What Happens if I Stop Paying My Timeshare?
This question comes up a lot on timeshare forums and blogs, and it can be complicated depending on the exact procedures outlined in your particular contract. There are a few main points that stay the same regardless of whether you have a deeded timeshare or right-to-use, and whether or not you have paid off the entire amount of the timeshare. The following is a description of the steps that will take place if you decide to throw in the towel and allow your timeshare to go into default, leading to timeshare foreclosure.
Timeshare is treated equal to real estate in the eyes of the law, and it follows the same rules and regulations as a homeowners deed. Your timeshare can foreclose in the same way as your home if you stop making payments – and this does not just mean payments on the principal balance, it also includes yearly maintenance fees. After your first missed payment, whether it be a monthly payment on the principal balance or your maintenance fees, you will start receiving calls from your timeshare resort’s collection company attempting to collect a payment. You will also receive information by mail detailing the amount due, including any applicable late fees, and their intentions on reporting your delinquency to the IRS.
The harassing telephone calls and letters will continue if you choose to not pay the balance due on your timeshare, and after anywhere from 6-24 months (this is dependent on the procedure of your resort company) your timeshare company will begin foreclosure proceedings on your timeshare. Timeshare companies will try to avoid this at all costs because a foreclosure means they have to take the property back and pay legal fees for the proper paperwork to be processed. I have heard instances of resorts offering to lower the amount due on the principal, changing contacts to make maintenance fees due only every 2 years, adding extra perks into your vacation package such as extended stays, rental cars, airfare, and sometimes even offering to forgive the amount owed if the two parties can reach a suitable agreement for payments to continue.
If your timeshare does go all the way through the foreclosure proceedings you will be notified by mail that your deeded timeshare will be part of a trustee’s sale or public auction. At the given date, time and place your timeshare will be sold at a sheriff’s auction to the highest bidder. The auction is public record and the transaction can be recorded and reported to the IRS and credit bureaus, effectively ruining your credit for the next 7 years. This strike on your credit score can make it difficult to finance a car, obtain a loan or even buy a home. Since timeshares rarely sell at auction for the amount owed on the deed, the timeshare resort company has the option to take legal action and sue you for the remaining balance owed. Read more on timeshare foreclosure and credit scores in the post – Timeshare Foreclosures and Your Credit Score
Timeshares can be hard to wiggle out of, but most anything is better than letting the property foreclose and take a major hit on your credit score – especially if you are anticipating a major purchase in the near future. Timeshare foreclosure should be your last resort if there is absolutely no way you can make the monthly or yearly payments. It is wise to contact your timeshare resort if you are having financial difficulties and anticipate missing a payment, some properties will even offer to take your timeshare back under some circumstances; some resorts will also offer a Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure. You will also want to check out possibly donating your timeshare if the principal amount is paid off in full – this is not an option if you still owe money on a loan.
Helpful Timeshare Foreclosure Links:
Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure for Timeshare - http://rcivip.com/deed-in-lieu-of-foreclosure-for-timeshare/
Timeshare Foreclosure and Your Credit Score – http://rcivip.com/timeshare-foreclosures-and-your-credit-score/
Alternative Timeshare Sales Options – http://rcivip.com/alternative-timeshare-sales-options/
Has anyone deal with Tree Top Villas
Hello,
I have a TS at Tahiti Village Las Vegas. I have been paying on time since 2008. I decided to stop paying them since it is impossible to make any reservations. I have not been able to stay there at all since we purchased it. It has been 5 years!!! I stopped making payments this year since I purchased my home 2 years ago and I know my credit will be ruined. They finally stopped calling me for payments from TS, but now I have Pennicle Financial Group (collection agency) calling me everyday, all day.
I have always been responsible with all my payments so I have no experience dealing with collection agency’s . I have heard they can sue you and garnish your wages. Is this true?? How else can I get affected besides have a negative on my credit?
Collection agency has no leverage, they cannot sue or garnish your wages. Also since they are not the ones your owe money to, request that they stop calling, just tell them that you prefer to communicate with them in writing.
THAT’S IT! That would be the end of them!
read this: http://credit.about.com/od/debtcollection/tp/fdcpa-violations.htm
Also read up on FDCPA http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fdcpa/fdcpact.shtm
One obersvation I have as I follow this thread, is new people who face the same problem as others including myself had come in to this forum to ask the question, they get answers and that’s it. Dialog seem to end. Also most of the people come from submissive or passive position, like we all did something wrong and now afraid not get spanked!
I say we should be more active and aggressive!
This crappy situation ruined or at least spoiled allot of families finances, we’ve all been lied and cheated on many diff points during sales presentation.
We’ve all been sold this “awesome” good, that almost overnight turned into garbage that we now cannot get rid off, the trash removal company is not really coming, but we all keep getting billing statements for “enjoying” this AWESOME PRODUCT and for trash removal services!
Please, PLEASE PLEASE people, lets get some ideas together of how we can put this thing in FORWARD instead of REVERSE!
Lets hear success stories or plans of action, so we as a group can come with some working strategies, to not only make these TimeShare scammers to go away, but to PUNISH THEM for being Greedy Lying ScamBags!
I know I want to and ready, WHOS WITH ME!?
I settled with Festiva TS in Branson after not paying for almost a year. They settled for about 1/3 of what I owed. I am free and clear of this nightmare.
How exactly did you settle with Festiva? I have a Garden City, SC timeshare with them, and would LOVE to get rid of it. I plan on stopping all maintenance fee payments as of January 2014, and hope they will eventually just take it back.
I didn’t pay maintenance fees or my payment for over a year. They kept calling me and I would just ignore their phone calls. they finally sent me an email and said they would like to settle the account. I told them that I didn’t want it anymore and that it was worthless. We came to an agreement which was about 1/3 of what was owed and signed a contract.
I have my own agreement with them. I haven’t paid maintenance in over 2 years. The TS itself was paid off a long time ago. My agreement is that they will never see another red cent from me. If they want to foreclose of do a deed in lieu go for it. But I won’t take their calls or be intimidated by them. All they can do is take back their worthless property that people don’t want for free, and sell it to another sucker.
I agree, people should be made more aware f the pitfalls of taking on a TS.
What about Facebook/Twitter?
Please Google “Tahiti Village scam”. You might learn that you can apply for a full refund. You should not be afraid of the collection agency ruining your credit. Consolidate Resorts is afraid you might figure things out and sue them for breach of contract and/or fraudulently selling non-existing property and have to give you a full refund. So you can go either way – tell the collection agency to obtain a deed in lieu of foreclosure or have a lawyer write a letter asking for a full refund.
Just be very careful about hiring a lawyer – remember there are many scammers out there who promise to sell your TS. There might also be scammers posing as lawyers who promises to get rid of your TS.
Hi BaldSpot: I googled that phrase and lots of links came up including stuff from Trip Advisor and a guy named Robert Paisola. Can you please post the link to the page that you are referring to, where one can apply for the full refund on the account? Does that include maintenance fees or just the timeshare loan?
Thanks in advance.
Hello,
I am in a bit of a different situation than most on here. I did get scammed by the Welks Resort and have made all of my payments on time. I am in good financial situation and could probably continue to make the payments. But me and my wife are expecting and I would rather spend the money on saving for my daughters education instead of wasting it on a useless ts.
I guess my main concern is that I do have the financial resources to continue making the payments, would this make it easier for the Welks to come after me, law suit and wage garnishment.
I have already purchased my house and have a good credit rating so I am assuming that if I keep making my house payments that my credit would rebound fairly quickly.
Also, does anyone know at what rate you are taxed on the forgiven debt?
Has anyone on here had experience walking away from the welks and know how they respond.
Any help would be appreciated. I am so glad to come across this website and all the helpful info on it. Thank you all for the info you have already shared. I will keep all informed of my situation and how it progresses.
Timeshare contract signed in Mexico – living in the UK.
Premier by Original (Original Resorts)
contract signed is payable over 5 years, with 1st payment due early May. Payments to be made by credit card – they have our details. So far – no money has been paid. We have received no benefits from timeshare. We were told it was a 5 day cooling off period. Very tipsy whilst signing, and didn’t look at contract properly until home from holiday – much longer than 5 days after.
We have “bought” 350 days to be used over 25 years – so assume it is timeshare points. We have no set dates or weeks. No mention of timeshare was made during sale – but we suspected as much – and there is a small mention of timeshare printed on one of the many pages of the contract. I have read through the very small print and nowhere can I find mention of what happens if we cancel. There is one sentence that hints that it will be passed to debt collection if we don’t pay – at our expense. There are no annual maintenance charges.
Has anyone come across this company before? Is it actually time-share or have we signed up for some form of holiday club run by the hotel chain? We are baffled – and have been trawling the net for answers – all to no avail. The resort is affiliated to RCI and SFX and is in their brochures.
What will happen if we cancel our card? They won’t be able to affect a payment authorization. I assume it will be treated as a default loan – but how can that be affected in Mexico – when we are in the UK? For a judgement to be passed to our credit rating, surely it would have to be applied for in the UK?
Just don’t pay or respond to any call or correspondence. There is nothing they can do to you in England, not even affect your credit rating. Just call your credit card company, let them know you want to change your credit card number because you were swindled by a timeshare company and that you do not authorize any payments to them.
Hi Cajame
I purchased TS in Florida 7years ago. My husband died August 2008 and I have not paid any of the mortgage or maintenance fees since he died. I have had many phone calls for the first couple of years and I still get bills with extra interest payments due added to the amounts. I have no intention of paying anything more for this TS and they can threaten as much as they like with collection agencies but they have NO jurisdiction in the UK and it cannot affect you credit rating here. All they can do is take the TS back, give you a Deed in Lue and sell it on to some other mug. Not that I am suggesting you are a mug just gullible like my husband & I were.
Just remember if you do not live in Mexico they cannot do anything to you!!
Good Luck
Phyl
My parents own (paid in full) a timeshare in South Africa ( Mount Amanzi). Due to the economy & retirement they can no longer afford the maintenance fees. They have several weeks stored and have tried to give them away for cost to cover the fees but that hasn’t worked in 5 years. (Its cheaper to get a vacation without having a timeshare!) They did not pay the fee due in September and have received the notice that they will be sued if payment is not received by May 1st. I emailed Mount Amanzi for them and asked for a Quit Claim Deed/Warranty Deed and was told to pay the Sept fee first. 6700 Rand = 670 US Dollars. Can this affect their credit here in the United States? Can Mount Amanzi put a lien on their house in the United States?
they cannot sue you until they foreclose and take back the deed, which is what you want them to do. even then, they will not sue you.
they cannot put a lien on your house unless they sue you first, which they will not do. These are just scare tactics. They can put a collections notice on your credit, but do you really want to pay the $670 per year not to do this?
If you pay them the $670, they will still not send you the deed in lieu. Don’t even think about sending them money until you get a letter from them signed by an officer saying if you pay so much, they will never come after you again. But, I would just not pay and take the credit hit.
Why/how are you sure they will not sue? Also, it IS possible to be sued if they, (being in South Africa), do not have the social security numbers or birth dates of my parents, (who are in the States)?? I’ve hunted all day for info on possible repercussions of going delinquent on international timeshare maintenance fees. ( My parents will never travel to Africa. ) 99.9% of what I find refers to timeshares owned here in the States. This is so exhausting and frustrating!!!
When you borrow money from a bank, the bank makes you provide “collateral” for the loan. So if you buy a house, the house is the collateral. If you do not pay off the loan, the bank takes the house and sells it to get back the money they loaned you. The timeshare contract does not have your house or any other of your property established as collateral for a loan. The timeshare maintenance fees are not loans. They are fees for services or use of the property. If you do not pay, the only thing they can do is prevent you from using the property and eventually, confiscate the property (the timeshare “property”) to satisfy any debt they claim you have. Since the value of the property far exceeds the maintenance fee (the rest of you – stop laughing!), you should not pay them any more money for any reason whatever. They want you to pay fees and fines and penalties and whatever else they can dream up because their only goal in life is to suck all the money out of you.
You should look up collection agency laws and debtor’s rights in your state and get informed.
I just got another bill from Thunder Mountain, $4430.00, they have it in Meridian Collections. Yearly fees are $650ish. I flat out refuse to give them anymore of my hard earned money!!!! They have made no offers to me at all and I think it has been like 4 years now. I just throw the collection letter in the woodstove!!! Gone for another year!!!
B., I am in a very similar predicament with the exact same location (Thunder Mountain). I divorced in 1998 and the divorce papers stipulated that the TS would be sold and the profit (haha) split, and my ex kept all the paperwork. Never heard from her again, until a few years ago.
Recently the TS showed up on my immaculate credit report as having gone to Meridian Collections to the tune of $8700. Can anyone here clearly define what happens if I let it go into foreclosure? I have no way to negotiate with Meridian because her name is also on the title (should I ask for power of attorney?). I want to be rid of this, and I can take the hit on my credit report. But how far can they go legally to collect?
Stop worrying about what won’t happen. They can’t do anything but send it to collections and then foreclose or issue a deed in lieu. Just forget about it, the worst has happened which is a little blip on your credit report. If they ever try to go after anyone’s bank account ot property the backlash and publicity would shut the whole Timeshare scam down.
they can call you over and over, and they can file a collections notice on your credit report. that’s about it. the TS company can foreclose. the collections notice stays on your credit report for seven years from the first missed payment
Can they take me to court for non payment,and can they garnish mt incoming wages?
no, they cannot garnish your wages
they couldn’t take you to court without foreclosing first, and foreclosing cures any debt owed
Ok, they told me if I give them 750 they will buy back my deed, should we do this to save our credit, we are all paid up, purchased in full, no morgage, but I hate timeshares and I don’t want to see another
you have to decide what it is worth to you — but do not send them anything until they have put it all in writing, or you will restart the clock and just have more grief.
If you pay them some more money they will give you money back for your deed? Can’t you see how illogical that is? What’s the money for that you have to pay them? Tell them to take it out of the thousands you already paid them. Have you heard of the Nigerian scams? They say, “A rich contractor died leaving $240 million dollars etc., all you need is to send me $40 for registration fee and then you get the money. So you send in $40 and they say, Thanks, now we need $120 for the Bank Fee. So you send that in and then they need $350 for tranference fee. And so on and so on and finally they have you for $80,000 and you still don’t get any $240 million.
Here’s the deal – you already paid this thing off – they are not going to pay you anything for it. Just turn out the lights and stop talking to them and do not send another cent. No more money. The End. That’s what I did, and I’m saving a nice bundle every year. They don’t care about me, and I don’t care about them.
So it has been 4 months since I last paid Wyndham, and I have been rejecting certified mail from them, and I have been receiving past due notices from them. I also have received phone calls saying they can make a deal by downgrading my timeshare since I have equity. Has anyone tried negotiating into a smaller monthly payment? And I am curious on how much of a hit everyone has taken on their credit report.
Do not negotiate a downgrade. Do not send them another penny. All they want to do is keep you hanging on and paying them something. Cut the cord and the BS and just stop. Don’t answer the phone when they call. Don’t respond to anything they send you unless they offer to take back the property and release you from the contract. The End.
I need help to get out of not mine timeshare as I can’t even get a vacation the name is pacific monarch which diamond resorts took over I just want out please help I’m in california
You need to read some of the posts here and you will see what you need to do. It’s been explained a hundred times already.
Penelope,
I too have a timeshare with Pacific Monarch. I’ve not made any payments for the last six months as I could no longer afford the quarterly dues. Diamond Resorts contacted me and offered to make a deal with me to lower the payments and add it to the end of the loan. The monthly payment isn’t my problem. I can make that. What I can’t do is pay the ever increasing quarterly dues that are now just shy of $700 every three months. I don’t know about your situation, but mine was with three other people (parents and my ex-hubby). My dad passed away, my ex is incarcerated and my mom walked away leaving me to carry the loan for the last five years. I owe approx $8K but there is no way I will continue to pay on something that hasn’t even been used in over six years. I figure I will take the hit to my credit and deal with it. It’s a scam and should be outlawed.
Has anyone stopped paying Tahiti Village in Vegas? I stopped paying 3 months ago & have received 3-4 phone calls a day in the last month. They threaten foreclosure & negative credit. Any advice?
not tahitit village — but that is what the timeshare people do — call often and say they will destroy your credit and foreclose –
but you want them to foreclaose, and you can’t stop them from giving you a nasty comment.
I quit paying two years ago. I changed my phone number and I refused to accept certified letters.So every month they send me a letter saying Final Notice! Pay now or this is going to collections. But they can’t sue me because it would be for services not rendered. As many of you have expressed, you can’t get a reservation at these places, which is fraud. If a prosecutor ever went after these pigs, they’d spend the rest of their lives in prison. Do NOT pay them another cent.
I’ve considered not paying Tahiti Village, but still on the fence. Have you’ve found any information about a class action suit against these people?
I have a timeshare with Tahiti Village i stopped paying back in 2009 i had it for a few months and thought why on earth did i get this. Integra is the collection agency they finally sent me a option for a payment plan of a crazy amount per month or Deed of lieu of Foreclosure. I understand the deed will def hurt my credit. it took them a while to contact me the letter said i had til the end of april. Any other way out of this.
The deed in lieu of foreclosure is the best thing – just make them agree to not report it to the credit agencies. But even if they do, who cares? Its a timeshare and anyone with experience knows that doesn’t count as a real credit hit but as an escape hatch from timeshare hell.
I stopped paying maintenance two years ago, and the loan since last January. I sent them a couple of letters indicating that we cannot afford to pay any more due to economic hardship. They sent us a letter stating instead of requiring us to pay $xxxx they are giving us a discount of 75% and only pay $xxx to get our loan paid off and our privileges reinstated. I am going to consult our lawyer to draft a counter offer stating we don’t pay them a single cent anymore, and for them to take back their unit that we no longer want to keep paying maintenance on (since I know we will be on the hook to pay maintenance for life even if we pay off the loan in full today). Hope that helps.
I have a timeshare in Kissimmee that we no longer want. It is paid for and all fees are current. I do not want this anymore and can’t sell it. If I let them foreclose on it will I be responsible for the legal fees? How much could they be?
I called by bank today to stop all the payment on bluegreen. I will not pay them any penney againg. I was told a lie.
After not paying for 2 months, I received a potential negative report from Wyndham. Has anyone received a negative report this early?
Honestly I don’t know or care what they report. Whatever they do it’s worth it to get this albatross off from around my neck. The only other option is to pay forever and to me that’s useless and blackmail. My credit is fine, there is not much they can do.
What about liens? Can they put a lien on homes, cars, and bank accounts if payment is stopped? My parents were deceived into a Wyndham resort in Florida and really do not have the means to continue payment but I fear they have a lot to loose.
It is highly unlikely and in any event, they must first file a lawsuit and obtain a Judgment against you before a lien can be put on your property. Plus Usually you cannot lose your home because of an unrelated debt.
No timeshare company wants the bad publicity of taking away an old person’s home for not paying a timeshare. It would bring that sham industry to a halt.
They are also not going to invest the time and money to sue a person when they don’t even know if they will get any money out of it.
that seems very quick, but look at it this way — now there is certainly no reason to pay them because they have already destroyed your credit and it is there for 7 years, not matter what they tell you.
My timeshare that i owned was foreclosed four years ago. I now have the negative credit report in my credit. I only owed $700 more dollars but the person who had taken over the property neglected to pay it nor told me about it. Not until I took charge and checked my credit reports that I learned about all these. I tried to buy it back but Wyndham wont let me. I started owning and paying for it way back in 2001. foreclosed 2009. I am thinking of either just letting time go by for this to be deleted or make a deal to pay it. As of now, they havent transferred it to a collection agency yet. What do you guys think?
If it’s been foreclosed why would you pay? It’s like paying for a house that has been taken away from you and you can never use again. Things go to collection agencies before they report it negatively to the credit bureaus, once it’s reported, just forget about it, it’s a blip that is easily explained to any serious place wanting to give you a loan. I doubt these things actually go to real collection agencies. They know people aren’t gonna pay it. They probably have some shill company that they create themselves to be their “collection agency”, same as the shill companies they create to loan people money to buy they shams.
Has anyone dealt with Westgate in Florida? I am concerned about stopping payments on my TS bc I really cannot afford to have my credit go bad. I have been planning on purchasing a “Real” home soon.
Purchase the real home, then stop the payments on the timeshare!
We have paid in full our timeshare at Vacation Village at Weston. WE have been paying all taxes and fees every year, we can not afford it anymore. I wrote and asked them to take it back. They said send them 750 dollars and they would take it back, any advice, thank you Cherie
They are going to take it back regardless, why pay them? I haven’t paid my maintenance for 2 years and get a call from an 800 number a few times a week but I never answer and they don’t leave a message. My credit it fine, I doubt that whatever they can report will even make a blip, a few weeks ago I got instant credit for an Amazon store card, I have never failed to pay a bill on time except for these crooks and their timeshares. It certainly is not worth $750 to me. Those crooks have enough of your money, don’t give them more. And if you do decide to go thru with it make sure you get in writing that you are done with the timeshare and will not own it any longer and will never have to pay them again, I don’t trust those cheats.
My timeshare nitemare originates out of Collingwood Ontario Canada where Resort Holiday Group/RCI and affiliates with Ocean Manor Resorts and a whole lot of other names this outfit likes to call itself have decided after only 2 phone calls to send my account to collections with the credit bureau. Now of course, they have tarnished my good name and I’m getting calls from the credit bureau stating we (my wife & I )have signed a promissory note that they intend to collect on it.I told them good luck with that as my wife and I are pensioners and I can’t understand what it is I’m supposed to be paying for! Points that aren’t enough to take a holiday with without buying more,weeks that we can’t get or places we can’t get because they are booked so far in advance that we would have to pay extra to get something if it was available. People there that don’t know a damn thing about your account. We were so conned into this scam by total misrepresentation of the facts and they don’t care. I would really like to hear from anyone having dealt with this particular organization and they’re B.S. With all the totally unhappy people who have been mislead by uncaring sales people and their managers I can’t understand why there hasn’t been a class action law suit agains’t these timeshare scam artists. We know the Gov’t won’t do a damn thing about these “legal” con men because they all make so much money they have to “contribute” to their favorite political party and the political parties don’t want to do anything that would jepordize the contributions they get from them.
I’m also sick and tired of hearing the phrase”buyer beware” when these companies have absolutley no concern about their ethics of business whatsoever!
Case in point…when we went to the presentation we were upfront in telling the salesman that we didn’t have the $75,000 income that was one of the requirements to qualify for this timeshare offer in the first place. I believe they should, as a responsible corporate business, qualify all potential buyers for their timeshare programs by means of income verification and a credit check. Had they done this, they could have saved a lot of people a lot of headaches including themselves and we wouldn’t have qualified.
Another thing we learned after the fact is that they will suggest you can add your kids or other loved ones names to the contract and leave them the opportunity to enjoy vacations anywhere in the world that RCI/RHG has affiliation with.
All they really meant was this is how we can screw your kids/loved ones into paying ever increasing maintenance fees and a whole host of other fees as they see fit for as long as they live or length of contract. Whichever comes last. Totally illegal without the signatures of the names of those people whose names you may have given them. Those people would then have to contact the resort by letter and signature to have their names removed. Even then I have my doubts that would stop these leeches.
Anyway, I at this point don’t even want to go to Collingwood Ont.Canada to ski at Blue Mountain ski resort, or the world reknown Elvis Festival or the world class fishing available in the pristine waters of Georgian Bay. At least not out of the Collingwood area. Yes…they don’t want to let me off the hook so I have no problem letting the world know what I think about how a beautiful little hamlet like Collingwood Ont. can support or give it’s blessing to a scum scam business like Resort Holiday Group aka Resort Holiday Developments Inc.aka RCI and a whole list of other names they like to be known as. Just google above names and add scams to it and read what comes up! This is MY OPINION about the whole matter and I will not cease and disist until they come to their senses and cancel the contract I have with them. I don’t even want the $4000. or so that they have already gotten from me although it would be nice to get it back.
Maybe someone from the resort will read this comment and realize that maybe they should take another look at how they conduct their business but I doubt it!!
Maybe someone from the Gov’t will read this and decide it’s time to put an end to the way these businesses conduct their business.
I understand how bad you feel, but what is done is done.
don’t pay them anything — the worst they can do is send negative feedback to your credit and take back the points.
by the way, the credit report people will never call you, so the call is just the collections people trying to get you to pay — but what do you do next month and the following month?
The credit bureau is not calling you. They don’t call people, they just collect data. They are lying if they tell you it’s the credit bureau calling you, just keep your credit fine and pay all your other bills and you will be fine. Ignore calls or requests from these scumbag companies. They lure people in with gifts or money offers because that’s how they trap you. Then they lie about how much you need to make to qualify for this scam. They don’t care about you, they know they are a dishonest business for the most part with the majority of unhappy clients that are stuck for life.
the sales people are all on commission, they don’t care about you, just about closing a deal so that they get paid.
the collection people are on commission. they don’t care about you, just getting you to send some money so that they get their collections commission
Hi Everyone!
I have been reading your comments in regards to the TS. My husband pass away March of 2012 needless to say I had no choice to stop paying in the maintenace fee $1000.00 yearly. My finances is getting very limited in paying the mortagage. My timeshare is at Oak Plantation in Florida. I am getting the calls for the collection agency, however not answering. Call OP, wont return my calls. Has everyone out there experiences dealing with Oak Plantation in trying to foreclose???
let them foreclose — that is what you want them to do so you don’t have to pay any more.
So I could use some advice/reassurance. Me and my wife fell for a TS scam from the Jockey Club in Vegas. Didn’t care bout all the free crap. Its the misrepresentation that’s p’d us off. Right now, I’m basically the guinea pig for a bunch of my friends who are stuck with the same garbage. Now, we live in Canada. Just outside of Toronto. Is there anything they can really do to me/us? They have been calling. Usually once a day. And now I got a “Starpoints” manager calling to try to make things right. Best line he gave me so far was that “they got 99% happy customers but every once i awhile someone slips thru the cracks.” LOL
The kicker that made me take a stand was when a friend tried to book a room at the Jockey club and they said it was full but we went on hotels.com and we could get a room for the same week cheaper then their “last minute” deal.
Anything would help. Thanks
I’m in the same boat Dave. Havent paid since Dec 2012 and the calls roll in, they threaten to call your employer, garnish wages, foreclose all scare tactics that havent happened yet. Only thing is my credit took a hit from the monthly negative reporting but that is the very least of my concerns I can be cash only for a few years. I owe $9 or $10k to them and theyll never see another penny. These people are well trained I must say they really play with your mind and seem to have degrees in manipulation.
I too stopped paying and keep getting the calls. We owe approx $8K and I am done. We haven’t used it for close to 5 years. The maintenance fees keep going up and there is no way we can pay. I’ve made no payments for close to 8-months. They keep calling with a special plan and they will tack what we owe onto the back of the loan. I tell them thanks, but no thanks. I can’t afford to pay the monthly payment and the quarterly dues. They’ve already gotten over $25K from us over the years. They can have it and resell it for all I care. I know I’ll take the hit on my credit, but I am adding a statement to offset the timeshare. No worries for me.
Bill me later Question
Has anyone dealt with Bill Me Later prior to paying their downpayment? Mine is due in March and I am not going to pay it due to stopping payment on my TS with Wyndham. I got scammed and sure do not want to spend any additional money. If anyone has had any experience with Bill Me Later, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks
I was scammed with “Bill Me Later” as well. After refusing to pay it for a year, I decided to send them a letter telling them I was tricked/scammed into agreeing to use Bill Me Later by a Wyndham salesperson. Wyndham told me it was for “Financing”, little did I know they charged a down payment of $10,000 to my name.
Bill Me Later sent me a letter saying they were going to investigate and I would hear something in 30 days…I’m not keeping my hopes up.
I will keep you informed if I do hear anything.
Have you heard back from Bill Me Later?
Nope. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
Back on November 28, 2012.
