I have a timeshare on Maui, If you go to one place repeatedly, it’s great.
Then again, I like to travel all over the world, and I’m gently trying to get my wife to move the money we put into one of three week-per-two-years into a world-travel fund. It’s easier and more flexible for vacations to unusual places.
Oh, and never, ever pay full retail for a timeshare. The first week we got at the Maui place was off eBay for essentially $0.
I’ve been looking at the resales on eBay. Now to find the one that works best for my family.
Timeshare points are almost universally scams. They don’t guarantee any specific value, what your points get you this year, might not get you the same resort next year. Also, the maintenance fees are usually variable, and gradually climb in price. You could also get hit with a “special assessment” charge, if management has expensive repairs that need to be made.
People buy these thinking they have secured a great deal on a vacation. Pretty soon they realize they’ve been locked into buying a vacation from one company, every year, until they unload it.
We also own Disney and since we vacation at Disney every other year or so, its been a good deal for us. We knew when we bought it that we were locking in this vacation for a while until we unloaded it, and did our cost benefit analysis based off “if we “sell” this for nothing in ten years, will it have been a value.” Answer was yes. We are ten years in and won’t sell for a couple more years at least. Also, with Disney I’m pretty darn sure what I’m going to get, as long as I can plan eleven months out and its my “home” resort.
I wouldn’t buy a timeshare unless I wanted to go to the same spot every year (or every other year depending on the system). If I wanted to travel different places (which we do in our alternate years), cash can usually get you a good deal.
Do you have a guarantee that your $100 this year will buy you the exact same thing next year?
This is something to remember about timeshare… you are one of the owners. You bought a share in the ownership of the resort, and the related expenses of maintaining it. Can you still pay the landscape crew the same as you did ten years ago?
Yes, but remember that that evil management company you mention is one hired by you… one of the owners. That company has decided on behalf of it’s owners (you) that it is in the best interest of the resort to invest in upgrading the property to maintain or enhance it’s overall value, which should ultimately benefit it’s owners (you).
Better to think of it as buying a vacation home… or more accurately a fraction of one. There are no guarantees if it will be in a boom or bust area and there are expenses related to maintaining it… hence the term maintenance fees.
No opinion on timeshares, but had to comment that this was a really tough post to read!
Actually, we have been trying to use my SIL time share by paying the fee for exchanging weeks/places. Finding a spot and a week that works for us has been really hard and I’m not sure when the last time she actually was able to us it herself.
If you are looking into Disney timeshares, make sure you understand how the points can be used if you buy a resale. They have changed the terms and conditions within the last couple of years. You get maximum flexibility if you buy directly from Disney. My husband and I have timeshare interests on both coasts with them, and we have been very happy with them. They are currently selling shares at their new resort on Oahu, Aulani, and they have started a new DVC tower at the Grand Floridian. They also have two more non-theme-park resorts, Vero Beach, and Hilton Head.
If you are dead set on getting a time share you’re almost always better off not buying it retail. So, if you go to visit a place and fall in love and feel yourself being convinced by the salesman just remind yourself that when you get home you can pick one up on ebay.
In general, I don’t consider timeshares a good investment. It might be break even when you pick it up from ebay for cheap. It’s a waste when you buy it full price from the company. The money you spend on the time share could be invested in a conservative investment, and each year you could buy someone else’s timeshare week or another rental in a resort environment and still be ahead of the game financially. All of this while traveling to different places and never being weighted down by a timeshare property.
We bought one about three years ago. It is near Disney in Orlando. Honestly, it was more that we bought it with the exchange into RCI that was mentioned upthread. We do the points thing, but were also given one week per year at a choice of 15-20 resorts for a $120 fee each year. We’ve been on two regular vacations using it so far, and a week long stay in Orlando for my son and I while my wife had to be at a conference. So far, we’ve been happy with it. We get an apartment sized place instead of a tiny hotel room. This summer, we probably won’t use it - we’re having another baby this summer and traveling with a new baby is a little challenging. Both my sister and I have timeshares - my sister bought about a year before we did. They seem pretty happy with it as well.
Brendon Small
Hey spud, my ex mil has two weeks at a nice place on Kauai (Poipu Point) she needs to sell. What is her best option? Since her husband died last fall the bills are mounting and this needs to go.
This.
Avoid buying direct. If you can, buy resale!
Often there are perks for buying direct and penalties for buying resale, but you owe it to yourself to at least check out resale before buying direct.
Timeshare is a bit of a gamble. A well managed property can be quite nice, but a poorly managed one will turn to crap and still charge you outrageous maintenance fees. Do you know how much the [del]developer[/del] manager takes from the maintenance fee as profit? You should. Also many timeshares are fantastic in the first decade or so. The maintenance fees are reasonable and getting a room when you want it is a breeze.
As more units are sold, getting a room when you want it becomes harder and harder. For everyone to use their vacations or points or rooms or whatever, the timeshare needs to be booked 100% full every day. Do you think that happens? If you travel at low demand periods, then a timeshare can be great. But if you travel at peak travel seasons, then you will have more difficulties. To make the most of your timeshare when needing it at popular times you would need to plan your vacations 11+ months in advance. If you can’t see yourself doing that, stay away.
The forever aspect kind of bugs me too. I think in the market “forever” ownership seems like a good thing, but “forever” is a problem when the property runs down and is not well maintained. Expiring ownership is actually better in my opinion. You won’t own it forever, but that means that the developing company has an interest in keeping the property in good condition so that when your ownership expires, then others will want to buy it (or re-buy if you live that long). DVC is like this, and I’m guessing (who knows really) that Disney will keep all properties well maintained so that when all the points revert to Disney they can resell and make oodles of more money. If they let the properties go to crap then even if they fix up the properties post reversion, the ‘trust’ would be gone and reselling would be more difficult.
