Think having a timeshare means staying at the same place every year? Think again! Timeshare points give owners more travel options than ever before! However, if you want to make the most of your vacation ownership, you’ll need to plan ahead. Here’s our guide on how to maximize value of timeshare points, so you can spend less time planning and more time on vacation!
Understanding Point Values
Timeshare points are vacation currency. You use them to book stays at participating resorts, much like you would use cash. Larger, more luxurious units cost more points than smaller, simpler ones. Vacations during peak seasons cost more than visiting during the off-season. It’s simple, right? Well, not exactly.
First, there’s no industry standard for the value of a timeshare point. Every vacation club does things a bit differently. For instance, at the Disney Vacation Club, a single point is worth a lot: you can book a night for less than ten points in some cases! Other vacation clubs, like Wyndham, only charge a few cents per point but require tens of thousands of points to book a room.
Resale Value
Vacation points don’t necessarily have a consistent value within the same vacation club! This isn’t due to developer pricing but rather due to different valuations on the resale market. Some factors that can influence point resale price include:
- Home Resort: Many vacation clubs, including Disney’s, link point purchases to a specific resort. This determines your annual maintenance fees but can also influence when you can use those points. You can often book stays at your home resort around a year in advance. Stays at other resorts may have a shorter booking window, such as six to eight months.
- Resale Restrictions: Developers offer additional perks to entice people to buy their points directly, but those perks don’t carry over to the secondary market. For instance, points at Disney’s Riviera Resort can be used at any DVC resort if bought directly, but can only be used at Riviera if bought on the resale market. As a result, points at Riviera tend to sell for less than points at equivalent resorts.
When shopping for timeshare points on the secondary market, remember to compare prices and research any resale restrictions. Those cheap points may seem like a good deal, but you should know whether the reason why they’re cheap isn’t a dealbreaker for your vacation plans.
Seasonal Point Charts
As a rule, the more expensive a resort is to stay at, the more points it will cost to stay there. However, that connection isn’t always one-to-one. Depending on the time of year, resorts will charge different point amounts for the same room, and these values don’t always perfectly map to cash values.
The best way to determine the relative value of your points is by checking your resort’s seasonal point chart. You can find these on your vacation club’s website or in your ownership portal. These charts are released one to two years in advance, so they’re a great resource for long-term planning.
The seasons in these point charts don’t necessarily correspond to meteorological seasons. Instead, they’re based on how busy the resort is on a given day. Weather plays a big influence in this, of course: colder, wetter months tend to be off-peak times for beach resorts, after all. However, holidays and local events also play a big role in determining the points required for a stay.
We’ll once again turn to Disney as an example. Peak seasons at Walt Disney World coincide with Spring Break and the winter holidays, when the weather is pleasant, and children are out of school. Stays are cheapest in September, when children are beginning a new school year. The other periods tend to coincide with holidays, though factors like summer heat and hurricane season also influence prices.
Using Point Charts to Your Advantage
The useful thing about seasonal point charts is that they’re set a year or more in advance. Unlike cash prices, point values don’t usually change in real time and are determined by the season rather than the day. This can be useful if you’re anticipating a price spike at your destination.
For instance, Disney hotels see a price spike in early to mid-January, thanks to the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend. January isn’t a busy time overall, but that specific weekend is an exception. However, because all of January is the same season, the points required to book a room don’t change. For that weekend, points have a higher effective cash value!
Point values don’t necessarily scale evenly, either. For instance, a standard studio may cost the same amount of points in two different seasons, but larger rooms may have significantly different prices. When booking your stay, it’s always a good idea to compare the point value of your room with its equivalent purchase price. This can help you squeeze out a little bit more value.
How To Maximize Value of Timeshare Points While Planning
Research is always important when planning a vacation, but it’s critical when using timeshare points. That’s because timeshares work best when booking vacations in advance. That doesn’t mean you can’t use them for last-minute getaways; it just means you need to be clever.
Book as Early as Possible
One weakness of points compared to a traditional fixed-week timeshare is that you’re competing with other owners for rooms. As with traditional hotels, rooms fill up quickly during peak seasons. You snooze, you lose. So don’t snooze!
Many timeshares offer priority booking at your home resort, with shorter booking windows at other resorts. When you’re buying your timeshare, choose a home resort you’d enjoy staying at. You’re going to get privileged access anyway, so why not use it? Otherwise, check for the earliest possible booking window. The sooner you book, the more likely you are to get your preferred room.
Here’s a resale tip. Points-based timeshares may allow you to combine points from multiple home resorts. This can give you multiple priority booking windows, but there’s a catch: you can’t combine points from multiple home resorts while using the priority booking window. Make sure you have enough points to book the stay you want!
