Over the years, I’ve received many timeshare offers. While I’d never buy a timeshare, some of the offers sound like great deals. (You just have to be OK with sitting through a two hour presentation.)
Last summer, we saved around $300 in Fiji for 1.5 hours of our time. Around two weeks back, Kim got a call from Hilton Vacation Clubs with an offer we couldn’t refuse.
Initially, I assumed the call would be a waste of time but the longer the call went on, the better the offer got.
Of the destinations available for the Hilton Grand Vacations offer, Orlando, Florida stood out the most. We figured that this would be a great opportunity to take a trip for the kids.
Lucas didn’t love Disney World when we visited a few years back and I HATE lines, but we figured it was worth another visit. I also think that Theo will love seeing Disney characters in real-life!
We were offered a 4 day/ 3 night stay for $199. This sounded like a fair offer but nothing to get overly excited about. When we showed lackluster interest, the rep then said he could offer a $199 refund after the tour. Wow, we’re listening…
We told the rep that we had to think about it and asked if we could call him back. He then asked us to hold and came back with another offer. He said that it we accepted the package now, he could also include a $200 Spend A Night On Us Certificate. (The way the certificate works is that you pick a Hilton brand and then get a certificate good for $200 off a one night stay.)
That sold us on the offer.
(There were some other little rules, like the need to book within 45 days or pay an additional $50.)
Upfront we paid $223.88. So once Kim gets the $199 credited back we’ll end up paying $24.88 for three nights at a Hilton property and a $200 Hilton one- night certificate.
For booking early and in a certain range of dates (we already confirmed our dates), we also will receive a $100 credit towards select theme parks. Hopefully Disney is part of that select group.
For flights, I used British Airways Avios. This cost me a total of 60,000 Avios and $44.80 in taxes.
Park tickets won’t be cheap but I can’t see a much cheaper way to do this kind of trip.
Have you done any timeshare offers? If so, did you find them to be a good value?
We did the Hilton Grand Vacation timeshare presentation in Orlando this summer. We were taking a cruise out of Miami already so figured we might as well extend our trip since we would be flying out from California and take the kids to Disney World. We chose the Tuscany Villas and had a wonderful time. They did refund the $199 to my credit card as promised and give us the voucher for the free night stay another time. The sales pitch wasn’t terrible; we don’t mind them; and in fact, our kids always enjoy playing in the kids’ room and having treats, so it is a win. This time we decided to stay and swim in the pool where the presentation was held (Parc Soleil) since it had a water slide. We declined on the offer of course but said we were interested. As we were checking out, we were offered the same deal again but this time a 4 night stay. We took the bait and will be going out to Myrtle Beach for Spring Break this year. Things like this are adventurous to us and it gets us going to places we wouldn’t normally try!
Kyle- Good advice- in the post I mentioned that we already booked!
Ron- Good question! I have no clue why my wife was called. 🙂
jealous! very interested, how can i receive such phone calls?
If you call any Hilton to inquire about a stay, or ask for something, you’ll likely get transferred over to the Hilton Grand Vacation line. I got switched over to one after booking a room for my boss. If you aren’t sure on the deal and need more time to decide after talking to them, literally just call back any Hilton and you’ll likely get transferred over again (happened to me while calling back the same Hilton a day later). I signed up for a 4 day/3 night in Orlando and got them to extend my travel dates out to a year, originally it was supposed to be used within 6 months. I’m still not sure it was a good deal, I’m not looking forward to the 2 hour time share talk which I hear can easily turn into 3 hours.
I used to sell these packages. Make sure you use it or you will lose it!!
Ruby- That sounds like a very nice offer! What destination will you be visiting?
We like taking these offers. We just availed of one from Holiday inn where we paid $249 for 3 nights and we will get $149 in cash back, 20k IHG points, and $100 certificate for use on any Holiday Inn hotel.
While we don’t have any plans yet, we’re probably going to lock this in for a vacation for early next year.