Vacation For Life - Brought To You By The Royal St. Kitts Hotel And Casino

Vacation for Life gives you an ownership interest in real estate. More specifically, when you purchase a Vacation for Life unit, you obtain legal title to a 1/52^nd interest in a Condominium Unit and a proportionate interest in the overall property. Each Condominium Unit has a total of fifty-two (52) interests (i.e., one interest for each week in the year, with two interests being reserved by the Developer for maintenance purposes).

Vacation for Life is a vacation ownership/condominium program, operating pursuant to the Condominium Act, 1974 and the St. Christopher and Nevis Vacation Plan and Timeshare Act, 2005. Since you are purchasing an interest in a Condominium Unit, you are obtaining legal title to real estate.

“Legal Title” means you are the registered legal owner of the real estate purchased, and this is duly recorded and registered at the public Land Registry Office with the Registrar of Titles for St. Kitts and Nevis. More specifically, your title is registered under the Vacation for Life Condominium No. 22 in the Condominium Index at the Registrar of Titles. The fact that you obtain legal title is evidenced by a legal document called the “Certificate of Title”. Once the purchase of the Vacation for Life unit(s) closes, the Developer will deliver to you a Certificate of Title, which has been duly stamped and registered by the Registrar of Titles.

Additionally, owners of a Vacation for Life unit(s) hold legal title “in perpetuity”. This means that you hold legal title to your vacation ownership interest until whenever you later transfer it, whether by resale, will or gift. To give you a sense of how this compares to other programs, vacation ownership/timeshare programs generally sell vacation ownership/timeshare units in three ways:

1. Lease: this generally refers to a contractual right to lease the unit for a specific timeframe on a recurring basis subject to an expiration date, such as 15 or 20 years, for example;

2. License: this generally refers to systems whereby the purchaser is granted use rights to the unit via a contract, club membership, or trust arrangement, and licensed systems generally have an expiration date; and

3. Deeded or Legal Title: this refers to a system whereby purchasers buy a real estate asset and therefore obtain “legal title” to the timeshare unit, and are able to later transfer that deeded title to a beneficiary in a will, such as in the case of a Vacation for Life unit.

In summary, by purchasing a vacation ownership interest via deeded legal title, you are essentially converting what is normally a recurring luxury expense into an asset in the form of real estate.

For a limited time period, we are offering a discount to purchasers who are interested in buying either multiple weeks, or multiple units, as follows:

These discounts are not combinable with other promotional offers, are limited in availability, and are subject to change. Please contact the Vacation for Life Department to inquire about current promotions.

In order to provide you with the most flexibility, the Vacation for Life Program operates on a floating basis. When you purchase a Vacation for Life unit, you can choose from two seasons, which range in dates and Use Week’s as follows:

A Floating System means that you are able to use your Vacation for Life unit for any week within the applicable Season. If you plan on using your unit, you have to make a reservation within the reservation window, which opens one and a half years prior to the start date of your Season. Because a floating system works on a first-come-first-served basis, we recommend that you book your week of choice as soon as possible at the opening of the reservation window, especially if you prefer to travel during high demand weeks, such as New Year’s for instance. For a full description of the Reservations Procedures, please click on this link.

If your travel schedule isn’t flexible, however, and you would prefer to guarantee the same timeframe every year, you can always upgrade to a Fixed Week Unit.

Absolutely, you can upgrade and purchase a Fixed Week. You can guarantee yourself any week within a year or you can choose from any one of our Premium Fixed Weeks. Premium Fixed Weeks are Use Weeks that we have designated as being Premium Weeks due to the fact that they are generally high demand travel weeks. The current pricing list for a Fixed Week add-on is as follows:

In order to manage the hotel room inventory available for sale to our travel wholesale partners, the Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino needs to know whether you plan on using your unit in a particular year. It is important to note that, even though your week is automatically guaranteed to be available for you every year, you still must contact the hotel or complete our online form to confirm your reservation if you plan on using your unit in a particular year. For more information about the Reservations Procedures, please click on this link. Please also note that the prices listed above are subject to change.

