Posts filed under 'Sell Timeshare'
Over the course of this series, we’ve examined the battle for timeshare owners’ hearts and minds – in-depth, and from various perspectives. We’ve done our best to define the battle lines between those that believe in timeshare, despite its flaws, and those that malign it, in spite of its value. Ultimately, the argument comes down to one simple question, “Are Timeshare Owners Dummies?” After much examination, I’m glad to say the answer is categorically NO!
If anything, timeshare is a product whose time has not come yet. Timeshare owners are simply the early-adopters; out-of-the-box thinkers able to see the value behind the sales-pitch. Ask any veteran timeshare owner about their experiences, and they will tell you: Timeshare is a tremendous way to vacation in luxury on a budget, once you learn how to make the system work for you. (And that they wish they’d bought timeshare resale in the first place.)
So then, if timeshare owners not dummies, why are there so many schemes to deceive them and erode the value of their timeshare investment? To answer this question is folly; to do so is to concede the question itself has merit. It does not. The world is full of ways in which fools and their money are quickly parted.
Timeshare, like all other industries, has its share of scams to be avoided. However, since the number of timeshare owners is still quite small (around 6% in the U.S.), and the timeshare community fairly insular, a vocal minority can quickly turn the conversation negative. If timeshare owners as a group have a flaw, it’s a certain naivety about the industry …and that is ultimately the reason for this series: to educate and empower timeshare owners.
Warning: An Industry Full of Scams & Complaints?
Some will still maintain that timeshare as a product is no-good, worthless, or even worse; insisting that the prevalence of complaints is evidence enough that timeshare is not to be owned. Hopefully, if you’ve read and understood the message of this series, you’ll turn a deaf ear. Should you feel inclined to defend your decision to own timeshare, perhaps you’ll find this fact useful:
A recent L.A. Times story reported the results of an annual consumer survey, conducted jointly by the Consumer Federation of America, the National Assn. of Consumer Agency Administrators and the North American Consumer Protection Investigators. The survey showed that “it’s clear from the nation’s economic woes that consumers and consumer agencies were hit hard last year.” The product with the highest number of complaints? The Car.
Perhaps, then, we should all be riding bicycles.
July 28th, 2010
The continuation of our series examining the battle for timeshare owners’ hearts & minds: As fraudsters of all varieties work in the shadows to exploit the timeshare owner, it’s clear that some see timeshare owners as dummies, but are they? HelpTimeshare.com doesn’t think so.
Less Than Zero – No, It’s not the popular Bret Easton Ellis novel I’m referencing, it’s the value of your timeshare… At least, that’s the value according to the latest fad to hit the secondary timeshare market like a storm: The “Relief,” “Exit,” or “Transfer” company. These firms have been quietly traveling the nation, advancing a notion that defies all logic. The Relief/Exit/Transfer crowd doesn’t just think your timeshare is worthless, oh no. These companies think your timeshare has a negative value – try -$3,000. (or if you prefer, -$5,000 – That’s a lot less than zero!)
At this point most owners probably think I’m joking, and I wish I was. After all, your timeshare is essentially just a 1/52 share of actual real property. In a mathematical feat exceeding those of even the savviest politicians, Relief companies are buying timeshares from owners every day for thousands less than zero. How many timeshares have been sold for less than zero? No one knows for sure, but well into the hundreds of thousands per year! To put this into perspective, ARDA reports the average sale price for one interval of timeshare was $20,468 in 2009, and there are 7.2 million intervals currently owned by Americans. That places the retail value of all timeshares owned by American citizens at over $140 billion. If the Relief companies succeed in “relieving” Americans of the “burden” of timeshare ownership, they will have “transferred” up to $160 billion in real estate and cash from hard-working timeshare owners to themselves… Bernie Madoff’s got nothing on these guys.
Once your timeshare mortgage is paid-in-full, the lender (usually a subsidiary of the resort) must file a “Satisfaction of Mortgage” or “Release of Deed of Trust” in the jurisdiction where the property is located. Once this document enters the public record, the Relief companies send you a postcard inviting you to a meeting. (Some even state they will be “buying timeshare” at the meeting.) What happens next remains a closely guarded secret. According to a WFTV Orlando investigation, owners are told the resale market is bad, maintenance fees are going up, and if you die with a timeshare your heirs will be stuck paying for it. Elsewhere, owners have reported being shown slide-show presentations of timeshares for sale on eBay for $0.01. The bottom line: In short order, owners are coerced into believing their timeshares are worth less than zero, before paying thousands to be “relieved” of them.