I posted information of my case about anyone having experience with buying time share advertising company. That they were charging me 600.00 to advertise my time share and then they went all the way down to 200.0 . They call me back this January and told them I post it on crispier and eBay n that was the last I heard from them. Now the timeshare had also stopped calling me as I keep telling them take their timeshare back as.I had already.gave them 15000 for nothing. Told them save them and myself some time and they could send from now the bill to collection agency as I couldn’t care less. I told them what it the difference if I stop paying now than later? That I would’ve given n loose more money and later they will still foreclosure the silverleaf resort when I lost my job to go into surgery and what ever agreement they will come out with I will still not be able to pay them a dime.
I was contact via phone by Nationwide Transfer LLC and inviting me to a meeting at a Hilton inn in ft worth to help out to get out of this asking for bank info of 25.00 to reserve seat n meeting. I did n yes was skeptical but out of desperation and listen to what they have to say I went. They were charging 3500 to represent me, I told them I filed on bankrup at the beginning of 2012 and trying to save money to get visa for my mother to come and care for me with my visa and I don’t have that type of money n no credit card due to bankruptcy, if I can’t pay the 200.00 for this timeshare how could they even think I could pay them or come out with this money to pay them? Im foreign and have.no family, no property and no access they.can come after.
two days later timeshare called me asking for more info on my health and my surgery not that they would care they just wanted to know why I stopped paying them only 2 months I got this vacation nightmare and she told me they were to send me a lieu to sign with a notary and send it back to them. I haven’t got any more calls about payment but yes the huge past due bill via mail. So I’m still waiting for the lieu document she offer if that was true.
I have a t-share at Mexican resort. I want to get out of it for many reasons. BUT, I’m from U.S….If I stop paying, ultimately can they ruin my credit rating? However, I believe their time share company is in the States in Cali…Thanks in advance…
I also owned timeshare in Mexico. Club velas vallarta in puerto Vallarta. Maintenance fees kept going up so I could not afford to pay. I just quit paying and finally they stopped sending me letters. You know you do not have a deed when you buy a timeshare in Mexico. I called the resort not long ago and they said I no longer own a timeshare. This has not showed up on my credit report and has been 3 yrs. The company I sent maintenace fees to were located in california as well.
We too quit paying on a Velas time share, with offices in California. They send letters which I ignore. So far there have been no certified letters. We cancelled our landline, so no more calls. It has only been 2 years for us. I have not checked our credit report as I was afraid, and figured everything else is excellent, and there is nothing I can do if it is on there anyway. We are soon to be applying for student loans for our kids college. I hope it does not show up.
What was the name in California I’m trying to get out of pacific monarch it making me sick
I received a phone call from Wyndham’s Owner Care service. They received my letter, and they want to try to work something out. Is it worth talking to, or just keep ignoring the phone calls? Has anyone talked to someone from Wyndham’s Owner Care department?
they will try to work something out so you keep paying them. Is that what you want?
Hi guy’s!!
Just like many here I don’t know what to do anymore with this timeshare I bought in Hawaï from wyndham. I’m 29 years old from Québec,Canada and I seen a great opportunity of busines buying this timeshare to rent out. The thing is that they were telling me I could have 4 weeks in hawaï or anywhere else with my 300000 points, and since i’m buying in Hawaï I could exchange 1 week for 2 in other resorts. After calculation with the sale representati. I found it interresting to rent. For me now this kind of vacations doesn’t interese me, since I backpacked about 35 countries. So I bought it like a investment…. and 3 months later after I try to book a first week to rent it, I realise that I can’t have these 8 weeks they promise me, but only 3. Which change the calculation radicaly. So since July I’ve been trying to cancel this thing for misrepresentation. I spoke to them many time explaning my case, but since ié,m out of the resiliation period they can’t do anything… So I flew back to Hawaï to speak directly to the people who mislead me into this contract, but either they can’t do anything saying the contract is not in theires hands anymore.
But just for satifaction and sympathie for other fool like me, I spend 4 days at the front of the door telling people about all their lies, and oven told the truth to the people who were walking out of the office so they walk right back in to cancel it… mouaaahhahah!!! But even after they lost many sell and me saying that i’ll stay there for a extra week, they didn’t want to take off this handcuff off me.
After I engaged a compagny call timeshare pro, that are suppose to make it cancel, stupidly I paid up front. For now we send a testimonie of what have happen and all the misrepresentation and asking again for a cancelation… all this notarise. So far I receive a answer form wyndham, saying they know i’m using a organisation like that and they have no power. This cancel company told me that was normal and they would have a answers to them, so far they are really kind, but I’m doubting of their competence.
Beside wyndham are calling everyday, but I stopped answering.
What should I do next? According to all the other post people say that my crédit won’t be affected all the way to canada, is that true? Is anyone went to foreclosure for a timeshare?? because I read only comment of people saying that the say they will go to foreclosure but look like they never really do it.
Thank you guy’s
They only care when you don’t pay, otherwise they don’t care about you at all. They can lie as much as they want and some actually find ways to stretch the truth but if it’s not in writing all the lies told to you can’t be proven. The only way to win is to stop paying and ignore them. Keep your credit good and whatever they do should not affect anyone, plus you are not even in the US so it shouldn’t affect you at all. They don’t care. It’s a scam where they lie and misrepresent the product and then even after you are done paying it the maintenance fees are so high that they keep making profits off of that.
thank you!! very hopeful and useful. Dawm I hate theses guy’s
Hi,
I’m from Quebec too and own 3 timeshares in Florida that I’m in the process of getting rid of.
I was able to get rid of one very quickly and I intend to do the same with the other two.
Here’s how things went :
- I stopped paying .
- The resort sent me e-mails to know what was happening.
- I replied telling them no money would be paid anymore and that the only thing I would accept was a deed-in-lieu. ( they take back the unit ) . I warned them that I was a canadian citizen unaffected by credit ratings . I warned them I would take no phone call from them, only e-mails.
- I received the same e-mail from different people of the resort , always replying with the same answer.
- After three months , I started receiving calls ; I always answered in French , speaking very loud and showing the caller I had no clue about what he was talking about. The calls stopped after only three calls. ( that was fun ).
- Finally , I received an e-mail from a « person-in-charge » . I was very firm : no money, only a deed-in-lieu , and if they decided to sue me , they would have to do under the Quebec laws , so they would have to translate everything in French etc etc ….
- One week later , I was offered a « deed-in-lieu » .
I had a $4500 mortgage balance on this timeshare.
So , here’s what I suggest :
- Forget what you invested ; it’s gone . you just want to get out.
- Don’t give them a penny. Don’t talk to them on the phone. E-mails only.
- Ask for a « deed-in-lieu » . Be very firm .
- You’re a foreigner, they can’t do much and they won’t sue you.
- Forget about them and be happy.
Hey thank you for your advice.
I can see there’s hope to cancel it and get the deed-in-lieu…
but since I never use this timeshare and I bought it less than a year ago do you think once they cancel it. I can ask to have my money back ?? that’s what I been told because it could be totally theifing at the eyes of a judge in this case, so I could go after them in court after if they don’t refund me. Wer’e talking about ±10 000$, I would like to have it back.
Anyway’s the most important is to get this contract cancel and learn from it, at a expensive price but a lesson that will serve me for the rest of my life.
Thank you
You can ask for your money back, but it will be a waste of time and it will make them think that you are a dumb sucker and they will come after you harder to pay them. that money is lost. There is no way to get it back. A judge can’t help you, if you paid for something you don’t like it’s your fault. There is no way to prove that they lied to you if they did. It was an expensive lesson. Your only choices are to keep paying and use the timeshare or walk away from that money pit.
now wyndham stopped calling me… it’s now pinnacle dept recovery that has started calling me everydays. What can I do?
now wyndham stopped calling me… it’s now pinnacle dept recovery that has started calling me everydays. What can I do?
Tell them not to call you anymore, or don’t answer or block their number.
I am in Ontario, I did not pay this year’s maintenance payment, and have have have stopped payments to Royal Holiday. I sent them an email asking for a deed-in-lieu because I will NEVER use the service. I have had a couple of emails from them, but not much yet. Anyone know if they can ruin my credit in Canada, since they are not in Canada?? Thanks
I am in Canada. I stopped paying, and RH sent me this in an email: We wanted to inform you that a Deed-In-Lieu does not apply since this is not a real property, therefore is not deeded either. It is a contract that you signed, and by that contract we must abide at all times.
I still have no intention of payment them a cent more, and don’t think they can affect my credit rating, or if they can, it is not enough for me to continue paying for nothing . . .
lol — that is even better. for real estate, they can do collections and then also do a foreclosure. If this is just a contract, they can only try to collect. You have just broken a contract as happens all the time. What are their real costs of what they have provided to you?
Can I ask for a deed-in-lieu from Bluegreen? I also lives in the states, so just wondering if anyone has any personal experience with bluegreen corp and not payinh??
yyyyaaaaahooooo!!!! just received the deed-in-lieu to sign up and then wyndham is taking my contract back. Really good news for me. Thank you everyone for your advice.
Hi,
I stopped paying to the Kingstown reef in Florida 3 years ago,in fairness they never hassled me with phone calls or letters,just the raising bill every year.
Yesterday i received a letter telling me that if i sign the enclosed Deed in lieu of Foreclosure Document,that i will be relieved of any further obligation of my ownership at Kingstown Reef and that they will send me back a cheque for the sum of £125.00.
So its not all doom and gloom
I am getting hounded by Pinnacle Recovery for back taxes and maintenance fees on my Florida timeshare. I am getting 2-3 calls a day from them. Can Pinnacle sue me? The timeshare company is SPM Resorts, Inc. They sent us another bill of $900 for next yrs fees. So far we have not been served court papers, but are they just waiting for the bill to keep piling up. Has anyone on here just stopped paying, and what was the worst that happened to you.
We have stopped paying our maintenance fees for 2 years because our fee’s went from $150 to almost $800 a year. This past Saturday we have finaly received a legal letter that we are being sued for the amount plus some extra fees. We have decieded to consult a attorney and see what happens. This is what will happen to ya if you dont pay.
I don’t believe you for a second. I bet you are a timeshare shill who works in the industry. If they want to sue my, have a field day, it will be your loss, even if they win good luck trying to collect the money.
Courts are not collection agencies and won’t help them collect the money, so they will have to pursue other means and waste more money to get money that they will never get.
If you are so afraid keep paying like a fool for life. Doesn’t make sense to pay for a lawyer. It’s small claims court, you can’t win, you do technically owe the money, but it’s for something worthless, useless and a money pit. It’s worth less than nothing because you have to keep paying for nothing every year.
First off, I am a timeshare owner, not some shill.
I stopped paying my maintenance fees on a Florida timeshare in 2004. I kept getting statements every year with penalties attached, to which I never replied. In 2012, I started getting calls and letters from a collection agency, which I have also ignored.
I recently applied for a loan. The delinquency is on my credit report, along with a 25 point hit to my credit rating. This may not happen to everyone, however, it CAN happen. I am sitting tight at this point, seeing what develops next.
I owe more in fees and penalty than I owed on buying the damn thing in the first place!
first, there is a legal financial statute of limitations after which a case will automatically be thrown out of court. it varies by state, but is usually 4-5 years, so they cannot collect in court if you raise the statute as a defense.
Second, there is also a seven year limit on old collections items on your credit report. You can send a letter to the credit agencies requesting to have the bad information removed since it is more than seven years after the last payment.
what a lot of BS — probably from a collections agency so they can get their commission.
Collectors cannot sue you –
and the TS first has to foreclose, which is what you want — and when they are ready to foreclose they ask you to sign over the property to save the legal fees.
a collection agency cannot sue you for not paying maintenance fees. only the TS can sue you and only after they have foreclosed, which is what you want.
we stopped paying on 40 TS weeks, and the worst that happened was calls from collectors that you can tell them to stop and only send letters. The worst they can do is file a collection notice on your credit report, and then why would you pay since it cannot be removed.
are you telling me you have 40 weeks?? What has happened?
We have 3 and we stopped paying in oct….. still waiting!
of the 40, we did not make the payment at the end of 2007 for about 30 weeks. We got about 9 collections reports on our credit rating, and only 2 were foreclosed with a copy to us. We received only 3 statements this year, so we have slipped off the others.
we did not pay 6 others at the end of 2008, and they have also disappeared. These are all oast the financial statute of limitations.
We kept 4 that we planned to use personally, but also stopped paying them at the end of 2011 since my wife’s cancer was discovered (which is currently under control with Chemo). I think they will just take these back since they are all prime fixed weeks and easy for them to sell. I expect to receive letters offering a deed in lieu.
We only receive phone calls, which are blocked by a little call blocker we bought from Amazon. We do not talk with them on the phone, or respond to any invoices.
Even with all the collections reports, our credit still ranks as good since all else is paid on time.
Bill, Your posts have really encouraged me. I inherited a Festiva timeshare from my parents 15years ago, and now cannot give it away. Should I notify Festiva that we are no longer paying maintenance fees, or just let them figure it out themselves? We are willing to take a hit on our credit, and deal with annoying calls/letter, as long as we can ultimately get rid of this burden. Anything else we should expect, or any paperwork we should fill out?
Liz — you just have to not answer when they call, since it will only be a collector who will yell at you. It does no good to notify them, since they just send it to collection. If they actually send a deed in lieu to sign, you can sign it, but if they want any cash, don’t send any since it just restarts the debt statute of limitations
Bill you are correct they do report as a collection on your credit report, and like you said so what! They will not remove it so leave it and never pay! Eventually your good credit will override the collection. Waiting for mine to go to foreclosure, it has been 3 yrs.
I hope you are not answering those phone calls. It only encourages them. Or, if you aren’t busy and have a good sense of humor, you could waste their time by having a looonnngg conversation with them. If you waste enough of their time, they might put you on their black list and then you would lose the privilege of receiving their calls. :0)
I stopped paying my maintenance fees two years ago. Every month, I get a final notice that THIS TIME, they really mean it and if I don’t pay, it will go to collections. So what are they collecting for? SERVICES NOT RENDERED! Good luck getting the judge to make me pay for that! All they can do is prevent me from using the property I paid for. They already got me for $30,000. They are not getting another dime out of me. I’ll go to jail first.
Here is a suggestion. If you have high speed internet, then go get an Ooma phone system. Plug it into your internet and you have free phone calls all over the USA for $4.00 a month (government taxes). This will also let you change your phone number and that’s the end of the harassing phone calls. Also, do NOT accept any certified letters. Refuse to sign. They cannot make you sign for the letter.
Had anyone have any experience trying to sell their timeshare with buy timeshare? They were asking for 600.00 to advertise my timeshare and as I refuse they have gone down to 200.00 yet I’m skeptical to be robbed again. Any advise ..
Most likely it’s just another scam. They found out they couldn’t steal $600 from you so they will settle for $200 to steal from you. If people can’t sell them for $1 why would you pay someone to try to sell it for you? They are worthless. Stop paying is the only way to get out of this nightmare.
Legitimate sales will extract a commission AFTER they sell. Rip-off artists require you to pay up front because once they get their “commission”, they don’t do anything but pop a cork on another bottle of champagne. Never pay advance fees. Go to Craigslist and eBay and search for timeshare sales and you’ll see how much you can sell your timeshare for. I think the going price is zero.
All of us timeshare owners have a big tattoo on our foreheads that says, “Gullible Fool.” So be aware there’s sharks out there hunting for fools.
Thank you Baldspot and Robert for your advice. You guys are great help. Also I had read something about after foreclosure and if they do the foreclosure you will get a letter from the IRS, what type of letter is this? Will it mean you own money to the IRS? .
From what some have written here, apparently if the timeshare people “cancel your debt”, then they send that information to the IRS and then the IRS wants you to pay a tax on that “income.” I do not know how legitimate that is. If the IRS really does that, then you need to investigate to see if your type of ownership actually qualifies for that kind of action.
Remember, the timeshare people will lie to you to make you think all sorts of things are going to happen to you if you don’t keep sending money to them. So always investigate fully before sending anyone any money. Even if the IRS sends you a notice to pay, you should verify first that you really do have to pay. Good luck!
Big scammers…I tried this in the past and they only take your money and never call you again.
I have already asked, but has anyone personally dealt with bluegreen corp timeshare? I did cancel my automatic withdrawal and this will be month 2 of not withdrawal. Just worried will get in legal trouble. We do live in states.
Thanks for any information!
Do you have an update? We have Bluegreen and are considering the same. I’m nervous, though. Would love to hear from someone who has done this!!!
I had a bluegreen timeshare. I attempted to inform them that I will no longer make another payment. I stopped payment on my bank draft. I received a 1099 to file on my taxes. On my credit report it is listed as abandonded. I have not heard anything in 2 years. THANK GOD! I’M FREE AT LAST!
Once you filed your 1099, how much in taxes did you end up paying? And what kind of an affect did “ABANDONDED” have on your credit report?
Bluegreen keeps calling and My husband and I continue to ignore all calls. We have recieved several certified letter notices(we have never been home to sign:) We also have recieved letters that I just trash. I may have my head in sand, but I continue to follow advice of ignoring all calls and letters. I originally tried to work with them, but they would not. I feel bad as we always try to pay our bills, but at this time our main home and kids are our priority, not a time share that we can’t use due to behind maintenance fees, etc. It is a low priority, if they forclose, what could happen? Take away a property I don’t have access to? Can this effect my main home, or cause me to lose it? We have already paid them aprox 14000 in last few years.
No they can’t take away your home.
It used to be bluegreen, and now Pinnacle. They keep calling, but we keep ignoring! Have gotten several certified letter notices, but haven’t been home to sign, and don’t open any mail from them. My head is probably buried in the sand, but I have to take care of mortgage that my family RESIDES in. Not having even the money to pay maintenance fees, can not even book at any site, so is basically was just zapping us for 287 monthly plus 1000 yearly for maintenance fees. They already have recieved 14000, and can’t afford to spend another dime on it. Can this affect my home, can they come after my home since it is mortgaged? Anyone had anything else happen with Pinnacle or bluegreen??
Anyone have any dealings with Festiva?
I have a timeshare in Branson with Festiva. I have stopped making my payments to Festiva in April. Right now all I get is phone calls about every other day. they have been real nice to leave polite voicemail but they do not respond to my emails. We do not answer the phone when we see what number is calling.
Hello, we purchased in Bahamas with Festiva and still owe. Do you know if they allow Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure? We have to get from out of this. Thanks
YES i have Festiva and THEY ARE THE WORSE. I am seriously considering to just stop paying period. They continue to tell me Im behind on payments that they previously stated were cleared. They add fees and new policies every day. THIS IS THE BIGGEST SCAM EVER. MOre and more money and nothing is available when you get ready to book. I don’t know what to do. There are several class action settlements against them. I bought mine in Orlando, Fl but live in Georgia.
I just settled with Festiva for 3 monthly payments for about 1/3 of what they wanted plus their 15% interest. I signed a contract and once my posted dated checks clear the bank they will send me the contract that states I am free and clear of this nightmare.
Has anyone been scammed into paying their down payment through “Bill Me Later”? I am planning to write a letter to the “Bill Me Later” and “Wyndham Vacation Resorts” corporate office telling them I was scammed out of thousands of dollars by their use of “Bill Me Later” to pay for down payments. Add that to the current mortgage and maintenance fees.
On Oct 9th I posted our situation with a timeshare we aquired in the Bahamas For RCI through Apex Mareketing International. I have since written a letter to the Resort / Marketing company STATING that due to extreme misrepresentation of facts that we consider the contract null and void. Along with this letter we gave a detailed account of our sales experience and promises made, of the phone call made to us conveniently 4 days after the cancellation period explaining how this REALLY was going to work and of the conversations we had with the Timeshare re-sale company that basically backed up the fact the Marketing company were flat out lying! I included emails and typed out voice mails. I sent all of this via email to the resort and to the Financing company, Property Manager, Timeshare re-sale company, RCI and the Federal Trades Commission. I then sent a hard copy to each of those places via registered mail. We didn’t hear back from anyone until Nov 1st (3 weeks later) when the Finance company called and left a message. We had cancelled the credit card they were to use for payment. My husband returned the call and left a message saying we had no account with them. Then on Nov 6th we got an email from the Resort saying that unfortunately since they received our letter outside the cancellation period our request to cancel the contract was DENIED. Obviously they did not read our letter. I thanked them for replying but said we weren’t looking for their approval and that no further communication was required.
Soooo…that is where we are at. I appreciate the advice given on this site. It gave us the courage to fight.
I love the part where you said, “I thanked them for replying but said we weren’t looking for their approval and that no further communication was required.” SLAM THAT DOOR! ha ha ha
I have been meaning to update. On Nov. 23 after 2 months of sticking to our position of misrepresentation, getting over 800 views on my tripAdvisor review, 2 couples cancelling their contracts within the 7 days after reading my complaint and another couple just walking away from the sales presentation I received an email from Apex Marketing International saying that because of our dissatisfaction they were cancelling our contract and refunding our deposit of $5800!! We signed a mutual agreement which I had a lawyer approve ($125) and we received our refund in FULL that same day!! It is worth standing strong!!Don’t give up or give in!!
Thank you so much for the update we are in this situation at the moment with misrepresentation and have sent emails from our legal person stating this. At the moment all is quiet from their side we just want our deposit back and get away from it. So will keep up the battle.
Everyone must make the effort to file complaints against these timeshare crooks. I got tricked in Palm Beach Shores Florida. I filed complaints with five agencies. I files with Pam Bondi–Florida Attorney General, Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, Better Business Bureau of Southeast Florida, Federal Trade Commission, and Broward County Permitting, Licensing and Consumer Protection Division. Even if you issue cannot be completely solved by filing complaints, the timeshare companies with be investigated and your complaints will be added to existing complaint files on these timeshare companies.
I will look for attorney General in TX and will complaint.
They were also calling n calling to go to orientation and right there they tried to get me into an expensier program and collect 20000 grand that day. I walked out and forgot they have my driver license, they kept it for a week till I told them send it ups, they wanted me to go there and get it after 12 hrs shift Ans past 9 pm after my work!!.
I really don’t have anything more to lose as my credit had been damage for other reason prior to this, u rent my apartment and I’m paying my vehicle, I was told by a guy in timeshare answer that they can Sue me and garnish my check. This guy said he charge 2595.00 to get me out easy for the way the use scare tactics to get me into this but if I don’t have the money to pay the mortgage to this suckers what make him think I have that kind of money to pay him to help?
the TS could sue you, bnut first they have to foreclose on the TS itself and they don’t want to — they also know that there is no point paying a lawyer to sue if they would just cause a person to go bankrupt.
Do not pay someone to take your timeshare, or you will still have the timeshare and be out what you pay.
Thanks bill as I said I’m already in bankrupt so I will really will only have to sit and wait and see if they sue me.
Okay all I wanted to know was if I will be working only to pay this thieves. I haven’t even step a foot and get any service from them nor I have bring home a peace of there hotel home , nor i borrow 13 grand from them and spend it and now refuse to pay. I have far more this.gs to worry about. My surgery and how to bring family here to care for me.
con_amor27, did you declare the TS debt with your bankruptsy fillings… ?? if you did then you have absolutely nothing to worry about as an insolvency agent will act on your behalf and your debt with them will be wiped out… you may find depending on your financial circumstances and disposable income after bankruptsy is complete that you will have to make token gesture payments to the insolvency agent who will dispurse that themselves. This may carry on for a couple of years or so.
Not worried stu.
Unfortunately. I didn’t enter that. The ti
eshare scam was after I declared myself in bankruptcy. I was worried about been sued. N sent them a money order two days ago and just minutes ago they called for the remain 162.00! I happen to attempt to cancel the money order with money gram but seminar they didn’t the refund claim on time!.
I had been reading how many people have been victimized. By this people. I presently got robbed and cheated on this. My TS is with the Holly lake ranch. In TX. The sales man named David followed me home to collect my down payment!! I was scared actually, I should have called the police. When I saw their intention to collect the money out of my bank card as a despair attention to get out I told them I had the money at home the the David guy became my shadow, they also keep my driver license. Anyone have experience with TS in TX? Can they Sue me and collect my check? . I have read all this message and I stop paying but for TX I don’t know what they can do. Any comments please
you cannot have your wages garnished for a commercial debt. And they would first need to foreclose, than sue, and then get a judgement — and they still could not garnish
Bill were you a victim of this people or u just here to give some advice?
when I was young, I bought some resale TS weeks that I planned to rent. But during bad times, people have no money to rent, but they still want maintenance fees. And then it became time to retire, so there was no extra money to cover losses. I did it to myself — lol
I live in the UK, bought a TS at Orange Lake back in 2010, a huge mistake, work has now changed and I cannot afford the payments. I spoke to Orange Lake but they were not interested and said if I did not pay they would make me bankrupt and obtain their money from the sale of my UK property. Please help as I do not want to risk my family home.
They can’t make you bankrupt. No one can. You are the one who would have to file for bankruptcy. They can’t do anything but take back their worthless timeshare. They can’t take your home either. I’m sure it’s not even legal for them to threaten you with that, by they do because they are scum. Just ignore them and they will go away eventually.
Don’t believe them. They are lying liars who will say anything to get more money out of your. We had a timeshare with Orange Lake but had to stop paying when my husband lost his job. They harassed us with phone calls for a while, then gave up and cancelled our contract. It never even showed up on our credit report.
Was it deeded like Westgate? I’m looking to walk away. Every year we call to book, our float, that week is “extra” money. In 5 years we have been able to use it one time.
Hi Peter
We also have an Orangle Lake TS and being in the UK as yourself. Our financial situation also changed putting us into the same situation of not being able to afford to pay the TS.
Thankfully i found this Blog and had a good read through, it was only the input from this site that gave us the confidence to cancell our payments. We did contact them (by traceable letter and phone). We are now entering month 3 of non payment and have only had a few phone calls, over due account letters and emails (which are both of standard format and non threatening). With the calls however they have implied that we are lying about our situation but this is all a front, a scare tactic to make you part with your money.
Please be reassured by another UK Citizen that they simply cant force you to into bankruptcy or to sell your home to settle their debt. In the UK its the individual that has to file for Bankruptsy and even then you have to have personal debts of over £50,000 oweing to a minimun of 4 creditors.
They will pester for a few months but eventually they will foreclose and then you wont hear from then again.
If you look into the Orange Lake finance system you will notice that the finance company (Wilson) has the same address on Bronson Memorial Way suggesting that they are totally self financing these mortgages which i do remember our sales guy also saying. There is no external finance company involved.
Your credit status will not suffer either as they dont report internationally. I still have 5* credit as reported by Noodle (this is free where Equifax and Experian charge)
Take time to read through this blog as there are many helpfull and reassuring posts from international TS owners.
I guess your financed this via a bank card of somesort like Visa debit etc, if so then you may wish to close the bank account and re open a new one as they can actually apply to VISA and obtain your new card details if they feel you still owe them money. This i found shocking but my Building Society confirmed this (odviously why they prefer to take bank card details). They also confirmed that they cant actually stop them from taking payments because it is a bank card transaction, you will actually have to call or mail them and ask them not to take anymore payments. (they will do this but only if you specifically ask.)
Have a read through the posts, Robert, Baldspot, Bill, Marianne and many others are very informative.
Forgot to mention that i also did some research into the TS industry in general and found that there are a lot of TS companies that are being taken to court for inapropriate financial activities.
Amen! Finally somebody is doing something about this thieves.
Exactly, and from what i remember reading it came across that this is and industry that is long overdue intervention and an overhall. Either way Florida especially cant afford the loss of too much tourism as this brings huge amounts of $$$$’s into the local economy every year and i understand Florida is quite a poverty stricken state when you scratch the surface.
Thanks for all the info. About the visa issue, I already changed my bank card number and they have not attempted to get the money from the new card even though I was in arrears. I felt very scared and somehow made all the payments upto date, now I wish I hadn’t. Anyway I will have a problem getting another bank account and so I don’t really want to cancel the only card I have. Any suggestions?
If any charges show up on your card from them dispute them. Your credit card is not responsible for paying the timeshare and tell them you no longer authorize it. They can’t force the credit card company to charge you. Keep disputing any charges. :Let the CC company know they will not be paid and you are not responsible for any charge made to your account from that Timeshare company. A CC company is not a court and can’t force you to pay for the timeshare. Let the timeshare company take you to court. They won’t anyway, and if they win, just say you can’t pay them.
