Now that you know WHEN to go when reserving your week at your home resort to MAX your ownership value, there’s really only one more concept for Deeded Week Owners to be aware of – I refer to this process as your “villa options”.
Related: What Dates to Reserve at Your Home Resort to Get MAX Value!
Lock-Off Options
If you have a lock-off option on your week owned, you are probably familiar with being able to lock-off part of it and reserving the 2 sections separately. This is a great tool to get more value out of your week, IF you don’t need the space for your traveling party. We’ve had lock-off options on our weeks, but never used them when reserving our home resort because we needed the space for our large family – that is why we initially became owners — our whole family could fit into a single villa and not be separated in hotel rooms.
There are a number of options to consider when deciding how or if to use the lock-off option when reserving your villa.
- The most obvious is that you can get TWO weeks of vacation from your 1 villa if you use the lock-off option. If you have a 2-bedroom villa, one week would be in a 1-bedroom and the other week would be in a Studio — a great scenario if only a few people are in your group!
- Use the lock-off option and use the 1-bedroom reservation at your home resort. Deposit the remaining villa reservation into Interval International and get another week at another resort. Because your deposit is a Marriott property, even a Studio carries trading power, especially if it is reserved during a high-value week. You could trade to another MVC property and stay in a studio for a week, or possibly even get a larger villa if you pay the upgrade fee — $198 to go from a studio to a 2-bedroom. And don’t forget about the non-Marriott/Vistana resorts.
- Use the lock-off option and use the 1-bedroom for your vacation and rent out the other reservation to help offset the maintenance fees. Or rent out the 2-bedroom — or lock-off and rent out each reservation. On a personal note, if I am renting my 2-bedroom, I do not use the lock-off option. It increases the risk because I have 2 rental units instead of one.
Split Week Option
You can split your week into 2 groups – 3 nights and 4 nights. This option is NOT available at all resorts. A few things to be aware of when considering using this option is:
- You cannot carry over or bank any unused nights into the next year. You use both groups during the usage year, or lose them.
- You cannot use 4 nights, and trade the other 3 nights into Interval International.
- You cannot use your lock-off option AND split-week option the same year.
- There can only be 1 weekend reservation for the year. You cannot reserve a Thursday through Sunday for one reservation, and then a Friday through Sunday for the other split week reservation.
Personally, for the way we travel, we have never seen any benefit in using the split week option. If we want to getaway for only a few nights, I use Destination Escapes or Bonvoy Points – not split our deeded week into two small trips. But that’s just my personal perspective. The VALUE isn’t diminished if you split your week.
I have a question about maximizing my II usage. I’ve been told that I can get two separate Interval weeks by first reserving my Marriott Desert Springs I week with MCVI with the Master Suite and then another transaction as Guest Room/Lockoff. That should result in two separate reservations at which time I can deposit each with Interval.
Is this a correct assumption?
Yes, that is correct. The positive is that you get 2 weeks for your 1 week villa. The negative is that you increase your risk somewhat — depending on what you are trying to trade to — in acquiring 2 reservations. It’s a great way to MAX your II/weeks if staying in a Guest room works for your needs.
Thanks for the reply. I have another question, which is related to this future deposit (as you can see, I’m getting my ducks in a row). I read with great interest your post about using the Marriott Points Schedule to determine the high demand weeks versus the II TDI chart. For 2023 the Marriott schedule shows that the highest number of points are required starting the day after Thanksgiving (Friday) at 4,225 versus 3,275 for the week of Thanksgiving. I would have thought that more people would want to exchange for the week of Thanksgiving, am I wrong?
Is the week after the holiday typically a higher demand time? Looking at the TDI, Interval shows Thanksgiving week (47) at 90 but the week before (46) at 125.
Thanks for the very informative posts.
Congratulations on strategizing your plans! I agree with your expectation of more demand during the week of Thanksgiving, but have never researched it personally. I browsed quickly through some resorts and their points charts — some have very high Thanksgiving week requirements (Palm Desert, for example). Others don’t (like FL properties). It looks like the location affects their requirement for that week. I’d reserve for lowest points required when it works best for you and your family — if you don’t mind being gone ON Thanksgiving. I think my kids would have a fit if they couldn’t come to our home to eat Thanksgiving dinner! HA HA!
Here is an epilogue..
As the saying goes, the best laid plans… Today was the day when the week became available and I was ready. By the time 9:00am arrived I was logged in and on the calendar page, ready and rearin’ to go. The date that I selected was in clear view, as were the two other dates for Thanksgiving, 2023. I made it all the way through and hit the “Book It” button, all the while grinning from cheek-to-cheek. Then it happened, a message displayed stating that the transaction could not be completed. Oy. I then started the entire process over and thankfully the dates were still there and the same message appeared. Within four minutes all of the dates were gone and so here I am, screwed. I finally called the Owner Services number but it took me four minutes to speak to a live person and by then, well, you know the story.
I prided myself with planning the entire strategy right down to the keystrokes, but it was all for naught. You know, something in the back of my mind told me that it wasn’t going to work out as planned and that little thing was 100% correct. Now that the points conversion window is closed, the only thing I can do is select an undesirable, low demand week and deposit it with II and hope for the best when it comes to getting something through Interval. Such as life.
Oh, that is so sad!!! My heart sank when I read about the error on your computer. You did everything PERFECTLY and it still didn’t work out. Oh, I am SOSOSOSO sorry!! Hoping that the rest of the year is only full of smiles! You deserve some truly “cheek-to-cheek” smiles!! Thanks for sharing!
Shanna,
Thank you for this helpful article. I’m considering buying a legacy week at Marriott Timber Lodge during ski season. It’s useful for me to know I could do the lock-off option and use one unit and rent the other during ski season. Also I only like to ski weekdays, so I could ski during the week and rent the other weekend days by splitting the week. Marriott seems to have a lot of nice resorts, I think I could trade a ski week for another Marriott week elsewhere or maybe Westin/Sheraton through II.