Diamond resorts "Class Action"

rasp

I rarely post on this site and never on this forum but hope my experience will be of some help.
A year and a half ago I wrote to Diamond Resorts stating I could no longer afford to continue to pay their fees and wished to terminate the agreement. I should add that all management fees at that point were up to date and there were no outstanding bookings for use of the timeshare.
I was not looking to get money back but simply wanted to walk away. Within 2 weeks I received a letter releasing me from Diamond Resorts after they checked that fees for that year were paid.
I have heard nothing from them since.

tonyld

I purchased a Time Share in TVC (Thurnham vacation club) a small UK company in 2008 for £9500, their annual fees were about £300 if I recall, with this we could get a high season week in one of 3 resorts (or maybe 2 weeks in low season). Within 2 years the founder had done a runner just after all the annual fees had been paid.
Shortly after this we were invited to speak with "the new owner" Sunterra. The outcome was that we had to convert our week into points but this was not worth what we already had. Our only option was to pay more (£3500) or take the reduced value and lump it. - We reluctantly decided to shell out the extra.
The annual fees rose steadily year on year - and finding holidays in peak time became almost impossible (we were restricted to peak time due to school age children).
Sunterra then went into liquidation and were in turn purchased by Diamond Resorts International.
This time we were not charged more but our fees kept rising.
In 2011 I was made redundant and by that time the fees had risen to over £1000 - at the same time I was researching solutions to this albatross around my neck that had not served us very well at all.
At this time DRI points packages were exchanging hands at 99p on Ebay
I found out about a Class Action in Scotland which had gained a bit of traction, this resulted in DRI offering a 'walk away' option.
I wrote to them and asked for this, and was accepted. Shortly after this I was released from my contract, around 15k poorer (not including interest) and still paying off the loan.
This was a very costly experience and I cannot believe how I was so naive as to purchase in the first place.
My advice is to steer clear of any timeshare companies