of Dznyacct's book and rent some points to pay for other vacations. I may just sell off my second contract since it's really not good for trading

 

[dznyacct]

bpmorley ~ just wanted to let you know that in case you do decide to rent out some DVC points, I had great success doing so on the DVC rent/trade board here on the DIS. I did a transfer to two different DIS DVC members. They were both very quick and easy transactions. Good luck!

 

[bpmorley]

bpmorley ~ just wanted to let you know that in case you do decide to rent out some DVC points, I had great success doing so on the DVC rent/trade board here on the DIS. I did a transfer to two different DIS DVC members. They were both very quick and easy transactions. Good luck!

That's good to hear. Although I have heard some horror stories on here.

 

[dznyacct]

I decided to only do a transfer rather than a "true" rental of points to a non-DVC member. It was very quick to do via MS. I received a confirmation number immediately and e-mailed it to my "buyer" who then sent me a money order, using delivery confirmation. I had my $$ within 3 days. There is a trust issue, but I have found such wonderful people on the DIS boards that I knew (or at least, really, really hoped) everything would work out.

 

[bpmorley]

I decided to only do a transfer rather than a "true" rental of points to a non-DVC member. It was very quick to do via MS. I received a confirmation number immediately and e-mailed it to my "buyer" who then sent me a money order, using delivery confirmation. I had my $$ within 3 days. There is a trust issue, but I have found such wonderful people on the DIS boards that I knew (or at least, really, really hoped) everything would work out.

If you don't mind me asking. What did you get per point? I see that most rentals are going for 8-13 per point.

 

[dznyacct]

I don't mind you asking at all. I got $10/point. I rented 80 points to one DISer and 40 points to another DISer. Our condo in Key West was ~ $1200 and I wanted to rent enough points to cover the cost. I don't know if it matters, but they were VWL points. It was in 4/06 that I did these transactions.

 

[tkillini99]

but I am an owner at the Hyatt Windward Pointe property in KW (and a brand new owner at SSR!). It is on the far side of the island near the airport, and parking isn't a problem there. On Duval you can have a problem parking sometimes, but we have found if you look you can usually find street parking for free during the day. We own a week in April, but we've also been down in May (very hot!), January, and February. We love Key West, so good luck to all of you trying for an exchange! We like Key West in April the best, and have been down during Easter week and the crowds are not bad at all.

 

[bpmorley]

I don't mind you asking at all. I got $10/point. I rented 80 points to one DISer and 40 points to another DISer. Our condo in Key West was ~ $1200 and I wanted to rent enough points to cover the cost. I don't know if it matters, but they were VWL points. It was in 4/06 that I did these transactions.

That's cool. It gives me a good estimate. I was thinking $10/pp. We're going on a cruise in October. I may rent those points to offset some of the cost of the cruise. Besides if not, I'll be banking almost all of my 6-07 points. We're going to WDW in December for 8 nights and that's using our 06 banked points. I guess I'll finally be a renter this year.

 

[Dizma]

Thank you all for your insight on trading to the Keys (or any place else for that matter). I guess when DVC sends you that book about all the fabulous destinations that you can trade to, one just assumes that with good planning it really wouldn't be THAT difficult. Somewhat misleading I guess. Still love DVC, but will have to think about renting out points to fulfill that dream or possibly looking into another timeshare puchase ........

Tkillini99-Windward looks very nice. How is the airport noise? And could you share any Hyatt timeshare info; how did you happen upon that, buy in costs, maintenance fees, expiration year, and Hyatt destination trades, etc? Just wondering how Hyatt ownership compares to DVC.
Longing for that cheeseburger in paradise........
Thanks!!

 

[tkillini99]

We purchased Hyatt Windward Pointe from the developer (which I now know wasn't that smart!). At the time, my husband and I had been thinking about buying into a timeshare in Key West because we love Key West. While we were on a trip down there, we were approached for the Windward Pointe presentation, so we decided to check it out. We haven't regretted our purchase even though we could have gotten a better deal on resale. Our property has held its value very well. Our lease runs out on the property on Dec 31, 2100, so we weren't worried about that at all!

We love the property, even though the location is not central. The airport doesn't bother us at all, although I have heard some people complain. There aren't any late night flights down there, so nothing to bother you while you sleep anyway. We haven't traded into any of the other Hyatt properties yet, but we have traded for other weeks at our property as well as into II. We own week 15 (second week in April), which is a Gold season week, 1880 points. Even though we own a 2 bedroom unit, we can trade into II for a 3 bedroom unit for 1730 points in red season, so that is nice. I feel like we have pretty good trading power within II, but I can't say that for sure. The only trade we did was for Orlando in November, which I don't think was that difficult. We'll see soon, as we are planning to try for Hawaii!

I believe Hyatt quality is right up there with DVC. We are brand new DVC owners and just returned from our first stay at SSR. I would say the quality of the furnishings and the resorts themselves are similar. One thing I like about our Hyatt property is that we have a dining room table (seats 6) in the unit, as well as a huge balcony with a nice patio set (4 chairs).

I believe our maintenance fees this year were right around $950. They have been going up significantly (probably because they were still being subsidized by the developer when we first bought in).

I definitely have been happy with our Hyatt purchase, and I will continue to be happy as long as we are able to trade within II for locations we want--so we'll see! I hope I answered your questions, if you have anymore specific questions, you can send me a direct message.

 

[Dizma]

Thank you for all the info. Sounds wonderful. Good luck with Hawaii, it's beautiful!
-Dizma