Ask the CC company how they can help you move the account if they find your new CC #, Lie if you have to and tell them that you are not allowed to use the timeshare so you won’t pay for it.
send a certified letter to the ts teling them to no longer bill your credit card account. the law requires that they stop charging your credit card, so you can both have the card company do a chargeback and you can also file a complaint with the FTC
Peter,
Was the card a Visa CREDIT card or a DEBIT card. If a credit card then call or write to them and ask them to stop authorising payments to the TS. as Robert states the TS cant force the CC to pay as the original agreement is with the TS and yourself. If its a Debit card then the best option is to call or write to the TS and ask them to stop taking payments. They have to honour your request and they do have this fascility on their systems as its exactly what i had to do. You cant stop payments through a Debit card just through your bank because this is a repeat Debit card transaction which the bank cannot stop, if the card expires or is changed then the TS can actually apply to VISA and obtain up to date card details and then continue billing (this is the reason why they offer loans of many thousands of $$$$’s with absolutely no back ground checks at all and are so keen to lend to anyone and everyone). Regardless of which type of card you used, you will still have to contact them and ask them to stop taking payments.
In my case i sent a registered letter explaining our financial situation then called 2 weeks later to see if they had recieved it, i found out even though the letter had been recieved and an account manager had made notes on our account, they were still going to take payments until the mortgage had been paid off before taking back the unit, this was because we had not told them to stop taking payments in the letter.
You MUST tell them not to take anymore payments. Just stating you cant afford it wont do the trick.
we also brought a time share in FL in August at Westgate. we tried to cancel it the next day but were told we could not do that and instead they exchanged it for a cheaper one. the closing officer told us not to worry about making payments as we didnt live in USA. however now returning from there and reading the comments, i think we should have been more harder.
we have only paid a deposit and havent had any letters or phonecalls yet. we are not 3 months behind on payments. we have changed the card numbers we left with them(again advised by the closing officer)
What i wanted to know is what would happen as i live in the uk?
will i still get debt collection letters and phone calls? if so for how long?
Will it also effect my credit history in UK?
thaking anyone who answers in advance
Jane,
You should have had a 7 day cancellation period which should have been explained to you during the sale. The fact that they didnt says it all, and then only let you scale down just goes to show the underhanded tactics they use to get your money.
As i understand it all TS companies should give you a 7 day cancellation period and i believe this is state law.
Our experience is with Orange Lake so i cant comment on Westgate proceedings. We are also 3 months in of non payment and have experienced a few calls, letters and emails. This is only to be expected as the will hound you, for us the calls seem to have dwindled away. If becomes a problem for you then you can always send them a “Cease and Desist” letter which they have a legal obligation to take notice of and then can only contact you with suggested remedies for the account. Generally “Foreclosure” is the remedy.
As far as your credit score/history is concerned then stop worrying, you can check this at Experian, Equifax or Noodle which is free to register. Credit scoring is not international!
As you were told you couldn’t cancel and were down graded instead just suggests that they really dont care about you and they are just after your money, the fact that the closing officer suggested that you stop paying and change your card details as you are a U.K. resident, well that just says it all. They just conned you out of your deposit.
Hope this helps.
Hi Not Worried Stu,
Thanks for your answer. That does make me feel a bit better. We have only had one phone call but didn’t answer, that was a while ago. Will see what happens. I can’t believe how they can do this. As of this month we are behind by 3 payments.
What I don’t understand aswell is that if so many people are defaulting on their payments then how do they make their money????
Thanks again hope it all goes well for you too. Keep us all updated I will update you when I hear anything.
I can’t afford to pay the payments on my gold key timeshare ! Can they garnish my pay checks?
I got sucked into buying a timeshare turtle cay in Virginia beach through Gold Key .. I can not afford to make these payments and have told thin this every time they call!! I tell them just to take it back!! The keep telling me they will garnish my check if I don’t pay:( can they do this I’m scared !!!!! What should I do?
Mo they can not garnish your wages, only the government can do that for unpaid child support or back taxes or other money owed to the government. They are just trying to scare you. Do not try to reason with them. They will take any reply as a weakness. Just don’t talk to them or reply to any mail they send you. They are flat out lying to you and are bullies.
Robert – I cancelled my automatic payments to Shell vacations club but once they don’t receive payment can they start taking it out of my bank account again? Thanks,
Yolie
Check with your bank. They will probably resubmit any refused payment. Make sure you tell your bank that it is now fraudulent (due to a dispute) and you do not authorize any further withdrawal from them. If your bank won’t do it than you may need to close the account or have it transferred to another account number.
Also put the request in writing to your bank or get some kind of confirmation.
Will do. Thanks!
it would be illegal for them to take money from your bank account after you tell them to stop. you could then sue them!
Has anyone dealt or defaulted on a Wyndham vacation resort program in Australia or just wyndham in general? The wheels are in motion but some reassurance would be great. Thanks
Hi,
we purchased a TS in Aruba with Occidental 3 years ago. We are still making payments towards our balance but we realized that we are wasting money. We want to stop making payments but we are not sure if that will hurt our credit.
Any suggestions?
Do some math – Do a “What If” analysis
1. How much will it cost you to continue making payments, and then continue making maintenance payments for the rest of your life?
2. How much will it cost you if your credit score goes down a couple of points, which most likely, it won’t? Write the amount in dollars.
Compare.
If you are still having trouble with this question, please call the Dave Ramsey radio show so he can yell the answer at you. We are Dave Ramsey disciples. We are out of debt, have stopped paying our maintenance fee, and are saving tons for retirement. What’s my credit score? I don’t care. I’m paying cash for my next car and for my next house. I’m never going to sign a credit contract again in my life ever. I’ll die first.
Another question: How much are you spending each year for this vacation thing? Are you able to use it? If not, consider what you could have done with that money – each year. Like, actually go on a vacation.
Each year, I save enough money to buy a brand new iPad. Or a set of snow tires. Or to do all the maintenance on my car. etc.
Isn’t it funny how we buy the other brand of canned peas because they are five cents off today, but then we turn around and readily hand over thousands upon thousands of dollar to crooks for nothing. Aren’t we the biggest bunch of fools that ever walked the earth. Time to get smart.
We defaulted on 2 Wyndham properties in the U.S. We were harassed by phone calls for many months. They finally stopped calling and writing and the last we heard from them, we got one of those IRS forms saying they had written off the balances. So that has to be counted as income, but we went to H&R Block and whatever they did, we ended up breaking even, so it worked out okay. On my credit report it is still showing as us being 180+ days past due. It has been over two years since we paid them anything. We actually used the time shares, so I kind of miss them, but after my husband lost his job, it was ridiculous for us to try to keep paying. It just wasn’t possible. We also defaulted on Orange Lake (yes, we were 3 times suckers) but that has never shown up on our credit report. They harassed us for a while, but then we got a letter saying they were cancelling our contract and that was that.
The horrors only get worst. I was put on disability from my job in May 2012. my income went to 1/2 of what I normally make. We made the Wyndham payments for May June and July. We stopped after considering financial concequences of keeping the property paying the increasing maintenance fees and not being able to trave as much because of my illnesses. BUTthe decision was made after I attempted to re finance my home and get cash out to pay the wyndham balance. The bank ould not allow me to get 40K out because my income no longer qualifies. I have been getting threatening calls from Wyndam daily, I have been contacted by VO finicial(Crooks and former Wyndham employees, busted 4th of July weekend) and another company wanting me to pay them a huge amount of money to get me out of my Wyndham contract. I sent that letter to an attorney and was advised the verbaige and contract was not in my best interest. So I tried dealing with Wyndham. THEY DO NOT CARE I may never work again.and keeping that property will cause huge finicial issues in the long run. They are not interested in decreasing the amount of time so we can pay it off. They have informed me I will be turned into the IRS, One supervisor told me since I have no deed it will be a repossession yet another person called the next day and told me regardless of a deed or no deed it will be a foreclosure.I want to do the right thing, but money I have saved in retirement has to last me 20 years if I live to be 73. Plus pay for complimentary medical care not covered by insurance, pay household bills, meet daily living expenses. I think for my sanity I will block their calls.
stop talkng to them. send the cease and desist letter about calls to you so that you only get letters. Just block or do not answer their phone calls. The clowns you are talking to on the phone get income from getting you to send them money, so they don’t care what you say, they only want your money. Just do nothing and eventually they will send you a deed to sign to them — and do not pay them for it, cause they save money by your signing instead of having to file foreclosure to get back the deed. If you were really lucky, you signed a membership instead of a deed, since the member ship just ends if you do not pay.
You are lucky the bank didn’t let you get a loan to pay off a worthless and useless timeshare that will always be a headache with increasing maintenance charges. Just forget about it and deal with the consequences. No matter what happens it will be a win win situation. like you said THEY DO NOT CARE ABOUT YOU. You could tell them you have become blind and lost and arm and both legs and have cancer and they still would not care. They may report it to the IRS meaning you may be charged the forgotten loan as forgiven debt. I forget what it is, but talk to an accountant if that happens and it will be much cheaper than keeping it and paying for it. The IRS is much more caring and understanding than they are. As far as I am concerned these companies are crooks offering unsecured loans for worthless properties that they don’t even want back which is really all they can do. Don’t talk to them or respond. If you respond they take it as a weakness. They prey on decent kind people because they are scum.
Hi
I live in the uk and have a ts as westgate resorts, the ts is pain in full but cant afford maintenance should i just stop paying it or write to them and let them know
Don’t write to them. All it will do is let them know that you are worried about not paying and they will harass you for the money. There is nothing you can write in a letter that will have them say that it’s fine and you don’t have to pay. Just don’t pay.
due to this site it has made me feel so much better that other people are in the same situation, as i have been really panicking about it all, and what they can do to us. so it is great to read everyone’s comments.
another question is what do you think if i just write to them and send the deeds of the property back, and say i dont want to hear from them again, or is it best to just not contact them at all???
Sending the deeds won’t do you any good. It costs money to transfer property from one owner to another. I would not communicate with them unless they are going to for real let you out of the contract – some others here have had that experience and can speak better to this. But if they say they are going to let you out of the contract as soon as you pay the $500 fee, forget it. Do not pay another dime no matter what.
How many times have I heard that you can sue someone, and the court can mandate they pay you, but in the end, the person never pays and there’s nothing you can do about it within the law.
I’m a living experience of sueing some one, a drunk driver and court order him to re-pay me 36 grand and he had only pay 200.00 since 2007. Part his fault I end up in bankrupt, as I end up with many medical bills and lost my job then.
Robert is right. The bloodsuckers will just play you for anything they can get. You must make a commitment to yourself you will not talk to them or pay them another penny.
What do you think these people do all day? They sit around dreaming up ways to manipulate people into giving them money. They have no power over you. Forget them.
i’ve had enough of it. keep getting calls from aspen national collections about my outstanding debt of the grandview las vegas. i just keep talking in my native language (dutch) wich confuses them, giving me the time to hang up the phone. thinking about sending them a cease and desist letter. looked up their address on one of their letters, but only finding a PO box number. i’m sure with a PO box, they can just claim to have never received the letter, can they?
You can block their phone number
You can simply lay down the phone and walk away
You can act like a jolly senile old person and talk real slow (this has all sorts of options for having fun)
You can promise to send money every time they call but never do it
You can use celebrity sound boards, record the conversations, and post them on YouTube and then post the links here
I am getting hounded as well by pinnacle. They call 3 times a day using different numbers each time. We are worried about getting sued by SPM resorts for not paying taxes and maintenance fees on our Orlando Florida nightmare.Can the collections agency sue us?
they are just harassing you to get commissions
first, they need to foreclose, and then you won’t get sued because it was their sale to you and their remedy is to take back the property
Thank you for the reply. I am so glad to have found this site. My hubby and I have lost sleep over this and he was ready to take from his 401 to pay the debt to collections and the fees for this yr as well.My thoughts go out to all that fell victim to this scam.
Hello,
I would love some advice. I was a teacher for 6 years, and midway through that time, I was suckered into buying a timeshare from Massannutten Resort, which is a Great Easter Resorts Inc. resort. I paid my monthly payment faithfully until August of this year, but I no longer teach, am planning to go back to school, and simply cannot afford it anymore. I have received several letters from them about my failure to pay my monthly payments. When I was called, I answered and explained to the representative my situation and that I simply cannot pay. They are refusing to help me with resale because I have not fully paid for the timeshare. I told the lady I don’t know what to do, and the only thing she told me was that it would go into foreclosure eventually.
I really don’t want that to happen, but I don’t see any other way out of this. I’m 28, and I know my credit is going to be ruined. Does anyone have any advice, or anything at all, to share?
Thank you!
If they truly are going to foreclose, you are lucky. The best thing that can happen is for your name to be blotted out of their records. Just make sure you do not pay them another cent. They may try to tell you there are charges for getting foreclosed or some other silliness. The whole idea is that you cannot afford to pay them anything. And don’t worry about your credit score. Think about this: Is it worth it to keep paying money for nothing to these crooks just so you can avoid a few points drop on your credit score? Others have said they have not suffered any hits in their credit score. I haven’t paid my timeshare for well over a year and I have no regrets. Saved a ton of money. Good luck to you.
can the ts company put a lien on my home or car? I live in The U.S.
We are with bluegreen corporation. Told that this is one of the harderst timeshares to get out from under from. Same boat as many others, can barely afford house morgage, much less 300 a month and 900 yearly maintenance fees! Stopped automatic payment from bank account today. Any suggestions?
If you get a certified letter in the mail, refuse it. You are NOT required to sign and accept it.
They will harass you on the phone. Put a block on their number. If they use different numbers, write them and tell them to cease harassing you. Keep a copy of the letter. Include in your letter you are unable to make the payments.
Do not waste your time trying to discuss the matter with a timeshare rep. They DON’T CARE! They only want to mess with you and try to get something out of you. Cut it off and leave it off.
They will send letters with any sort of threats. Keep all of them in a file. Make sure the dates they arrive are on the letters. If they call you for any reason, keep a log of all calls and what they say.
If you read this entire blog, you will not see where anyone has been taken to court or lost their home, etc. The last thing the timeshare industry needs is the news telling everyone about what a rip-off the timeshares are.
Hi there, we were suckered into a TS with Westgate Resorts back in 2011 and like many others above felt pressured to purchase. We have not been able to pay our monthly payments and have now received foreclosure advices. As we are Australian Citizens is there anything they can do to effect our credit rating or cease assets we own in Australia?
Thanks
There are thousands of Americans who have stopped paying their timeshares. The timeshare companies are going to go after them before they spend the time and money to chase after people in other countries. And like I’ve said before, the last thing the timeshare industry needs is for you to contact your local or national investigative reporters to do a hit piece on the timeshare industry.
If they want to foreclose, you are lucky. Just make sure you refuse to pay foreclosure costs. The whole idea is that you are not going to pay them any more money – period. You have already paid them too much.
Thanks for the response – helps put me at ease with the whole thing now. Cheers!
I am so glad I found this site. Does anyone have any experience with timeshares in the Bahamas? We just came back from a week in the Bahamas where we went to a sales presentation for RCI. Because we already own two timeshares (we were scammed a few years ago acquiring the 2nd timeshare)there was NO WAY we were buying into another timeshare!! However, the sales people offered us $6000 for EACH timeshare, deducting it from the value of this new timeshare. Of course there is no paper trail as to the offer for $12000.00 for our existing timeshares, just the final cost of the new timeshare. After filling out the transfer papers that they said were to transfer the title from our name to them I asked “So, just to be clear…this is a DONE DEAL?!” the reply was “Yes M’am, a DONE DEAL!” I said “So in January when the maintenance fees are due we will NOT see a bill” the reply was “That’s right, this is a DONE DEAL!” So YES, we went with it thinking we were getting out of 2 timeshares and going back to just ONE! We really believed we were going in with our eyes open! 4 days after we got home, consequently 4 days AFTER the cancellation period we got a call from the Director of sales who wanted to make sure we understood HOW the transfer worked (Blood draining from body). I said I didn’t understand as we were told it was a DONE DEAL. He said he isn’t sure who would have said that…but it has to first go to a Transfer company. That company would end us forms for power of Attorney so they can sell our other 2 timeshares (which we ALL know is near to IMPOSSIBLE!!) They have assured us it will all work out and they have a company that will take our weeks and pay for the maintenance fees until the transfer is complete. They also sent us an email saying this tranfer company will take over our timseshare assuming all responsibility for fees…I sent the transfer company this email for confirmation and they have been unable to comment! (Strange? I think so!) I saw a lawyer today and he advised that we continue to insist that the contract is null and void due to complete misrepresentation. We have filed a dispute with our credit card company in the hopes of retrieving our deposit and cancelled the card so no future payments can be taken out. We are Canadian and it’s my understanding that refusal to pay can not effect our credit rating.
Any other advice anyone has regarding this situation? I don’t want to just walk away. From all the research I have done these companies keep messing with people, causing stress. They can’t be trusted!
I feel foolish because we were scammed once and in our attempt to right that wrong we were scammed again!!
My husband and myself were taking a dream vacation to Belize &on our way went through Cancun..got suckered & bought a timeshare for the Mayan Palace in Cancun…gave them a downpayment & have monthly payments for balance…we now want yo stop payments but we’re afraid they can inhibit our ability to visit Mexico…we also own a sailboat down there…anyone have any experience with this?…
You have to think about the millions who cross the border every year. The border agents, the police, etc., and not going to focus attention on people who haven’t paid their timeshare stuff. They are not interested in people who owe a debt. They are concerned about criminals, which, in this case, would be the timeshare scamsters.
With all the murder going on, with the US government advising federal employees to stay out of Mexico because of the out-of-control violence, I wonder why you would go there at all. If it was me, I’d get that sailboat and sail for the USA and never go back.
We bought a timeshare about 25 years ago in Aruba, which we paid in full because as dual income couple with no kids, we could afford it. Our son was born a year later, and we never used our week at the resort, but exchanged it almost every year for a more local location once our kids were born and did lots of exchanges for family vacations, such as Disney, through about 2002. I think the last time we made an exchange was in 2003. Around 2004, they raised or maintenance fee to a one-time $1000.00, which we didn’t pay. Since then, we haven’t paid the exchange fee because we were never able to get a good exchange with Interval, but still kept memberships in RCI and Interval International for lowcost Getaways and Extra Vacations. In fact, we took a couple of those lowcost “extra weeks” through RCI. I have been reading about how the home resort will instigate collections and foreclose if we don’t pay the maintenance fee, but it hasn’t happened to us. We just get the bill every year for the maintenance fee, but we don’t pay it. If we chose to exchange our unit, we would, but my husband has been traveling a lot and we’re also getting a lot of free hotel/flight deals because he’s getting perks that way. I wonder if the timeshare company hasn’t pursued us because we already fully “paid” for our timeshare (we don’t have a mortgage on it), or if it will catch up with us sooner or later. By the way, we have great credit, so the nonpayment isn’t showing on a credit report; I just bought a car with no problem.
They cannot do anything to you because they are billing you for services not rendered. The only thing they can do is deny you access to the property you own. I paid the mortgage on our timeshare and, like a fool, paid the maintenance fees for years. Then it hit me – why am I paying this? They have never allowed us to stay there – always said there was no vacancy. So I wrote a note to the guy who was sending me emails about my late maintenance fee and explained the following:
1. I have never been able to stay at the resort due to “no vacancy.”
2. I cannot sell the property, I cannot give it away, and the company will not take it back.
3. The maintenance fees are eternal – they will never stop.
4. The maintenance fees increase every year.
5. I will eventually have to stop working and suffer a reduction in income.
6. Eventually, I will not be able to pay the maintenance fees, and you will start your process of threats and of doing everything you can to destroy me financially as your way of thanking me for paying you over $30,000 for nothing.
5. So why should I pay my enemies another nickel?
6. Good-bye.
The emails stopped immediately, and instead, they send me a FINAL NOTICE every month telling me if I do not pay the maintenance fee by the end of the month, they will send my account to collections. It’s the same letter each month, only with the date and amount changed. I stopped paying two years ago, and have saved enough to buy a couple of beautiful new iPads. There is no hit on my credit, but, since I am a faithful Dave Ramsey disciple, I don’t care about my credit score anyway. Next month, I will be completely debt-free. (Thanks, Dave!)
In 2004 my husband and i purchased a TS in Las Vegas for 20k and fully paid it right away.They sent us a bunch of papers including documents that I should have returned within 45 days to have the ownership transferred to us .They also asked us to pay 799 for the closing cost.I remember the sales person told me we don’t have to worry about that because we can start using the resort anyway without that. So we did, and totally forgot about it. Recently we thought of donating our timeshare and we were asked for the deed and that’s when we found out that the deed was never transferred to our name, that’s after checking with the county clerk. We got a lot of advise that if we are trying to get rid of the timeshare , just walk away, we never owned it anyway.What about the maintenance fees? Can anybody give us advice? we really want to get out of this TS.
The only thing they can do if you stop paying the maintenance fees is prevent you from using the timeshare. I stopped paying mine a year ago and all I get is a letter each month telling me they are going to send it to collections if I don’t pay by the end of the month. They tried sending a certified letter, which we refused, and they can’t call us because our phone number changed. So all we get is the monthly threat. They don’t dare take us to court because they do not need the exposure on national TV. Imagine if one of these investigative news organizations like 20/20 or Dateline did a report on timeshares. End of the industry.
I wish they would do something on 20/20 some investigative reporting. They talked us into buying so many times on top of our 1st TS. Making it seem like it would cancel the last one and somehow we were going to save $$. my husband always misunderstood the question can we afford this? we are soooo behind on our bills. we have a child with special needs and now we are behind on therapy bills. I hate those liars.
As promised an update..
Firstly we would like to thanks all those making positive comments on this blog especially Robert for his continued input and Bill and Marianne for there replies as this has given us the confidence to just stop paying.
We sent our letter explaining our financial circumstances and sent it fully registered nearly 3 weeks ago, having heard nothing i contacted Orange Lake to clarify that they had recieved our letter. I spoke to a gentleman called George who i have to say was full of sympathy for our situation and fully understood the financial strain were are currently under. He did confirm that the letter had been recieved and notes had been made on our account, the notes were less that satisfying just stating that as the mortgage was not paid up then they would not take back the TS. I asked if they would still request payments and they reply was “yes”, asking how do we stop payments as our UK home is now at risk is these payments continue, he said that if i asked he could cancel the payment requests there and then but the account would then go to collections and they would start calling. If our situation fails to improve and payments not brought up to date then the account would go to foreclosure.
Having learnt from this blog that effectively that will be the ens of it. There was absolutely no mention of debt collection agencies, or being taken to court. Just that we would start to recieve calls and letters.
A payment was due out yesterday the 18th, checking my account today it has not been taken. So we now wait for the inevitable calls and letters.
After talking to George we do not feel under any further threat (at the moment anyway!) and are sleeping much better for it. I guess there is at least one good guy working in the TS industry, i hope i havnt made that comment too early!
Again we will try and keep you up to date with the process as it developes.
You said, “A payment was due out yesterday the 18th, checking my account today it has not been taken. So we now wait for the inevitable calls and letters.”
You need to change your account number so that they cannot take out any more money. As long as they have the information to withdraw money from your account, you are in danger. Remember – these are thieves you are dealing with. Nobody with any integrity would work for a timeshare company.
As far as I can remember,I made a simple business( more informal) letter to my bank that I ceased doing business with my greedy time share & highlighted in that letter NOT to allow them to auto deduct from my account. That was it. I still maintained my original bank account. I didn’t have to close it & my life has been going on timeshare-worry free, maintenance & monthly mortgage free. That was the biggest investment mistake I’ve done so far & hope it ends there.
One thing, I never encountered any people from collection agencies, or where ever they may calling from, any threats or such arguments with those crooks & liars, because you know why? I don’t entertain them, I let the phone ring, I don’t answer my landline phone( phone number attached to my TS account)I answer everyone who called me thru my cell number cuz I know those calls are worth answering for.
Just let it go, Sleep tight, & stop worrying about it
I was fortunate enough that I had already switched phone companies (check out Ooma – we love it) so they could not call us. Shortly after we notified the scamsters we were not going to pay anymore, the mailman presented a certified letter to me at the door. I asked him who it was from. He said it was from the Postmaster. In other words, it was from someone concealing their identity – the scamsters. I refused to sign it and he said “Okay.” and that was the end of that.
Hi Stu,
I’ve only just seen your update – just wanted to add that there is something you can do if you don’t want to receive the harassing phone calls.
I found out from THIS FORUM that you just need to send a “cease & desist” letter – similar to the text below (google cease and desist debt letter). I can’t remember if I did this or not, but I do remember that after the first couple of months I did not receive any more phone calls – only letters.
Hope this helps
Marianne
——————————————————————————–
Date
Your Name
Your Address
City, State Zip
Collection Agency
Collection Agency Address
City, State Zip
RE: Account #xxxxx-xxxxxx
Dear Collection Agency,
Under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act Section 805 (C), it is my right to request that you cease contact with me. I am exercising my right to do so with this letter. I request that you immediately CEASE and DESIST all contact with me.
With this notice, under the law, you can now only contact me to:
1.To advise me that your company’s further efforts are being terminated;
2.To notify me that your companie may invoke specified remedies which are ordinarily invoked by such debt collector or creditor; or
3.Where applicable, to notify me that your company intends to invoke a specified remedy.
GIVE THIS LETTER THE IMMEDIATE ATTENTION IT DESERVES.
Sincerely,
Your Signature
——————————————————————————–
OH…. just wanted to add that you should cancel the direct debit or card, so they can’t get any more money.
And another thing…. in August I had a look at my credit report from both agencies here in England (Experian & Equifax). Neither one showed anyhting regarding the timeshare purchase – not the original credit agreement or even the default.
My credit history is completely fine.
Thanks Marianne for your replies.
We are getting fed up with the calls although they are not to persistant so i guess the next step for us is the cease and decist letter.
Thanks again for your input.
we went with a little call blocker from Amazon — also to block all the election calls and telemarketers — we can block them after the first call
Last July,my wife and I were stupid enough to get scammed by RHG/RCI points timeshare through RGH vacation club in Collingwood Ontario, Canada. We’re close to being “seniors” who are raising two grandchildren on a very limited income (Gov’t pension),don’t own our home,(we rent) and have credit cards maxed out,3years left on vehicle loan,but own an atv which is paid for. We simply cannot afford to pay on this timeshare anymore and we had dreams of being able to take our grandkids on vacations with this plan. It was explained to us This would be such an easy way to do this. Just trade your points for the holiday of your dreams! Ya right! They didn’t tell us we had to still fork out extra money for a “dream vacation”. We don’t have a pot to “p”in, and I’m wondering what will happen when the payments that are due for Oct. 1st. come up and we don’t pay. Have already closed the bank account and opened a new one which they don’t have, however they still have a record of my visa card that I used to make the down payment on this scam. When we asked questions,they glossed over everything.We were not told how many points we would need to use to stay at our home resort which is what we were most interested in.It was almost 3 years of points. To stay at another cottage which we asked specifically for they said they had many when in fact there are only one ot two that are booked almost a year and a half in advance. We were not made aware that it costs extra if you have not booked a year plus in advance. Many of these things we only found out as we were trying to book a vacation. We have not used it at all! The math was not done for the maintanence fees but put down as per point. What do we do?
stop makng payments. they will call and send you letters and have collectors call you and maybe even put a collections notice on your credit report. That is the most they can due, even thought it is a real nuisance. Just stop paying and eventually they will foreclose and it will be over.
What about them coming after you for the balance. Like wager garnishment or coming after our house?
If they have your credit card number, call your credit card company and have them issue you a new number. If they will not do it just because you want them to, hang up and call back in a few days and say you lost your card. They will issue you a new card with a new number. Just remember to update all your accounts where payments are automatically deducted from your card.
I stopped paying my maintenance fees last year. Every month, I get a FINAL NOTICE saying if I don’t pay by the end of the month, they will send my account to collections. The problem is that they are billing me for services not rendered. Very hard to collect for that. The only thing they can actually do to me is deny me from using the timeshare, which they did already from the beginning. I have never been able to make a reservation and use my timeshare because they always say No Vacancy! So much for “owning” a week. They “owned” me!
