Just returning from Florida I was inundated with Timeshare offers.
I just don’t seem to be able to understand the attraction of paying a huge upfront fee, as well as an annual fee, to, essentially, rent a nice hotel suite.
I’m not knocking timeshares…Obviously a lot of people feel they are a worthwile purchase. Am I missing something?
Tt’s the same theory as owning a condo vs. renting an apartment. Why throw your money away on rent which you will never get back when you can pay the money towards an asset that you can later sell?
I will then.
I’m not sure that a lot of people really do think they are worthwhile; certainly a lot of people say they are happy (and a lot don’t), but I find myself wondering if it isn’t themselves they are trying to convince.
As a general rule, the intrinsic worth of the product is inversely proportional to the aggression of marketing. Good products sell themselves (of course there may be exceptions to this, but you’ll have a hard time convincing me that timeshares are one of them).
I think that if you find yourself (or can imagine yourself) returning to the same place for vacation year in and year out, it’s probably nicer (and cheaper, in the long run) to have your own place to stay that you’re familiar with. Eventually, I guess, it would start to feel like a second home (albeit one that several other people have also been in recently). For me? There is just too much of this world to be seen to ever want to spend so much vacation time in the same place. Sure I love Hawaii, Palm Springs, Carmel, Sedona, etc., etc., but just not enough to want to visit that often.
“…that you can later sell” being the questionable item here. If you have no objection to staying at the same place at the same time for vacation every year, a timeshare is worth it, but many timeshare owners who get tired of their “vacation homes” find that they are unable to resell them, that they are unable to trade for a desirable alternative (exchanges are another supposed benefit of timeshares), and they still have to make those payments and pay management and maintenance fees. Defaulting on a timeshare is a costly legal mistake, as many of the companies that develop and market timeshares are out for blood. I’m sure that most timeshare owners go in with their eyes open and are satisifed with the bargain, but there are a LOT of horror stories as well.
Is the market for selling timeshares any good? Houses you can be reasonably sure
that you will be able to for more later on but it is not obvious that time shares. The benefits of time shares are somewhat questionable to me. I have stayed in time share apartments in Cabo San Lucus and Hawaii for less cost than what the owners have to pay when they stay because the time share subscriptions were undersold and it was better than leaving the room empty.
Full disclosure: I own a timeshare in the Caribbean. I’ve owned it for about 10 years.
There are two situations that make owning a timeshare worthwhile, and they’re both financially motivated.
The owner wants to return to the same resort every year. For the annual maintenance fee (in my case this is around $400), they get the use of the resort for a full week. Many of these resorts charge $300 - $400 per night normally. Therefore, even if you factor in the original up-front “purchase” it usually makes financial sense.
The owner wants to trade their home resort week every year for top notch resorts around the world. Financially, it’s the same as #1. For $400 a year (plus another $50 for the trade), they can get a week at some of the top resorts anywhere in the world.
I have a good friend who fits category #1, and is thrilled with his purchase. I could not say I’m thrilled with my purchase though. Let me explain. I’m a category #2 person. However, I have found it difficult over the years to get a trade to a desired destination during Christmas or Easter breaks. Many people who own those weeks don’t trade them, and they’re in such high demand that people who are more organized than I am get them before I do.
We’ve organized our vacations around the kids’ schedules, so that’s why Christmas and Easter are currently the only choices for us.
Having said all that, I agree with Mangetout’s statement:
I don’t quite understand why they insist on such a hard sell.
I was lucky. They’re much more laid back in the Caribbean. I was the one insisting on finding out about their available timeshares.
The few times I’ve looked into timeshares, it didn’t seem to make sense financially. It looked to me like you could pay for a nice hotel room with just the investment income on the original purchase price (along with the maintenance fee).
But if you’re seriously interested, a lot of people regret the decision and try to sell their timeshares, so you can probably do better by buying a “used” one rather than a new one from the developer.
My father-in-law has a time-share in Manzanillo, Colima, Mexico. In fact, he’s got three, because they’re perfect for him and his retired life.
He’s got his wife, five of the six kids, their grandkids, and all of the associated inlaws. They live 8 hours by bus or 6 hours by car from Manzanillo.
For the first time-share, he’s got the desirable “spring break” (“semana santa”) at one as wells as a few other weeks. The wife and some of the children have several other weeks at the same time-share (they call 'em “villas”). They know most of the other residents of the same unit, and his son (my brother-in-law) has served as the condo board director once or twice. All in all, they can go at the peak season, and have lots of opportunities to go. When they can’t, they go to one of the next two places.
