Holiday Inn Club Vacations Villages Resort Timeshare

Lovely setting

Poor condition condos

We have stayed in other Springleaf resorts and they were excellent. Hope the conditions here are not how all this brand is heading. Hope Holiday Inn can turn this brand around.

No WiFi and scant ATT service

Spent several afternoons in lobby catching up on email. Had to drive one mile away to make calls.

Holiday Inn has much work to do on this property!

Overcrowded pools near older condo units. Drove to a newer pool!

Pool was lovely but patrons were required to exit pool every hour and show pool passes! Why Hassle the owners and guests instead of hiring two pool boys so one could man the gate!?

In a two bedroom condo only four dinner plates!

Only one blade on the hand mixer.

Faulty coffee maker needs replacement.

No facial tissue

Broken glass and debris on the patio

Stairways and sidewalks dirty and not maintained. A leaf blower would do a fast job of cleaning!

Carpet so dirty I put on new white socks and they were black on the soles after one night! The vacuum left in the unit since no cleaning done unless you stay over 10 nights????

No activity sheet given to us on checking in to unit.

No directions to nearest grocery store…. We brought our groceries with us from a Walmart 30 miles West of resort.

Updates needed on all furniture. It has been used and beaten to death.

Water park was too expensive for what it provided. Booked this exchange for ” lazy river”! Not a lazy river when kids scream and jump around overhead! Headache River!!!

Did enjoy trips to Tyler and the new pool in Presidential area. Learned from owners that they are angry that now anyone can use this new pool. They were told only Presidential owners could use the pool.

No soundproofing between floors! Kids upstairs stayed up till 11 pm running back and forth .

RCI member for 35 years so I have been to many resorts since I own several timeshares. Gold Crowns in Hawaii and in Mexico and a ski week in Colorado. Plenty of trading power to be stuck with this! Left early!

Made a reservation here based on our IHG membership and the limited availability of hotels in Tyler area for our dates. Sounded great. And that’s where the greatness stopped.

Arrived about 8:30 pm (check-in begins at 4), and waited IN LINE TO GET CHECKED IN for over 45 minutes before we got to the counter!!! (What? They didn’t know how many arrivals they had that day?? Not!) Finally, it was our turn. Even though we are IHG members with all information in our reservation linked to that number, we had to fill out a sheet complete with our LICENSE PLATE NUMBER (like Motel 6 does…) and some of the relevant info that was already in the reservation that I’d made.

Got keys and was told to now go over to a different desk, where we had to wait AGAIN, to get a parking sticker for the window of our car. I asked why and was told “that’s the way we do it.” Waited in line in that area, got up to the guy at the counter, who then was going to do a hard sell on us taking a tour of their vacation facility and we’d get free tickets to the water park, etc.!! They wanted to sell me a time-share…BEFORE they’d give me a parking sticker! I said no, I’d rather pay the $85 to get in the water park than sit through a presentation and be strong-armed into buying something I didn’t want. The middle-aged man attempting to lure me into a one hour presentation became VISIBLY TICKED when I told him that, and he pretty much tossed the parking pass AT me.
Got out of the check-in area over one hour and 20 minutes after we arrived to check in! MANY people in line were MOST perturbed! Frustration level in that room was palpable.

Having managed an international hotel myself for 17 years, I can tell you that if the best my front desk could do was make people wait over 80 minutes to walk out the door with their room key, I’d have had new staff.

So…we move forward. After we had been in the room the first night it became evident that because of their 10 a.m. CHECK-OUT TIME….yes, 10:00 a.m., we would need to be in the room until much later due to our family situation and an event we had to attend that evening. So I asked the front desk if I could pay more and stay until later the next day. She said I could stay until 11 a.m. and if I wanted to stay until 1:00 I could pay $50 extra. When I told her I needed the room until 4:00 pm I was told I’d need to pay for another whole night. I asked if the hotel was sold out that night or something and she said definitely not.

Soooo I said, “OK, if that’s the way it is then extend my stay for another night and I’d pay the extra $169.00 to stay that few extra hours.” And THEN came the most ridiculous part yet! “Oh I’m sorry you’ll have to go online and make ANOTHER reservation for that!” The front desk cannot extend anyone’s stay! I then explained that I absolutely REFUSED to check out of my current room, clean it, take the trash out, and do all the extra things that THEY require a guest to do before they leave, and THEN have to move all my family of 5’s things into yet ANOTHER room! She said let me check, so she did and first she said, nope I’d have to move from that room to another! I made it crystal clear that that WOULD NOT HAPPEN, and suddenly she was “able to let me stay in that same room.”

What a joke of a hotel, from start to finish! I’m quite certain there isn’t a manager there that has any experience in dealing with people, nor trying to deliver even remotely “good” guest service! And I won’t EVEN go into what happened in the water park area, with the Subway restaurant in it, and the employees over there, but suffice it to say that this hotel/”resort” (laughable) is the worst managed facility we have ever experienced in over 45 years of traveling…in all parts of the world.
Don’t waste your time going here. It looks good in the online advertising, but that’s where it stops being good on any level.