Hi I’m looking to see if someone can help me,
Me and my partner were sucked into timeshare convention in west gate resort Florida on febuary,the sales rep sweetened it all up how good things were and all what a pile of S**T,I’ve recently contacted them stating that I’d been reduced in work hours and can no longer pay the payments,they obviously didn’t want to help,I’ve tried convincing my partner to just stop paying it and let it foreclose and that be end of it,but we holiday from northern Ireland to Florida every year with our kids and she is scared that if the timeshare went to foreclosure that it would mean that we could not enter america again because we would be arrested or something,I’ve telling her how silly she is,I am hoping that someone can help me thanks so much
Not paying or foreclosing on a timeshare is a civil (monetary) matter. They can’t even report you to any government agency, not even a credit bureau if you don’t have a Social Security number. It’s not a crime to not pay for a timeshare, you will never be barred from entering the US for that.
Hi Robert thanks reply,
I’m just off the fone with a timeshare resale firm from America,he said that if I foreclosed on the timeshare that there would be high possibility that we would be strewed at the airport,that if it forecloses he would advise not to return to the us,I’m baffled how I can find out more on the matter,thanks your input
I couldn’t reply to your other post, so I had to do it to this one. They are just trying to scare you to get money. Just Google and you will find out the truth. The resale companies are bigger crooks than the timeshare people. You can’t give these things away for free after they are paid, they can’t resell them, they are thieves and liars and look to prey on weak scared people. Just stop paying.
Thanks for the reply Robert
I’m doing my best to search google to see if we will be arrested at airport,I’m just worried that my children wil do as the oldest is only 6.
You can’t be arrested at an airport for owing money. We don’t have debtors prisons in the US. All they can do is send it to foreclosure and try to scare you. If they threaten anything else like arrest have them put it in writing and then you can sue them for threats. They can’t stop you from coming in to the US and you will not be arrested at the airport.
Robert your a true gentleman thank you so much for your help,I wish u all the best and good luck for helping me,I’m going to call the us embassy in Belfast just to confirm what your saying thank you
They, the lowlife crooks, scammers , liars etc, cannot do you a damm thing. I stopped paying maint about two years ago on a ts in florida. I’m from canada, and have since travelled to the US and no worries. These dirtbags just want to keep you forever on their gravy train.
Hey Robert, the best thing you could’ve done was stumble on this blog. It was my saviour 3 yrs ago and I hope you’ll take the advice like I did. I’m from Jamaica and was going through the same thing you are now. Since I stopped paying, I’ve been to the US approx 23 times…never once been stopped
I’m another one who just can no longer pay. My husband and I bought a timeshare with Hilton in Orlando in 2007. My husband died very suddenly 2 years ago. I struggled to make the payments for another year, but have had to stop. I did ask them if I could give back the timeshare but they said they have no buy back option ‘at this time but may in the future’. My income now is well under half of what it was when there were the two of us and I have no one to discuss my fears with. Today I have received a summons from the clerk of the court. They have also summonsed my late husband, even though I have told them many many times that he has died. This has upset me greatly and I just don’t know what to do. I live in the UK. I am scared of what will happen. Any ideas folks? has anyone else had a court summons?
What does it say on the summons — it should give you information on what you need to defend, but my guess is that they are trying to foreclose on the timeshare. You need to see what the summons refers to, but if it is a foreclosure, you should not respond and the foreclosure will go through and you will no longer own the timeshare. You should also ignore any claim for payments if they send you one. We were foreclosed and never heard from them again
Hi Bill, thanks to all the good advice on this forum Hilton finally foreclosed on me last week.
They did continue to send demands for money – maintenance fees and loan payments right to the end. At last I got a letter from the Orange County Court saying the deed had been foreclosed and the ‘property’ sold to the highest bidder for $100. Not surprisingly the highest bidder was the Hilton Corporation. I told them 2 years ago I could not continue to pay following my husbands death and asked them if they would just take it back from me. At that time they said they couldn’t possibly do that and went on to try to sell me even more points, which I obviously refused. They could have saved themselves a lot of administration and legal fees if they had taken it back from me then.
I feel like a weight has been lifted from me. I live in the UK so know they can’t send anyone to my door looking for money.
This forum has been my saviour and has kept me from being beside myself with worry these last 8 months or so – thank you to all posters.
Julie
UPDATE..
Posted our letter today to Orangle Lake detailing our financial situation, will take upto 7 days to get there so not expecting a responce for at least 2 weeks.
Popped into the bank to see if we could stop the payments and were told that debit card payments cannot be stopped, even if the card goes out of date they can contact VISA and obtain new card details and keep on taking money if they feel money is still outstanding. So this totally backs up some previous comments. I was told that the only way these can be stopped is by totally closing my bank account and openning a new one.
Now i fully understand why they are so keen to lend thousands of dollars without seeing any proof of income.
We shall give them a chance to respond and see what happens.
Will keep you all posted.
you should call them or send a certified letter, return receipt telling them to stop taking money from your account. That means they have no authorization to your funds and you can counter-sue them for damages if they continue to take funds without authorization.
Thanks for the input Bill. Letter we sent is fully traceable, so i will get a reciept that the letter as been recieved. Will wait and see what happens from there, if more money is taken then will go down that route.
Again will kep you all posted!
Hi All.
Well im afraid to say that my partner and i have joined the exclusive “sucker” club and want out.
We jointly purchased a 2 bed unit at Orange Lake resorts in Nov 2011 while on holiday. My partner was made redundant from her job just over 3 months ago making the financial side of things difficult. Now i have recently been informed that i will have to take a reduction in hours at work or face redundancy as well. Obviously our home in the U.K. is far mor important to us than a TS we can no longer afford.
I remember the 2 hour presentation lasting for 5 hours and almost feeling pressured into signing, every time we said no the rep would dissapear for a few mins to speak with his manager then come back with a cheaper deal, 3 times he dissapeared and finally he came back with his manager which just added more pressure for us to sign. We were not told about the 10 day cooling off period and as we were in the first of a 2 week holiday it had expired by the time we got back to the U.K. Part of the sales mans patter was the we would get 100,000 points each year which we could use within the Holiday Inn Club or exchange to RCI and take advantage of further offers. I recently looked into using some of our points to find that 4/5 days in Vegas works out at about 150,000 and thats on a special offer.
So our financial situation aside, we were also “Duped” into buying a worthless TS, putting down about $2500 deposit, incurring $300 monthly mortgage payments and approx $900 a year maintenance fees.
We were initially told that the loan/mortgage was for $18,000 over a maximum 10 year period but if we made 1 extra payment every 3 months then this would bring the duration down to just over 5 years. It the extra payment were not made and the loan/mortgage went full term then this would work out at arround $34,000. Im writing “loan/mortgage” because in the UK mortgages are generally over 25 years and loans are no longer than 10 years. so not sure if we are really paying a loan which they are calling a mortgage. Can anyone shed any light on this.
We are now thinking about just stopping paying the TS mortgage and maintenance and foreclosing.
I have been reading back through the posts and see that as we are NON U.S. that there seems to be almost nothing they can do apart from the relentless calls, emails, and letters then foreclosure.
My concern is that for $34000 + maintenance they may think that we are worth comming after even given our current financial situation and living in the U.K. can anyone share there international experiences with these figures involved.
Many thanks
Hi Stu,
Just saw your post and wanted to respond as a fellow UK citizen, that there isn’t much they can do to you besides the letters and annoying phone calls.
My Mum & I got roped into ‘buying’ a 2 bed TS in Orange Lake back in April 2011. By October 2011 we knew we had made a mistake, so we just stopped paying.
They made all the usual noises, letters & phone calls stating that my credit would be affected. I just told them to stop phoning me as it was harassment (which I learned from this forum) – I didn’t even bother put it in writing. Last month I finally got round to opening all of the letters they had sent, and found one dated March 2012 which stated they had cancelled our account and foreclosed on the TS.
I also know that this hasn’t affected my credit here in the UK, as last month I got a copy of both my Experian & Equifax report and nothing relating to Orange Lake is on either of them.
So don’t worry… because as you have read on previous posts, they’re not going to waste their money pursuing anyone abroad.
Hope this helps.
Marianne
Hi Marianne
Many thanks for your input, its exactly what i wanted to hear. Although many posts point to exactly what you say its always worrying when your going through it. Hearing it from a fellow UK citizen is very reasuring.
Again i will keep the blog updated as to what happens.
Thanks again Marianne from a No So Worried Stu.
Sorry.. meant to ask if you were looking at similar values to us?
I hope that ours is sorted out as fast as yours.
Thanks again.
Has anyone got put of a Shell Vacation timeshare in Canada?
My husband and I got suckered into a timeshare at Carriage Hills(Shell Vacations) in Ontario Canada. We were vulnerable and got caught up in the dream of a vacation. Well we have paid the payment but not the maintenance fees. My husbands career went down hill and so did his health and we are unable to pay for this and don’t know how to get rid of it. We were stupid we know but after paying on it for 4 years @ $220.00 per month we were shocked to learn we have only paid off about $2000.00 of the principle and have 6 more years to pay the whole thing off. Should we put it in just his name so both of us don’t get the bad credit hit. Do we just stop paying? We are in dire financial straits due to my husbands health and need to cut our losses ASAP! HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hi Leanne,
Have come across a few blogs with Shell Vacations posts but for some reason this blog wont let me post any links.
Try putting this in your search engine
Shell Vacation Club Fraud & Misrepresentation jack conway
Jack Conway is a former Shell Vacations Sales Rep and makes a reply to the blog.
Try also searching the same but without “Jack Conway”, there is quite alot more that comes up.
Hope it helps
Does anyone know how do Westgate handle their foreclosure procedure? How long does it take for them to foreclose? We stop paying and starting to get phone calls from them and I just ignore them. My only concern is if they would start calling my in laws, we had their contact down as our next of kin. The strangers thing is they have not contacted my husband yet.
I don’t know but you should contact your in laws and tell them to ignore any calls if they get them, that you were duped into this and the only way out is to not pay them. Your in laws might think you are in a financial mess or maybe they will make a payment for you which would be worse.
Hi Mel, just wanted to know how your getting on. We brought a time share with wedtgate in August but are not going to pay it but worried about what will happen.
If would be useful to know how long they took and what they done.
Thank you
Hi Jane, we did not pay them a cent since we found out that we have been scammed. we just have to close one eye and let the deposit go for an experienced! we have not heard from westgate after ignoring their calls for few weeks. Strangely we recently received an invoice for 2013 maintaineance fee from Hilton vacation even though we bought it from westgate and still owe on our TS. All we knew was Hilton was buying this particular property off westgate that may explain why we are getting an invoice from Hilton for the maintaineance not westgate…..
Robert, do you have any advice for us on this? We obviously are not going to pay for it but just wondering the circumtance of not paying? Is that mean that we are now in trouble with both westgate and Hilton? We are also curious why there is no mention on the invoice for the amount we owed on the TS?
No, my only advice would be to not pay and don’t respond to Hilton either. If Westgate sold your property to Hilton you can’t owe both of them. If I were you if asked on a credit report or any other instance just reply that you never bought a timeshare with Hilton.
I found an update regarding wage garnishments. First of all they have to sue you in court. Most likely it would be small claims court, which is the cheapest way, but there are state limits as to how much they can sue for usually under $5,000. Then you refuse to pay and they have to find a way to get the money.
If you are on social security they cannot garnish it. Only the Federal government can touch that money if you owe them money, not for private debts.
Otherwise they can, but most likely won’t. Certain states don’t allow for garnishments for private debts. Others have limit where it’s beneficial towards you. Check the laws in your area, but most likely they won’t sue because they know they probably won’t see a penny and are just throwing money away.
Also if they are foreclosing I don’t understand why you would owe money. When a house if foreclosed you don’t have to keep paying for it.
Hello, Does anyone know where can I file a complaint? RED? We bought a timeshare at PH Westgate Las Vegas. Want to get out of it.
If it’s less than 10 days you better find out how to get out by reading your contract and finding out more info online. Those crooks will not help you, in fact they will lie and stall until the time is up and you are trapped.
Once you are trapped you have to stop paying, foreclose, pay any tax penalty, and take a hit on your credit report, which may not be as bad as you think. Otherwise your only other solution is to throw good money away and in the end own something that is worth less than worthless. Get out as soon as you can by never paying another penny to them. All they can do is harass you because they are dishonest bullies.
Hi Robert,
We purchased it about 2 months now. We were not told about the cooling off period and apparently there is no recession period anyay for the contract we signed. We wrote to them but they won’t let us out. We are not Americans so we don’t really care if it go foreclosure unfortunately we will lose our deposit. The only worry we have is we do not want to be haunted by this for the rest of our life and hope this will end once is foreclosed?
If you only lost your deposit be happy, most people lose 20, 50 0r 100 times more than that with their timeshare. You will never see that money again but they can’t take any more from you. If you don’t live in the US just stop paying, basically there is nothing they can do but harass you and make false threats, just ignore them and they will go away. Don’t bother writing to them or even ever contacting them again, they do not want to help you, they just want your money, The only way to win in to realized it’s just a learning experience and to never send them another cent.
And yes it will end once it’s foreclosed. It will end as soon as you stop paying, but they won’t tell you that because all the do is lie.
Hi Robert, yes it is an expensive horrible learning experience for us. It ruined our exeperiece we have in Vegas and is terrible to have to experience this during our honeymoon. We now have come to a point that we just have to forget about the $4k and be positive about it.
I also realized that they are a lot of TS victims out there. Why no one do anything to stop this? If we live there and have easier access to resources we definetly would take actions! And would not just simply walk away.
Hi
Has anyone out there ever stoped their maintance payments at Lake Okanagan Resort in B.C.
Canada.
Hey everyone join the forums and post in there.
The dumb blonde chick with the short hair on Survivor this last season was a Time Share salesperson. She’s the dummy who at tribal said that it was funny when someone gets blindsided and then a few minutes later when it happened to her she was almost in tears. Her cousin who joined her for the relatives competition was also a time share salesman and on the show they mentioned how creepy their relationship was.
They can’t put you in jail, they can’t kill you. They are not going to hire lawyers to fight you and pay court costs when they can’t guarantee that you will pay the judgement anyway. All they can do is harass you and give you a bad credit score if you are in the US. You bought what you were told was property. I bet you don’t even own the land, just a 1/52 share of one unit. You really don’t own anything, you just got suckered.
And what is the resort losing? A sucker. They gave you a worthless property and then they take back that same worthless property, but they won because they took your money and will look for another sucker to take your place. The only way to win now is to never pay them another cent.
Oh and if you have an old relative that owns one, make sure they default so that you are not stuck with it, and refuse it and do not sign anything saying you take ownership. I know there is more involved so look into your legal responsibility, but you are not getting something of value, you are inheriting a debt.
Don’t worry, be happy.
You know things are bad when people are not even concerned with getting their money back and just want to walk away and can’t after already having lost thousands of dollars.. For the most part timeshares are legal robberies that you can never get out of. A mechanic can be arrested for over charging you too much or for putting in a used part and charging you the new price, but a timeshare company is allowed to sell you something that is worthless and has no resale value for as mush as they can and lie about what a great deal it is, and basically not take no for an answer and make you feel trapped. It’s all politics and as long as they can donate to politicians they can continue their scams.
Thank you for this site! After reading all of the complaints and answers I feel I am not alone in the RV Resort membership scams. I joined Silent Valley, Banning CA, 4 years ago, and find that this company can do just about anything that they want and make it impossible to get out. THey have over 50% delinquencies so are in trouble. They cut service, impose large increases of fees and can also assess any amount that they want. I know buyer beware! but we are senior citizens that just wanted to have a summer place to go, and the legal forms don’t make any sense anyway. I have never had one delinquency in my 74 years, so this is my first default….We will just go default and take what comes and follow the suggestions that have been posted on this site. It is time that laws are passed to help the members that get sucked into these scams. Thanks for being on line.
Oh yeah and good luck trying to get the thing donated. Even if you have the maintenance fee paid for a year most of those things are just further scams where they want to sucker more money out of you. Some that will take if or free, if you can find it won’t transfer the deed so if they don’t sell it you are still stuck with the fees.
Don’t even think of those companies that say they will sell or rent your timeshare. Even I know a scam without getting into it. People think you are a sucker when they hear Timeshare. While some can be good if you do have a large family and plan to use it every year, where it can be cheaper than two hotel rooms for the week, in the end there is still no easy way to get out when you don’t want it anymore. Oh and if it’s ever in a will or your parent owns it and passes away you have the right to refuse it. Never burden another person with it and let them know their rights.
There is some Karma. David Seigel of Westgate had to stop building the largest house in America. What moron wants to live in Orlando in a hillbilly palace. A billionaire wants to live in Beverly Hills, the Hamptons or Palm Beach. Regardless he will always have enough money to live a millionaire lifestyle. He will never be homeless or hungry which is what he wants the suckers paying for his lifestyle to do.
If I ever get a call again from there collection agency I should ask if I should skip my rent and be homeless so I can pay for my maintenance? I know they will say yes. Because they are garbage. They don’t care about anything or anyone. They just want your money.
I stupidly wrote a letter demanding they let me out of the timeshare as soon as I realized what a trap it was. All they said was that it was past the 10 days. I was basically trapped so I paid, like a sucker. At least I enjoyed it twice, and gave it as an expensive gift to my sister once (not that she offered to pay any of the transfer fees).
So don’t waste your time writing to them. It just lets them know that you care. When a bully try to poke and harass you it’s best to ignore them.
I’m also surprised some people are paying $600 a month for their timeshare. That’s $7,200 a year, plus maintenance and you own NOTHING. You can rent a studio walking distance to the beach in south Florida in the winter for 6 months for $750 a month, which would only be $4,500 for 6 months, and you would get to live somewhere for your money. Or you can get a small studio apartment all year round a few miles from the beach for that same $600 a month.
Remember with a timeshare you are paying a mortgage that is not even underwater, it’s WORTHLESS.
What can they do, take back that worthless timeshare, they don’t even want it. If they were smart they could let you out and offer to sell your timeshare to people who got suckered into the presentation but keep saying no and sell it for a few grand plus maintenance. But they don’t because they know you are a sucker for falling for the TS scam.
Your credit score might take a small hit, but you can explain to lenders that you got scammed and paid in full (yeah you can lie like the TM companies do too if you didn’t pay it in full) and can’t get out of it. Show them that you paid all your other bills and otherwise have good credit. If it’s a person and not a corporate machine, they should understand.
There are no debtors prisons, they can’t take your house, your car, or withdraw from your bank accounts without authorization. IF you were dumb enough to give them your bank account info change your account numbers with your bank, tell them you suspect fraud and just pay for new checks if you have to.
People in other countries who bought timeshares in the US have less to worry about. just stop paying and all the can do is offer empty threats and phony scare tactics.
Basically just stop paying. You don’t own anything. All you own is a rental agreement to stay at their place once a year and you have to pay a large amount in maintenance to do it. You are not going to be sued. They know they won’t get money because if you had it you would pay. They are bullies who use scare tactics.
So far I stopped paying my maintenance that was due in January. I did take a call from them early on and I said that if my financial situation improved a lot I might be able to pay it at a later time. Then they already added a hundred or two to what is owed. It’s like they don’t want you to pay.
They won’t take you to court. Even if they did you might lose. But you really don’t have to pay. If you don’t voluntarily pay a judgement they have to find your assets to get their money and they can’t take your house. They won’t sue you because they know it will cost them more to do it than they can regain. It’s just a scare tactic.
I think these loans they offer you are just their side company doing it. They don’t require any collateral for the loan and the timeshare itself is worthless. What do they lose if you stop paying. Nothing. Most people already paid a lot anyway.
I read on here if they guy didn’t make a typo that he owed $129,000. For that amount you can buy a small or 2 bedroom condo in south Florida. I didn’t get taken that bad. I had an odd year deal. I got talked into it because every time I said no, his manager would come over and pressure me into it. I felt trapped like I was being held hostage and they wouldn’t let me leave without buying. Finally they gave me a number which was $5,000 which was reasonable. Instead of a monthly payment with interest, I just sent them the $5k all at once. So with the maintenance and transfer fees I paid about $2.500 for each of the 3 times I used it. It’s a learning experience. I don’t even like to admit to anyone that I even got suckered into it. That $100 they promised me to go to the presentation, which I never got, they just deducted it off what I owe them, cost me a lot of money and worry.
So far the calls have not been harassing. They told me if it has to go to collections that those people are nasty, but I don’t care. I will just hang up. I have caller ID that I can see when they are calling. They called from another number and I let the girl speak for a few seconds and then hung up. Now they leave voicemails, but it’s not even people calling. They leave automated messages that I have to call them. Yeah right.
They won’t get anything else from me. All I will do is pay for a notary to fill out the Deed in Lieu. I won’t even send them $5 to settle the deal. What are they losing? Nothing. They are just getting another person upset.
I won’t do a cease and desist at the time because then they can’t offer me a deed in lieu. I will only do a C&D if to the collection agency.
So if you do a C&D can they no longer bill you or ask you for current of future maintenance fees?
Remember they will use bully tactics to scare you, all they can do is lower your credit rating for a while. You made them a promise to pay for something that is so worthless that you can’t even give it away for free. It’s so worthless they don’t even want to take it back. Just let everyone know how bad it is. It may work for some people, until it stops working and the fees go up and you can’t use it and you can’t get out out it, or so you think. I wish there was a TSA Time Share Anonymous meeting where we could spread the word. I don’t watch mush TV so I don’t know if there are still talk shows, too bad Oprah is still not around to do a show on time share nightmares.
Remember all they can take back is their worthless property that they don’t even want. Maintenance fees are not that, they are profits, otherwise they would gladly let you out of the deal and sell your property to someone else. This really should be regulated so that people are not stuck paying maintenance fees that are really corporate profits and they should regulate it so that if you want to get out of it after it’s paid in full that you can freely do so.
I have a Westgate timeshare that is paid for and I refuse to pay any more maintenance on. I think my maintenance and taxes are between $600 and $700 and I don’t use it anymore. The good thing was that it was an even year thing where I only had it every other year. I just had to pay almost $100 a year for interval. I did use the timeshare 3 times in 6 years but I had to switch to a different property each time so there was an extra cost involved. They do set you up in nice places. The first year I used it with my sister and her family. They stayed in the main part that had a big bedroom with a Jacuzzi and a loft for the kids and I had my own little hotel sized room with two beds and a bathroom across the hall.
Second year I switched and came alone to Fort Lauderdale, I got a very nice one bedroom apartment in the Marriot Beach Place in Fort Lauderdale, I just had to pay a little more to use it thru Interval International. and I had to pay extra for parking, like $70 for the week. The third time I gave it to my sister to use. I had to pay for the transfer to another property and a guest usage fee. It was a decent place, I lived in Florida by that time and went to visit them there.
The problem in that two years later I paid the maintenance and tax and had no where to use it because I was in south Florida and didn’t need to go anywhere to vacation. I didn’t offer it to my sister because it would have cost me a few more hundred dollars to transfer it to where she wanted it and to use the guest voucher. It’s good if you use it all the time and want to save money cooking your own meals in the kitchens, and also if you have a large family it’s great because it’s like renting an apartment for the cost of s cheap hotel.
I offered it to my sister to take over and she doesn’t want it, which is fine with me. I’m done with them. I’m not too worried about bad credit, I’m not buying a new car or house in the foreseeable future. The only thing that would suck would be if my car insurance went up, but if it does I will have to deal with it. I’d rather be homeless then give The Queen of Versailles Mrs. Seigel and company another dime. I’m so glad that their goal to build the biggest house in America failed. I wish much worse for them. So fat I got a few calls and got threats that collection people are really mean, but I don’t care. What collection company would waste their time accepting this lousy debt.
Warn anyone you can to stay away from timeshares unless they know they can pay a hefty maintenance every time it’s due plus other associated costs for life. Maintenance is obviously artificially high and they get about $30,000 a year from each unit in a building. So if a building has 20 apartments it gets $600k a year.
It’s a shame that this is considered physical property when in effect you own absolutely nothing with no value, not even enough to give it away for the cost of maintenance and taxes. if you do have one and go to a different location and they tell you they want to schedule a presentation you have the right to refuse. If you give it to a friend to use make sure they also refuse it. They will lie and try to tell you that it’s mandatory, but you are on vacation, you paid, and it’s not required.
I am from Canada, I joined “Just Dreams” vacation club thinking we were going to get some nice vacations from them…well that was a waist of time, they have junk places to stay at and none of the places they showed us in the presentation are locatable. Instead they give us crap to stay in, needless to say we are wanting to tell them to take a hike and let the payments drop off, we never used them once and never used any of their money for anything, I’m hoping they cant come after us in Canada. Any Thoughts?
We too are Canadian. Owners at Starwood Vistana resorts since 1991. Stopped paying maintenance fees this year. Received a letter this week saying there was a special offer – a one time alternative to foreclosure. Association offering to release us from the amounts we currently owe in exchange for deeding owndership to the Association. I’m assuming this is the deed in lieu everyone talks about. They send a package, wwe get everything noticed and transfer is done. Has anyone else had this happen? Starwood also has a short video on a webiste … 3 easy steps … ask for the package, get forms notarized and sent back, transfer of clear title, release of liability for past due and future assessments and/or real estate taxes. I’m a little leary of anything to do with timeshares now. Need to know if anyone has followed through on this. Thanks.
This is the first bit of good news I have heard so far. Tell them you aill stop paying fees and they will release you of all further obligatins, Am I understanding correctly??
No, don’t tell them anything, just stop paying.
have you completed their request? Have they required anything further from you? We are Canadian and are owners of a timeshare at Grand Seas in Florida. They apparently filed chapter 11 in 2010. I have read on other forums that we can’t convert our week at GS to points at Club Navigo nor can we exhange it externally at Interval International because GS owes to both of them. We still have 6 yrs on our mortgage and our maintenince fees keep going up. We want to know if we walk away, if it would affect our credit rating in Canada
Hi
As anyone out ever tried to get rid of a TS at LAke Okanagan Resort in BC?
WE oen 2 and would like to get rid of both or even one of them. We stopped the maintenace payments on one of them but the resort siad we could use the other one because on non payment. Has anyone had this happen to them? Any suggestions?
I agree. I own my ts at westgate for oh 7.8 years now. Paid off! I was paid ahead partially for taxes and maintenance, however couldn’t come up with the full amount. I made a payment in following year towards that and they conveniently said my payment didn’t go thru. Rrriigghhttt! It was the same account I always pay, now it’s in collection and theyve tacked on fees and interest. These guys do lie and are scams. You’d think they would treat their owners with dignity. Is there anything u can do to sue them for that? And what about my equity? I paid 26,000 dollars includes the 18 percent interest, you know, My friend owned at orange lake resorts and when they couldn’t pay at least orangelake offered to take it back even tho they paid half of it off anyway and didn’t have bad credit! Why can’t westgate follow the big boys example? Really westgate Is a snar and a racket! Any one want to buy a timeshare real cheap?
I have a 2BR Christmas week — same story.
you’d think they wold want it back to resell it, but who knows what they are thinking. I can certainly ignore the calls from the collectors. it did trade well — marriott st thomas 2 years ago and hyatt key west last year.
I’m reading all this for the first time, and my Wyndham timeshare has been such a burden for me. I recently found out that Wyndham took out credit from Bill Me Later for a down payment on a contract I agreed on last October 2011. From all the pressure tactics, I had no idea they had me sign a contract where I had to pay Bill Me Later for the down payment, which I cannot afford along with the mortgage and maintenance fee. I plan to stop payment on all of this soon, but maybe I can work something out with Bill Me Later where my monthly’s are not so bad. Should I just stop payment on everything all together? This is really taking a toll on me. Thanks for any advice!!!
The same thing happened to me. I can’t afford the timeshare and the bill me later. Someone please help me. I don’t even know what to do next.
