TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Ocean Club timeshare membership migration to Vacation International

Now that Ocean Club is gone and supposedly not being rebuilt, just wondering what others think about the offer to migrate our Ocean Club timeshare membership to Vacation International's points-based system. Looks like their properties are very limited, primarily in the Pacific Northwest, with a few in Mexico and Florida. A few people, including myself, who have contacted VI have got different info about using points and an add'l fee for properites outside their system, including one (apartment) in St. Maarten.

What if we don't accept this offer and sign over our contracts as requested? Do we have any recourse, other than obviously wasting money on legal action? Has anyone been in touch with then OC management / owner, or anyone from the SXM Gov't, to see if we have any rights or other options? Are our 99 year contracts, which grant us timesharing rights in SXM, worth anything more than the paper that they're printed on? Rhetorical question...I know the answer to that one.

When certain members at Simpson Bay Resort permanently lost their units because their buildings were totally destroyed by Irma, they were offered a points system migration at no buy-in cost other than a $275 yearly processing fee (payable to Interval International), and an annual maintenance fee (on a non-existing unit) payable to the resort. Those who chose not to pursue the points offering were eligible for a refund of their 2018 AMF and were asked to sign a "force majeure" release. I personally chose to decline due to costs, and concerns over the severe reduction in 2BR inventory. (The resort recommended placing reservation requests 11 months in advance to improve one's chances of confirmation , , , not viable for me).

Just a guess but I’m thinking the paper it’s written on is probably more valuable than the defunct timeshare. For all the years there have been timeshares on the island there has been ‘talk’ about the various governments passing timeshare legislation and to date it’s still just blah, blah, blah with nothing more to show for it.

With regard to the points buy-in, if the exchange company doesn’t have a good inventory of member resorts my first thought is why bother?

All of us who hold timeshare paper on SXM have to hope for the integrity of the land and property owners. Or in all probability we must be willing to pay a lot of money in legal fees to possibly reach a happy settlement. Or possibly NOT. I loved the Ocean Club and feel for you over it’s loss. But as an additional thought and while I don’t know what your AMFs were like, it’s altogether possible you could rent elsewhere on the island for not much more than many are currently paying in AMFs and save yourself the grief of litigation.

Agree with Pat. Drewmon, check your contract for "force majeure" language. That should give you further insight,