Dis tends to ignore issues not to rock the boat.
Commercial purpose is a judgement of intent, and rather than start judging they're ignoring it and brushing it aside. They really should be designating a portion of your point value that needs to be for personal use. It could be a smaller or larger number, I would be content with placing that around 50%. Number of reservations is nonsensical, because a person who has 4,000 points and a person who has 150 points are not looking at the same frequency of reservation.
I believe that personal could include friends and family. I think we could all agree there is a very big difference between someone who occasionally has too many points so rented out some extra they couldn't use that year, or a person whose account is primarily being used to rent the points.
These are all good points and there is nothing stopping DVC from putting in place stricter thresholds to shift a membership from personal use to commercial use. They absolutely could say its a % of points you must use...they could lock owners out from online booking once the computer sees reservations on a membership above a certain number and the only way to make one is call....lots that COULD be done.
But, the fact remains, that DVC is the only one who gets to define when a membership crosses a line...and while many think DVC is ignoring rules that are in place, we don't know that because we really don't have a clear understanding, other than from back in 2007, what DVC now uses to say a membership has violated the commercial use clause.
Hypothetically, a membership with 100 reservations in the names of others could be one a reasonable person sees as a violation, but if DVC looks at it and says, "nah, most of those are single night reservations, the membership has 4000 points, so, its fine", then that owner has been cleared. That is not DVC ignoring it, its DVC defining that level of activity falls under "personal use", no matter how far fetched it sounds.
You and I and every other owner can, and should, send feedback to them on what they think those thresholds and rules should be and based on member feedback, they very well could change them. But, changing the rules means they have to now enforce them.
I shared yesterday that the entire 20 reservations threshold that was put in place in 2007 may have made sense because the volume of rentals was small. Fast forward to today and how much easier it is to advertise and rent reservations, they may need to go back and revisit what and how they define a membership being used for anything but for personal use...with personal use including at least some rentals.
I know you believe that they ignore the rules, but it is possible that what DVC has decided to do is set the threshold so high when they see a "pattern" that is is hard to cross it. DVC could say the rule is that you can book 50 rentals a year on your membership, and if you own more than one it is 50 per each. You will only be considered in violation if you go above 50. They could say that in a rolling 12 month period, you must book at least one reservation for yourself or family/friends, and the rest, up to the remainder of your points can be rentals. All of those would be allowed because while commericial purpose is a real term, its enforcment within the context of DVC memerships is what they determine. Even if you and I as owners think its silly to set those rules, and that it pretty much means they are condoning it, they could. The only recourse owners would have, at that point, would be to file a complaint...just like we would have to do if they tried to make rules so strict that renting, even one, was impossible.
Because FL timeshare law and our contract allows for rentals, the rules that they use, and enforce, have to be seen as reasonable. Now, they can do what they want and then owners might be forced to file a complaint that our right to rent is being violated...but I just don't see DVC doing that.
What I think, right now, is that DVC has set up rules that allow them to be wishy washy and/or don't care to define the use of a membership as commercial until someone reaches an unlikely threshold.
Plus, I do think that DVC is only going to set rules they can and want to enforce. There is no sense in setting them if they can't enforce them and like it or not, at least the 2007 language made it clear when you would be in violation and when you would not and at what point would you have reservations canceled.
To be fair, I think there should be a reasonable threshold in place, whether its # of reservations, % of points, etc. But, I also think that once that is determined, enforcement has to happen. The problem with enforcement, which is what we see today, is that DVC tells us that they do indeed monitor and hold memberships accountable...well, that is what they have told me....
But if I think a membership being used for commercial purposes means one thing, and you believe it to be another, then the whole system doesn't work.
DVC should be accountable to owners to be clear on what standards are in place that define a membership as being used for personal use (enjoyment) and what one is not, and what consequences we would face if we violate those rules.