Hi! got 1099-A 2010 Tax Yr. I put in a sch D since it is higher than a FMV so far zero_ I havent received 1099-C which is cancellation of Debt that will be an Income if I receive that from Wyndham so far nothing yet..1099 -A is only an acquisition back,it wont be an income unless they send 1099-C . My advice to everybody is to stop paying, and be ready for a hit in your credit for a year. My credit was hit , I cant buy a home but I saved my money I was then paying $600/month and $123/month Maint fee, I got sick and got divorce so I have no choice but to stop paying it is so unpractical to have it is only for rich people. I would rather have bad credit (which I regained again now) than giving my $700 a month and pass my on stupidity to my children and , TS was treated as Real Estate property, it should have been like an Insurance that if we stop paying ,we cant have their facilities or just simple cancel the benefits, unfortunately it is not that way. It was a nightmare and thought of it and i was scared to ruin my credit,until this time i am declined to buy a house when they see that unpaid TS, so I keep saving the money to buy in a next 2 yrs and pay bigger DP,anyway buying a house is not my priority now, im still renting but at least I saved my sanity.
good for you!
it is extortion for them to ruin your credit if you won’t pay the $700 per year for life
So you did not have to pay any legal fees? I want to stop payment but I am worried about any repercussions afterwards. I don’t mind the bad credit, I purchased a condo 2 years ago and a new car recently. Credit is the least of my worries now. I just realized a huge scam they played on me regarding a down payment, and that was the last straw.
We never paid any legal fees. We just waited them out. Of course, our credit will be pretty bad for a while, I guess, but we really had no choice.
Has anyone had any experience trying to extricate yourself from a time share with Festiva? We have just recently stopped our payments and are receiving all kinds of threats reference our credit ratings. We are now within 2 days of the default date. Also, we told Festiva that we would only communicate with them by email. Easy if you have caller ID and refuse to answer any caller who does not identify themselves. This has probably frustrated them more than anything else we have done.
Anyone with experience with Festiva?
Ours is currently with Festiva but we are still using it
curious about what happened wtih Festiva…i am in dire financial trouble and am considering just not paying anymore. Please advise
I am also with Festivia and this will be the last month that I make my payment also. I am tired of not getting anything for my money. I purchased the point system and then was told by a realtor that it was only worth about $3000. they have gotten my money now for 6 years now and I still owe 90 more month. Please let me know if anyone has had any dealings with Festivia. thanks
Has anyone had to deal with Vaction Village Park Place in Orlando? I stopped paying last year, the collection calls continued from Lando Resorts daily until about 4 weeks ago, and now nothing.
My husband and I got sucked in to a Westgate timeshare when we were on vacation in Las Vegas at the PH. I felt uneasy about the whole thing after signing and discovered all this horrible stuff online about them. The following day I wrote a letter to cancel the timeshare. I faxed it and sent it Priority/Certified mail to 3 addresses. I just hope I caught it in time. I also called my credit card company and reported fraud and had the credit card number changed, so they wouldn’t be able to get any more money from us. I have no intention of paying them a dime after hearing all the bad stuff about them. I could care less if the thing forecloses. I live in a great house that my in-laws own and don’t ever have to worry about buying a house, so if my credit sucks for 7 years I don’t care all my credit cards are maxed out anyways and nobody with give me credit anyways. So @#$! those con artists. I hope they all burn in hell for ripping innocent people out of their hard earned money.
So, I was contacted by Westgate and they told me that because the timeshare was an assumed loan we couldn’t cancel it. I am so angry with this whole mess. They just keep on lieing and I can’t afford to hire an attorney to make sense of it. Oh well…good bye timeshare, hello foreclosure.
Today I reported Westgate to the BBB. I found un-dated and falsified paperwork (falsified by the Sales Rep) amoung the copies of the Agreement they gave me. I am also planning on reporting them to the Attorney General. I guess we will see what happens. I’ll keep everyone posted.
Heather, You might want to find some sort of free or low cost legal clinic near you that might be of assistance. If there is a law school near you people there might be able to help. Better to pay them than to pay for a timeshare in perpetuity!
I am very happy to say that I think I won this little battle. I recently recieved a letter from Bill Me Later – Webank in correspondence to a purchase at Westgate. It said they could not approve me for the loan because they didn’t have a physical address. Then I got a credit from Westgate on my husband’s credit card for $300 which was the amount we paid up-front at the closing. They certainly wouldn’t return money to me if they were planning on taking more. Somehow I slipped out of that one with very minimul effort. I guess I am just lucky that all my mail gets sent to a PO BOX.
I finally heard from Westgate and they sent me a Cancelation letter. It’s over. I did it!
Hi Heather, caught my attention reading your comments. My husband and I were lied to purchase this timeshare while we were in Vegas just 2 months ago. We came back home and found out all their lies and deceptive sales practice we are very unhappy and could not stress enough on what we have gotten ourself into!! We were not told about the cooling off period and we started to write tot them after a month our signing the contract but before the closing date of the loan. They come back to us and said there were an acting agent selling a loan not a timeshare so there is no recession period! we have paid them few thousands in deposit!! We felt we have been ripoff by them! Could you please let me know of you have to go on a battle with them to get them cancel your contract and get your deposit back?
You have 10 days by law to cancel a timeshare purchase. You should be just fine. You sent it priority certified, very smart!
hello everyone, So I have received the warranty deed in lieu of foreclosure for my POS westgate timeshare and they are asking for $250, which I will definitely not be sending them. I have signed and have had the document notarized and it’s ready to go back to them, minus the money. but the question I have is how will this affect me tax time? Will I have to owe the irs?
We faced this situation this year because we defaulted on two timeshares through Wyndham. The ‘forgiven’ debt is considered income, which is absurd, but that’s how it is. However, if you can show that your assets are less than your debt, you may not have to claim it. Quite frankly, when we did our taxes on TurboTax, we came out owing almost $10,000. So we took it to H&R Block and, I don’t know what they did, but we ended up pretty much breaking even. So it was worth the $335 they charged us. I would also add that we had another time share from Orange Lake that we also stopped paying on after my husband lost his job. They had sent us a letter saying they were cancelling our contract. We never got any IRS forms from them, so I guess that’s that.
We have our Timeshare through Wyndham also and we can’t pay for it anymore. I called to tell them and they didn’t offer any solutions. What has happened with yours? Did you stop paying or what?
We have our Timeshare through Wyndham also and we can’t pay for it anymore. I called to tell them and they didn’t offer any solutions. What has happened with yours? Did you stop paying or what?
Elaine, how did you got rid from Orange Lake? I recently recieve notice of laid off and they didn’t offer anything… The exact message was:
“Your patronage is important to us, and we hope that you’ll continue to give us opportunities to serve you”. WTF I just told them I will be lay off by May 31th.
We just stopped paying. I think I probably sent them a letter explaining that my husband was unemployed, but I can’t remember for sure. Eventually they sent a letter saying our contract was being cancelled. That’s the last we heard from them. They did not send an IRS form for the cancelled debt, thank heavens.
After 3 years of not paying our Orange Lake Kissimmee maintenance fees (we paid off the mortgage some years ago), we finally got the Warranty Deed papers arrive in the post, to hand our week back. YAAAY!!! We’re off to get it signed & stamped by a notary (if you are in the UK – you can not use a solicitor, Orange Lake require it to be a notary – some solicitors are both though. The fee is £70 from the one we’re using)). We have never answered a phone call from Orange Lake, never written to them, we simply stopped paying when they said they would not accept the week back 3 years ago. We got the usual voicemail messages, the usual ‘your account is delinquent’ letters, and then the letter saying a lien would be put on the property (property? We never owned any real ‘property’ there!) and it would then foreclose. Clearly they don’t want to have to pay for that, so we just sat tight and waited for the paperwork to come through with them asking for us to sign it back to them. And it did, which is about a year after the lien/foreclosure warning. Being from the UK this has no impact on our credit score. So stay strong people, you can do it!
Hi…i need some advice who got out of Wyndham TS. We are not from the US, but recently victimized by misrepresentation during the sales. We are asking for cancellation but we are being told that we cannot get out. Any advice? Thank you!
We had Wyndham and just stopped paying, finally, after trying to get them to cancel. We stopped paying in October of 2010. They harassed us for a long time, then finally gave up. We never got an official notice that our timeshares were cancelled, but they sent us the tax forms that indicated that they had cancelled our debt, and we haven’t heard from them since. If you are not in the U.S., you probably don’t need to worry about the tax forms.
Elaine…..you stopped paying in Oct 2010, did you owe both mthly payment and maint. fees at that time? How long did the collection calls lasted? What’s the difference between getting DIL vs. tax forms?
Sorry for all the questions. Thanks!!!!!
From what I’m hearing from everyone, bottom line is do not pay these scammers and just be ready for whatever happens to your credit rating.
We owed both maintenance fees and monthly payments on two Wyndham timeshares and one from Orange Lake (I know, we fell for it more than once, but when my husband had a good job, we did actually use and enjoy them). After he lost his job, we tried to keep up payments for a while, but finally realized it was crazy to be paying all that money for these things. I can’t remember exactly how long the calls kept coming. We stopped talking to them after a while and just didn’t answer the phone. I want to say it was somewhere around 6-9 months. Wyndham never sent a letter saying they were going to do anything; no DIL or anything like that. At tax time we got the forms saying the debt had been cancelled. Orange Lake eventually sent a letter saying our contract had been cancelled and that was that.
How did you get a warranty deed in lieu.Did you request one, did they foreclose and then offer one. ??? Thanks
They never sent us anything. We didn’t request a warranty deed in lieu. The only papers we got were the IRS forms indicating that the debt had been forgiven.
If they foreclose, then the deed is worthless and does you no good. It depends on the place. People on the up and up will accept your deed in lieu, but most places are scams and frauds, like my crooks. Their whole goal was to defraud their victims into crazy rising maintenance fees which are worth more then the value of the hotel room. In this case, they don’t want a deed in lieu, because the whole idea is to try and scare, trick and defraud you into keeping the fraudulent agreement in place. It is essentially extortion, holding the threat of credit reporting over your head.
There is only one way. Walk away!!! Just as you would walk away from any criminal who was trying to rob you. It is a shame that apparently the travel industry bribes our congressmen to look the other way while this legalized extortion takes place. I guess the bad guys are winning. Sorry for the not so cheerful, yet accurate advice.
Hey Keith,
We simply stopped paying our Orange Lake Kissimmee maintenance fees. They threatened foreclosure, we ignored that (so it forecloses, who cares?!), then finally they sent us the papers for giving the timeshare week back to them, that way they get to avoid the costs of foreclosure. The whole process from stopping paying, to getting the papers through was about 2 and half years. The deed in lieu papers came through about a year after the letter saying they were going to foreclose it. We’re from the UK and the cost of getting our papers signed by a notary here, which is what they require, was £70 (about $110). A bargain to get rid of this rubbish! We didn’t contact them at all. Just stopped paying then ignored all their phone calls, letters & bills.
Hi Mayra, is your TS PH Westgate in Vegas? Could you pls let me know how long does it take for them to foreclose? You still have money owin or just maintenance fee?
We got lied in to buying ours few months ago. We stop paying and started to received phone calls from them now.
Even after reading many of these posts there seems to be some disagreement between paying/not paying balance and maintenance fees. Either way here’s my details. Purchased a TS in Vegas in 2006. Currently not past due and current fees paid but still owe about $5K on balance. Being active military, if I decide not to pay any more as most suggest what are the chances they can garnish wages, effect my 22+ yr career and/or anything else that could hinder my status as a military member? Honestly, this entire TS business is a joke, but of course sometimes some of us do feel consequences later, whether it be on a credit report of financial status. The reality for military members is if you are having financial difficulties the military can actually prevent you from getting a security clearance, which in turn has career impacting consequences. So if anyone has some insight on this please reply. I would appreciate your thoughts.
You need to first talk to your security people and explain what is going on. You need to clarify that this failure to pay is not because of financial problems, but because you got scammed. They may or may not know anything about the problem with timeshares. We recently went through our “re-investigation” at our base right when I had decided to stop paying maintenance fees on my paid-up timeshare. I called the security people and learned they had no clue about timeshares. In my paperwork for my re-investigation (for you non-government types, this is where you have to sort of re-apply for your security clearance.) I explained that (1) We had paid off the mortgage. (2) Had never been able to stay at the facility because there was never a vacancy, (3) I was refusing to pay for services NOT rendered rather than real property, so the only thing the time share could really do is deny me the privilege of using the facility, which is what they’ve been doing anyway from the beginning. I further explained that we are in very good financial shape, almost ready to pay off our house and we have no other bills, so I am not a security risk from the financial aspect. I don’t care if the timeshare puts a mark on my credit report because we are students of Dave Ramsey and are paying cash for everything now.
So my point was after all that, is get to know the security people where you are and let them get to know you and understand what the deal is with your time share and you should not have a problem in my opinion unless you have total jerks. If they are jerks, then go get your superior officer to stick up for you and tell the dogs to go bite someone else.
Good luck with this mess.
I’m going to make just one other suggestion–namely that you discuss this matter with a military attorney and get a professional, legal opinion.
One potential problem that I see is that personnel departments, (including govt. personnel depts.) don’t normally tell an applicant why they didn’t get a position or promotion, at least not the REAL reason. If you press them, they may tell you that the position was already filled, or another applicant was more qualified, but that type of explanation may just be the standard response used to protect themselves legally, also known as CYA or “cover your ass”.
An initial consultation with an attorney is almost alway either free, or provided at a nominal charge (normally, less than $50.)
I have a timeshare with Tahitti Village in Vegas. What a nightmare, I bought this thing several years ago, and have been paying for it, never been able to use it. Don’t know how we got roped into this, I didn’t think we were that dumb. We went to one of those meetings, and we spun a wheel to see if we could win extra free vacations, and we won 6 free vacations. When we called to try to use one of the free vacations, we were told that the company had gone bankrupt and the new company would not honor the free vacations. I just plain can’t afford it now that I have lost my income. Tried to sell it back or work with them, and believe it or not, no one even can tell me who owns the note. the company I bought it from went bankrupt, and the timeshares got sold off to multiple companies. I have spent hours trying to find out who owns our timeshare. With every call I just get different information, and no one can tell me what to do. What will happen to me if I just stop paying? I really don’t have much of a choice right now.
We bought Club de Soleil from the same company who owns Tahiti Village. We paid off our mortgage, and now have stopped paying our maintenance fees. We have never been able to stay at the resort because they never have vacancy. Which means they stole our week every year. They have sent three letters, one per month, saying they are going to send my account to collections if I do not pay by the end of the month. They can send my account to collections if they want. Will not affect me. My credit score means nothing to me now. I am not going to pay for something I cannot use. I am not going to pay for services not rendered.
Here is what all of you must think about:
(1) The maintenance fees increase every year.
(2) You are obligated to pay them for the rest of your life.
(3) You will not be able to pay these fees forever.
(4) The inevitable will come some day when you will be forced to tell them you can no longer pay. Once you have stopped paying, you will be subjected to the hell of their harassment for a period of time. And then you will be free.
Why not stop paying NOW and get it over with so you do not have to deal with this in your old age. Why not stop paying NOW and keep your money for yourself instead of paying it to people who hate you? The more of us who stop paying, the more we hurt the bacteria who are preying on us and others.
I did the same thing too. I stopped paying and now the collection agency is after me. Will they hit my credit?
My ex-husband and I bought a timeshare in Sedona, AZ in 2008 while we were still married…honestly, I never would have bought the damn thing, but the agent convinced my ex he would make an excellent sales person and he should get his Real Estate License and they would hire him. Using this same schpeil they convinced him we had to buy so he could sell. Sadly, to keep the peace in our turbulent marriage, I agreed. STUPIDEST mistake (apart from marrying him) ever!!!!!! When we divorced in 2009 the Timeshare and all debt there in was placed on his shoulders. I had been making payments up until January of 2010 when I gave up, couldn’t afford it and why the hell was I paying for it and he was using it anyway????? All contact infor the company has is for him…so I’ve received nothing in the last 2 years about what is going on.
That being said, it was brought to my attention by 2 mortgage companies I am trying to obtian a home loan thru that they will not underwrite a loan because I have a foreclosure on my record…WTF??????? Apparently, in May of 2010 the TS went into foreclosure and is now showing “Proceedings Pending”. I have looked in the county where the “property” is, where I live and where the collection/loan comapny is and to date nothing has been filed.
My dad spoke with two different associates (one a bankruptcy lawyer and the other a judge)…both told him that I am totally screwed. A divorce decree is NOT A LEGAL DOCUMENT (so why the hell did I get one???) and that the TS company will most definatly come after me and do whatever they have to to re-coop their money.
This totally screws me, as I have no contact with my ex-husband, I know he doesn’t give a crap about paying any of the debt we aquired together (I’ve already paid close to 15K in marital debt to date) and I don’t want to be stuck with this either.
Its creating a huge problem for my current husband and I as we want to buy this home but thus far both the companies we’ve talked to say the divorce decree isn’t legal and we have to get the timeshare foreclosure COMPLETELY removed from my credit if we want to get a home loan.
How the hell do I get out of this???? The only thought we have come up with is to contact the agency (blocking phone number of course, just in case) and see if they will settle with me for half of what is owed (my portion) and take the negative off of my credit report.
I know that Mary and others all say “don’t worry, don’t pay, they can’t touch you” but I’m finding that as far as the State of Arizona is concerned, this is not the case…has anyone dealt with trying to settle a portion of the debt and letting them go after the other party on their own????
For all I know, he has been sent DIL’s, served with Foreclosure paperwork, gotten the 1099A and 1099C all without telling me anything…and seeing as how his philosopy is “You left me, not my problem” when it comes to debt, this is not surprising. I just want out of this mess!!!!!
I’m sorry for the problems you are having, but you are mixing up too many things at once.
Your divorce decree is a legal document, but it does not affect any debt you have signed for. The creditor can some after you for payment if you signed, no matter how you divided property. What it give you is the ability to sue you ex for debt he agreed to pay, so ou can sue him if you have to make any payments.
Foreclosure is filed by the TS so that they can reclaim the TS from the property deed. This is filing to take back the deed. Coming after you for payment of any difference between the value of the property and your agreement is separate, and it is very unlikely that the TS would come after you for a difference since you could easily argue that what was sold was not what they said it was. Not a can of worms that they want to open.
The warning here for stopping payment on a TS or maintenance fees is that it will appear on your credit report, and like anything on the credit report, it means less and less over time. A current foreclosure will prevent most banks from giving you a reasonable rate on a mortgage, but after a few years you will be able to get a mortgage, just like after a bankruptcy.
I believe you will find that the foreclosure is already complete, and you can pay all you want and it will still remain on your credit report
It does all appear a jumble as I read it again now a few hours later. I think it’s just frustrating that people go thru the process of getting a divorce decree to protect them and it doesn’t…eh, se la vie at this point.
I did call the TS company today to see what the heck, and you are right…the timeshare foreclosure is totally complete. They also told me that if I haven’t heard from an attorney by now (and they do have my correct phone numbers) then I never will because they were able to sell the “property” for what was owed.
And just let me say…don’t let them tell you that it’ll ruin your credit!!!!! This has been on mine for 2 years…no ding in my credit, in fact…my credit has increased by 130 points in the last 2 years since this all started…that was a big factor for scaring me as well.
Can you tell me which timeshare you bought in Sedona? We are threatened with foreclosure with Premiere Vacations, who is now owned by Diamond, and I don’t know if they’ll report this on our credit report. I’m hoping to have same experience as you.
Jeri – First of all, never use your real name on the internet.
You are worried about a foreclosure from a thief having an impact on your credit report. Please stop and consider your choices. Is it worth a few points on your credit rating to keep paying all that money for nothing? Remember that your maintenance fees go on forever, so eventually, you will have to quit. And then they come after you anyway. So why not quit now and put all that money in the bank you would have paid to the thieves and then you won’t need credit.
I wish everyone here would get Dave Ramsey’s book or course or just listen to him on the radio. You will find out your credit rating, especially these days, is not that important. What is important – get out of debt!
We quit paying our maintenance fees and every month, we get a letter saying we are late and if we don’t pay by the end of the month, they will send it to collections. We get the same letter every month. No collections. They can’t call us because we changed our phone, and we don’t talk to them or respond to anything they send us. We also refused to accept registered mail and packages sent by “Unknown” or “Postmaster.”
here are the numbers on credit score for collections and foreclosures which disappear after 7 years. these are from creditkarma
1 notice costs 80 points,
the 2nd costs 35 points,
the 3rd costs 20 points and
more than four a total of 35 more.
so even if they do report, this is all it hurts your score
Stephanie,
The only way would be for the timeshare company to agree to take your name off the contract, and write up a new contract, placing the timeshare interest and debt, in your ex’s name alone.
It is possible that the reason some of the others here believe the timeshare company won’t (or can’t) come after you, is because they haven’t been able to come after them. That only really applies to debtors who do not have substantial money/assets.
If you have a good job, credit, assets, etc., it is very possible that they can, and will pursue you for the balance owed on that timeshare, as well as the annual maintenance fees/taxes, etc.
However, if they were able to resell the property for more than the debt owed, that should end your financial obligation.
Omg thanks for the info about resort in Williamsburg that’s the one we have and they lied I’m def gonna check out the info about lawsuit I wanna be a part of it I wanna get out of this nightmare! Thisblog is such a blessing I was losing sleep over this TS!!!!
in 2010, we were talked into buying a TS from grandview in las vegas. stupidest thing we ever did, but i guess you keep telling yourself its not so bad for a while, they never told us about the revocation form, and build lie upon lie to get us signed. we didnt know, were from the netherlands and were made to believe we made a good deal. yesterday we send their mortgage department an email, saying they could keep their TS, and we stop paying right away. kinda scary to do, but we cant be bothered anymore paying for what we never use, and got tricked into signing. have the feeling no one in that company can be trusted, so i wont respond to calls. just downloaded an app for my phone that can record calls, so if they start getting rude and abusive, they are in for a treat. will keep you guys posted on what happens. wish us luck!
well they sent me a reply to our email, and they mention something about a Secured Promissory Note? anyone know anything about this?
If you live in the Netherlands, the chances of a U.S. timeshare corporation pursuing you legally is probably slim to none.
However, when you signed that note, what you secured it with, is your interest in the timeshare property. What that means is if you don’t pay, they can repossess your interest in the timeshare property. Big deal, huh?
However, from a legal standpoint, if they do not get enough from reselling your interest in that time share property, technically, they could then go after you in court for the difference, PLUS their legal fees, court costs, and interest.
But whether they will actually take you to court? Well, if timeshare companies took everyone to court who defaulted on their payments, they would probably spend more time and money than they would ever end up recovering, and this is something they calculate in making that decision. Especially the cost of pursuing someone in the Netherlands? Chances are probably pretty good it would be in their best interests to write off the debt instead.
Unless, of course, you have lots of money and assets, and they are pretty sure that they would not only be able to win, but also know that they would be able to collect on that debt. In which case, they just might.
So for you, it becomes a risk that you have to decide on whether or not you are willing and able to take. I highly recommend consulting an attorney before making that decision.
I would like to know if it will hurt my
Credit rating in Australia?
Timeshare in Nevada!! Some advice would be great. Thanks
From what I have heard credit reporting agencies only report on what happens in your own country. So it should not affect your credit rating there.
I live in Virginia and my timeshare promised alot of features that don’t exist I think I’m going to attorney general on them I stopped paying 6 months ago….
I have a wyndham timeshare that is paid off & now want out of it. Can someone please tell me what wyndham does when you stop paying the maintenance fees? I have many comments but really unable to find out what happens when the timeshare is paid off & you stop paying the fees? Thank you
Hey if you own your Wymdham free and clear I’m willing to take it off your hands and pay the transfer fee and maintenance fees. I want more points but I don’t want to sign another contract. Depends on what your monthly fees are though and I”m not sure how many points you have.
Yes I am interested, I have Wynham Oceanwalk in Daytona Beach, beautiful place, 105,000 points annually, 1 week in high season, paid over $13,000 12 years ago, used it about 16 times but I have to live in another country for awhile & just do not it anymore, but I will not pay to give it away, its worth more to me, had great times & memories.. Currently there are many people looking at it & considering but as of now no one yet has committed, but it wont be long plus it is listed for sale with a free broker in Florida timeshare resales & he said it will not take long so if you want it let me know soon. Thanks
I pay $55 a month maintenance fee.
I have 77,000 deeded points, anytime, fees approx. $40 a month. Will let you have them. If interested, let me know- also reciprocal with RCI
Paid in full I might add.
Mine has sold thank goodness, thru a broker on timeshare resales, it must be fully paid if so then you may have a chance for the broker to sell it, mine took less than a month. Contact r.levene@evanstuart.com & let him know what you got & he will let you know if it can be sold, good luck.
I just received a quitclaim form to sign for Summer Bay. Finally they will take a deed in lieu of foreclosure. Had to get their atty involved.
Hi Valerie,
I too have Summer Bay and am waiting to hear from them. I stopped paying Jan 2011 and lately have not gotten any calls. Can you give me more info on
how you achieved getting the DIL. I will send you my email address if you are willing to share info to help me out……thanks Diane
As of January 2012 we stopped making payment on our Timeshare. The resort has called and we have told them our financial situatiuon and they appoligized for that anD said they would “note the account accordingly and turn to the collectin department”. I am aware that my credit will be damaged, but this debt has never shown on my credit report. It simply does not show up. What does this mean? I keep a close watch on my score and my husbands.
continue from last post. My computer logged me off accidentally. We replied to few calls and told them to go to hell. After 6 months the calls and letters stopped and we haven’t heard from them ever since. They are not on our Canadian nor my husband’s Us credit reports. Don’t waste another dime on these vipers, all you Canadians stop paying.
Hi , Canadian too . This website is a blessing. It answered many questions I had and convinced me to stop payments for my TS. I own three at the same resort in the Orlando area and unfortunately MF fees are paid for 2012 but still have a $3,000 mortgage on one of them. I don’t plan to use any of them in 2012. I found this site only last week otherwise I would started the process for 2012.
I will definitely stop paying the MF next year and but I don’t know what to do with the monthly mortgage. Should I pay the balance so when I forfeit next year, it will be only a MF default or should I just stop paying the mortgage right away ? ( outrageous interest rate ).
My feeling tells that since I’ve decided to drop the TS anyway , I should not throw away money but the fact that it’s the mortgage makes me hesitate . Does it increase my chances of being sued ?
Anyway , I’m ready to take all the harassment and heat they are going to throw at us.
Laurent, any update? What happened to your TS? Please share your experience to a fellow Canadian. Thanks!!!!
Barbara/Laurent….please let me know if you got out of your TS. How long did it take and did it appear on your credit report/rating in Canada? How long did you get collection calls for? Need some advise pls. Only one thing I know for sure, we ain’t paying these scammers not even a penny. Thanks!!!!
RCCC,
I’m in the beginning of the process.
I just stopped paying the mortgage and the calls started immediately. Not from the Collection Agency yet but from the Resort.The usual threats …. I told them they could do whatever they want , I would not send them any money . The only thing I will accept is that they take back the units . They will likely put me in collection this fall and it will probably take close to a year or two before it’s over.
I asked them to stop calling and that further communication be done by writing but of course they keep calling. I don’t talk to them anymore. Altought it may take some time , They will end up taking back the units because that’s their only option and they know it’s a lot harder to sue a foreigner. If for any reason , they decide to go forward and sue me , then they will have more hurdles as I’m a Quebec resident where laws are different .
Last time I visited the resort ( 2011 ), they were still able to attract hundreds of people to their timeshare presentation so it make a lot more sense to take back the units and sell them back to new people.
As slimy as the process is, they think of this as their business — so they spend so much in incentives to get peple to listen because they might get some cash, and they have done an analysis that some people will cave to their collection calls, so they make more by doing collection calls than they do by taking back the unit week. They probably have lots of weeks available, so they will sell others and try to gt cash from you. The collections are the same. Their only income is if they get you to send them money.
Laurent…please keep us updated. Lots of collection calls for sure. Maybe you and I can connect thru email or phone. We’re from ON.
Anyone know anything about the cease and desist letter? I remember reading it here somewhere. What is this for?