No. In order to ensure that our Floating System operates fairly, while also offering purchasers the ability to guarantee specific weeks, we have limited the number of Fixed Weeks available for sale to a maximum of sixty (60) units during any particular Use Week. This limit means that, if all 60 units were sold as Fixed Weeks, only approximately 20% of the total units would be reserved for Fixed Week Owners; the remaining 80% are available to reserve!

Please note that in accordance with the Declaration of Condominium, we do reserve the right to increase this limit, but in no event will we ever sell more than 40% of the units in a given week as Fixed Weeks, as this is also stipulated in the Declaration of Condominium to ensure that the floating system operates fairly for all owners.

Your proportionate share in the overall property naturally depends on what unit type you purchase and how many you purchase. For a full explanation on the calculation of ownership interests, please see the Ownership Interest section at “Vacation for Life Tab --> Resources --> Legals” or refer to the Declaration of Condominium and the associated Exhibit entitled “Percentage of Undivided Interest in Common Elements”.

If you don’t use your unit in a particular year, you can do any one of the following:

1. Deposit your Unit in our Rental Program. If you can’t visit St. Kitts in a particular year and you don’t wish to send someone in your place or to exchange into a different destination, simply deposit your unit in our Rental Program and you can potentially earn rental income; or

2. Send a Guest. You can send your family, friends, or employees at no additional cost; or

3. Exchange to a Different Destination. If you enroll in the exchange program offered by our timeshare exchange partner, you can deposit your unit with the exchange partner and select from thousands of different resorts. For more information on how the exchange program works, please visit the Exchange Partner section under the Vacation for Life drop down menu.

There are two rental programs in the Vacation for Life program; one for each unit type: the Sugar Haven Rental Program and the Kittitian Escape Rental Program. When you deposit your unit in the applicable rental program, the Hotel will add the unit to its inventory of hotel rooms that it rents out to tour operators and travel wholesalers.

The net room profits are distributed among all owners who deposit their units into the applicable rental program. For example, if forty owners deposit their Sugar Haven units into the Sugar Haven Rental Program and the Hotel is only able to sell thirty of those Sugar Haven units, the net room profits are still distributed amongst all forty owners. One-hundred percent (100%) of the net room profits generated from each rental program is distributed amongst all of the Vacation for Life Owners who deposited their units into the applicable rental program and each Owner’s share of the profits depends on how many units he or she deposited into the rental program. Rental profits will be distributed on an annual basis.

Yes. You own the vacation ownership interest and, accordingly, can decide whether you wish to use it, send a friend or guest, or deposit it in the Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino’s rental program. Owners can send their family, friends, employees, or business colleagues at no additional cost. Please note that owners must still make a reservation for their guest in accordance with the Reservations Procedures.

The Vacation for Life Program operates on a floating basis, meaning that you reserve your particular unit type (i.e., either a Sugar Haven or Kittitian Escape unit) annually. In order to administer the Vacation for Life Program in a way that offers the most flexibility to the owners, the Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino designates particular units as being set for arrival on a particular date. For example, one block of units may be designated as “Friday arrivals”, while the next block is designated as “Saturday arrivals”. This allows the Royal St. Kitts Hotel to accommodate the various flight schedules of owners who reside in different countries. Therefore, when you buy a Sugar Haven unit, you can reserve any Sugar Haven unit within the hotel.

That being said, if you prefer to be in the same unit every year, you can certainly reserve the room number when making your reservation.

The Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino has many connecting units to accomodate families.  In many cases, you can purchase a Kittitian Escape unit connecting to a Sugar Haven unit, as well as two Sugar Haven units or two Kittitian Escape units connecting.  Each individual unit is a separate purchase; as noted in question #3, however, the Vacation for Life program offers discounts on multiple unit purchases.  Please contact us if you are interested in purchasing connecting or multiple units.

As is the case with any real estate transaction, there are Closing Costs associated with closing the purchase of a Vacation for Life unit. Schedule B of the Contract for Purchase fully outlines the Closing Costs that apply.

If we use the example of purchasing a Sugar Haven Unit during the Platinum Season for a total cost of $7,000 USD, the closing costs would be as follows:

Please note, however, that if you finance your Vacation for Life purchase, in addition to the interest charged on the financing amount, there will be additional closing costs associated with the recording and registering of the mortgage against the title, which is currently set at 0.5% of the total amount financed.