Why haven’t you heard this story? The State of Florida issues a flamboyant press release every time it succeeds in fining a small-time boiler room operation with dubious timeshare resale practices, while numerous Relief companies, far more damaging to consumers, operate with impunity. It could even be argued that the success of Relief companies in Florida is the reason why resale companies there are failing at selling timeshares for market prices.
A Victimless Crime?
Okay, disgusting as this scheme is, if a timeshare owner wants to pay thousands of dollars to transfer their timeshare, who does it hurt? On the surface, it may appear to be a victimless crime, but that’s only half the story. All of these freshly transferred timeshares don’t just disappear – they are, after all, deeded real estate. What exactly does a Relief/Transfer/Exit company do with the timeshares it collects? As largely privately held companies, they don’t have to say… What is clear from public records is that they don’t hold onto them for long. Remember those slide-shows of timeshares on eBay for a penny? You know, the Relief companies’ “evidence” of how worthless timeshare is. Maybe it’s just coincidence, but the larger the relief companies get, the more penny timeshares appear on eBay. Insidious is an understatement; the relief companies liquidate valuable timeshares for pennies, thereby reinforcing their assertion of worthless timeshare. So, who does it hurt? If you own timeshare, the answer is you.
We all know the real estate bubble burst, and many of us are anxiously waiting for homes in our neighborhoods to start selling again – without recent “comparable sales” it’s nearly impossible to know what your home is worth. What would it do to your home’s value if your neighbor sold for negative $50,000? The same is true for your timeshare property. The ramifications are even bleaker if you want to sell your timeshare: Even if you ask just a fraction of retail value, you cannot compete with Relief companies selling for a penny.
Let us Not Forget, There is Hope.
All is not lost. Many of what we consider “high-line” timeshare properties already have “First Right of Refusal” clauses. These require owners that want to sell, first allow the resort to buy at the agreed sale price. (Hopefully your resort will not turn down an offer of -$3,000.) If your resort does not yet have such a policy, attend a HOA/POA meeting and suggest one. This is the single best protection against poor/non-existent timeshare resale values. Check auction and classified sites for resales at your resort priced at near-zero; if you find a listing, contact your resort immediately.
States’ Attorneys handle all types of civil and criminal cases, with few if any having specific knowledge of timeshare. Contact the Attorney General where you live, or where your resort is located, and ask why they are not pursuing Relief/Exit/Transfer companies – Take a few minutes to help them understand the problem. ARDA (the American Resort Development Association) is hard at work drafting misguided legislation aimed at regulating timeshare resale companies. If the Relief/Exit/Transfer companies are not stopped, they needn’t worry: there won’t be any timeshare resale companies left to regulate. How do you compete with a penny?
Lastly, be careful! There are scams in every industry: You need to fact-check and investigate any company before doing business with them. Legitimate businesses have nothing to fear from you taking a few moments to investigate their practices. Pressure to act right now is sure sign of trouble.
July 21st, 2010
Timeshare owners now find themselves barraged with schemes to devalue their property and exploit their trusting nature. Apparently some in the industry believe owners are dummies – at Help Timeshare, we don’t agree. In this installment, we’ll address the issue of user generated content. This is information on the internet posted by a user rather than a webmaster; like reviews, comments, and forum posts.
User generated content has quickly overtaken the internet, but can you trust it? Last year, TripAdvisor warned that reviews on their site “may be faked.” The truth is that no one knows which users are in fact “users,” and which are spammers. Today thousands of timeshare owners have been lured into participating in forums and bulletin boards to discuss their timeshares. Many likely feel like they’ve found a safe haven, to discuss the ups and downs of timeshare ownership, but what they’ve really discovered is just another way to get exploited. Don’t take me the wrong way; I’m a huge supporter of free speech (no secret to any regular readers of this blog!) What I, along with many others in the industry, object to is coercing owners into speaking against their own interests:
Let’s say you have a grievance with your resort. You do a quick web search to see if anyone else shares your problem. You find a bulletin board where another owner is complaining about your resort, and start a discussion. Harmless enough, right? Not if you care about your timeshare investment. Your words will remain on the web in perpetuity, luring even more owners at your resort into posting their grievances. Before long, a cloud of negativity surrounds your deeded property. Decide to sell your timeshare, and you will have unknowingly provided a potential buyer thousands of reasons to say “no.” – All the while, the first post that drew you in may not have even been written by an owner!
