I am going on a sales presentation tour tomorrow at one of the Marriott Vacation Club properties (this is my parents' timeshare week, but now that I'm old enough/employed/otherwise eligible, I figured it was worth checking out!). They're offering a gift of either $100 in gift certificates, usable around the resort or at other places around here, or 10,000 Marriott points.

Since Marriott isn't my primary hotel chain, I don't know a whole lot about the program and what points are worth, etc. I'll mostly be doing status-maintaining at my primary chain for the rest of the year, but I have some big trips (domestic and international) planned for the next two summers so maybe it might not be a bad idea to get some alternative points in the bank...?

Thoughts? What's the general "exchange rate" in this program?

If it were cash - I'd say take the cash.

Gift certificates don't really get me excited so I'd take the points - with a few other stays you'll have enough to get a free night somewhere when your travelling for yourself. Just my two cents.

A penny a point is reasonable value - I get a little more than that actually, but if I did not have a large stash of points I'd probably take the cash. Marriott points are at their most valuable when you reach the 270k-330k level.

More importantly, whenever I've done timeshare tours in the past, they've offered up a lot more than $100. I've done one for 20,000 points and one for $225 in resort credit. I also did a third one where the rate for my villa was essentially the "reward" (I valued what I got in that case at about $400, given what I would have otherwise booked). I believe Marriott restricts you to one tour every 18 months. I also have noticed that they no longer aggressively market to me - I used to get slick direct mail pieces frequently for Hawaii, Florida, Arizona, and elsewhere. I suspect that my three-time non-buying status is definitely recorded in their systems.

If you haven't toured already and are there for a week, I might sniff around for a better presentation offer... If your particular location is nearly sold out and they don't need to sell many units, they might say "take it or leave it - we have other buyers". But considering that the timeshare market is somewhat soft right now, they might be a bit more eager than $100 to do a presentation.

EDIT...based on MacDaddie's post...I definitely agree that if you accept any kind of gift certificate you should definitely validate that it is truly cashlike. Either a gift card or a gift cheque that can be handed to any Marriott clerk, anywhere, to settle any kind of hotel charge.

In other words, you're at your parents' timeshare property for a week. I'd want to turn in my gift cheques to settle my weeklong food/bar tab on that stay.

If you are currently staying at the MVCI property (using your parents week) and can use the $100 toward food or other items chargeable to your room, I would probably go that way.

With that said, 10K points will get you 1 night at a Cat. 1 or 2 hotel. So the points aren't necessarily useless, but there aren't a whole lot of Cat 1 or 2 hotels around. Though I just used some points at a new Cat. 1 FFI in Cleveland, TN. It was actually a very nice hotel. So they can be found.

Thanks for all the replies. I'm definitely going to check out exactly where these gift certificates can be used; I'm pretty sure we won't have $100 worth of food/bar tab (though this might encourage people to try and make that happen...) but if they look at all usable, I'll go for that.

We took the cash and used it towards the Spa at the Marriott Waikiki Beach where we were staying.