My Timeshare Story (Mostly True)

FWIW, I am happy to hold forth on various aspects of timeshare vacationing that I am familiar with or have formed opinions about. But nobody should rely on me for expertise beyond things I have done 1st hand -- & I am not necessarily an expert even on those. And despite how extensively I sound off here & at TUG ( www.tug2.net ), my timeshare experience is not all that extensive. We've rented out CP1 & CP2 a few times, but have had less success in that venture than we expected, & once even had a CP1 "surprise vacation" because our timeshare villa advertised for rent got no takers. So it goes.

It all began in 1970. The Chief Of Staff signed us up for a promotional timeshare vacation in Atlantic City NJ. I went along, but grudgingly, & I grumbled excessively. My recollection of the high-pressure, arm-twisting sales pitch we got is highly negative – that is, the sales pressure made me feel cheap & uncomfortable – & all the more uncomfortable because I was cheap, poor & cheap, otherwise we would not have needed a promotional deal like that in order to afford a weekend getaway. Anyway, we went, we got the treatment, we said No, we went home, I grumbled some more, & that was that – except that I felt vaguely guilty ever since about my unkind behavior toward my own spouse over what she planned as a nice getaway for the 2 of us.

Fast-forward to 2002. The Chief Of Staff bought us a $200 promotional vacation package that included 2 nights' accommodations in each of several popular locations including Orlando & Ft.
Lauderdale FL, Las Vegas NV, & Puerto Vallarta in Mexico. A timeshare tour at each location was part of the deal. To make it up to The Chief Of Staff for being so negative back in 1970 ( – we have long-reach memory around here – ), I heartily endorsed the venture & was 100% amenable & cordial & cooperative all the way. The Orlando timeshare we toured was Vacation Village At Parkway, which was lavish & lovely & costly. To the sales people we said No Thanks but we recognized that such a luxurious vacation spot was miles ahead of our accustomed economy motel accommodations. Heading back to our dinky motel afterward, we saw a large advertising billboard by the highway that said...
TIMESHARES – BUY RESALE – SAVE THOUSANDS.

In that instant, the realization hit us that "new" & "used" are meaningless when it comes to timeshares, because they're all used, even those bought "new." Except for the very 1st Grand Opening Day occupant, everybody who checks in to a timeshare unit or condo or villa checks in to 1 that somebody else has previously occupied. That being so, why pay thousands "new" when virtually the same thing can be bought "used" (resale) for nickels on the full-freight dollar?

That single realization is the sum & substance of our timeshare wisdom. Everything else we know or think we know comes from actually doing timeshare stuff, from paying attention to the experiences & ideas of others via TUG & this CP1-CP2 Yahoo Goup, & from paying attention (with appropriate discount factored in because of the Baloney Factor) at the many timeshare tours we have attended once we learned how to let the high pressure & the arm twisting affect us the
way rainwater affects ducks.

Acting on that realization about "new" & "used" timeshares after we got home from Orlando & Ft. Lauderdale, we called the toll-free number from the timeshare resale billboard – came close to buying a 2BR unit at Isle Of Bali (Orlando, later renamed Ron Jon & after that again renamed Liki Tiki Village) for $6,500 or so, but we dragged our feet because the resale folks did not offer anything else. Turning to the Internet for research into timeshare resales, we discovered TUG & became acquainted vicariously with someone who led us to a connection with a distressed CP1 owner unable to keep up with fee payments because of currency transfer restrictions in his home country. We bought a Floating Diamond 3BR CP1 lock-off for $3,500, made a 2BR reservation (saving the 1BR for later), & enjoyed our 1^st timeshare vacation in September 2002 – had a marvelous time.

Following up another TUG timeshare tip, we soon bought a 2BR standard-grade fixed-week timeshare in South Africa for $750 or so, strictly for cheap exchanges into nice USA timeshares. It was a good deal because of favorable currency exchange rates at the time. The deal included several years of paid-up RCI membership. Before that, we didn't belong to RCI, never wanted to exchange CP1 but only just go there ourselves. Our 1st week-for-week timeshare exchange was into Vistana Orlando, January 2003. Before buying the African timeshare, we had not considered timeshare trades. The idea was to go to CP1 ourselves & trade for other people's timeshares via RCI using our South African unit as RCI trade bait. So far so good.

While at CP1 that 1st time (September 2002), as new owners filled with pride of ownership, we naturally signed up for the Owner Update, not realizing till it happened that it's a stealth timeshare sales tour. We were shown CP2, right across the street, & were favorably impressed by the units & by the elevators in the condo buildings, unlike the CP1 walk-ups. We didn't buy, but the seed of an idea had been planted – though I'm getting ahead of myself again.