Bill – TS’s strategy is to scare everyone with collection calls and ruining credit, so if it works then they collect more $$$? What a way to extort people.
Laurent – any update?
Update-We bought our timeshare in March 2010 from Orange lake Resort. We live in Canada but my husband is an American citizen. We paid off the down-payment a sum of about $2000. However, like I said before we had a death in our family and realized that the timeshare is a fraud and useless so we never paid any of the monthly premiums. They called us daily for the first 3 months and sent numerous letters. W
I bought one from them in Myrtle beach and was thinking about not paying and was wondering if you could tell how this process went for you.
Barbara, what happened to your TS? Did they cancel or you got DIL? How long did it take? Thanks!
Does anyone know if ypu purchase in Mexico and it does not appear on your American credit report, can this affect me if I stop paying? I work for a bank and am concerned it will damage my credit and cause me to lose my job.
Does the Timeshare company that owns the one in Mexico have its HQ there or in the USA?
i believe the hq is in florida
Susan,
Thank you so much for responding. I’m so sorry this happened to you. I’m sorry that it’s happening to all of us. I honestly think that if we were to each calculate how much money we have already given towards our timeshare, the majority of us will see that we’ve actually paid A LOT more than what it was originally bought for. A while ago, I offered someone from Westgate some money to settle this but nope, the amount they actually counteroffered was just $100 less than what is owed. Unbelievable. For many years I have done the right thing by paying them even when they did absolutely nothing for me (I never used the property. Every time I tried to change a week, they would tell me there was no availability so I would have to pay for my own hotel anyway). So since that last conversation, which was probably almost a year ago, I have decided that I tried to reason with them and just like before they were no help so I’m not going to be bothered with them. I will follow your advice. Hopefully these crooks will be put out of business soon!!! Again, thanks so much!!
I am with Westgate resort and I stopped paying them a while ago. There are calls everyday which I ignore but recently we got a call from a “mediator” who said she is not with Westgate, just someone who wants to help me and tell me about my options to get the “issue” resolved.
Anyone ever dealt with someone like this? If yes, how did it turn out? I haven’t returned her call because as far as I’m concerned, they are all the same. But I am a bit nervous about the consequences of not paying my timeshare.
Thanks.
-Mayra
Mayra,
I was with Wyndham. I “owned” 3 different contracts with them (I know, I must have had a giant sign on my back!!)I stopped paying last September 2010 on 2 of the contracts and stopped paying on the 3rd in Oct. 2010. I got all the letters, phone calls etc. I got a call from a third party person offering their help to “get out of the contracts” so I waisted another $3000.00 to receive their assistance. DON’T DO IT. I waisted my money. They did nothing! I was scared to wait it out because they were sending it to foreclosure. So they said! Never happened! In Feb. 2011- just 5 months later. I received a deed in lieu. My advice is do not spend any more money! I firmly believe that the timeshare companys are giving out your numbers to these people to duke you out of more money. How else are they getting them! Good luck to you and stay strong!
You sound just like us! They sure make those sales pitches convincing. We had two with Wyndham and one with Orange Lake. Stopped paying on all around October 2010. So now, we have just received these 1099C forms (“Cancellation of Debt) where they list the “Fair market value” and the amount of debt cancelled. I’m really scared. First of all, this is going to make us owe a lot of money to the IRS, which we don’t have. Secondly, I’m filling out the FAFSA forms for my son to get financial aid for college and it’s going to look like we make twice as much money as we actually make. Does anyone know if there is a way to protest what they call the ‘fair market value’? If this was really the fair market value, I would have been able to sell these things, you would think. I need to figure this out quickly since I need to do our taxes and get the college forms done asap. Any ideas?
Elaine: I am right there with you! Just received the tax form today in the mail and about had a heart attack. We had just finished our taxes and were getting money back for a change and this will probably mess everything up! Had to call the accountant to place our taxes on hold. Haven’t talked to him yet and hope he has a way out of this. I can’t believe they can do this to us. We, too, have 2 children in college and will be filling out the FAFSA forms. I did not even think about what this will do in regards to that. The fair market value is RIDICULOUS!!!! As soon as I hear from our accountant, I will write back.
Did you check with the IRS to make sure Timeshare companies are considered a ‘commercial lender that can legally issue a 1099C. If its from a bank they use for a loan to pay for your timeshare they would qualify but if its just the Timeshare I am not so sure. Read this:
When a commercial lender cancels or forgives a debt that you owe, in order to claim the loss as a tax deduction in its accounting books your lender will issue you an IRS Form 1099-C (cancellation of debt attributed as income).
Did you check with the IRS to make sure Timeshare companies are considered a ‘commercial lender’ that can legally issue a 1099C. If its from a financial institute they used for a loan to pay for your timeshare they would qualify but if its just the Timeshare I am not so sure. Check the IRS Publication 4681 and what I found below:
When a commercial lender cancels or forgives a debt that you owe, in order to claim the loss as a tax deduction in its accounting books your lender will issue you an IRS Form 1099-C (cancellation of debt attributed as income).
Elaine: After talking with our accountant, if you can show your debts are higher than your assets, you can file Form 982, which will discharge the amount they showed in their Form 1099C. Hope that helps!
Could be a collections person dressing in sheeps clothing. Especially since she isn’t working with Westgate. She is working for a collections agency – who else would have a stake in getting this resolved?
Hello, I’M from Canada and I buy this summer 1 units in T.S in Grandview at las Vegas, when I receive the document from RCI 3 months later I realize that nothing is available for the vacation and I want to cancell this contract it was just a lies from the sales representatives . I call for stop the paiement of the mortgage do you thing they will take me in cour here in Canada ?? I have more then half paid already . Thank’s Please if some others canadiens know some informations just let me know , I want my money back. What I can do ??
we bought a TS week resale at polo towers in Las Vegas. The problem was the rapidly increasing fees and the special assessments. We stopped paying because the fees were ridiculous. Within 6 months, they used a special NV law to take the TS week. We got a notice that we were being foreclosed, which we did not answer since we wanted them to take it, and heard nothing more. There was no mortgage
we also had a marriott timeshare in Las Vegas with a mortgage. They called and yelled at us on the phone after about 60 days, and after 5 months they offered a deed in lieu — which ended the collection, but the forgiven mortgage showed up as a forgiven debt on and IRS form
fyi — there is a new FTC advisory on time-barred debt that you should read
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/alerts/alt144.shtm
Hi Julie-please read my post below. I’m Canadian.
hi Julie, any news? i am with the grandview aswell, and looking for information about how to stop my contract.
Elaine thanks for the info keep me advised.
Elaine thanks for the info keep me advised. you were paying on a mortgage right
Elaine were you still paying for your timeshare did you have a mortgage
Yes, we were still paying on the mortgage. One thing we learned (too late) was that once they get you, they are constantly trying to get you to ‘upgrade’ or buy more points. That makes it hard to ever get paid up.
I never fully paid the deposit before realizing this was a bad idea but was past the 10 days to cancel….i called and let them know i wanted to cancel but was unable….i recieved calls for the first two months but they have stopped…because i never payed the deposit in full does it change anything ? should i expect action or is there anything i can do besides just wait it out and see ?
I have a point system and not a deeded property anymore in Branson Mo. I was suckered into changing this over about 2 years ago. Can I just stop paying my payments since it is no longer a mortgage? I pay maintanance fees every 2 years $1000. I just don’t have the money anymore and sure was very stupid in the first place to think we needed a timeshare in Branson. Can someone give me advise?????
thanks
I encourage anyone out there who got scammed and lied to by a Florida resort to file a complaint with the State of Florida Attorney General’s Office. If your salesman lied and/or exaggerated the product, your complaint would be for misrepresentation. You can also send a complaint to the other agencies that I have listed below.
Office of the Attorney General Pam Bondi
State of Florida
PL-01, The Capital
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-1050
The official complaint form can be found under the Florida Attorney General’s website:
Once you are on the website, click on “SERVICES”. Then click on “CONSUMER PROTECTION”. Then click on “HOW TO FILE A COMPLAINT OR CHECK ON A BUSINESS”. Then click on “CONSUMER COMPLAINT FORM”.
The Florida Attorney General’s Office is concerned with all potentially unfair and deceptive trade practices that mislead consumers. By law, this office exercises statutory authority to address consumer fraud under Chapter 501, Part II, Florida Statutes, known as Florida’s Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices Act. Our office focuses its enforcement efforts on business practices by companies which harm numerous consumers in more than one
judicial circuit. We use complaints to develop information about patterns of business activity which may indicate the need for formal investigation or action by our office to protect the broad public interest.
In addition, you may contact the following consumer agencies as you seek to resolve your individual complaint:
Federal Trade Commission
Toll-free: (877) 382-4357
Internet: http://www.ftc.gov
Better Business Bureau of Southeast Florida (serving Miami, Ft.
Lauderdale, West Palm Beach areas)
Phone: (561) 842-1918
Internet: http://www.bbbsoutheastflorida.org
Broward County Consumer Protection
Phone: (954) 357-5350
Internet: http://www.broward.org/consumer/
Finally, Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act provides individuals with a private remedy to bring an action for damages, attorney’s fees and court costs. If you need legal advice, The Florida Bar offers a Lawyer Referral Service which you may contact toll-free at (800) 342-8060. If you cannot afford an attorney, you may be eligible for low cost or pro bono assistance through a local legal aid office. The Florida Bar can assist you with this process. The Bar’s website provides more information about legal aid:
http://www.floridabar.org
Thank you for contacting Attorney General Bondi’s Office. I hope this issue can be resolved to your satisfaction.
I’m in Virginia and we purchased a time that was still “under construction” and they promised that by 2011 they would have an indoor water park and still hasn’t been build plus they promised we could trade our week for anywhere in the world for $170/week but I tried to trade 3 times for Florida and California and they told us they were booked and the price would be around $1000 for a week…. We stopped paying for 6 months now and I am going to file a complaint w atty general here in va….
Oh yes I know all about that one! Did you know there is a real lawsuit:
This is from Insidethegate.com
http://www.insidethegate.com/gatehouse/2011/10/eastern-usa-october-1-2011/
Colonial Crossings Resort, its HOA and developer Land’Or of Williamsburg are being sued by 465 timeshare owners for breach of contract. Essentially, the group is seeking $30 million over a water park that was promised but never got built.
According to the lawsuit, Land’Or touted an indoor water park called “Cascade Taverns” that was supposed to span 22,000 square feet and feature six heated indoor and outdoor pools when done by 2007.
The defendants began to market and sell timeshares in 2005 with the claim that the water park was the resort’s central theme and the main reason to purchase there. To further entice buyers, the developer offered free single-day water tube passes, 50% off unlimited access, and year-round access to the water park even if they were not staying at the resort.
However, not only has no water park been constructed, but the park was never included in original site plans and no application was filed with York County to get approval for a water park.
The lawsuit further states the same pitch still continues. Those who purchased a timeshare in 2009, for instance, were promised that the water park would be fully operational in two years. The same promise of “within two years” is still being made, according to the suit.
Besides restitution, the plaintiffs are seeking to have their timeshare contracts voided.
The lawsuit also states, “The defendants are harassing the plaintiffs with daily phone calls when plaintiffs refuse to pay for a water park that they were promised and does not exist.”
Colonial Crossings claims that the water park is not specifically identified in contracts signed by the buyers but would instead fall under the generic mention of “amenities,” and the document reserved the right to “discontinue any amenity.” On the website, the water park is among a list of “proposed” amenities.
Well, at least 465 timeshare owners aren’t buying that argument. Stay tuned for what the courts eventually decide…
Besides Erica, is there any other person out there who has stopped paying mortgage payments and maintenance fees to the crooks at Palm Beach Shores Resort and Vacation Villas? This resort is under the control of Palm Beach Resort Development Group or The Berkley Group out of Ft. Lauderdale. Erica, has been extremely helpful to me regarding this matter. However, I’m just wondering if anyone else has dealt with these shameless hucksters?
I stopped paying to these crooks in June or July of this past year, 2011. I am getting divorced so we just stopped paying as we knew it was a bad deal even before the divorce. We both have new phone numbers, but they found us. Luckily we closed the bank account that they drew from, so they aren’t getting any money. There were a lot of calls and threats to collections. My ex now said that there was a packet mailed to her the other day. I’m anxious to see what it is. I’m going to get it this weekend. They can’t really sue us and make us pay their lawyers’ fees can they? I’m getting a little nervous now. We had $6,000 remaining, up to $7,000 now with late fees, etc. I live in the midwest, and purchased this in 2005.
According to just about everyone on this site, the most that the timeshare scum will do is foreclose on the unit, report you to the credit bureaus, report you to the IRS, re-sell the unit, and then try to collect the difference between what they got for the unit at the sale and what was owed. I spoke with a Florida attorney, Susan Budowski, who specializes in fighting the timeshare crooks. She told me that the timeshare companies rarely make the effort to sue the owners who are in default. I hope that she is right. If Palm Beach Shores Resort tries to sue me, I would hope that my dozens of complaint letters describing their misrepresentation of the product will help my case. I have also filed official complaints with state, federal, county, and private agencies.
Greg keep me advised to what action they take if any against you. my only issue is my daughter is on the paper work we have no deed they never sent one.
thanks
Just an update. I am fully divorced now. I was going to purchase a townhome. I surprisingly wasn’t denied because of the timeshare, however I got to see it in my credit report. I got to see all 3, and it has affected one of them, by 100 points. When I go to the timeshare line, it shows it is in collection since 11/2011. I haven’t heard from any collectors though. Nothing appears in the credit report in the public records area, as in forclosure. There is an M9 next to it, meaning it was “charged off”. It has a “PP start date of 11/2011″, meaning it went into collections then, but there is a PP 9 that I don’t know what that means. Is there a possibility that this isn’t doing to be “foreclosed” and just written off, or am I in for a rude awakening soon? Anyone else see what their timeshare looks like in their credit report? Thanks.
Josh – I too let go of a Timeshare due to divorce. Mine shows it went into Foreclosure in May of 2010, as of last week it shows that they have started the filing process in the courts (I have yet to find anything filed). It is showing on 2 of the 3 credit reports, and is stopping my new husband and I from being able to qualify for a home loan. BEWARE – an ex-bankruptcy Judge told us that we are screwed, they will 100% come after us for the monies owed…and a Divorce Decree – if you listed the timeshare in it as being the responsibility of one party or another…is NOT A LEGAL DOCUMENT!!!!!!! They don’t care what it says, you are both on the timeshare you both owe all the money. Hate these stupid crappy companies!
Josh:
According to just about everyone on this site, the most that the timeshare scum will do is foreclose on the unit, report you to the credit bureaus, report you to the IRS, re-sell the unit, and then try to collect the difference between what they got for the unit at the sale and what was owed. I spoke with a Florida attorney, Susan Budowski, who specializes in fighting the timeshare crooks. She told me that the timeshare companies rarely make the effort to sue the owners who are in default. I hope that she is right. If Palm Beach Shores Resort tries to sue me, I would hope that my dozens of complaint letters describing their misrepresentation of the product will help my case. I have also filed official complaints with state, federal, county, and private agencies.
the final light at the end of the tunnel is the financial statute of limitations, after which they cannot successfully sue you for anything. it varies by the state you live in but is usually five years or less. if one of them sues you, you answer legally to the court that it is beyond the time allowed.
there is a new FTC advisory that discusses this
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/alerts/alt144.shtm
Hello Josh and Greg,
I have stopped paying since November of 2010 with Palm Beach Shores. They have stopped mailing me and of course stopped calling me (since I have changed my phone number). The only thing that has showed up on my credit report was the collection from the maintanence fee, not the acual mortgage of the resort. So, I’m only actually showing $1000 and some change that I owe to the collection agency (problem them as well). But, nothing else is showing in my credit report.
So, they have yet to send me anything in mail about foreclosure. Since I haven’t heard from in way over a year. I am assuming they have just closed it out and resold it to someone else. It’s not worth the money for them to try to foreclose it and pay all the fees, when they get just as easily resale it to someoone else.
You have nothing to worry about. Just don’t pay them a single dime!
I really had struggled with the though of not meeting an obligation when I had stopped paying on my timeshare. Although I know I had been had by the Sales person I felt since I signed the paper I had
committed to a long financial obligation in which I tried to for fill until my wife because of her physical
condition had to retire early and our income dropped dramatically. I kept getting phone calls in which I
didn’t answer for months, then one day I received a letter from a collection agency who was representing the resort I had gotten the timeshare from. I owed 31k on this timeshare and in the letter they said if I would pay 5k and sign the release of deed then I my wife and I would be released from all financial obligations past and future which included the maintenance fee which I hadn’t paid for the year, and that
all negative credit reporting would be erased. I was able to pay this money and finally its all over for us.
what a relief to not have to deal with this financial burden anymore. I knew I could never pay 31K so 5K verses 31K didn’t seem bad. Thanks for sharing all of your stories throughout this trying time and I wish everyone who has gone through what we have the best and hope you get your questions answered.
E. Lyon
Unfortunately what they did not tell you is that the IRS can come after you for the unpaid portions as if they were unclaimed income and when they do they will usually send you a bill WITH penalties AND late fees since you didn’t know this was coming you of course didn’t pay and the IRS will say you should have known AND gotten a tax form showing the released amount of debt from the company showing as INCOME by forgiven debt….
It has happened to us 2X and we have never received this tax form “the company” claims they sent. One even sent us a letter saying that we would not be responsible for any future repercussions (it meant nothing).
ASK QUESTIONS before you pay anything!!!
Vikki: So, did you claim this forgiven debt as income on your taxes? We just received a tax form that apparently we have to show as income, which is a bunch of B.S.! Just wondered how you handled this. Thank you.
FYI…To donate your timeshare it can cost you literally thousands!!!1 I called a company about donating our Vacation Village @ Parkway and with legal fees, transfer fees, maintenance fees that will be due in January and their fees it would be well over $4000. But wait…I get to take that off my taxes. IF we’re able to itemize…We were able to give back our Plaza Resort Club in Reno just by asking nicely. We’ve owned that for over 20 years and have hardly been able to use it. We’ve paid maintenance fees for that long. We were duped into the Vacation Village by believing that we’d be able to use the points for things like airfare and hotels. Yeah…if we had about 500,000 more points!!!! They failed to say that with 74000 there isn’t much you can do and when they expire every two years, you can’t even save them up long enough to use them for anything. I’m convinced that all these comapnies that say they can get you out of your timeshare are really working for the timeshares themselves. It’s a way for them to not only take your resort back but get you to pay again to get out of it. What a racket!!!!
[...] 8.Stop Paying Timeshare, Foreclosure Steps, Can I Not Pay My Time … Mar 25, 2008 … You will also want to check out possibly donating your timeshare if the …… Currently i’m in the process of getting the residence for Canada. … http://rcivip.com/what-happens-if-i-stop-paying-my-timeshare/ [...]
We bought a timeshare at the Grandview in 2007 and never used it. Then we went to Vegas for a few days when the Grandview sent us a notice for 2 “free” nights and got suckered into buying a “better” one. We have never used the TS and now don’t ever plan on it. I wish I would have known what I know now. I plan on stopping my credit card that is the payment source for our payments after reading all of these posts, for hours now…..a good thing though! My question is, is it true that if the TS “mortgage loan” does not show up on your credit now, showing your payment history, can they report it after the fact? I was told that they can’t report if they haven’t all along. Does anyone else know about this?
Hi there, I was here in April looking for help about the same thing be trapped in a Time Share feeling kind scared because my credit, but now is Oct 11/2011, and I got a phone call from my lawyer, to said that is over, Orange Lake take back the deed and I am debt free from those li-ers so I am so happy, I know I have to pay to my lawyer, but I followed what they told me to do and finally is over, I didn’t have any recovery’s from them, but I take as and learned experienced to go to those places with out checked who they are and how they take the money from honesty people. So don’t be scared ask for help, and I want to let the person who ever attacking me in this website becaused I shared this information, the lawyer is not my family or I ever meet her imperson, I got the information from here and I went online read her credentials and hired her, and that was the best thing I did. I was waited to get my case resolved before I can tell everyone there, you are not along. My email is milegon@yahoo.com, if you need any information. Have a great day.
We have heard nothing from Wyndham for months. We dropped our home phone a month or so ago, so maybe they just can’t reach us. But we have not received anything by mail, either. So we’re just waiting to see what is going to happen. BTW, we stayed at Bonnet Creek last year (just before we stopped paying) and it was really nice. I’m sorry we won’t get to go back, but this whole timeshare thing was just ridiculously expensive and we just couldn’t continue to pay. It’s too bad. We had some nice vacations. As far as negative results, our credit rating is pretty bad right now, but there are other factors besides the timeshare at work there, so I can’t say how bad the hit was. It’s amazing how fast your credit rating can go from excellent to poor when your income is cut in half and you can’t pay all your bills.
Stopped paying Wyndham last year got a 1099c last week – over $4,000 in taxes. Have you gotten anything like that? Does anyone out there have any suggestions for mitigating this?
I have, and it’s a lot more than $4,000. I’m trying to figure out what to do about it.
i GOT 1099-A FROM WYNDHAM LAST YEAR POINTS IN CR WENT DOWN,NOW I HAVE A HIGH SCORE IN CREDIT BUT HAVE NOT RECEIVED 1099-C YET AND DENIED TO BUY A HOUSE MY CREDIT SCORE BECAME 730
i’m guessing that the 1099A was for your interest payments made in 2010. if your credit rating is down, that would be because they filed a foreclosure on your credit report. the real question is how much are you willing to pay to maintain your credit rating, since you would have to pay off the mortgage, which is much more than the taxes, and you would still need to pay them a thousand a year in maintenance fees.
I’m sure a lot of people now have bad credit reports. it does make me wonder how these clowns expect to keep selling while working over so many former buyers
what happens with mortgages on foreclosed homes?
wow, this is a long, long pages of comments. there seems to be EVERY opinion and good/bad stuff about resorts, resale companies, and anything in between. I was reading on timesharescam.org and their information seems good? A lot of it made sense to me, but I was hoping to get other’s thoughts/feedback on the site.
thanks
Hi everyone this is Ruth here, its been 3 months since we signed our DIL. we haven’t heard from TS people. I went to India for vacation in June and just returned back. It was lovely vacation and I had most wonderful time with my family. Just wanted to let all of you know who have burnt out with TS just like me. This vacation was planned by me and my husband and we stayed and enjoyed according to our leisure. After the sleepless nights and worries for more than 6 months our nightmare is over, so just stop paying for this JUNK called TS. There is a hope. hey life still goes on.. God bless..
Thank you Ruth, I have been reading the TS post for hours now and yours is the one that has lifted my spirits! I think I just needed someone to remind me that this isn`t the end of the world, that life does go on. I have decided to just quit paying and take the hit on my credit, and what a relief this decision has brought me. I am so glad that you and your husband enjoyed such a wonderful vacation and hope you have many many more. Thanx again!!!
YES,YES,YES! Exactly what I did and it works. The ONLY penalty for not paying MAINTENANCE fees is you get no use of the “system”. HOORAY!
I posted here last November regarding not paying my maintenance fees (my initial membership had been paid in full). My account was sent to a collection agency and after a few back and forth letters, I finally brought the hammer down when I could show in my contract that there was no provision in writing for continuing ones maintenance fees indefinitely. The only penalty for not paying the maintenance fee is losing the right to use the facilities. I lost my original purchase money but was able to get out of the maintenance fees. The collection agency sent a letter of apology and this is over.
DON’T PAY ANYONE TO “GET YOU OUT OF YOUR TS”. THEY ARE A BUNCH OF SCAMMERS THEMSELVES.
Last month I got suckered into a TS with Bluegreen in Branson Mo and suffered all the same issues most of you have suffered. After not realizing I needed to cacel within 5 days a month later I find myself way in over my head. I have considered using a company that guarantees they can get me out of the agreement or my money back after 12 months. I don’t think I can justify throwing more good money after bad. I live in Ks so does anyone have experience with walking away and allowing foreclosure. Can anyone share their experiences with Bluegreen.
Thanks and I have lowered my stress level substantially after reading this blog. Great input.
Ken any updates on what happened with your ts?
I was able to cancel the contract working with the Mexican Consumer Protection Agency…Profeco. We asked to cancel within days of returning home. So that helped. We lost our deposit but didn’t have to pay anything further a d could have fought for a refund but it may have lingered and we wanted it to be done. Tough lesson learned. These TS co’s don’t want bad press and they won’t to move on to the next victim so be tough a don’t give in or call them back. Work with Profeco…depending how long you’ve owned will determine your options. Don’t try to sell your TS to a group as those are scams as well. Good luck !!!
Ken,
Can I get more info on this? I have had regrets since I have been back home. I can’t stop thinking about it and how we made the wrond decisions.
[...] to web 1.Stop Paying Timeshare, Foreclosure Steps, Can I Not Pay My Time … Mar 25, 2008… resort company) your timeshare company will begin foreclosure proceedings on [...]
[...] 10.Stop Paying Timeshare, Foreclosure Steps, Can I Not Pay My Time … Mar 25, 2008 … Timeshare foreclosure and your credit score This question comes up a lot on timeshare forums and blogs, and it can be complicated depending … http://rcivip.com/what-happens-if-i-stop-paying-my-timeshare/ [...]
marsha says:
August 31, 2011 at 1:33 pm Hi Everyone
I am a fellow(sucker) for westgate sacmas and an early one at it. I just bought on the 16th, lossed my briefacse on our way back home so didnt have neough info to rescind properly and now thattime has lasped and with all my research, countless hrs reading, asking ?/, i have decided to try this at another angle. Now i signed with Blue Tree resort orlando and i dont know if we all havethe same type of standard contract form, but at the back states i have 90 days to cancel the waiver for loss of life fee. This amounted to over 1000 which was added to my mortgage price. My theory is, if i send that certified letter requesting it be cancelled, wouldnt that mean the mortgage total will change and an NEW agreement for new figures have to be drawn up? If so then i am going to forward a letter to them stating that until this mortgage figure is revised due to my cancellation rights, i am not paying anything. As it stands i have already only paid the deposit. My question to u fellow wastegate victims isthis:
1. Do u all havethat cancellation clause on ur contracts as well?
2. Has nayone ever just never paid thier timeshare instalments and wht has happened to them…
3. I am not american or canadian, if i just dont bother to pay, how can they come after me….my credit? would they sue?
Pls, advise andthank u all for ur time and acknowledgement of my fears
Marsha – i left my email after i saw your post..are you back? Please share your update…thanks!
Hi RCC
I Cant seem to find the post!!!
Here is my email address: RWASEALES@YAHOO.COM email me there and i’ll send the link. Trust me, u’ll love it there. WG had someone call prentending to want to help me sell, they left a message, but i know the only way out is to ignore them, and so i have.
Awaiting ur email.
Marsha
Thanks & Regards
Hi Marsha, I got your email on July 25th on my yahoo account but you didn’t give me the link. Please send it via email again, not sure who contacted you before but that wasn’t me. Thanks!
I got a timeshare in the dominican republic about 3 years ago. The contract was signed in the dominican republic for a property in the dominican republic . The contract clearly says its under Dominican Republic Law. So my question is.. If I stop paying this how can this affect my credit score in the US , if a foreclosure happends , it will happend in the Dominican Republic , so the debt is in DR , …???
Wharever timeshare company you have this info will help you. I know this will not help the protestors in Europe, but it will help the American protestors. Contact the FTC. I called last week and was told the only way the government can sue DRI is if there are enough complaints concerning the same issue. The FTC must then get the go ahead to sue through legal means. If you look on the FTC website, you will see they have successfully sued timeshare resale scammers in Florida. Next, go to the BBB site and complain. DRI has to respond, and the good part is the complaint goes against DRI grade. Hey, you may even get what you want. It looks like some people have from the statistics on the company. Anyway, DRI’s grade was A – a few months ago, now it is an A. It does not seem like much but the 1/2 grade drop were due to the recent increase of complaints. Go to the DRI headquarters and view the dates and reason for complaints.
