Creating a Bluegreen Knowledge Base. Please provide input.

[bfdretired]

1. upgrade costs B/g vs secondary market
2. is there any way to check availabilty without going thru reservations
3. B/G exchange with rci any thoughts would help
4. new B/G rules regarding cancelations how many and cost
5. most likely resorts to get bonus time
5. update talks....any tips
6 advantages and disadvantages to putting family on deed
7. is there secondary market to obtain points for one time usage? if i am short points for a booking B/G allows for paying maint fee early to get points is there another way?
8. if points are purchased on secondary market will they qualify for silver and gold status and will there be a conflict with annual renewal dates.
9. any rumors about more midwest resorts opening for B/G

[vintner]

Originally Posted by Thirsty

1. What is the AIM program and how does it work?
2. Can I get a printed history of all of my reservations?
3. Is there any software to keep track of points?

What is the AIM program? I haven't heard of that.

[BocaBum99]

This is turning out to be a great thread. I am in Vancouver now, as soon as I get a chance, I will start the FAQ thread and answer all of these questions.

Jim

[Aashlee]

1. Alphabet Soup -- This info is probably elsewhere, but a summary of acronyms and what they mean (UDI, for instance -- I never heard of that kind of ownership until I came to this forum).

2. The different kinds of ownership categories. I am a points owner, but then there's this UDI thing I keep hearing about ... (LOL) So, how is it that I wasn't offered this kind of ownership, or an every-other-year option? I've only heard about straight points ownership.

3. The whole buying and selling points outside of Bluegreen representatives confuses me. Again, until I came to this forum, I never knew these options existed. How does all this work? You're going to have to start from Square 1 in explaining this to me because it's all new.

4. If you have to sell your ownership, what is the best way to do this? How can you reap the most money/benefit if you have to sell? I don't intend to, as I really like my vacation ownership, but if there's an emergency and I can no longer afford my ownership, I need to know what to do.

5. Bluegreen as a company/corporation -- How is it doing management-wise and financially? How can we best find out? I want to know that this company will be around for the long term. Sometimes with all the emphasis on growth, I worry that it could end up being a pyramid scheme that will fall upon itself if the economy doesn't pick up. Is my investment "safe"?

6. Tactics for dealing with Bluegreen sales reps. OK, we've all heard the stories about sales reps telling you one thing, but the truth being somewhat different. This has got to be the biggest complaint I hear about Bluegreen. Then there are a bunch of other little annoyances that people have. What's the best was to deal with these annoyances?

7. Rumors, rumors, rumors! What's the rumor, and is it true?

I don't know if all of these interest you, but you asked for ideas. Hope these help.

[rstopps]

How that BG has begun the new Premier ownership program, how many owners are there in each of the levels? Also how many owners does BG currently have.

[Missouri wanderer]

Why is it so hard to reserve anything online?

[vintner]

Originally Posted by Missouri wanderer

Why is it so hard to reserve anything online?

Oh, it isn't hard. It is impossible

It would take a big change to make online reservations possible.

[Timeshare junkie]

Originally Posted by BocaBum99

Okay, I am finally going to bite the bullet and create a Bluegreen knowledge base. I am not sure how it will manifest itself yet. I'll know when I compile all of the information and after I get your input.

Right now, I need input. Here is what I need:

1) Questions for a Bluegreen FAQ. Please post questions that you think are important or you would like to see answered. This I can start compiling right away since this message board format is perfect for that type of information.

2) Topics for broader discussion and/or description. An example would be exchanging. Bluegreen is a fantastic ownership for exchanging. We should have a whole topic dedicated to this subject. Post your desired topic and include some ideas for what needs to be included.

Please refrain from answering questions on this thread. The purpose of this thread is to collect questions and topics for a knowledge base. If answers or off topic posts are made, I will move those off topic posts to their own separate threads.

Thanks. This should be fun.

Firstly let me say we love BG. Good selection of really unique resorts. However, we were originally enticed with the carrot that we could use the AIM program to exchange another timeshare for BG points, and then use the rental dept to make a little money on it. Basically we were sold an investment. Of course we had to sign that we understood it was NOT an investment, but to be used for personal use only, but that if we did want to take advantage of the rental dept, they had an 87% success rate. Of course this was no guarantee that any rentals we put in the system would rent at that rate. It seemed like we couldn't lose.