We made a December 2002 reservation for our CP1 1BR "B" unit, but had to change vacation plans because of serious illness in the family. Instead of losing out entirely on our unusable reservation, we put it up for rent & succeeded in renting it out for $350 or so. I'm not sure where we advertised it -- TUG possibly, but TUG readers are a savvy & thrifty crowd who really know how to find the bargains, so I'm not sure that's where we found our paying tenants.

Meanwhile in 2003 we started scouting eBay for CP2 Grandevillas timeshares & eventually snagged a Floating Diamond 3BR Grandevillas lock-off by sniping in a winning bid of $1,925 during the closing seconds of a garbled eBay auction – it mentioned Cypress Pointe Grandevillas in its title but was full of reading material & photographs of Embassy Grand Beach. We decided we'd be happy with either 1 & so we bid with confidence regardless of which it was & were pleased that when the dust settled it was CP2. Then we resold CP1 for the same $3,500 we paid for it – in effect getting paid some $1,500 for "upgrading."

With that $1,500 burning a hole in our pocket, we soon spent some of it on an RCI Points timeshare in Arkansas USA – we get minimal points for it, but it allows us to get more points if we choose by depositing our other timeshares into the RCI Points exchange program instead of into the conventional RCI week-for-week timeshare exchange program, our option every year. To get started, we did Points For Deposit that way with a previously banked South African timeshare week, then split our CP2 time into a 2BR week & a 1BR week, did Points For Deposit with the 1BR & rented out the 2BR for approximately the amount of that year's 3BR CP2 maintenance fee.

The thing about RCI Points is that for no more than 9,000 points + reservation fee (7,500 points for Florida timeshares), RCI offers full-week "Instant Exchange" reservations into RCI Weeks timeshares
any time within 45 days of check-in. Naturally the pickings are slim with so little time remaining before check-in, but for people interested in off-season reservations, it's an extremely attractive option. Just after midnight on the 45th day before check-in, our son snagged an Instant Exchange reservation at CP1 for 7,500 + reservation fee for his family's 2005 pre-Christmas vacation – our
initial foray into using our newly acquired RCI Points account.

The more we're able to vacation where & when we want using RCI Instant Exchange & RCI Last Call, the less we'll need to rely on our own paid-for time at CP1 & CP2. The less we use those for our own vacations, the more we'll be able to try renting them out to others. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

We bought back into CP1 last year, Floating Diamond 3BR lock-off, alternate years only. By the time the purchase transaction was complete & our names were officially inscribed on the owners' list at CP1 & VRI, it was getting late in the year. With delinquencies down & owners' prompt payments up at CP1, getting a reservation by requesting late in the year is no longer a sure thing. Unlike 2002, there's hardly any slop in the system now & in fact it's possible to get shut out completely by waiting too late in the year to put in a reservation request. We took what was left – a 3BR week in October 2006 – then advertised that for rent everywhere we could think of including eBay, got no takers, & so checked in ourselves, with friends we've known since way back, on a nice surprise vacation.

Our "surprise vacation" was in the 2BR "A" unit. Our 1BR "B" unit actually did get a bidder on eBay, but the winner never paid & never even contacted us till 1 day before check-in. By then we had given up on our non-paying eBay bidder & rerented out the unit instead to somebody else via Craig's List. So it goes.

Our own January 2007 Orlando timeshare vacation was at Silver Lake Resort Silver Points, via RCI Last Call. We have CP2 up for rent right now on Craig's List & on WTOP-FM radio's web site's free classified ads section (with lots of pictures). We've had a couple of inquiries but no follow-ups so far. We could be in for another surprise vacation – who knows?

The trouble in trying to rent out Orlando timeshares is that so many are so readily available from so many sources for so little money –significantly less than the owners are paying in resort maintenance
fees in some instances. I'm leaning toward the idea that timing is everything – offseason Orlando timeshares are cheap & plentiful, high-demand-season Orlando timeshares are scarce & pricey. If that's how it is, then the key to successfull Orlando timeshare rentals is to lock in a high-demand week, then market that week aggressively on the rental market – RedWeek.com, eBay, Craig's List, etc.

TUG membership – $15 per year – is a big bargain for any timeshare owner. Membership isn't even required – sign-up at the TUG-BBS discussion forum is free. Sign-up is not required to read the TUG-BBS, but free sign-up is required in order to ask & answer questions, reply, add one's own commentary, search by topic & user, etc.

Anybody who has not yet got his or her fill of my output can click on over to the TUG-BBS, sign up, & look up stuff contributed by AwayWeGo, my TUG-BBS user name.

That's my timeshare story & it's mostly true & I'm sticking to it. Anybody interested in any specific follow-up from me is welcome to contact me individually on or off TUG, on or off this Yahoo Group.

– Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.