European protestors: E. Brennan told a European protestor they can not complain to the BBB. This is true about the FTC, however with the BBB all you want is the complaint logged in the system so DRI’s grade drop :whether DRI solves it is not important. BBB is used as a go between between customer and company. BBB tries to solve disputes. I am just glad I see the progress in their grade dropping.
uh, maybe a dumb question, but isn’t the current A better than the previous A-? it is usually like, B-, B, B+,A-, A, A+…. but i have been wrong before
Ed you are correct,. I gave nit been in school for some years. However, DRI CO
PLAINTS have increased nob the less. I just want this company to stop conning us out of money when vacations can be taken for more cheaper than what DRI is charging.
This is a warning to all readers who are thinking about purchasing a timeshare from a resort in the Berkley Group Timeshares, which is also known as Palm Beach Resort Development Group, LLC., which is also Vacation Village Resorts & Affiliates. In March of 2010, my wife and I were duped and conned into purchasing a timeshare at Palm Beach Shores Resort & Vacation Villas in Palm Beach Shores, Florida. The salesman lied to us about several issues that were very important to us. The primary misrepresentation that was committed by that resort and salesman was the exaggeration of resort availability regarding the RCI exchange program and extra week program. They showed us this huge, thick catalogue of resorts and then made us believe that we would have no problem getting into any of the resorts. It was all a lie. If you want a nice resort on the beach or if you want a nice resort that is in an appropriate location for the season you are traveling, forget about it with this company. We are completely dissatisfied with the resort availability. We now realize that my wife and I will never get the resort that we want during the time when we want it.
Everyone whoever holds your timeshare complain to the FTC and BBB. This is working. DRI’s headquarters ratings went from A- to A in about 2 months due to the complaints.
My father recently died. He has a paid timeshare. We don not want it nor do we want to pay maint. fee. Will Affidavit of Disclaimer make it go away?
Thanks
Read the contract and see if there is any provision for continuing the maintenance fees indefintely. If it is not in writing, just write to them and mention that fact to them. If it is not in writing, then there is nothing they can do. I really think death would absolve anyone of the maintenance fees.
Bluebeard’s in St. Thom? No, but I have 2 at Elysian beach which is its sister site.
was looking to compare notes with other BC owners to establish the pattern of fraud.
Any Bluebeard’s Castle Owners?
Hi Ron i was a bluebeard catle owner,
I was talking to William.
What they’re saying is TRUE according to them. We have over 400,000 anytime points and can’t use even 1 unless we catch up on ALL of our maintenance which is well over $5,000 and that’s not gonna happen. Give it up, cut your losses, you will NOT win.
Hi Mary
Have you ever heard of this before?
We own two TS at the same resort. One in Feb. and one in July.
We have stoped our maintenace payments on the Feb. week only.
The resort has come back to us stating that if we don’t pay our Feb. maintenace fee we can not use our July week. The units are two seperate contracts. Is what their doing legal or is this just a scare tactic?
You must be new to this WEB SITE. We don’t need another web site, and we ALL need to do is stop paying maintenance fees, and send in a “hardship” letter to your time share provider. There is usually a clause in most contracts for “hardship. Can’t hurt to try, we did and it worked. Got us out of the one we financed, and we just stopped paying maintenance on the two we bought outright with cash.
Mary,
Are you talking to me or zees.
Any who,
DRI Collections(?) stated over the phone that this will continue to try and obtain the money for another 6-7 months, and then foreclose. I believe this is to lengthen this out so that I will owe the maintenance fees for next year. All I want is to not be a member of DRI. By their bylaws, after 45 days of non payment, you are no longer in the club and they take your points and put it back in the trust. Is there a way for me to force the foreclosure. I know I will have to wait on them but I do not want them to add this maintenance fee. Will the loan and fee be included together or separate on the credit report
So where do I look in all the paper work for the address of whom to send a hardship letter to?
I didn’t look anywhere. I just sent a hardship letter. period.
1ST, ANYONE HAVING PROBLEMS WITH DIAMOND RESORTS, THERE IS A SUPPORT GROUP RAN BY AP(DRIP.ENJIN.COM) HE WILL ASK YOU QUESTIONS TO VERIFY YOU ARE WHO YOU ARE. HE MUST GIVE YOU FULL MEMEBERSHIP. THE GROUP IS BASED IN EUROPE BUT THERE ARE AMERICANS(MYSELF INCLUDED)ON THE SITE.
EVERYONE PLEASE GO TO THE FTC. GOV SITE AND COMPLAIN. I CALLED TODAY AND WAS INFORMED THAT FTC MUST GET SEVERAL COMPLAINTS AND GO THROUGH LEGAL PROCESSES TO SUE ANY TIMESHARE COMPANY. I NEED SOME ADVICE ABOUT DIAMOND RESORTS TIMESHARE AND FORECLOSURES.
1. I OWN A POINT BASED TIMESHARE WITH LOAN. I TOLD DRI BEFORE THE 1ST PAYMENT WAS DUE THAT I AM NOT GOING TO PAY THEM DUE TO MISLEADING AND LYING ABOUT THE SAVINGS OF TIMESHARES. I WAS INFORMED THAT THE TIMESHARE WILL GO INTO FORECLOSURE OR REPOSSSEION DUE TO NON-PAYMENT. MY QUESTION IS HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE FOR THEM TO FORECLOSE? I HAVE TOLD THEM IN EMAILS THAT I WANT THE FORECLOSURE. I HAVE NOT PAID ANY ON THE LOAN. WHAT WILL THE TIMESHARE COMPANY DO?
ALSO, I TIRED TO CANCEL THE LOAN WITH THE COMPANY THAT I BORROWED THE MONEY FROM WITHIN A MONTH OF SIGNING THE TIMESHARE. THEY CONTINUED TO STATE I WAS NOT IN THEIR SYSTEM. WAS THAT DUE TO IT STILL BEING IN ESCROW.
We’re all in the same boat, so when you file the class action let us all know so we can join in, Thanks!
Ditto.
no one has been as dumb as us we baught 5 and all good times and locations.
charity will not taake them unless they excepting them.
we have lost by scameing sales people wanting to sell them for us money up front , don’t do it they are aall liers and scamers.
what we all need to do is contact each other and start a legal web site and tell the world where we stand with scum like timeshaires. it wont cost us anymore thaan what we are sending them for fees. and good chance we could get a llawyer to send letters to the gov. wishingotn dc. we wish mnow we got our own lawyer to read the contract first. people never sign a contract with out reading and understanding it all small print included.if everyone would gang togetheir maybe we can change things with washing dc.let get someone whos willing to set up a web site to tell the truth about timeshaires and scams they are pulling when they sell them don’t you think if we all got togetheir we can make a difference. we all could afford $100.00 to $500.00 instead of the time share fees for a lawyer if we all had the same lawyer we might win. it ould be better to pay a one time fee than to continue to pay timeshaires fees each year for ever.i say let join togetheir where ever we are from or have our timeshaires. let s look at it this way if we have to apy $100.00 per timeshaire we own is stil cheaper than yearly fees .i,m betting we can find thousands of people like us looking to get out. well thats my idea whats yours? we can open a trust fund so the money is safe.signed fight fire with fire we can find people in the same boat by sending out messages looking to buy timeshares no money up front thousands will reply . even if it cost us up to $500.00 per unit its worth it. free at last free at last that my thoughts whats yours???????? together we stnad seporate we fall to the lieing timeshares
I have west-gate, they are liars, I quit paying in Jan 2011. So far all I have gotten is phone calls. They sent out a form to fill out because i told them I can not afford to pay, They wanted bank accounts pay stubs, tax records. I ignored them. Now all they do is call, It is now turned over to a collection agency. I have never heard of anyone’s credit being ruined or going to court. I decided if they sue me I will bring several people who they have lied to with me. Then I will file a class action on them. I told this to the last person I talked to and she said “I don’t think they will take you to court. I do not care at this point if they do.Will keep everyone posted.
Bonnie – Any further action since7/26?
Thanks
At the very very top of the home page there is a link. You can always go to justask.com and ask any professional a question and you select the price you’re willing to pay. If you don’t like or didn’t get anything out of the answer, you don’t have to pay.
Also, for a small fee you can go to the legal team mentioned at the top of this blog.
Hi Mary where is the area where the legal team is located on top of his blog? I don’t see it. Just in case i need help one day.
First, they can’t take away anything that isn’t paid in full. Second, check with your bank about them attaching your acct. Third, look up on internet the Secretary General’s Office for your state. What state are you in? Also, if you qualify financially, contact Legal Aid in your county, or try one of these TV lawyers that might give you additional advice on who else to ask.
Thanks for the advice. I will go by my bank on Monday. I live in Florida.
My daughter works for a credit union and she thinks they can freeze my bank accounts and take away my cars. Does anyone know if this is true?
You need to find out what your state’s laws are. Here in NC, where I live, NO ONE except a government agency can attach our assets or garnish our wages…..period. That will be where you need to investigate. Keep all of us posted.
Where exactly do I look? I have tried to do some research- but get conflicting answers. Does it matter that the foreclosed on property is in another county(same state)? Not sure whether to look at state statues, real estate laws, banking laws, law forums etc. Thanks for any help I really appreciate it.
Am being foreclosed on in Florida. Can’t pay anything. I have other property. Can they take it as well? They say they can put a lien on my assets. I just got served but have only 20 days to respond.
you need to take a step back and think about this.
when they foreclose, they are required by law to have you served with the foreclosure notice, which always says they can come after you for whatever else is owed.
But remember that takes a separate court action in which they need to prove that you owe them something. I don’t know the Florida laws, but first, they have to decide to spend money suing you, then they have to prove that you owe them something, then your state has to allow them to attach something, which it may not.
Now, even worse is if you keep the TS and pay on it, since you would still pay probably more than you would pay even if they sued you and got a lien. The worst that could happen is actually better than you have today.
We(my husband and I) were each sent by mail a “Complaint for mortgage foreclosure” with a case number and 14 other defendants names listed. I did verify that it is officially filed in the county court records. It then lists each defendants name and amount owed. It is then signed by an attorney. The summons states that “a lawsuit has been filed against you. You have 20 calendar days after this summons is served on you to file a written response to the attached complaint with the clerk of court. A phone call will not protect you. If you do not file your response on time, you may lose the case, and your wages, money and property may thereafter be taken without further warning from the court. There are other legal requirements/ You may want to call an attorney right away.
Is it legal for my time share to not give me the information on my 2010 week or keep it from me if I have no yet paid my 2011 week? How do they have thte right to keep something I already paid for?
[...] http://rcivip.com/what-happens-if-i-stop-paying-my-timeshare/ [...]
Hi Susan- Did you had to ask for the DIL From Wyndham? or did you just waited? until they send you one?
How did you get out of Wyndham ? I have been trying for about 3 months and no luck I have not paid them anything but I have not got anything either.
Merrill – any update? Did you get DIL? Thanks!
Hi David- Sorry for taking so long to respond. I just waited & they sent it to me. I stopped payment in Sept. & they sent it in Feb. Good luck!
Hi Susan- was yours deeded with a title because i don’t understand why its taking so long for them to send me the DIL , i was thinking its because my has a deed? I wish i did not got the deed.
update on my Feb 16th posted status:
my last payment on my timeshare with Holiday Inn Club resorts at Orange Lake FL was in January 2011. i also have not paid my maintenance fees and taxes for 2011. my original loan amount was 18k and apparently after paying for a year and a half i owe 19k. lol. i get a call usually once a day, sometimes less than that, but it is a company cell phone so i usually answer and then hang up on them, or listen for a bit first. doesn’t bother me too bad. all this time i have requested a deed in lieu but “that is not something we offer, we do not do deed in lieu’s you will need to pay” well imagine my surprise when a lady named Ximena from Orange Lake property offered that to me yesterday! she wanted me to send $600 for something like the maintenance or taxes (original maint and taxes was over 700, and with fees is now over 1300). i tried negotiating that down to $300 but she wouldn’t budge on that. She wanted me to send the $ and then they would send me the FedEx packet of stuff to sign and have notarized. i told her in no way would i pay anything without something in writing as to the agreement. she gave me the crap about the calls are recorded, and she represents the business and blah blah, but finally agreed to email me the discussion details. i am sure it would not be hard for them to “lose the recording” if i asked for it. anyway, i still have not received her email, but now that i know the deed in lieu is an option, i can now just move forward with the negotiations on the $ amount needed to acquire it! this site helped me out sooooo much! i am glad i found it earlier this year! i was starting to get worried !
we had a marriott that went through a similar process.
in their initial letter, they said that we had to pay the maintenance fee, but then we got the deed to sign, and it did not require that the maintenance fee be paid.
They want to cancel the contract and you will get the deed in lieu without having to pay the MF. There other option is to foreclose, which costs them legal fees, and they still don’t get anything, including the MF.
We got a DIL from Wyndham after about 4 months. We had to pay nothing up front. Be Careful! In fact they paid us $125 or $175- I can’t remimber which. Good luck!
What has happened since July? We have a TS with Holiday Inn Club, which they bought us out from Burroghs & Chapin From Myrtle Beach, NC
everything changed, can’t get a payment history,maintenance immediately increased, let me know what happened, I want out!!!
oky the same thing happened to me and my man. we went to va beach and got sucked into timeshare, at the time it sounded like a good deal, untile we got home and started reading though the pappers. if you look though all your pappers you will see thay give you 7 days to cancel the agrement. so i called and did just that thay try to talk you out of it. but all you do is tell them you have read all the pappers and you have the right to cancel within the 7 days. and thats what thay did so i mailed all the pappers back to them and that was the end of it. so i would say to people that are thinking about timeshare DONT DO IT.
Has anybody actually stopped and asked themselves, why am i worrying about STOPPING PAYING on 20,000 14% APY loan on something that I might be using 10 years from, on something THAT HAS A MARKET VALUE of $0 TODAY… plus I HAVE TO PAY $1500/y MAINTENANCE FEE ON THIS SOMETHING.
“I GOT BRIDGE TO SELL YOU”…..
Has anyone heard of this company or know anything about them?
http://www.professionaltimeshareservices.com/
Like most of us I can not afford to NOT pay and ruin our good credit. I told my husband we had 3 options.
1. Pay off the Timeshare and give it to a charity and use it as a lessened learned. Reason why is that we bought it for 12K 2 min later when we realized it was a scam we were already screwed. The interest rate is so high (even though they told us we can refinance another lie)for every payment we make we get about the same tacked on as interest. At least our credit cards will have a MUCH MUCH less interest rate.
2. Don’t pay and deal with what comes at us.
I don’t know how these people sleep at night…its beyond me….if ANYONE finds an attorney let me know I am still looking! how all this is legal is also beyond me…
Good luck to us all.
OH the time share place is Inn Season Resorts
You’re missing a key point. You most likely will not find a charity willing to accept it. Then you will have thrown away the money, and still be stuck with the payments, collections, credit issues, etc.
So what are you suggesting…what have you done? I have am not done reading all the posts.
Oh – I did not see the link to the timeshare reseller company. Anyone who claims they will help you donate or resell your timeshare is a criminal. Nobody wants to help you for nothing. You were scammed, and con artists figure once a mark, always a mark. The only people who will tell you the truth is others who have also been victimized, like all of us here.
You have one option: WALK AWAY!!! It is not pretty, not clean, but it is the only one which will free you of the predicament you now find yourself in. Sorry.
They are not a resale company. They help neg out of your contract…look at their site…I dont know anything about them so just curious if anyone has talked to them ever.
THERE SITE SAYS:
We are a consumer activist group that helps timeshare owners who have been victims of fraud and misrepresentation break their timeshare contract without the need of an expensive attorney. The first step to getting out of your timeshare is to get your questions answered. Take advantage of our free service so you can make an educated decision about what to do with your timeshare property.
Cant hurt to talk to them but I also know that I wont pay anyone upfront anything….just like my boss does not pay me upfront for work I have not done I wont pay anyone else.
we have all seen these scams to get us to pay someone to get us out of our timeshare. That is a joke.
If you want to get out of your timeshare, then stop paying
If you want to get someone else to take it, then sell it on ebay giving free transfer and the next weeks use free — that is cheaper than paying one of these clowns and geting nothing.
Just try to collect on their 100% refund. If they were legitimate, they would not ask for a fee until they are ready to transfer title or have transferred title.
you cant give it to a charity i tried. for 3500 you can give it to them and then you have to pay the closing cost and all the other rip of fees that come along with it. We stopped paying our maintenance fees in Feb, and the calls are rolling in now from the creditors, I’m not paying another dime for this crap.Ill let you all no how it turns out for us.
I am sorry to hear that but happy you are saving your money….We are SO close to buying a home I would hate for this to hurt us…Is there anyone out here who has stopped paying and can tell me how this has turned up on their credit report and if anyone gives slack for it? We are going to talk to a financial adviser and attorney…to advice…if we get anything of value other then stop paying I will post on here…We have until before Aug before the next payment is debited out of our account…
Thank you for your honestly and everyone’s exp keep them coming…it will help save on the effort. So if they foreclose on us its gone gone forever right? Other then the 7 yr sting on our credit report…but heck 7 yrs goes by fast…ugh…
Unfortunately if the collection agency reports it, then it does show up on your credit report. I saw it on mine.
Of course since it is based upon fraud and extortion, one could sue them for defamation of character. I didn’t bother – I just let them play their game. Refinanced anyway – it didn’t make much of a dent if any in the actual score. But I only owed maintenance fees. They see its not a credit card or bank, and therefore don’t assign much weight to that particular debt.
I dealt with a lowlife named P.G. at SPM Resorts and his mafia henchman at Meridian Financial collection agency whose alias is “Bob”. By the way, several former executives of SPM resorts are all in jail now. Maybe the other scum are too by now, god willing.
Its funny that “legitimate” companies like Wyndham hide behind these fronts. The public needs to know that these hotel companies have subsidiary businesses which are guilty of fraud, extortion, and racketeering. They seem to play a shell game where everyone blames the other arm for the fraud and extortion.
you should get one of the free credit reports online so you can see what is reported. There is a very good chance that the timeshare payment is not even listed.
if you stop making mortgage payments, within 90 days, they will probably report you. If you stop on maintenance fee payments, nothing will be reported for maybe 2-3 years and then it will be collection activity by a collections company that most banks ignore if you have bank loans and credit card accounts.
If you are close to buying, you should just buy and then you can stop making payments.
IMHO
So is there a difference on how bad this will be if we still own on the time share or not?
I am thinking the same…buy then stop paying…We have excellent credit…thats my problem.
My TS company reports only on loan/mortgage and only on 1 credit agency of 3 (experian).
I stopped all payments about 5 month ago.
My credit has dropped in first 2 month from 735 to 620 (its 635 now).
Having this being reported on just 1 of 3 credit agencies is good. as mortgage companies for example look at middle score, as long as 2 others are fine, you’re good.
If you’re concerned with credit, get monthly monitoring service, that allows you to see alerts on changes and lets you run 1+ reports a month, i use amex Credit secure its 11.99/m, discover has some similar for <$10.
I am also using services of timeshareaid.com they promises and price sound decent.
I will share here and other forums about my experience with them latter, once i get any results (if any, hope they will not try to f… w me, as I will eat their kids at night:) )
I tried to reason with TS company, waste of time and breath, fealty rootless crooks, they selling you an “Investment that will save you money and will go up in value, and 4 years latter after you paid them 15k+ and never really used damn thing, THEY WILL NOT TAKE THIS F@#@ING INVESTMENT BACK FOR FREE”
THEY ARE SCAM AND JOKE, SO YOU SHOULD TREAT THEM THE SAME.
THEY CANNOT DO ANYTHING…. just bother you and ding your credit history, WHICH YOU CAN FIX BACK UP FOR THE COST LOWER THAN YEARLY MAINTENANCE FEE”
yes, the collectors only care about getting you to send money, because they only get paid when you send money — they have no interest in anything else.
it just occurred to me that the benefit of still making payments on he TS, is that they will foreclose if you stop making payments, and the foreclosure eliminates any maintenance fees they want you to pay.
but if you stop paying maintenance fees, they just turn you over to a collection company and hound you for years for maintenance fees.
My two TS’s are paid for but I stopped paying maint. fees 2 years ago. About 2 months ago I got a call from a company called PINNACLE, I immediately sent them a “cease & desist” letter, they stopped.
By the way can they come after other property we own? We have a duplex we own…any info on that would help…
No chance, ever.
Ok everyone….we are going to stop paying. We will be going to the bank tonight to change credit card numbers and stop authorization of auto payments. I am going to change our profile info etc that’s on their website. I am also getting ready a letter for them not to communicate with us other then in writing.
SOOOOO anything new happens I will post on here. We are up to date on our payments and maint fees. We talked to a mortgage lender and worse case scenario is that we will have to explain we got screwed and pay a lil more when we buy a house big deal with the money we save we can! So wish us luck everyone. I will keep you posted as something new develops.
for what it is worth, we did a deed in lieu with Marriott about 2 years ago, after they had us delinguent in payments for 4-5 months, we were foreclosed on a TS in Las Vegas and in Florida, and we have lots of TS collection activity listed on our credit report. I checked our credit score on creditkarma and it was 688, about average, so it hurt but we expected to be like the hockey goalie on TV.
DIL Tell me what we should be looking out for is they ask us to do this? In writing i know…atty look over everything?
Hi Bill- Did you have to ask for the DIL or do you have to wait to received it.
David,
you have to wait until they send you a letter asking if you will do a deed in lieu to cancel the debt and your ownership. The collection guy will just keep telling you to make payments. The DIL comes from a different department.
Thanks Bill- That Answer my Question, but should i still send that written cease & decease letter, or should i just keep letting the debt collector send me those letter and just anoy them?
Hi David,
we have not used the cease and desist letters. we have caller id on the phones and don’t answer calls we don’t recognize. Our phone also allows us to block a dozen numbers, so if we recognize the same caller we block it. If my wife does answer a collector, she says we do not owe anything and hangs up and we change our blocked call list.
Hi Bill -Thanks for the answer-so getting back to the DIL & The Debt collector, If i had pay off the loan 6 yrs ago, and did not answer there call for six years, then i wait for the DIL but once i release the DIL to them , then it only settle the Mortage? and not the maintance fee. or does it take care of both, but the Debt collector will keep sending the owe maintance fee? You notice I am confused, I apologies -Please have patience with me,
Hi David,
There are several parts to the answer.
The deed in lieu cancels out the mortgage and the fees. Which doesn’t mean that they won’t still try to get you to pay the fees.
do a google search for financial statute of limitations. One of those sites will give you the years for your state. After not paying that number of years, they cannot succeed in any court case against you, but if they file a case, your response to the case is that any debt is past the financial statue of limitations so a case is moot.
the easiest way to not be bothered is to send the cease and desist letter to the collector saying both that any debt is past the financial statue of limitations and not to contact you by phone for any collections.
the ts can still try to collect, but could not win in court, but collection agencies cannot continue after the time has passed.
For anyone else — make sure to never send any payment to the TS or collectors, because it restarts the clock on the statute of limitations.
Hi bill – I look up the statue of limitation for California-It said a written contract is 4 Years-Then Judgement is 10 Years-Interest for Judgement is 10%-And Lastly Mortage Anti-Deficiency they Put YES. I Look up what Judgement mean and it said that-Notes
1. Judgments can be renewed in many jurisdictions. In some cases, even a dormant judgment can be renewed.
Bill- If the Judgements can be renewed in many Jurisdictions, then perhaps i should send that cease and decease letter and see what they do. what you think.
judgements mean that you have been taken to court and lost and that there is now a judgement against you (like the judgement against OJ by Nicole’s family)
you have already passed the 4 years, so you can use the time past the statute of limitations as the answer to any suit filed against you.
The cases and desist is only to make the collectors stop calling your phone (and to deal only by letter). But, it will stop the calls.
Got it. so the Judgement part don’t apply to me unless they take me to court and i lose. Ok-cease and decease- they have not call me anymore but still sending letter to me. but i had annoy it. so the last step is for them to send me a DIL. I will wait and report back. Thanks again Bill for having Patience with me. I am getting more confindence in moving toward the right direction and not looking to find answer in a haystack.
I agree with almost all of this thread with 2 exceptions; 1. The cease and desist letter can also apply to the ts as well, so they can not contact you either. 2. the cease/desist means they cannot contact you by ANY means; phone, email or letter.
My father recently died. He has a paid timeshare. We don not want it nor do we want to pay maint. fee. Will Affidavit of Disclaimer make it go away?
Today we got our first call. Did not answer. Lady just said they needed to talk to us and gave us a reference number…ha ha ha. Sending the S&D letter tomorrow with delivery confirmation.
Good for you. Glad to see you taking action FAST!
Ok So all the letters were sent via fax with confirmation, regular mail and certified. So THREE methods they got. I sent it to ALL locations, corporate, their attorney and the resort billing company. ALL certified confirmations have come back. They by LAW can respond ONE MORE TIME to us. SOO we got one letter yesterday and keeping track. ha ha cause if the location contacts us again…we are going to SUE THEM!!!! wouldn’t that be a twist! ha ha ha. So we are protecting out rights in other ways…to can play this game!!
I have to say that before all the letter confirmations came back they called my husband and I as we were together. I happen to be latin so when they called me on my phone I spoke Spanish they hung up on me. Then 2 seconds later they called my husbands phone same guy but talked in Chinese (the few words I knew) he hung up. We laughed our heads off…never called again. Just thought i would share that…keep you all posted…
we have 2 weeks in St pete, that we last paid the maintenance fee in 2007. today, we got the deed in lieu to have notarized and then it all goes away.
I’ve been reading this blog since 2008 when I started looking for an answer to my timeshare worries and it has saved me thousands of dollars. Since then I secured a loan and built my house and I’m now over my TS issues. I just wanted to say THANKS A LOT to whoever started this blog and the many others who were brave enough before me to stop paying. I did and handled the annoying calls for a while until they stopped calling. My wife and I are very grateful to you all.
Dear Doug,
just wondering how that all played out on your credit? Did it cause you problems getting the loan??
I had no problems but maybe that was due to me acquiring the loan just before I stopped paying.
Hi All
We have a fully paid timeshare in BC and are planing on not paying our maintenace fees.
Can anyone who has done this with a timeshare in Canada let me know what has hppened when they didn’t pay their maintenace fees.
Actually, your issue is NOT with the resort staff directly, it is with the owner, i.e. Wyndham, as they regulate what the staff says/does, and they train them ALL the SAME! So, again, the issue is with the timeshare owners like Wyndham or whoever it is that “owns” the corporation that has your timeshare.
We bought a time share from Velas Vallarta in Mexico in 2008. It was a rushed, strong armed approach that included alcohol, etc. Sierra told us we could sell weeks, but that we had to keep it quiet when signing the paperwork. We were told not to mention that we were doing this as an investment. Red flags everywhere in hindsight, as you all know.
We paid maintenance fee in 2009. None of our weeks sold. Decided not to pay in 2010, but conveniently, Sierra suddenly now had a buyer, but said we must pay maintenance fees first. We paid. We even ended up paying close to an additional $2000 (taxes? They said) which we wired to Mexico, with the understanding that we would get it back at the time of sale. As soon as the money was wired, all contacts through Sierra completely stopped – phone just rang continuous, e-mails bounce back, etc. However about
6 months later, the bank called and said our wired money had been returned (yay). Now fees are due for 2010, and miraculously we get a call from a different company with a buyer. We are not falling for that again.
How do you tell if you have a deed? We have a 25 year contract that says “Fractional Ownership Service Agreement” which I assume is not a deed? Does anyone know? We have tentatively decided not to pay any more money, and if it trashes our credit, we will deal with it. It will be hard
hard, as we are 52 and have two kids to put through college,
Thank you for all the posts on this site.
we have one in Puerta Vallarta and they mention to us that we rent it for 25 to 30 years and it is not deeded. After the time is up they take it back.
Just like before we amazingly received another offer this week. Anyone ever dealt with Malibu Property Management Group? Something about needing to get to 21% ownership. I told them we were not paying anything – if they needed money it had to come from the proceeds of the sale. I thought that would shut them up, but surpirsingly they agreed. Offered $30.000 and want a copy of our Velas contract and a copy of my ID. The ID part scres me. I
That’s what I told one of those crooks. I said, IF you have a so-called sale, then take your cut out of it and send me the rest…………NO we’re not registered realtors, therefore we don’t operate like that.