Second one was converted to a “time share” by my father-in-law, It used to be their beach house (well, there’s an empty lot across the road separating them from the beach, and it’s not a “swimming beach” [rip-tides are strong]), but they sold shares to three other people, and they all rotate week-to-week. He still feels like the “owner” and has taken advantage of knowing the other partners aren’t using their weeks. It’s a nice house, but I think it’s kind of being run down because partnerships are hard to keep running right.
Finally, he just recently purchased 52 weeks at the same Las Hadas as the first timeshare! I’m not sure if it should still be called a time share at this point, though…
All told, it works perfectly for them. Would I buy a time share there? Heck no. First off, my father-in-law likes me :). But mostly, I’d be limited to taking vacations at the same, fixed time every year, and going to the same bloody place. Maybe it’d be something to think about when I open my microbrewery down there.
Obviously, much of the financial justification depends on the original purchase price. Assuming a 10% investment return, the original price of my timeshare would only pay for a couple nights of a nice resort villa. My timeshare is on an island that at the time was not a big tourist destination so it was relatively cheap. In addition, for apples-to-apples comparison purposes, note that I never vacation in just a nice hotel room, which of course would be cheaper than a place with a full kitchen, dinette, etc.
Again, I’m not wholeheartedly defending a timeshare purchase. All I’m saying is that for me, it made financial sense even though timeshare exchange hurdles have made it a less than perfect experience.
We inherited a timeshare from my parents. My dad bought three different timeshares, and when he died each of the three children got one. So far, my sister has been able to get us together each summer (except this one, for various reasons), and it has been a nice legacy; I think our parents would have been overjoyed knowing that the family has been able to get together due to their gift.
The resorts we have stayed at so far have been decent enough, and having the full suite, including two bedrooms, gathering room, kitchen, laundry facilities, etc. makes vacations chearper and more relaxing.
I don’t think I would be up for purchasing one unless I could get an excellent price, but receiving one for free is a good deal.
RR
To be fair, there are some companies that offer timeshare plans where you don’t have to go to the same place all the time. I recently attended a pitch for one of these companies (I wanted the free goodies they were handing out 
), and their timeshare scheme allowed you to either spend your yearly days at one of their local resorts, or cough up an extra $150 and get your choice of over a thousand other resorts worldwide. There were also no requirements on when you could use your days, and you could purchase extra weeks if you wanted a longer vacation one year.
My wife and I declined due to the cost, but I can imagine it being useful for some folks who want to travel in style and have a healthy bit of disposable income.
If you really want a Timeshare- you can get one HEAVILY discounted from someone desperate to sell, or a broker. They have very poor resale value. eBay sells quite a few, amoung others.
Amackfu- “Condo’s- all the disadvatages of owning your own home, combined with most of the disadvantages of renting!” 
The best things about timeshares are:
Discounted or free stays
Free gifts
Saying “I’ll think about it” over and over again
I once frustrated a sales agent so much he almost threw my gifts at me after telling me I had wasted 2 hours of his time. That was fun. 
This is the new “point system”. You get so many points every year and you can use them as you wish. Problem is that with the old system you get a deed to the property and with the point system there is none. We own a timeshare in Orlando and have stayed there. Every year we trade to go somewhere else. So far, we’ve been to the Canary Islands, England, the Channel Islands, France, Italy, Spain, Norway and Sweden (not to mention Amsterdam), plus many places in U.S. including Hawaii. One hidden advantage was before I retired my wife had a hard time getting me to take a vacation, until we purchased a timeshare.
I meant to say we’ve never stayed there. 
Absolutely! In fact, hubby and I go on quite a few timeshare sales pitches, in order to get the free gifts; but before we go, we find a timeshare for sale on ebay, in that area. Then, when it comes time for us to sign on the dotted line, we say something like “well, actually, if we were going to buy a timeshare here, we’d buy it on ebay. We found six in this area, for a tenth of what you want!” After all the sales talk about how these things can be sold or transferred with full benefits later on, the salesman never has a comeback for that one!
Also keep in mind that all time-shares are not the same.
My wife and I bought a time share in Hawaii. It is part of a larger “Vacation Club” so we can exchange our points and go elsewhere. For instance, we stayed in Orlando, Florida this past spring. They also have a three or four resorts in Scotland that we want to visit (and others around the U.S.).
Though, we also received a deed for 1/104th (we bought one week every other year) of the unit.
We can also turn our “Vacation Club” points into the “frequent flyer” points of the affiliated global hotel chain. So we could stay at one of the hotels if they did not have a resort in the area.
The real reason we bought it, though, was to make us think about taking a vacation every other year. We both work in stressful jobs and this way it will make us do something to try to “get away from it all” every so often.