It seemed like it was to good to be true. And guess what. You guessed it. It was.

It seemed like the rental dept had an 87% unsuccess rate. We felt conned. Cheated. 5 years later I have found my own way to rent out points, and we are very happy with our membership, but the bad taste still lingers.

And now they have done away with the rental dept altogether. Why? Is this an admission that it was a con, a deceitful marketing tool that I am sure was the clincher for hundreds of members. Or am I alone. Did I just have a horrendous bad run of luck using the rentals dept.

I would be interested to hear others experience. But I am sure I smell a rat in getting rid of that program. Can anyone shed light on this?

[vintner]

Originally Posted by Timeshare junkie

…Snipped stuff….
And now they have done away with the rental dept altogether. Why? Is this an admission that it was a con, a deceitful marketing tool that I am sure was the clincher for hundreds of members. Or am I alone. Did I just have a horrendous bad run of luck using the rentals dept.

I would be interested to hear others experience. But I am sure I smell a rat in getting rid of that program. Can anyone shed light on this?

I understand that the primary reason the rental service was discontinued was the lack of owners that used the service. If you have 100 owners and only 2-3 are listing, that doesn't give the rental service a selection to offer. Anyone looking for a place to rent, isn't finding inventory. They move on to another site, and soon, BG owners looking to rent their weeks move from the BG rental to another service or method.

One thing that always bothered me, I did not know how much BG would charge for the week’s rent. Would the week be listed at $1000 or $600? I never knew. I know that sometimes I would have a partial week rented. I had no say in the renting of my week. That is why I left the BG rental.

When you want to rent your week, here is what you want:
You want the week to rent.
You want to get the amount of rent you requested or very close to that amount.

After leaving the BG rental system, I have had about a 95% success rate in renting my units. They were all on my own listing, using myresortnetwork.com or craigslist. There are other rental places, some work better than others (none that I know of work great), some require a lot of paperwork, some are costly. Before joining this group (and learning a lot) I bought one of those 'we will list your place for rent for just $XXX for 5 years'. Well...the 5 years are about up and not once has a unit rented or even a contact come from them. No one will guarantee that you will rent your week, you need to put in time to get a unit rented.

[BoardGirl]

Originally Posted by Timeshare junkie

Firstly let me say we love BG. Good selection of really unique resorts. However, we were originally enticed with the carrot that we could use the AIM program to exchange another timeshare for BG points, and then use the rental dept to make a little money on it. Basically we were sold an investment. Of course we had to sign that we understood it was NOT an investment, but to be used for personal use only, but that if we did want to take advantage of the rental dept, they had an 87% success rate. Of course this was no guarantee that any rentals we put in the system would rent at that rate. It seemed like we couldn't lose.

It seemed like it was to good to be true. And guess what. You guessed it. It was.

It seemed like the rental dept had an 87% unsuccess rate. We felt conned. Cheated. 5 years later I have found my own way to rent out points, and we are very happy with our membership, but the bad taste still lingers.

And now they have done away with the rental dept altogether. Why? Is this an admission that it was a con, a deceitful marketing tool that I am sure was the clincher for hundreds of members. Or am I alone. Did I just have a horrendous bad run of luck using the rentals dept.

I would be interested to hear others experience. But I am sure I smell a rat in getting rid of that program. Can anyone shed light on this?

Nah, not a con. I seriously doubt it was The Clincher on many deals but I guess it depends on what you're looking for in a vacation club - I'm looking to vacation.

But you aren't the only one that had a bad experience. Mostly what I heard was that the weekend would get cherry-picked, leaving the other days un-rented. not quite the bonanza the owner hoped, but, that weekend probably rented out higher than what the owner could get for it.

My personal belief is that they pulled out because it was an awkward position to be in, since they have their own unsold intervals to rent out. They could not possibly serve themselves AND their owners fairly (if you put in Resort A, Week Super Prime, and there's an identical unit week they own, which to rent out?? Put money in the owners pocket or money in the business pocket?). The right thing to do was stop the owner part. I'm ok with that as renting on your own is not hard, and I would like the public rentals to continue pumping revenue into the system, and hopefully capturing more 'full freight' buyers so they can continue to expand the system.

all just my opinion