Patience and flexibility. Sounds like your already doing the patience part. Unfortunately, the flexibility part is a necessity with timesharing. Even with the trading power you have, sometimes the inventory is just not there for prime weeks as the owners often use their units themselves. If you can adjust your travel dates to include a range, you may be pleasantly surprised at what comes up. I've been to some really glorious places, but never have been able to "pick my week".

When did you want to go and what size unit? I can see lots of exchanges for Aruba.

How far away from your travel dates are you from when you placed your requests? We typically make our requests approximately 10-12 months in advance for peak season dates. We usually receive a confirmation within 8 months. It is a big waiting game and does get frustrating, however we have never not been able to receive a trade. If it has only been a month since you placed your requests, I wouldn't worry at this point, just hang tough and something should come through for you.

We have owned our timeshare for 10 years and have had nothing but great experiences with the quality of our trades. We have stayed at well known resorts (Marriotts, Hyatts, etc.). The biggest thing you need is patience. It is a very different way of arranging travel, but is usually worth the effort.

Mustangsally sounds like a salesperson from Mariott. Most travelers do not call their rooms "inventory."

We too, have been told that we have one of the most desirable locations but had trouble not only in getting dates at our home timeshare location in one year but was put on a wait list with Interval in another year. In both cases we tried to place our reservations 10 months in advance.

We pay Interval an outrageous fee for their magazine and have to pay again to deposit our week or to make an exchange.

Apparently there are some tricks to using Interval.

Call Owner Services. They might be able to help.

The maintenance fees are out of control. Ours have gone up $200 in the short time that we have had it. We have listed our timeshare with an agent.

No, I'm not a salesperson for Marriot. Just a happy camper. Patience and flexibility even got me into Harborside at Atlantis. Patience being it took 7 months to get a confirmation, and flexibility - a year later to travel.

I belong to Interval and have stayed at Austria at a prime location for skiing, London and Paris just to name a few. I have put in request but one of the tricks I have used and actually have gotten more results is I check the area almost everyday when I get home from work. I just punch in my week for trade and the area I want to stay in. Usually I have to adjust my traveling time to get in, but I find really great locations by doing this little trick. You have to be very flexable when trading. The biggest problem with timeshares is people think of them as an investment. They are not that for sure. My maintance fee has double in eight years. I have rented mine out several times to friends who wanted to visit the area and at least it payed for my maintance fee. I have thought of changing from Interval to RCI but have told they are owned by the same family. Also be aware if you are late exchanging your week you can only book out about 6 weeks ahead and trust me, you get nothing on that time schedule. I did that last year and ended up losing my week because I didn't want to spend the time or the money going to Orlando or Branson. That was a hard lesson and hugh waste of money. Good luck.

I hate Interval! We have 2 weeks banked with them and have tried many times to use them and with no luck. I have called and tried to pick a hotel in Guatemala with no luck~the call was made 9 months ahead of time! I am trying now to get a room in Aug. in Texas(San Antonio area) for an emergency with no luck! If anyone has a unit in San Antonio I will glady pay for it!

Cheryl

Hi,

I understand your frustration. It's one of the eye-openers when you first start using timeshare.

There is ALWAYS a problem trying to exchange for popular weeks, no matter how desirable your unit is because an owner has to deposit their desirable week for you to get it.

Persistance--checking every night for yourself rather than waiting for II to contact you really helps.

Also, we've had very good luck with finding some cool places between 16-18 months in advance of when we want them. The II website is your friend for browsing and you'll be surprised what pops up now and then.

Good luck.

Debbie

There is a lot of strategy to successful trading and before you give up or completely regret your purchase, please start reading the forums at tug2.net

It's a timeshare users group website with invaluable information from many experienced timesharing folks.

You will learn exactly what you need to do and when. We were frustrated Marriott owners until I discovered this site, and now I have a lot of confidence in future trades.

frenchquartersandi: <i>I have thought of changing from Interval to RCI but have told they are owned by the same family. </i>

RCI is owned by Cendant Corporation, a huge hotel/lodging corporation. II is owned by IAC/InterActiveCorp. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interval_International

I have heard bad reports abouit RCI - things like Cendant allowing executives in Cendant to use the exchange service without putting up an exchage. Similar (but not quite as asinine) is allowing Iraq vets access.

We have owned Marriott's Newport Coast Villas for six years, amd we have had some wonderful exchanges - never stayed there even once. Just trading stock. We have gone to Paris, to Scotland, to England, to Hawaii, etc. Right now, we are waiting for something to pop up in Australia next April. So far nothing.

In II there are two ways to work: request early (a year or more if you can) or the last 90 days. People who have reservations start to bail. People who have units suddenly deposit them. The latter way means you have to be flexible. We have got some interesting things late in the game. Last year in January we went to Hawaii. The first week was with Sunterra, four days in Maui (A come-on to lure us to buy - we bought. 8^)), but we wanted a second week and got it through II, a week in Oahu.

This year we went again. Got a week through Sunterra waited and waited for a week with II. (Sunterra has an internal exchange that works to our advantage). II never came through until 60 days before we left. But we wound up staying on Kauai at the the Marriot resort there. (and scrambled to cancel hotel reservations, etc.)

The other downside to time shares is that we need to make travel arrangements well in advance. We like to use frequent flyer miles, and you need to reserve those early. We have our airline reservatons for Australia, but we still haven't filled in all the gaps for time shares.

There are several time shares that have internal exchanges. I mentioned Sunterra (Now Diamond Resorts). But Westin has internal exchange, and (our favorite) WorldMark. With internal exchange (not actually an exchange, you just make a reservation) The resorts are all available until someone reserves them. With II the resorts are not available until someone deposits them. We live in the hope that Marriott will go to an internal exchange soon. This could be very hard on II and RCI to have the premium resorts go internal exchange. We have ten days of our Australia trip fleshed out with Worldmark resorts.