Please also note that if you use a closing agent other than the Developer, or if you use the services of a lawyer (which we of course recommend) there may be additional closing costs; but you would have to retrieve such information from your agent or lawyer.

Since you hold legal title to your Vacation for Life unit, you can later transfer your unit through resale, by will, or by gift. There is no capital gains, inheritance, gift or wealth tax in St. Kitts. You may still be liable to pay tax, however, on the transfer in the jurisdiction in which you reside; you should seek legal and/or accounting advice in this regard.

If you no longer use your Vacation for Life unit and you wish to sell it, you can either sell it back to the Hotel or to a third party.

The Declaration of Condominium gives the Developer a “right of first refusal”; so if you wish to sell your unit and you obtain an offer from a third party, the Developer has the right to first match that offer to purchase the unit back from you prior to you selling to a third party. If the Developer decides that it does not want to match the third party offer and purchase the unit back from you, you can then sell it to the third party.

The Vacation for Life Program also currently offers a Guaranteed Buy-Back. The Developer guarantees to buy back your unit after five (5) years from the date of closing at sixty percent (60%) of the original sales price paid. The Guaranteed Buy-Back is a promotional offer and is only available for a limited timeframe; for more information on this offer, please contact us.

Yes, as with any condominium form of ownership, owners are obliged to contribute to the common property and pay annual maintenance fees. In addition , since we recognize that vacation ownership only makes sense if the annual carrying costs are minimal, we have also decided to structure our program in a unique manner.

Every Vacation for Life owner is entitled to have his/her proportionate share of the net operational profits credited to his/her owner’s account annually, and this credit may be applied against the owner’s following year’s maintenance expenses, providing the owner with the potential of having no carrying costs. Excess credit can also be applied against certain purchases at the Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino, including all-inclusive meal plans, certain tours, gift shop purchases, etc. Shortly coming to this site, owners will be able to access their account information via their login account.

The maintenance fees set for 2010 are as follows:

It is possible that maintenance fees may increase. The Vacation for Life Owners’ Association Board of Directors is responsible for determining each year’s maintenance expenses in accordance with the projected annual budget for the next fiscal year. If the owners believe that the projected budget for a particular fiscal year is excessive (i.e. maintenance fees are increased by 150% from one year to the next), they can call a special meeting of the Board of Directors by the written request of fifty percent (50%) of owners within thirty (30) days after the budget is announced. Upon a majority vote of owners, the budget can be amended and re-enacted.

The annual financial statements will be independently audited by an American accounting firm and will be presented within 45 days of the fiscal year end. These audited financial statements will be available to all owners via their secure log-in account on the Vacation for Life website.

The price of an all-inclusive meal plan for Vacation for Life unit owners is $50.00 USD per person per day. The meal plan includes all beverages and meals served at the buffet restaurant, as well as the snack bars. Please note that this price is subject to change.

Land and House tax may apply to your unit and is currently set in Frigate Bay at a rate of 0.2% of the value of the property. If such tax is to apply in the future, it will be directly billed to each owner by the Government of St. Kitts and Nevis.

There is no capital gains, inheritance, gift or wealth tax in St. Kitts. You may still be liable to pay tax however on the transfer of your unit in the jurisdiction in which you reside; you should seek legal or accounting advice in this regard.

If you know you only wish to use your unit on an every other year basis, you can purchase a Biennial (or otherwise referred to as “Bi-annual”) Interest, which entitles you to the use of your unit every other year for life. A bi-annual interest is still a deeded interest, documented by the delivery of a Certificate of Title; the only difference is that you are obtaining half (½) of an entire annual interest.

Generally, the main differences between the Sugar Haven unit and the Kittitian Escape unit are as follows: the Kittitian Escape units are larger in square footage, generally have more attractive views, and have more high-end finishing and fixtures. Moreover, as the price of a Kittitian Escape unit is more expensive than a Sugar Haven unit, owners of Kittitian Escape units will have a greater proportionate share in the property.