posted 03-31-2005 03:31               

The most popular fractional is the quarter share.
With a quarter share you own ¼ of a condo. That equates to 12 or 13 weeks of usage per year. About one every 4 weeks. Quarter shares are great if you can get to the condo every four weeks. Developers seem to love quarter shares since it only takes 4 owners to sell out the condo. The problem with quarter shares is that it’s too much ownership! Who vacations one week goes home for three and comes back for another week…for the entire year? No one. Every year the quarter share week moves forward one week. This means that every four years you spend week 52 at your condo, and then must wait four more years.

If you can’t use a week most fractionals let you deposit the week in II. Marriott fractionals let you turn in 2 prime weeks for Marriott Reward Points, if you bought the fraction from Marriott, if not, you can’t. but most off season weeks are doggy weeks and are low trading power. So many quarter share owners just try to rent the week out at ANY price or just let it go unused. I’ve talked to many a disappointed quarter share owner. I don’t recommend quarter share ownership.

Most quarter share fractionals at the big timeshare companies, like Marriott, go for $300,000 - $700,000 a fraction depending on the size of the unit, like 1BR or 2BR.

TW sells four weeks per fraction.
There are 13 owners for each condo at a TW fractional condo. 13 * 4 = 52 weeks. These four weeks are three months apart. This works out much better. You can go to your condo for a week in each of the four seasons. Many folks buy multiple fractions to get more usage.

The tremendous advantage of a TW fractional over any other fractional is that you can turn in any or all weeks and get TrendWest Trade Points. These points are interchangeable with WM credits. We can take one of our weeks that we own in South Lake Tahoe and go snowboarding in Whistler at week 52, or Maui, or any of the 59+ resorts in WM. We can also exchange the week for an II certificate that is a high trader and get any week that is available in II.

posted 03-31-2005 06:22               

The way they work is that the 1/4s have four schedules (A, B, C and D, I believe), which revolve. You get different weeks each of four consecutive years, and then repeat. The 1/8s are similar.

I guess the pro for the owners would be if they can use them a lot or if the property has good rental value (our resort has a rental pool, but it sucks away about 60% before passing a pittance on to the owners).

There are several developments here in Branson that also have whole ownership and/or fractionals combined with on-site rental programs and/or exchange company affiliations

I'm biased (which means I am now going to express my opinion as opposed to just facts), but I see fractionals and whole ownership as a good deal for the developer/management company/resort. They make money when they sell the fractional, have someone to pay for the operation of the resort (and their ongoing salaries and profit), and then siphon off the rental money.

They do that with far fewer owners than 100% timeshare resorts.

Sweet deal.

posted 03-31-2005 13:28               

We get our time a month at a time, one month during ski, one month during summer & one month in off season. The bad part of this is I am often left with a partial week which I either have to use, rent or do a direct exchange - no way to deposit. I just lost six days that I couldn't do anything with. They did put considerable thought into how the months cycle, if you have December you will have Jan of the following year, that way New year week is left intact for deposit or use.

I have done very well renting, by renting 2 of the ski weeks, I pay a large portion of my maintenance fee.

I deposit a week or two (the right weeks are top traders with RCI), rent many and use a few and have done several direct exchanges as well. I have thought about selling it because our vacation time has diminished in the last few years but it is my husband's favorite & any time I mention it, he has a fit.

The 1/4 shares I have seen through the association newsletter are very reasonable - $3000- $8000 depending on the size of the unit. I have amid size unit - my maintenance fees are $200/month. If you use it, it is another $63 for clean fees and if you deposit with an exchange company, it is $100 plus the maintenance fee. So $300 for a top trader is pretty good.

It takes some work to manage but so far has been worth it.

posted 03-31-2005 15:01               

It's all right here in the book on pages 18 and 19. The 1/8s are given three two-week intervals each year, and they are rotating also.