Membership Info Needed, Please.

For us and we LOVE TTR (29 trips and counting, 12 DRM trips with 2 booked for 2021) the membership would NOT have made any sense if All we did for travel was to go to TTR/DRM/DP.

However, you can get other travel award benefits (SFX/RCI) which operate as a trading/sharing of time (weeks/nights) at TTR/DRM for the same amount of time elsewhere, and get those places for litterally ~90% discount rate. I've mentioned this elsewhere on here... I booked a a 2-bedroom/2-bath beachfront condo on Maui (in Kehei if you are curious as to location). The condo cost me $450 for the week, and the fee it costs to trade-in the week was ~$199 I believe it was. Contrast that with the price I paid for a pair of 1-bedroom typical hotel rooms (Sheraton in Lahaina, Maui) the year before at $550/room/night... and stay there a week! Granted, Maui's not all-inclusive, but saving ~$7050 on lodgings gave me quite the cushion ($55/night/room * 7 nights * 2 rooms = $$7,700 vs. ~$650).

However, with the new Tower, if you Really like being in the Tower rooms, a good option is to pick the class of room you want as your "base" room (I'd suggest the master suite level to start the negotiations, the Penthouse is just stupid expensive for an actual basic stay, but good for parties, eh Steve!), figure out "going in" (i.e. before you go in to negotiate) what the daily rate "usually" is, knock that by 50% and start there. That's real money n your pocket and it's what I did when upgrading during the reno and moving our membership to DRM when TTR was closed.

** EDITED to Add, because I forgot **

When we first got our membership in 2010, I was Very like you, I want to see (so to speak) what I'm being offered, the benefits in plain language vs. the cost in plain language, and if it makes sense for I/we/us I'll buy it. I negotiate for a living, but I was told by a Norweigian business man years ago (smart dude), "If they can't put the entire deal concept down on the front of one, single piece of paper clearly... it's not a good deal."

I told the person who set us up for the appointment that, told the girl who was going to "take us on the tour" that, then told the guy who initially sat us down the same thing. He began talking about the awesomeness of the resort (i.e. he started his pitch by rote) and I cut him off, and told him to get me numbers, now, or we're done here. He didn't get me numbers, but he did get me the on-duty sales manager, Luis.

Luis Did get me the numbers, clearly and concisely, and it only took the top half of his piece of paper. Then, when Stacia said, "I still don' see any real benefit for us, as we like to go other places, too." (we travel a lot, it's what we do with our free time/money, instead of a huge house or extra-fast cars, etc).

THIS is when Luis got excited, as he went into explaining how RCI/SFX work. In the end, This part is what caused us to get the membership. It's a long write-up, but you can search for it in my posts... I think I may have typed it out 4, maybe 5 times here on CCC.

 

Thank you for this information. I will certainly search for your previous post.

 

So. What would the membership rate be for a Bash room?

 

Nobody will have an idea, as we don't know how good a negotiator you are, what other perqs you want, how many nights, if you want the Yacht access or not... and so on and so on...

 

Some of these new membership prices are crazy high. We paid between $6k and $8k total around 10 years ago. We get 175 nights for 25 years (or 1 week a year for 25 years), but that should be more than enough as we like to travel to other places as well. Of coarse this is only to get a "discounted" room rate for 175 nights.

Our membership room rate for garden view is $219 a night for July. The member room rates go up every year. The one positive thing is the past few years they have a black Friday sale and the room rates go down a little. Checking on expedia now it's $242 a night for the same time frame in July we booked at $219 a night.

I believe they change the memberships and contracts slightly every couple of years to make it less valuable for the older contracts and more valuable for new contracts. My guess is that they do this in order to try to get people to upgrade who already have a contract.

The first couple of years our membership was well worth it. We saved a lot of money compared to expedia and other travel sites. Now, I can normally find similar rates online.

 

I can’t add too much...though I have sat through the pitch twice at TTR and a few times at other places. The starting number is never the actual number and I have seen it drop 75-90% by the time you get to the actual last guy in line. If you really want to know the best possible price (and have the spare time), negotiate all day and then agree to buy (with a 24 hour cooling off period), then cancel the next day. You will get to meet the man behind the curtain and you will then get the best price. Did one in PV that started at $150K, we negotiated down to $50K, I gave them a CC, then cancelled. They offered the same exact deal for $17K but we still walked.
Best advice is to know what you want, find it and then not look back. We never bought (usually use the 3-5 hours as a sobering up and liver detox period on whatever trip we are on depending on what they are giving us to attend (yes we are that cheap some days)).
The Black Bands would be the main perk for us but we have booked PH or Master the last couple times and get the Pink bands which (I believe) get the best “treatment” perks. Sounds like you probably can afford to do that so why use any cash up front?
PS - would love to fly in one of those mini suites on Emirates or similar but definitely cant afford $1,000-$2,000 per hour (or so) for the ticket, we’ll done!!!

 

With regard to just going to TTR, I completely agree with that.

But, remember... we also DO get Way-Cool White towels, BLACK (and for some ultra-special types and GOLD) wristbands, a couple of extra items on the menus at no cost, premium booze options (when available), Butler Service (when you can find one), Sky Bar access (this IS cool) at no additional daily cost, get to hang out in "Members Only" elitist areas (the only one we use and we LOVE it that way is the Members VIP Deck Bar, those bartenders there are the A-Team!), free access to the spa, AND to top it all off, we get our own VIP Members room to check-in so we don't have to associate with the masses (except that those staff members are the most incompetent at their jobs at the resort).

 

I just want to go see some boobs, and and my wife’s, and have balcony sex at the best price. Show me the way.

 

PM me and we can trade

 

We have membership... Our base is garden view but usually book the master suite. If we book a master suite flight package with a 3rd party its cheaper than booking through our membership. My question is what benefits do you miss out on booking 3rd party master suite? It seems booking the master suite gets you some perks rather you are a member or not.