That’s what I always think when I hear about timeshares. For a great deal less money you can rent modest vacation homes or condos anywhere you want, and don’t have to dick around with all the timeshare paperwork. And if you’re too broke or too busy or too sick to take a vacation, you’re not tied down to any schedule. I just don’t get it.
That’s true especially now that we have things like AirBnB available.
I feel better reading this thread.
Years and years ago, while we were living in abject poverty somewhere in the Midwest*, Mrs. J. and I got a circular in the mail offering us wonderful prize(s) for sitting through a timeshare presentation. I nixed the idea and Mrs. J. was a bit pissed off at me.
On a semirelated note, I still feel guilt over not accepting a job in Baton Rouge. The potential employer paid for my long-distance airfare and accomodation before the interview and they took me out to what I still remember (after more than 30 years) as one of the best dinners I’ve ever had, at a nice seafood restaurant. It would not have been a good job fit for me, but damn, that dinner was good.
*I was still in radio.
I’m sure some are available more cheaply than that, but yeah, you’re making a substantial financial commitment when you buy one. As some people in this thread have said, they certainly can work out for the right type of family. But buying one spur of the moment because of a sales pitch is probably a terrible idea. Whereas impulse buying a new brand of cottage cheese, as jtur88 suggested, has a much smaller downside, no matter how awful the cheese turns out to be.
In many parts of the country, $50,000 could buy you an apartment or cabin. If that’s not enough, go in with a friend and buy it together. Rent it out when you’re not using it. In short, there are many better ways to spend that kind of money and get a vacation out of it.
Granted my purchase was decades ago, but it was substantially less than $50,000. (I still regret it though)
I used to own a timeshare at Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort in Maui. I bought it resale. That’s the only way to go. In fact, I’ve never attended a sales presentation, just because I didn’t want to waste my time or theirs, cause there is no way I’d pay developer prices. You can pick up an Ocean Front 2 bdrm/2 bath unit at that resort for about $25,000 now on the resale market. Developer is asking over $80,000. (Which is a joke.) A 2 bdrm sleeps 6 quite comfortably and 8 not so comfortably.
Maintenance Fees are $2400 a year. A similar unit rents for about $400 (low season) to $700/night (high season). If two families stay in a 2 bdrm unit, it’s less than you’d pay for a hotel room, plus you get a washer/dryer, full kitchen, and all the amenities of a hotel resort, such as room service, valet parking, onsite restaurant and workout room.
I never regretted owning it and didn’t have any difficulty selling it when I wanted to expand my horizons.
I don’t either. My mother and stepfather both have doctorates (my stepfather is an endowed chair business professor no less) and they fell for a time-share presentation in Los Cabo Mexico a few years ago. I laughed so hard that I spit when they told me and then I asked them why they would do something so stupid. The answer they gave was that they really liked the resort and wanted to go back there year after year.
That is the dumbest answer that you can possibly give. Anyone is perfectly free to rent rooms, condos or houses anywhere they want without a lifetime contract, large upfront fees, yearly maintenance fees and often insurmountable scheduling restrictions.
The salespeople must have been really good because they somehow made people that travel all the time for work completely forget how hotels and resorts work. They ended up going a few times, got tired of going to the same place and started giving their weeks away to family members. I always refused the offer on principle alone but my aunt and uncle took it and they bought one too while they were there even though they weren’t even required to go through a presentation :smack:.
My mother and stepfather now want to get rid of that timeshare but they are still convinced they can do better. The whole family got an e-mail one Saturday morning a few months ago asking if everyone would be interested in visiting them on a partial ownership of a golf course house in Austin, TX. They had to know right away because it was “an unusually good deal” but it was only valid until 5pm the same day. :smack::eek::dubious:
Both my little brother and I made record time picking up the phone and told them to just stop it because they were about to get scammed yet again in very blunt terms and thankfully, they listened. The reason I care about their dumb decisions is that I am the executor of their will and I don’t want to have to go through a nightmare getting out of them when the worst happens. Plus, it isn’t pleasant to see people that are otherwise intelligent behave like financial retards.
The solution to aggressive salespeople in any form is simply don’t let them be that way at all. You shouldn’t ever let anyone talk you into buying anything especially on the spot but that doesn’t mean you can’t have some fun with them. I have done everything from changing my name multiple times in one conversation to telling a Toyota salesperson that I was about to walk out if he didn’t shut up about add-ons.
They are the ones trying to screw you. Real men and women screw them right back.
I was in Vero Beach Florida last year staying at a decent hotel that happened to be hosting a scam-fest (aka time share presentation) and I was bored one morning so I sat in on one. Dear God, please tell me people aren’t that dumb. Unfortunately, it turns out that many are and I sat there eating my complimentary breakfast while some signed on the bottom line. The only saving grace was the scam artists were blocking the hotel computer room and they mistook me for one of their marks. I made it a point to insult them every time I walked by and there was not a thing they could do about it.
Oh, dear, I’ve been missing his posts??? :o
A friend’s family in Salt Lake had one in Park City, an hour away. They loved it and used it all the time.
I think that would be one of the only ways it would make sense.
I get too irritated by stupid sales presentations so any kind of prizes wouldn’t be worth it.
Like the OP, I can’t imagine myself being pressured into buying something. On the other hand, I’ve a clue about what timeshares are really like, while if I didn’t it could seem very appealing at first glance : great location, easy to exchange, easy to rent, easy to sell…So, I assume that I could have been tempted if I had been clueless and had attended such a presentation.