Check For Deals and Promotions
Some timeshare companies offer special deals on their ownership portals, often for specific weeks at select locations. These are usually connected to off-peak times, but they can also be due to a wave of sudden cancellations, or for no reason at all. Taking advantage of these flash deals can save you a lot of points, but requires some flexibility and spontaneity.
Timing Is Everything
Checking the seasonal points chart can reveal off-peak dates, but travelers who are willing to be flexible can squeeze out even more value. Pay attention to the point chart, and you may spot some unexpected deals. Provided, of course, that you’re willing to be flexible with your travel times.
Here’s another Disney example: DVC resorts charge extra points for stays on Friday and Saturday. For smaller rooms, this can be a difference of two to three points. However, in larger rooms, the difference can be as much as 30 points! At the Villas at Disneyland Hotel, timing your holiday stay to arrive on Sunday and depart on Friday can save you 60 points! That’s enough for another vacation during off-peak seasons!
Speaking of the off-season, it’s a good idea to identify the dates when peak and off-peak seasons overlap. At the Villas at Disneyland Hotel, the off-peak season is in January, immediately after the holiday peak. That means if the dates align, you can arrive around New Year’s Eve, attend the end-of-year celebration, and switch to the cheaper January rates in time for the weekend.
How To Maximize Value of Timeshare Points With Vacation Exchange
Another way to maximize the value of your timeshare points is with a vacation exchange. Services like RCI and Interval International allow you to convert your timeshare into points that can be used at thousands of other resorts. You can even use your points on cruises, tours, and more! There are usually fees associated with vacation exchanges, but they can help inject some new life into your timeshare ownership.
When you deposit your timeshare in a vacation exchange, its value is determined by many of the same factors that affect its resale value. Large allotments of points are valuable, as are those at highly-sought after resorts. This means that, if your timeshare is particularly lucrative, you can get a lot of trading power. You can transform one vacation at a popular resort during the peak season into multiple off-season vacations.
How To Maximize Value of Timeshare Points With Loyalty Programs
If your timeshare is connected to a large hotel chain, like the Marriott or Hyatt, you can leverage their reward programs to maximize the value of your timeshare points. Depending on your reward program, you can earn rewards just by staying at your timeshare. However, that’s only the beginning.
First, a quick point of clarification: points in a reward program are different from timeshare points. The points you earn through a program like Marriott Bonvoy are more like frequent flyer miles. They’re often worth less, individually, than timeshare points, though this depends on your timeshare program.
Rewards programs like Marriott Bonvoy and Hilton Honors offer benefits such as late check-out, complimentary meals, and discounts on spa treatments and excursions. You can also use reward points to book stays at non-timeshare resorts, greatly expanding potential vacation options.
If your timeshare offers a rewards program, it’s worth considering a branded credit card. These let you earn rewards on regular purchases, such as gas and groceries. Using one for regular purchases and paying it off each month will cause your point total to snowball, giving you more perks to add to your timeshare. Some credit cards even give you discounts when used at affiliated destinations.
So Your Points Are Going To Expire
Timeshare points are usually valid for only one year, after which they will expire. Nothing feels worse than watching your hard-earned money evaporate. Fortunately, timeshares offer options that let you preserve some of that value in years you can’t travel.
Many timeshares allow you to bank points for up to a year, but may have restrictions on when in the use year you can do so. This is great if you know you won’t be travelling in advance, but you could still miss the rollover window. Not all timeshares offer this benefit, either.
Some vacation clubs allow you to convert timeshare points into reward points. This perk is usually limited to owners who purchased from the developer and comes with limitations. You may only have a limited window to convert your points, and may not be able to convert all of them. The exchange rate usually isn’t great either, but it’s better than nothing.
How to Maximize the Value of Timeshare Points with Rentals
One of the most reliable ways to maximize the value of expiring timeshare points is by renting them out. Renting them out directly works if you know you won’t be able to use them, but there’s a last-minute option you can fall back on. As long as you make your reservation before your points expire, you can book a stay at any time in your booking window. That means that, if you’re booking at your home resort, you can make a reservation for the next year with points that are just days from expiring. Once the stay is booked, you can rent it out on a service like BuyATimeshare.com. Try to aim for the most desirable week you can get with this method to maximize your chances of finding a renter.
Buy Timeshare Points Timeshare Broker Associates
If you’re still wondering how to maximize the value of timeshare points, here’s our biggest tip: buy on the secondary market. You can save as much as 50% off the retail price this way, making each point that much more valuable. Buying resale is one of the best ways to get into vacation ownership, and Timeshare Broker Associates can help.
Our marketplace makes finding a timeshare hassle-free. Browse listings by brand, destination, resort, and more. Each listing shows the price you’re paying per point, so you don’t need to break out your calculator to find the best deal.
Want to learn more? Click the button below to browse our marketplace, call us at (407) 917-8432, or email us at [email protected] to get started.
