What The Bleep Is A Timeshare?
PRLog (Press Release) – Nov 24, 2011 -
Would somebody please tell me what a timeshare really is? When I bought my timeshare, I thought it was all going to be a great time for my family. We would buy a week in a fancy resort and trade our time to stay anywhere in the world for little or nothing. “What a deal!” we thought, so we opted to buy even though we were resistant about the hard-sell tactics employed by the sales staff at the seminar that we attended.
The salesman told us (off-the-record, of course, and he cautioned us that we could not repeat what he was about to reveal to us, because it would be strictly against policy) that even if we did not use the vacation week ourselves, that we could rent our week on eBay for thousands of dollars. Then he pulled his secret stash of his own eBay listings from his briefcase and showed us how he and his wife were renting their weeks for thousands of dollars. I examined the print outs and thought, “There is no way we can lose on this deal.”
If we don’t get to use our weeks for any reason, no problem; we simply rent our week on eBay for thousands of dollars. Easy. This is a no-brainer. I was assured by the salesman that if I decided to add more weeks in the next six months, I could get additional weeks at today’s one-time-offer discount rate, if I wanted to rake-in the big bucks, like he was.
After some convincing, my wife agreed to buy a week (that we thought was not only like money in the bank, but we were also assured that the value would increase over time… plus this was our foot-in-the-
That was three years ago. Today, what do we have? I big ol’ pile of, “bleep.” If you have an existing timeshare, you know the rest of the story already. If you try to use your week… good luck. Chances are the week that you can get off for vacation is all booked up. What about going to another location? Same deal.
Oh, and the renting your week on eBay deal? Go ahead and look for yourself; you will find lots of people’s weeks for rent on eBay, but no bids at all. Why? Because you can get the week at the same (or similar) resort for half that price on Cheap Tickets or Expedia! And check out the prices that these poor folks are asking for their week. You will notice that it’s exactly the same as their yearly maintenance fee. That’s right; they can’t use it, so they’re hoping to at least get their maintenance fee paid for by giving it away (but sadly, no luck).
I thought, “Is it just me?” Then I found Natalie R. Simpson’s book, The Truth About Timeshares.
That was a sobering experience. I had no idea what I had gotten myself into. Millions of folks – in the same boat as me – have no idea what we have gotten ourselves into. Did you know that according to your contract, your heirs and their heirs will be punished for the rest of their lives, and their children’s lives, and their children’s lives… for your purchase of this timeshare?
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. If you’re dissatisfied with your timeshare, have thought to yourself, “This is not working out the way that I thought it would,” or heaven forbid, “How do I get out of my timeshare?” then you owe it to yourself to be well-informed and visit http://www.thetruthabouttimeshares.com first.
I can’t help but wonder if the long arm of the law might come to our aid someday, but it appears that the governing entities are in full support of the timeshare sales corporations.