Our family had four units just after Christmas. We checked in and immediately the high-pressure sales pitch started. My 80 old father was pestered with upcharges for the waterpark unless he listened to a 60-minute sales pitch (he had to listen to 2 1/2 hours)

The units were far apart from each other despite early promises. The first unit was dirty and second unit was smelly and very old. Huge tub but no shower in master. Tacky walls with mirrors everywhere. 2nd bedroom small and lots of mould in the shower.

Brother’s unit smelled so bad so moved, the 2nd unit had dirty dishes in sink despite being called ready and “cleaned” and 3rd unit also had 1 shower only with stick furniture and threadbare couches.

On the plus side, we enjoyed the mini golf and the small waterpark. (Was super cold but outside of their control since it was so cold outside)

Would not ever return with the family or ever.

First room mould. Second room tiny with stick furniture made from branches of trees. Third room had sewer smell. Staff was uncaring and rude. We booked as part of RCI and not as an owner and got the worst rental units and the rudest front desk. There is one section for owners but we couldn’t upgrade to it not even by paying cash. We were tired and needed a room and no one at the front desk cared. RCI needs to take this resort off there list of approved resorts. Did I mention all the bugs and cobwebs in all the rooms? Ugh!! Glad we didn’t invite people to vacation with us there. Separate charge for the water park too. STAY AWAY if you are not an owner. Check out some youtube videos of the resort. You won’t want to stay.

We had a reservation for a presidential and ask for the beach club area. When we arrived they had us in a Harborside unit which is the older units. I ask for a beach club she said she can move us but it would be a downgrade into a cabin. We ended up in building b unit 204. The unit was not clean, there was food and ants on the rail behind the bed. The carpet is stained and dirty, so dirty that my granddaughter’s white socks were black. There was no linens for the pull out and it took 7 calls and 10 hours to get them. The master tub was not clean there were ants in the bathroom. I got a glass out of the cabinet after taking a drink I realized my lip was bleeding, the glass was broke. There are bugs in the unit the back door is not sealed and they just crawl in. Crack in the door is more than a 1/4″. There was an air conditioning unit that was making loud noises every time it came on, I spoke to the front desk and told them all this, his response was “have a safe trip home” with a blank stare. If this was a hotel a would have never stayed there and I will never go back to The Villages. The pools are nice and the game room is great. All the units need to be remodelled with the exception of the Beach club.

We have been owners now for approximately 20 collective years. (We sold an old property, then bought another in 5 years). But both of us have grown up in the community that surrounds the villages resort, fished and put in at the marina, swam in the pools, and enjoyed the parks and playground that the natural beauty of the East Texas environment provides. We have also appreciated the efficient and friendly service that the staff has been providing over the decades. The recent and subsequent trips have collectively become disastrous, to say the least.

If not for the fact that we have paid the property off in its entirety, I would cancel all future payments and allow for it to go into foreclosure (no joke, surpass the whole ordeal). From EXTREMELY long wait times for check in (the last was 40 minutes) all while two employees were “eating chips” at the desk and allowing for one woman to answer phones and check in guests while the line was continuing to fill and was at 8 persons waiting, to trash piling up around the resort spilling onto the ground, disgusting restroom facilities that were previously maintained, rude staff members who were loud and disrespectful to swimmers and families, “selective” rules for pools (open containers consumed in pools & children climbing all over unsafe equipment) to broken and unusable equipment. When multiple attempts were made to contact staff via telephone to inform them of unsafe “lightning storms” with swimmers in the pool it took a phone call to the water park, who had to “text a staff member” to answer the phone call, and continued to call 3 additional times prior to an actual answer to the telephone.

Previously, this resort was a warm and welcoming environment. Check in was smooth and felt “like home”. I agree that some changes could’ve made for an improvement. But the sterile “every individual has a single task” assembly line service is very disappointing. To compound the fact that our maintenance dues have increased by 30 dollars and to see trash spilling over the cans and trails of fire ants expanding, disgusting restroom facilities, and poor service is a slap in the face to previous owners.

There is really nothing else to say. Holiday Inn Club Vacations took over and it was nothing but a mess and a LONG speech to listen to. I think the total listening to the salesman ramble on was over 5 hours. And everyone that is NOT a Holiday Inn Club member is required to go to the sales pitch.

Our rooms were a mess, filthy dishes and silverware, one room was standing with the door open when we got there and was SO hot, the air conditioner never did catch up. One of the rooms we were supposed to have was “out of service” at the last minute? so the room with no air was the alternative.

The indoor water park is not that great. Typical, slides, tiny tot area, small lazy river, that’s it.

I would just avoid it and sell so you can find a better property.