That’s my WAG at least.
I own a timeshare at the Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort Villas North (say that three times fast). We bought it because we love Maui and I didn’t want the hassle of renting a privately owned condo (via VRBO) that offered the space we wanted, was fairly upscale with a beautiful pool, was beach front, in the location we wanted, and that was available the week we wanted it. So we simply bought a week (resale) at a place that met all those criteria. Now I can lock in my airfare (usually with points), then call up and book the week I want. Done!
Since I started staying in condos and timeshares, I have a really hard time staying in hotel rooms if there’s more than 2 of us. I really enjoy the extra space that a villa offers, including having our own private bedroom and t.v. I make good use of the kitchen – we eat in just about every breakfast, and eat-in or pack a good portion of lunches. With airlines now charging for checked luggage, I also appreciate having a washer/dryer because it allows me to pack super light.
We’ve already used our week this year (exchanged into a 2 bdrm villa at Westin St. John, which was fabulous!), so when we go on vacation with the kids this summer (Boston, Philly, DC), we’ll be renting a lot of hotel rooms. It’s going to be a culture shock for us because we’ve been staying in our timeshares since 2007. I did rent a one-bdrm condo in D.C. for three nights because it was the same price as a hotel room. But, as a point of comparison, the MFs for our two bdrm/2 bath unit costs the same as a 1 room/1 bath hotel room.
Since we either personally use our timeshare every year, or rent it out for a profit, we’ve been pretty happy with it. Yes, it’s more expensive than I originally thought it would be (MFs have increased significantly since we bought our resale unit), but all in all we’re pretty pleased. But, I’ll admit that they’re not for everyone.
FYI, if you like timeshares, but don’t want the commitment of buying one, you can usually rent one from an owner for cheaper than you can rent from the company itself. Redweek.com is one place where you can browse rentals for a nominal fee ($15/year?). And I still love, and use, VRBO to rent condos and private homes. We rented a fabulous home in Sedona last year, for instance. The downside is that most timeshares and condos only offer weekly rentals, so it’s not great for bee-bopping around.
My parents have two. They’re retired and a) have lots of time to travel, and b) my mom has lots of time to pester the timeshare people for exchanging points so they can use them elsewhere. So it’s worth it for them. My sister and I join them for vacations, and the places they get are always really nice. They also gifted a week to each of us as a wedding present (which, considering the fees, was a princely gift!)
For us it wouldn’t be worth it at all, even given that my parents have already paid for it up front. Even the maintenance fees wouldn’t make it worth it for us. If our parents gave them to my sister and me, if we could work out something where we used it for mutual family vacations it might be worth keeping, but that’s the only situation where I could see it working.
+1 and +1
My dad became so furious at the increasing rates at their timeshare that he literally photographed every publicly available surface plus the entire interior of the time share over the course of 3 stays. Took the 1000+ pictures to the management and asked them where these “improvements” occurred and then demonstrated that nothing had changed or improved. They refunded the last two years of maintenance fees and took back the timeshare. The lesson being, the timeshare companies can be reasoned with, as long as you have meticulous details and records! I have also heard of people putting their timeshare as a free add-on to a home sale, so there are ways to offload them too 
As my parents were beginning to try and terminate their ownership, my partner and I did the free 3 day stay for the two hour sales pitch deal. About a half-hour into the spiel, my partner gets out the checkbook and starts writing the check and hands it unsigned to the salesman and says, “I will sign this check in the next 3 minutes or even tomorrow if you can provide one person or audited proof that anyone has gotten a positive return upon reselling their time share.” We then walked out and enjoyed our day uninterrupted.
This was one of the 2 main reasons we bought into the Hilton Vacation club. The other was that we can and have used it as a way to get our friends to go on vacations with us to places they can’t usually afford (Hey, I’ve got these points to use up, want to take your family to Disney with us?)
We went with a fairly small package, (Hilton uses points) and we end up banking the points about every other year, and then using them for an upgraded/2 bedroom place on the other years.
So far, it’s worked well to go to Orlando, Las Vegas, Cancun and this year to Hawaii.
Could we take cheaper vacations? Sure. Could we get a 2 bedroom/2bath/full kitchen/living room setup that makes traveling with 2 families easy? Our annual fees amount to less than 1 nights stay, so we figure it was a decent purchase, as long as we think of it as an investment that returns vacations and not cash.
SWMBO and I travel a lot for Taekwondo tournaments. We kept looking at timeshares (mainly to get free tickets at Disney World), but about two years ago, the numbers finally made sense and we went ahead and got one.
Now we wish we had signed up the first time we went. It is very convenient for us.
Yes, this is a nice property. It has been re-named The Point at Poipu… who knows why. I really haven’t dealt with the resale side though. Advise that is always good is to contact the resort directly and see what they recommend. I believe this resort (or at least their parent company) is still actively in sales, but most are still good at helping their owners get a fair deal.
Another Disney Vacation Club (Disney World’s On Site Timeshare) here.
For DVC, it really only makes sense to buy if:
If any of these things aren’t true, don’t buy DVC. If they all are, look into it (preferably by planning a vacation using rented points ).
All of these things are true for my family and me so we are happy DVC’ers.
As for other timeshares, I know people who have them and like them and some that hate them. The factors to liking seem to be:
The Point at Poipu is very difficult to sell right now because owners were assessed for a very expensive water intrustion problem. The original developer filed for bankruptcy and cannot be touched. The company who bought PoP from Sunterra, Diamond Resorts International, is now billing owners for the repairs, to the tune of ~$7k per 2 bdrm unit, IIRC.