An ex’s friend was actively chasing sale presentations (not only, but also including timeshares) for the freebies. To my knowledge, he never bought even a tea spoon. For timeshares, it was always in foreign countries, typically Spain, because while French law was giving to the “victims” a delay during which they could change their mind (I think two weeks), this kind of protection didn’t exist in Spain (for instance) at the time. So, even if they were selling the timeshare in France, the sale would take place elsewhere.
Nevertheless, I never found this very appealing. The freebies typically didn’t look very attractive, and the sale pitches seemed unbearably boring. I’d rather not take the free week-end in Spain if I have to go through 4 hours/day of sale pitch. I think this guy was quite niggardly and that was the reason why he was ready to go through that for something free. He was also attending TV shows and exhibitions installement for the free food. And I guess that being a penny-pincher made him quite invulnerable to a sale pitch.
Like others, I’ve known someone who was very happy with her timeshare, that she could easily exchange (which she was doing pretty much every time, AFAIR, she hardly ever was staying in the timeshare she owned). So, I guess that if you choose intelligently and end up with a desirable timeshare, it can be a good deal.
We went to one once, in Las Vegas. My wife really wanted the giveaway (tickets to see Phantom). I am soooo lucky that she didn’t go alone, or we’d own a timeshare now.
The first thing they do is, make you all kinds of comfortable. Sandwiches! Drinks! Cookies! Do you guys want anything else? Anything at all? Great, great!
Then you meet Guy #1. He’s super nice. So very nice. Check out this deal, guys, this is awesome. You like vacations, right? Imagine always having a vacation spot! Awesome, right? Yeah, just imagine! And you can have it for just X dollars! He’s a tough guy to say no to, but say no you must.
He’ll then go get Guy #2. He’s even nicer than Guy #1. Seems impossible, but it really is. Guys, hey, we’re all buddies here, right? How about that hometown sports team? Awesome, right? Hey, I have even better deal Y, for only Y dollars! Less commitment, but you still get to have awesome vacations! Everyone loves vacations! You feel like you’re shooting your own dog, but you have to say no to this guy, too.
The guys leave. In comes the closer, the Dragon Lady. Dragon Lady will try to guilt you into a sale. We took you guys in! We fed you, gave you drinks, spent all kinds of time with you! We spent money on you! You owe us! Buy something! Anything! NOW!!!
It’s actually kind of fun to say no to the Dragon Lady. Collect your prize from her and get out. You are now two hours older, but you have Phantom tickets. Hooray!
I worked at a scuba diving operation that is located at a timeshare resort in the Caribbean. We did see a lot of the sales process from a distance and found it oddly disturbing.
The agreement between the resort and dive shop allowed the timeshare sales reps to give away certificates for a dive outing, either as incentive for sitting through a sale presentation or as a perk when buying a unit.
Clearly there is a subset of traveler for whom timeshare is a good deal. They like returning to the same location every year - some more that once a year.
But we saw the down side as well. The resort was seriously damaged by a hurricane and was underinsured. The time share contracts permitted the developer to impose a mandatory charge to the timeshare owners to cover the loss, all due in short order. Not all of the owners could (or wanted to) readily put their hands on that money quickly.
They’re not BS, but there’s usually some sort of catch. I got free restaurant cards. They were legit $100 coupons, but I found out later I could’ve bought my own for $20. The extra $80 value comes from the coupon’s restrictions (must eat here, must spend this much, doesn’t include tax, etc.), just like any other coupon.
I also got 4 free round trip plane tickets. But they’re only good if you stay at participating hotels for a certain number of nights, spending rack rate. Suddenly you’re in a $200 hotel room being charged $350 instead.
So there are catches, but they’re not the ‘fault’ of the timeshare company, and they aren’t meant to dissuade you from using the gifts. On the contrary, like any other coupon/sales promo, the company wants you to use it.
As a counterpoint, I find the presentation quite entertaining! It’s like at a party when someone has a fun story. It’s not a good movie or a rock concert, but it’s good enough to pass the time with a smile. I like meeting a stranger and talking about vacations. I like their silly jokes, I like the banter, and I like the antics of the performance. It’s not an overall great way to spend vacation hours, but it’s not a bad way to burn idle time. Throw in a [del]$100[/del] $20 restaurant gift card, and I’ll listen.
4 ‘free’ tickets, that cost me $150 a night is what I meant by BS rewards. If you stay three or more nights, it would be less expensive to do the whole thing on your own, air & hotel.
When I was a kid, my parents liked to vacation in Gatlinburg, TN. One day our plans got rained out, and somehow we ended up attending one of these timeshare presentations. One of the advertised perks was that you would receive a sack of 10 Susan B. Anthony coins for watching their presentation, which I thought was awesome.
They put the whole group in vans and drove us up to their accommodations on the mountain. The condos/apartments were nice, with plenty of rooms, and the group included lots of children, so nobody was bored at that point. Then they herded us all back into the vans and drove us back to their offices, where each family sat at separate tables until a representative (or group of reps, I can’t remember that part) would lay on the pressure. Anytime someone bought into the timeshare, the representatives would start clapping wildly, which I found to be a bit creepy. My parents were completely turned off at this point (having already realized that the whole timeshare thing wouldn’t work anyway), so Dad asked one of the representatives for the sack of coins so we could leave. They finally produced them after a while.
This particular timeshare operation had a large portion of its property destroyed in the recent fires in Gatlinburg.
Oops. Wrong thread.