Timeshare - any supporters

Lezanne26

We have had a timeshare in Tenerife for 13 years and have had some brilliant holidays. At first we used to exchange our week for one in England as we couldn't afford 5 flights to Tenerife and consequently we have visited places we would not otherwise have considered (especially in March) - Cornwall, Wales & Scotland. The accommodation has always been far better than the normal self catering places you'd get for the same price.

We now tend to go abroad - my dd and dh love going back to our timeshare at Pearly Grey in Tenerife (the reps are really friendly and one even baked a cake for my dd's birthday) but I would now like a change. Exchanging is fairly simple - especially if you're flexible about places and times - the RCI call centre staff are really helpful.

I know you have the maintenance fees & exchange fees to take into consideration but I still think it has been worthwhile for us anyway.

moonrakerz

I must confess I don't know a great deal about time shares - for very much the same reason I don't know much about Lassa fever, hungry alligators and quicksands - I stay well clear of them !

I was fascinated by some of the figures quoted in this thread. One post said a 1 week slot cost £3000 and "service charge" is £385 per year (which may even be payable for ever and a day).

£3000 X 52 weeks ( X 20 [?] units = £3.12 Million !
Plus
£385 X 52 X 20 = £400, 000 annual income ( for ever ) !

I have just realised that I have wasted my whole life - I should have been building and flogging time shares !

lynzpower

my grandparents have a timeshare with RCI and the whole family have made use of it.

they have 4 weeks in the Algarve, but they think its boring now so have swapped thier weeks for cruises, holidays in the UK, driving holidays in USA and canada and more. When the RCI offers come out of extra free weeks, Ive ofen been tempted with a week in Hungary at the cost of the admin fee.

I dont tihnk its something I can see myself getting into just yet, but whne I have kids I think its certainly something Id consider as you get a villa for effectivley the cost of the service charge per year and 4 weeks. If they pay 385 pa, then that is less than 100 pw in a villa or cruise etc. I think it represets pretty good value, the villas I stayed in Florid with the fmaily were far superior to anything we got from package hols with marble floors, beautiful grounds , own pool etc.

By chance I got my flight cancelled flying back from Cancun and got put up in Tucancun tresort which is a RCI resort of distinction. Very niceit was too, the food in particular was excellent. ( not sure about the need for a MExican theme night but there you are! :rolleyes:)

CaroleK_2

We have had 2 weeks timeshare in Tenerife for many years, and have had some great holidays because of it.

Our circumstances have now changed and we decided it might be a good idea to try to get rid of it. We don't want a lot of money for at as we think we've had our moneys worth already. I saw an advertisement on the TV for ETOO (European Timeshare Owners Organisation) and sent them an email. They called and told us they had some corporate customer who wanted to buy 40 timeshares in Tenerife, and were willing to pay £6,000 for our 2 weeks! Too good to be true?? It was a guaranteed sale within 12 weeks. The catch? They wanted £850.00 up front for administration, but this would be returned on completion! She said they had to do it like this as the standard contract that they had to use as they were members of the ITRA (International Timeshare Resales Association) was worded this way.

I went on to the ITRA website and there was no list of members, and it looked like it was based in Gibraltor, same as ETOO!

She called this morning to see if we wanted to proceed, and I said that the sample letter that she had sent me did not guarantee a sale, just said the client was interested.

I said I'd been on the website of ITRA and it didn't list any members, she said she could give me their telephone number for me to call them, and I said I was unwilling to throw good money away.

Guess what, she put the phone down on me. I guess I shalln't be hearing from her again!

Has anybody else had any experiences like this?

lynzpower

No carol, I havent heard of that, but paying someone up front as they have " a buyer sounds like scammery to me!

A close escape there -phew!

dzug

Problem is it is theirs 'in perpetuity', so not only are they liable forever, it becomes part of their heritable estate and the family becomes liable!

Not quite - the family is definitely NOT personally liable. The heritable estate is liable. If it can't pay, the debt ceases, it does not pass on to relatives.

Still bad enough though.

Browntrout_2

dzug wrote: »

Problem is it is theirs 'in perpetuity', so not only are they liable forever, it becomes part of their heritable estate and the family becomes liable!

Not quite - the family is definitely NOT personally liable. The heritable estate is liable. If it can't pay, the debt ceases, it does not pass on to relatives.

Still bad enough though.

So it comes out the will first, and what would come out, the next years maint or next 99 years?

Would the estate have to pay a legal fees to contest the sum asked for in 'settlement'?

Timeshare sounds like a great thing on the upside when you are 40 or whatever with plenty time and money and hopefully health, it's yours forever and will go up in value like an investment maybe....

The reality is it goes down in value as soon as you pay for it and in some cases the only way to get rid of it is to bankrupt or worse.

:mad:

vivatifosi

Timeshare can be great - but only if you buy into the right one.

We bought into the Disney Vacation Club (owned by Disney Corp) in 1995. At that point our investment cost us $12,000. We pay fees each year but stay in luxury property in Disneyworld at the equivalent of about $15-20 per night all in (normal room rate $300). Such has been the increase in demand for DVC properties that the corresponding price today has increased by half and if I want to sell Disney will buy it back. OK, the pound dollar has fallen since then, but I have in effect been on holiday for virtually nothing for the past 12 years.

How is that a bad investment?

fudgem

For those timeshare owners who like to bank and swop their share, try http://www.dialanexchange.com/default.aspx

This organisation does not charge a membership fee, and is cheaper per swop than any of the others. We have used them for a few years and found them excellent

Mark7799

moonrakerz wrote: »

I must confess I don't know a great deal about time shares - for very much the same reason I don't know much about Lassa fever, hungry alligators and quicksands - I stay well clear of them !

I was fascinated by some of the figures quoted in this thread. One post said a 1 week slot cost £3000 and "service charge" is £385 per year (which may even be payable for ever and a day).

£3000 X 52 weeks ( X 20 [?] units = £3.12 Million !
Plus
£385 X 52 X 20 = £400, 000 annual income ( for ever ) !

I have just realised that I have wasted my whole life - I should have been building and flogging time shares !

As you said, you don't know much about them:p

We own one week for which we pay a service charge of £305 - once per year only

We paid £7000 to buy the timeshare - a one off payment.

I took the trouble to learn about them before I made a considered decision to buy.:rolleyes: