Went on a presentation while in Hawaii.

Is it worth it?

I see there are plenty of points on the secondary market for less than what they are currently offering. Is there any difference?

Will the resorts be "available" when we choose to vacation?

Been owners with Marriott for almost 20 years. So we got in when things were a lot less $$$.
We use ours every year and have been very satisfied. But the maintenance fees have continued to rise. Ours has doubled over that period. You're actually paying in advance. We have been able to use ours just about anytime we wanted, especially when you plan well in advance.

We take advantage of the out of season period and double, sometime triple our use. Good planning is the name of the game.

They get us to sit through update presentations and with today prices, I would not purchase. Now, understand, we purchased under different guidelines (a platinum week, with lockout capability which could give us two weeks).
Today it is points, which we have tried the last two years, but can return to our original agreement (which they hope we don't).

We also have membership in Interval International and you can get some great bargains, especially in the off seasons and with good planning. Example: We have reservations at the Marriott Royal Palms at WDW in October
(2BR/2Bath) and paid $304.00 for the week. Were there end of March this year at the Marriott Sabal Palms (2BR/2B) for $327.00 for a week. Have reservations at Marriott Ford Colony at Colonial Williamsburg in November (2BR/2B) $407.00 for week.

We stay at WDW 3-4 times a year, Branson 2-3 times a year, and Williamsburg once every year. Other places through Marriott have been Hilton Head (multiple times), Panama City, Myrtle Beach, Boston, and Hawaii.
Many other places through Interval International. We use it.

The last update presentation I attended, the cost of what we purchased almost 20 years ago was $35K. We paid about $13K. The maintenance fee each year now is about $1200, plus our membership in Interval International(which is optional). Being able to retire extremely early, including the wife, has made it easy for us to use our MVC. Plus the Marriott Rewards System is great for hotel reservations, our trip for the UCLA game was 17 days, of which 9 nights were free.


Secondary market is cheaper, Daughter in law purchased Disney VC for 1/2 of what Disney was offering. Had to get Disney approval for transfer.


I've rambled enough.

Semper Fi

We bought in 10 or 11 years ago. Now that we are very close to retirement we will use it a lot. We have put it to pretty good use since we have owned it. But if we had it to do over again, I doubt we would do it. Especially as expensive as it has gotten.

With that said, I was looking last night. When I retire in about 2 years, I have figured out that we can spend the entire month of August in the mountains--Colorado or Utah. Lake Tahoe we could only stay about 2.5 weeks. That's putting it to some good use.