There are ways to discuss timeshare issues privately. All forum and bulletin board systems have the capability to appear “private” to the search engines, protecting your content from the outside world. Why aren’t most timeshare discussions set-up this way? Traffic. Practically no one is searching for “timeshare bulletin boards” or “timeshare discussion groups,” but literally thousands of people are searching the name of your resort. Traffic = Money.
Self Fulfilling Prophecy
A quick look at some of the user generated content on timeshare discussion websites will reveal a distinct theme: Your timeshare is worthless and resale companies are scams. While individually each of these statements might be sometimes true, logic would dictate they are not always true. Is it plausible to believe that, with nearly 10 billion in sales during 2008, at an average sale price of over $20,000, timeshare developers are selling a worthless product? Would hundreds of timeshare resale companies exist with the intention of not selling timeshare? Only in the world of the timeshare forum, where moderators and admins continually steer the conversation toward the negative.
The mantra of “worthless timeshare and scam resale companies” has been repeated so often online, it risks becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy in two specific ways: First, if perception is in fact reality, the more timeshare owners that believe this mantra, the more truthful it becomes. As each new convert adds their comments of agreement to the cacophony of existing user generated content, the message gets louder. Secondly, timeshare sales people commonly refer to the secondary market as “dangerous” or “a scam,” when the topic comes up on tour. When potential timeshare resale buyers later search the internet for listings at that resort, negative user generated content only serves to confirm what they heard from the salesperson.
Follow the Money
People work to get paid. Behind every scheme directed at timeshare owners, is someone’s paycheck. The type of forum and bulletin boards I’ve discussed are insidious, in that they appear to be neutral, not-for-profit, or emanating from someone like you. Once your defenses are down, it’s much easier to lead you into negative postings that hurt your pocketbook. Be assured, if something is on the internet, someone has found a way to monetize it. (Even YouTube is about to make a profit!) Timeshare discussion boards are generally monetized in one of two ways:
- Never, Never, Never pay upfront to sell your timeshare (except us) – These sites target timeshare owners that have already paid another timeshare resale company. They usually have an admin or moderator begin a discussion about a resale company, posing as a client. This will alert the search engines to the keywords – specifically, the name of the resale company. Then, any clients or potential clients the resale company may have will also see the forum posting when they are looking for the company’s website. The more clients a particular timeshare resale company has, the more traffic ends up at the forum. Once inside the forum, the timeshare owner is told the resale company is a scam, and that they should never, never, ever pay upfront to sell a timeshare, except the arbitrary fee the forum charges for their classifieds (usually $15-$50.) Since one forum can feed off of hundreds of resale companies, they quickly collect fees totaling in the millions – often more than the timeshare resale companies they are cannibalizing. The catch for consumers? You end up paying to advertise your timeshare, on a site that was free to make, to other embittered timeshare owners, who no doubt agree with the forum that your timeshare is worthless.
- Post and Pay-Per-Click – These sites don’t appear to take in any revenue on the surface, but are actually quite profitable due to advertising revenue. Once you’ve been lured in by postings about your resort or resale company, and contributed to generally negative postings that will hurt your resale value, you’ll be served with carefully worded advertising designed to get you to click through to… either a resort or resale company. Yet another vicious cycle where you are sold to the highest bidder.
If you own timeshare and want to talk about it, you should. Other owners will add to your knowledge with their personal experiences… But, before you go posting away, take a minute to consider the consequences. Are you really helping you? Are you really even conversing with someone that owns timeshare? The safest course of action would be limiting your online conversations to “private” forums and bulletin boards, where risk is minimal. Many resorts actually have private boards set-up specifically for their owners to talk – where you can know that you are talking to other owners.
This isn’t a post I’ve wanted to write. There’s no doubt this blog post will result in a backlash against this blog, or my company, from various timeshare boards and forums. Despite the risks, the damages currently being done by timeshare owners to timeshare owners, due to user generated content manipulation, are so great that I would be insincere not to point them out. Please exercise caution with content that effects your timeshare investment – even if you are not concerned with resale values, there are many other fellow owners at your resort who are.
June 23rd, 2010
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