San Luis Bay Inn Resort by Diamond Resorts International

We are owners with Diamond resorts. Avila like all of their other properties the concierge hassles you to sign up for a property update. Always with the promise that no one is going to try to sell you anything they are just going to inform you of company wide changes.

We have 23,500 points paid for from day one. Maintenance fees continue to rise but point values go down making the value of your points to go down.

In the meeting the person you speak to indicates up front they have no thought of selling you points yet minutes into your meeting they start pressuring you and then berates you for not wanting to purchase any more points.

After 10 times saying you are not going to buy (not an exaggeration company policy is you have to get 10 no’s) they send someone over that wants to give you free points for a small fee.

The constant hassle ruins your stay!

The resort itself is 4 stars, new owners updating all… Avila Beach & Port are delightful.

The staff is trying hard… looks like 100% turnover in one year, every year…we go every year & never see repeat employees ! = Bad Sign.

As early owners, we are treated extremely poorly when making reservations !!! Any one off the street using Hotels.com can make reservations with less hassle than required for owners through Wyndham Owners WebSite or Phone,

HOWEVER: Do Not Fall For The Diamond Sales Pitch… it is a very modern & very sophisticated HARD SELL designed to look as a soft sell. It is not worth the “free gifts”
to sit thru a 3 hour (as opposed to the 90 minute promise) hard sell pitch, although I will admit, the cool blonde closer was outstanding in her role.

The hotel is somewhat old and the decor is out-dated. The gym is extremely tiny, and the pool/hot tub area is nothing to brag about. They will try to sell you on a timeshare multiple times during your stay. None of this is a big deal though. My main complaint was this: at 3:00 in the morning, we woke up and we were sweating profusely, as it was 87 degrees in our room. We had it set to air conditioning, so we called the front desk to see if we could get it fixed. We were informed that there was no maintenance staff working until 7AM. They told us we would have to switch rooms, so we had to pack up all of our stuff (3AM!!) and move (into a room that was not as good as the first). The next morning, I went to speak with the assistant manager. He had to make a couple calls and found out that the A/C only works if it is above a certain temperature outside, otherwise the system will only heat, even if set to cool. Apparently, none of the staff (management included) are aware of this or they would have told us that rather than making us switch rooms. Further, when we said we felt like we should be compensated for this major inconvenience, they offered us a $25 gift certificate to a restaurant (which the hotel gets for free), and said that we the best they could do. This amounts to little over 2% of the cost of our 3 day stay. This felt to us to be an extremely inadequate response to the issue.

This is not a hotel, but a timeshare and they treat you like the unwanted in laws. No clean towels or sheets allowed for non-owners, as they informed us. Expedia was even apologetic as they were fully aware of this but chose not to disclose it us. There are other hotels in the area that can provide normal hotel amenities and you don’t have to be hassled about buying their timeshare!!! So my advice is don’t do it!!! Don’t make a reservation here or even consider buying a timeshare for a place with such poor customer service

AS we were looking for a last minute place to stay, near the beach, in that area, we found this listing but did not realize it was a timeshare we were renting, not a hotel with traditional amenities. Partly our fault for not understanding what we were renting, I guess, but c’mon, not even room service with four nights stay, and over $200 per night. Quite ridiculous !!!

Almost ridiculous as having someone acting as a concierge, only to spend the whole week trying to bait us along with others, into their seminar about the timeshare, all in exchange for entering a drawing, or getting some lousy food discounts.

Don’t know about others, but I’m on vacation, I’m ok paying for my food, just want to enjoy my time without having to avoid the lobby area so I don’t get confronted about business while trying to enjoy my vacation.

Oh, thanks for the lovely self-service luggage carts, elevators that barely work, if at all, and a jacuzzi that was too hot to enjoy, with guests complaining all week, but maintenance unable to resolve.

Way to go, next time you should advertise that we can overpay for this lack of service, so we can make more effective decisions.
Feeling quite ripped off !!!