I faxed the contract and the last statemnent on what we owe on membership fees. No ID. We will see what they say. I don’t expect anything good to come of this. I tried to look up this company but can only find that they are NOT a member of the Better Business Bureau. (Big Surprise!)
Has anyone had bad dealings with Palm Beach Shores Resort in Florida? Our salesman totally misrepresented the timeshare product to us about 15 months ago. They will not take the timeshare back, and they will not assume any responsibility for their salesman’s lies. I owe around $10,000 on the mortgage, and maintenance fees and property taxes are about $360 a year. I would just like to quit making the payments and walk away from it. Does anyone know about how aggressive this resort is in pursuing timeshare owners who do not pay?
Hi Greg,
I have a timeshare with Palm Beach Shores in Florida. I stopped paying mortgage/maintenace in November of 2009. At the beginning you will be getting phone calls every other day asking for you to make a payment even just a small payment don’t do it. You need to read through the previous comments to write a letter to prevent them from contacting you. Any way..myself I just ignored the phone calls, because no matter what you tell them, they don’t care about your situation they just want some form of payment. I than cancelled my credit card where payments were being taken from. Phone calls started, mailing contact started.
No more phone calls or letters from them, but I still get phone calls from the collection agency because of unpaid maintenance fees which is $1000 (two years of unpaid maintenance fees). It did put a hit on my credit, but not much. My credit score is 720. Aslong as you pay all your other bills on time your credit should be fine unless you had bad credit from the beginning than it really doesn’t matter.
But just so you know it took 2 years for them to stop contacting me and I stilled owed $12k on the mortgage. I just wised up and realized that it wasn’t worth the money I was paying them. I called one time cause I was considering paying it off in one lump some. I found out during the 2 years I was paying only $1000 went towards the principal out of $6000 I paid. At that poing I realized it’s worth to keep it for lifetime. Especially the maintenance fees goes up every year. I can have a great vacation paying less than what I was paying towards them yearly.
You just have to ignore the phone calls, don’t take the threats seriously. If you go through all the comments you will realize they can’t really do anything to you, but threaten you with your credit, your home, garnishing your work check. My check has never been garnished, never been taking to court, etc. I’m still waiting from them to forclose on me, but they seem to have disappeared for months now. But I will keep all updated.
Erica, thanks for the response. Your information has been very helpful. I believe that I am going to close the credit card account from which those crooks and liars take the monthly payment and then just hope for the best.
Erica: I have decided to stop paying on Palm Beach Shores TS. I am hoping that all that happens is foreclosure and hit on my credit. I am expecting the phone calls and threats. I know that it has only been a month and a half since you told me about your situation with those crooks. Has anything changed with you since then? Thanks for your time.
Hi Greg,
I only receive phone calls from the collection agency to collect money from the maintenance fees I owe. I no longer receive phone calls from the timeshare itself. I have yet to receive a foreclosure notice from them…nothing. I assumed they just dropped it all and realized it wasn’t worth to pursue. But just moved the money I owed on maintenance fee to the collection agency.
As I said before it has been since November of 2009 when I decided to stop paying them. Remember don’t answer the phone and don’t agree to pay anything. It will just start all over again. Just do the math. It’s not worth it. What you pay in a year you can have a nice vacation a week somewhere half the price you pay towards them.
They will threaten you of all sorts (if you answer the phone). Just ignore it. They will call from a 954 area code number. Trust me nothing will happen. No lien on your home or no garnishing from you check. Nothing will happen except for the small credit hit from the collection agency trying to collect money from you from the maintenance fees.
Hope that helps.
Erica
Mine switched collection agencies, and a new one called. Usually you hear stories about collections people being rude and crude to collectees. However, I turned all of my rage about this situation right on the collections lady. I think she started to cry right before I hung up. I tend to be kind and empathetic, but have a mission in life to attack bullies. I don’t think they’ll be calling back.
Hi Erica:
Any update from your situation with Palm Beach Shores? We haven’t paid them anything for a couple of months now. We have been getting a lot of phone calls and e-mails from them. They have been leaving us messages telling us that our case will soon be turned over to a collection agency. I am thinking about writing them another letter and asking them for a deed in lieu of foreclosure. Maybe I should have an attorney write the letter. Thanks.
Hi Greg,
I’ve stopped hearing from them. I guess they got the point since I haven’t paid them since November 2009. No Foreclosure, nor did I receive a Deed In Lieu of Foreclosure. Any money I would have gave to them I put in my savings account towards a “real” vacation, when and where I want to take it to.
No credit hit from not paying on my timeshare itself, but I did get minor credit hit from not paying the maintenance fees. But, my credit score is 745 since I pay everything else on time and in full.
Greg, Just walk away and don’t worry about it. It’s been about 2 years and I have yet to get a notice to pay them in full, or a lien on my mortgage, and my paycheck has never been garnished. Those are all threats to get you to pay them. Don’t pay them anything otherwise the clock starts all over again.
Erica
Hi Erica. It is February 16th. Do you have an update on your situation with Palm Beach Shores Resort? Thanks for your time.
Greg
Greg, it’s not the time share where you own, it’s the time share people like, for instance,Wyndham,or others that make the rules. Go back through and read the replies going back through May/June and you will learn what those of us who respond to you, have been telling everyone else. Learn, then DO what you read. What can man do to you? Are they going to send a hit squad, NO! Are they going to do anything? NO! WHY! because they’re going to just take the time you HAD for not paying, and sell it to the next (sorry to say this) sucker. Just walk away, don’t look back, and read what’s already been written and DO what everyone else has been taught….. RELAX! It will be OK, no matter what you own, where.
Mary, thanks for the response. My issue is with the resort’s sales staff, which I guess are employees of Vacation Village. The salesman lied to me and my wife during the entire sales meeting. We spent six hours with this huckster, asking him everything about the timeshare that we could think of. He lied to us the entire time. I believe that I am going to stop making the mortgage payments and maintenacne fee payments and see what happens. It would be worth taking a hit om my credit.
That’s BS, it cannot be secured debt, as they cannot possibly physically secure 1/52 of of the unit. ITS A JOKE!!!!
Go back through previous recent replies on this site and see what advice the others got, and follow it. To recap, DO NOT FEAR! They can’t do anything to you, just stop paying, don’t accept any mail from them, send it back saying “return to sender”, and if they start calling send them the following letter (THIS LETTER IS A LEGAL DOCUMENT). Send it CERTIFIED MAIL, RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED. This PROVES that you mailed it, they received it, and that they HAVE to leave you alone……PERIOD! It WILL work! And, DO NOT FEAR!
DATE:
RE: Account number:
To Whom it May Concern:
Please cease further communication with me regarding the referenced debt.
Pursuant to the provisions of Title 15 U.S.C.§ 1692c.
Thank you for complying with this request.
Sincerely,
______________________
Signature
Printed Name
Address:
Sent via: FAX TO:
Mary thank you so much. I will do that ASAP!
Hi Mary, they called me today and they said that we cannot cancel the TS because it’s a secured loan and even they put in forclosure we still have to pay them. My husband is in the military and currently away from home and they said that his career will get affected if we put the TS in forclosure. I even told them that if they don’t stop calling me i will send the cease and desist letter but they said it’s not gonna work either because that’s not the way it is.
Is there anybody use the cease and desist letter yet? I need to know if it’s really work. I am knew here in TX and i don’t know if that works here. Thank you in advance.
Remember they are sociopaths and liars. Yes they can mess up your credit, but that would be it. Now they are stooping so low to threaten to ruins the careers of distinguished servicemen, which of course they cannot. But they can commit extortion which is what they are doing with those statements.
Write a letter to your congressmen, and tell them a time share company is threatening that they can ruin your husband’s career, which they cannot, just to scare you into paying for something which they fraudulently sold you. If they support our servicemen, like they all purport to, they should get off their ass, and crucify these timeshare scum.
This is so outrageous it is unbelievable.
Thank you all for the advise or concern! It ease me alot. My husband is currently deployed and he’s not here to help me, but I am so happy that someone or somebody out here are always there to help others like me. Proud to be an army wife and i am proud of you to guys. God Bless us all.
God Bless You and your husband for being the ones who make it possible for we to be as free (as our gov’t. will currently allow). Thank you and your husband for serving our country. My dad did in WWII and suffered the rest of his life for his country. Take care, and God Bless!
Hi Sporty- I give you credit to try to carry this burden through. I was like you scare, and paid them little by little, finally my son had to go to college and couldn’t afford it any longer, didn’t even had the time to talk to anyone, hire a lawyer and the lawyer told me to don’t do anything, DON’T EVEN ANSWER YOUR PHONE. i had change my phone # not because of them but too many telemarket trying to sell. but its been 6 years now and finally i can talk to people like Bill, Mary, and Ron. I can just kind of tell people what happen to me , what i am going through and to find answers that other people know that i don’t know ,so sometimes take a first step which is DON”T answer your phone, DON”T pay anything and let the clock run. If you can wait for your husband to return from war then this waiting for the clock to run out should be a breeze.
It’s been 7 months since we stopped payment our TS from Silverleea.We recieved alot of calls from them but we never answer the phone or return their calls. Last month, we recieved a promissory note saying that we have to pay the full amount within 10 days, if not, they will turn it to the collection but, we ignore them after a week we recieved another letter saying that they will sell our TS this month. After, folliwing some advices here me and my husband never scared from. So thank you all for the advice. For those who need some advice too, read all the comments here and follow Mary’s advice. I will keep you posted in 2 weeks and see how’s the selling goes.
Hi Everyone.
I’ve been reading this blog for a while so im very familiar with a few of the options mention…ie…the deed of lieu foreclosures, statute of limitations and of course just walking away by not paying another cent.
I live in Ontario and the Timeshare i own is in Daytona Florida. Luckily for me the actual unit/timeshare is paid off and what im left paying now is the yearly outrageous, constant rising maintenance fees.
I spoke with my home resort and asked for assistance last year on the years mainteance fees but of course they were no help. I ended up somehow coming up with the money and paying them.
I want to walk away next year tho when my bill comes in the mail Jan 2012 as we really cannot afford this ever rising fees anymore.
Since I live in ontario, Canada and the unit is Daytona. How will this affect my credit rating if i walk away ? and Secondly if the creditors start caling me what statute of limitations apply to me? ontario 2 years or florida 6 years?
Whats the worse that will happen besides the harrassing constant phonecalls and letters?
The statute of limitations apply to where YOU live, not where the TS is. Just DON’T pay the bill….period. All they can do is NOT allow you to use your time, as they will lock you out until or unless you pay up. If you don’t care about using the time, then don’t pay the maint. My two on St. Thomas are paid up, and I owe over $5,000 in maint. They sent me to Pinacle collections. I simply sent them a cease and desist letter that is posted many times on this site. Find it and follow the directions. If you can’t find it, then email me back and I’ll send it again w/the directions. Then they are forbidden BY LAW to ever contact you again, in ANY way.
My husband and I bought a Timeshare at Silverleaf Resorts in Oct. 2009. Two weeks ago, we sent a Cancellation letter to Silverleaf and told them that we can’t afford anymore. Five days after they recieved the letter, they called us and said that the letter that we sent is not gonna work and we have to continue pay them. I even called our bank and stopped the payment. Please help us. Don’t know what to say the next time they call us. We have no experience dealing like this type of problem. Thank you in advance.
To whoever left the message about the registered letter, accepting it doesn’t start the clock, what does is IF you start paying them anything. I sent Pinnacle a cease and desist and they HAD to stop contacting me. I did it after the FIRST phone call! Don’t waste time on sending that letter. If you were going to be sued, you would NOT be served via a cert. letter, the Sheriff would have to serve you in person. Just send the cease & desist.
Thank you so much Mary for replying. it put me at ease i will send that out certified, so i’ve been doing the right thing. now i know from Bill that i don’t have to accept anymore register mail. Also the property tax that i had receive is real from the office of the lieutenant governor property tax collection division 5049 Kongens Gade, #18 St. Thomas, virgin islands 00802-6783, Mary- i think if i had paid this, they the t.s. company would say that is a partial payment also and the clock would start again. is that true?
If this is true people should know not to deed any of there timeshare unless they know and accept that there maint. fee assessment fee and property tax will go sky high and is willing to pay into it for life.this property tax will go up everytime they the t.s. company say they made improvements.
Now you’re learning. Everything you said is correct. Don’t pay anything. I have two St. Thomas TS and I’ve never received a tax bill for either.
Now you’re learning. Everything you said is correct. I have two St. Thomas TS and have NEVER gotten a tax bill. Just don’t accept any mail, even if it’s first class, just write on the front of the envelope “RETURN TO SENDER”, and be sure to send the cease, ASAP. You’re welcome.
Hi Mary- I just went to the U.S. virgin Site and there is Property tax when Property is Deeded, but read a little further and they were mentioning that in aprox 2006 they told people not to paid it, thats why i only receive one and from then on did not receive anymore, apparently they did not resolve the issue. owner where complaining that the property tax for a studio should be lower than the 1 bedroom.
I have seen a new type of request from collectors. When they realize they cannot collect, they now offer a deed in lieu of foreclosure and say that you need to pay a legal fee as well as the current years maintenance fee in order to receive the DIL.
everyone needs to decide what they are willing to pay to make these guys go away, but personally, I would just ignore them and only sign a DIL from the timeshare company and not pay the extra fees to the collectors. (the worst case is you make a payment to the collector, and they treat it as a partial payment and restart your statute of limitations clock)
I admit I almost fell for a trick from the collection agency when i still spoke to them. They tried to get me to pay a portion of the amount owed, then, they would try and convince the company to take the deed back (DIL). But they only promised to “consider” taking it back after everything was paid up. I said no and that was the last time I spoke with any of them.
Hi bill- isn’t it true that once it goes into collection, it is not negotible with the t.s. company anymore? and if you can, then would they the t.s. company tell the collection agency that they are negotiating with the timeshare owner?
Hi David. When they say that you cannot negotiate with the timeshare company anymore, it is a little misleading. This is really contract language between and t.s. and the collection agency.
When a t.s. company signs up with a collection agency, they agree to refer any negotiations to the collection company since the collection agency takes a percentage of whatever they collect. After some period of time, the contract expires and the collection agency no longer has that collection and the t.s. needs to decide what to do next — foreclose, try for a DIL through a lawyer, get another collection agency, etc.
If you are dealing with a collection agency, you just need to wait until the collection agency turns the contract back to the t.s. and then they can negotiate once more. the collection agency has no reason to work with you on a DIL since they only get a percentage of whatever they collect.
It’s a ploy on the part of the T.S. Send the cease and desist letter I’ve posted in previous responses, and forget about it! They cannot touch you!
We CAN take them down if only ONE person knew a lawyer willing to do a CLASS ACTION SUIT!
I agree Mary. I have looked!!! We pay our TS + fees. Have been for a while but seems that…soon we are going to fall behind… we want to buy a home in a couple of years which is the only reason why we still have this horrible thing…soon after we got it we realized it was a scam…but had already passed the date to give back so they say…so stuck with it!
we filed for bankruptcy this year,the time share we owned was payed for and we owe back tax and maint for $5000.00 got all the threating letters.what was so funny the lawyer and the judge snickered when we brought up the timeshare we were told they do not count as anything. they can not sue. By the way the deeds on these things are not real deeds. When the collection people called I said sue me and show me were I own this property well never heard from them again. one more thing I have a deed from this time share I called the tax office were it was filed from and its really amazing they can not find my name in the county book of records. this is all scams.For the people out there who owe rip up the paper work its not real deed. Yes I did have a real lawyer check this all out and its all true.
That makes sense they made a mockery of the timeshare having any legal authority to collect anything. Its too bad there is no way to let people know that if everybody just told timeshare companies all at once to go rot, then they would all fold. Its like showing a child there is no boogie man in the closet – I just wish I knew how to open the door so the world can see that they are just so much vapor. We have seen through their BS and scare tactics and now we know they have no power to do or say squat. Too bad we couldn’t take them all down at once. Wyndham / Marriot / Fairfield / RCI – may they all rot in hell!!!!
Hi Peter- nice to see that the judge snickered at the timeshare and they cannot sue. but the deed that i have sure looks real. just like how it is every year in my own property in ca. with partial numbers block # and all. just wondering how can a timeshare company. sell a week here to tom dick or harry and say they own a week. that is like me owning my house and then selling it out week by week to all the tom dick and harry and when one don’t pay i would tell the city and county of L.A. or whereever that it is those guys that owe the tax not me.
Peter – I am scratching my head .
Your example is exactly correct. Forget about it, they can’t touch you. They are the crooks, not you. Stop scratching your head, relax.
What I’m doing is I’m sending a letter to the TS saying that I will not continue making MFs, and giving them 2 alternatives: a) issue me a Warranty Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure, or b) I will take TS to a transfer company. See what happens.
Hi- Melham- just talk to my accountant and he said 1099c is a cancellation of debt. so the lawyer is right the 109A WILL be a gain but if the property is worth 0 then you you would subtract and there would be no gain that i guess is done in the 1099c. the question i have is how can one find out how much the property is worth in writing?
Thanks bill for the comment, they said that 1099-c is the one debt cancellation, 1099-A is just they took it back …so what I did in my Tax return I deducted the principal value ,from the remaining debt that came out with a loss…everybody and still nobody can explain even in IRS that 1099-A vs 1099-C.
Can you give some details?
Our credit is a mess, but that is because these collection agencies have reported “collection activity” with the credit reporting bureaus. We still have credit, but they have reduced our credit lines.
Waiting for foreclosure doesn’t mean much, since we have had 3 TS weeks foreclosed by companies that do not want to do a deed in lieu — which makes little sense since it would be cheaper, but I don’t think some of the TS managers know a lot and just defer to their lawyers who pick up the fees.
A 1099A from the IRS means that the debt has been forgiven by the lender, so the IRS wants taxes paid on the forgiven amount since they consider it a gift. I think the easiest way to fight this is to have documentation of the current market value of the TS and to argue that this is the real value forgiven, with the remainder a loss to you.
If you received an 1099A, that means that there is no foreclosure coming and that the TS took back their week.
my credit was ruined.,Im just waiting for the foreclosure, just received 1099-A from IRS.
I have a question in rebutle about “has anyone hired a lawyer”. My question is “HAS ANYONE BEEN SUED, FORECLOSED, RUINED CREDIT REPORT?” If the answer is NO, then why do we have to pay out MORE for a lawyer who will get richer along with the TS.
I hear a lot of not paying or do this and that but has anybody actually found a lawyer to get the correct info or even sue any of them. Min ei spaid but tired of the maintenance fees and worried they may go up
Reply to Ron and ALL! Agree, and why hasn’t anyone started a class action suit? I would if I knew how. Anyone know how. As far as the TS salesman goes, he has no room to talk about “tort” law. They have broken laws up and down the scale to the max. DO NOT pay anyone anything, anymore…..period.
STOP! FORGETABOUTIT! Don’t due deed in leui, don’t do anything, and don’t pay anybody to do anything for you. Leave it alone, but do-do one thing, send the CEASE AND DESIST LETTER I’ve posted on this blog. If you can’t find it, email me and I’ll send it to you word for work.
Mary,
Thank you for your great advice. I owe nothing to my TS, but what I will do is send them the Cease and Desist letter, to get them off my back hopefully forever. Please send me your version of this Cease and Desist letter.
Thanks you ever so much!
Isabel
DATE:
TO:
RE:
To Whom it May Concern:
Please cease further communication with me regarding the referenced debt.
Pursuant to the provisions of Title 15 U.S.C.§ 1692c.
Thank you for complying with this request.
Sincerely,
______________________
Signature
Printed Name
Address:
Certified Mail
Return Receipt Requested
This letter was drawn up by an attorney. Be sure to send it CERTIFIED mail,RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED That will give you a tracking# for your letter and the return receipt you will receive back once they receive the letter and sign for it. Without this proof, you have NO proof of ever having notified them.
You can also FAX it and then do the mailing as described above.
Thank you so much, Mary, for your this info. I will use it to stop claims for maintenance payments.
My next question, however, is since I hold a deed to this TS, how do I get rid of the deed? Like I said, the TS is paid in full. The problem is the company defaulted and sold the company. The new company has doubled maintenance fees to the point where it’s no longer worthwhile.
If you don’t intend to ever pay up the maint. fees, the deed is irrelevant. Just forget about it, I did.
i also have a deed, so what do we do about that? Do we follow the same rules?
HI MARY -THIS IS DAVID SPEAKING-Want to get it right- If i have a Deed on my T.S. and i want out, and did not pay Maint. Fee for over 6 years now. do i have to notified them (the collection agency or who?) and do i have to get a DIL? JUST WANTED TO KNOW THE RIGHT STEPS TO GET OUT. OR SHOULD I JUST NOT NOTIFIED THEM AND JUST LIKE YOU SAID DON’T DO ANYTHING.
If you haven’t paid maintenance fees in 6 years you are finished with them. You have a deed huh – TO WHAT? I guess you own it and can paint it or build something new there or…oh wait… you can’t – you don’t really own anything. Get it. You don’t hold a DEED, you hold a receipt for a SCAM.
The deeds are useless pieces of garbage. You never owned anything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You were scammed by criminals. Why do you want reason with the muggers who robbed you.
WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY, WALK AWAY. DON’T LOOK BACK!!!!
they have probably already foreclosed or taken it back as abandoned property.
If a collection agency calls or writes, tell them that the claim is past the statute of limitations.
Bill if you bought in The U.S. Virgin Island but you live in california is the statue of limitation in the state where you live or is it in the country where you had bought the time share?
the statute of limitations limits lawsuits that can be brought against you where you live. Any claim against you for debts would have to be brought in your state of residence.
AMEN, just WALK AWAY. There is NOTHING you have to do. Just leave it alone, and FORGETABOUTIT!
Thank you Ron,Bill, & Mary for all the answers and encouragement. There is one question? I’ve a property tax bill that came in the mail from the U.S. Virgin Island and have not pay that either, so since i live in calif do I walk away from that too, can they put a lien on my property in calif.? What is the worst that they can do to me? Sorry, this is the last question i have.
Mary-Now that you know my situation, would you suggest me walking away from this without sending them a CEASE AND DESIST LETTER?
the worst they can do is put a lien on the TS in the Virgin Islands. *lol*
BILL-I guess i am laughing about that too- but what if they the U.S. Virgin Island decide to put a lien on my property in Calif, can they do that and make me go to court?
they can only put a property tax lien on the property being taxed.
the TS will pay the property tax. They do not want a lien on the property
Bill-now everything make sense. They own the entire property, but they lied to me and said that if i wanted to sell the property i need a deed. and by getting the deed they want me to pay the property tax. so they don’t have to pay it. that is why there was no parcel # when i try to get rid of it. FIRST I MADE A MISTAKE, i did not have to get the deed because there was no parcel #. But Bill seems like it work out anyway, because now i don’t pay anything no tax, no maintance fee, but lost out on the closing cost and the cost for the Deed.
Can anyone answer this question? pinnacle DEBT COLLECTION AGENCY send me a certified letter, that means i have received it. can a person refuse to sign for it? ALSO, DOES THIS MEAN THAT THE CLOCK STARTED OVER AGAIN? I AM HOPING Ron, Mary or Bill can answer this question.
I do not see a reason not to accept the letter. If they were filing a suit, it would need to be served.
If they are asking you for a reason they should not be sued, you should assert the positive defense that the debt has passed the financial statue to limitations with the month and year of the last payment made.
the statute of limitations does not make any debt go away, but it means that the suit cannot be won by the collector as long as the positive defense of the statute of limitations having run is given as a positive defense immediately as an answer to any suit.
the only thing you can do to start the clock over is to make a partial or full payment to the collector or to agree to an agreement with the collector. that’s why you never make any payment once you stop, no matter how small.
But why not do a Deed in Lieu if it’s offered and it costs you nothing and you can get out of that nightmare?
but do you really think you will actually be offered a deed in lieu that costs you nothing? you do not want to pay anything at all with the deed in lieu or it will just restart the clock. Paid off properties are not treated the same as ones that still have a mortgage to pay.
My TS is payed for. I have not payed the maintenance for awhile now.I get pinnacle calls at least 5 times a week. I have never heard of anyone getting there wages garnished for a TS so far.These people are crocks and they know if they try to pursue us for there bogus fees that eventually there going down. just hold off and what for you deed of lieu.I will post all over this page the day i get mine!!!!
NO, NO, NO – these piddly little fools don’t have any authority, moral or otherwise. They couldn’t garnish wages from a frog. They have no juice except to fake people out and scare them. Just laugh at them and tell them to f-off. If everyone did that – they would be finished.
there is a statute of limitations for financial matters –
that is, if you have not made any payments for the number of years for your state, then they cannot file a lawsuit to recover any funds.
the time for each state differs and you can look this up on google as financial state of limitations or such to see what it is for your state.
for many states it is 4 years, so you can probably tell them that the statute of limitations has passed and they no longer have a right to your funds or to come after you for money.
Just don’t make any additional payments or the clock starts all over again.
for RI where I lived when I made the contract is 15 years for a written contract.In Massachusetts where the timeshare is is 6 years. In NC where I am now is 3 years. Big difference. Which one would they go by?
the statute is for the state where you live, and NC appears to be consumer friendly. It means they can’t file a lawsuit (or can’t win one once you raise a defense of statue of limitations) and third party collections companies cannot contact you.
thanks so much, I guess we picked the right state to move to. I cant believe there is such a big difference between RI and NC.
I live in NC and can say unconditionally that NO ONE other than a local, state or federal agency can attach to your bank accounts, or real estate. NC IS consumer friendly, strange as it is so far behind in many other ways. Obviously I am not a native, but glad I’m here and not in another state.
I made a few payments on my timeshare 5 years ago. I stopped because we couldn’t afford it anymore. I told them over and over again. They said it would go to foreclosure. I never heard anything. Now 5 years later I am getting bills again. I have written letters again stating I could not afford to pay it. I have ever used at all. I just want to be done with it. It is on Cape Cod Mass. and I am now in NC.
The statute of limitations is UP and they can’t touch you, and couldn’t anyway. See my last post to this issue. Just DO NOT be afraid!
thanks, I know what you mean about NC being behind. My husband does autobody and he said they are way behind in technique as to up in Massachusetts but we like it here. Even more so now with the statute of limitations.
Don’t ACT like there are no worries, KNOW that there are NO worries, and keep that ATTITUDE if/when they contact you. And, IF they do contact you, get that cease and desist letter out; fax or email it, and then print it off, sign it and send it certified mail, return receipt requested. Take back your rights. This world is in such a bad state, that the least we should be worried about are lousy TS’s. Be happy, and celebrate this Memorial weekend, and please remember my Dad who served in WWII and was so shocked by it all and could never get help. He suffered the rest of his life. We have no idea what most older soldiers in WWI, WWII, Korean, Viet Nam wars; saw, lived through and not only were shot at, but some were forced to canabalize in order to survive. My Dad would rather die than do that, so unfortunately he gorged himself on food, literally eating for all the poor of the world, just from what he went through in that war. NEVER FORGET! God Bless You All, enjoy the weekend, but PLEASE remember! Thanks for reading all my ranting.
Hi Mary,
Could you PLEASE, PRETTY PLEASE let me know exactly or guide me on how i should approach my situation. My TS is not paid in full and we owe $8000. Ive been making the payments but struggling to do so every month. I want to just stop making payments and see what happens. They told me after its 60 days delinquent they will report it to collections. I don’t own a home and i don’t own my car (still making payments). I don’t care anymore about my credit going bad after this. Will they garnish my wages and what am i going to end up paying the IRS? im so clueless with this as you can how i got in this in the first place.
I would really appreciate your help!!! Please.
Thank you,
L
Hi L,
If you don’t care, then STOP. The more you pay the more trouble you get into cause the statute of limitations keeps on ticking. What state do you live in? I stopped caring years ago about ANY debts I’ve been paying on forever, as I’ve more than paid for them in interest over/over/over again. Don’t feel I’ve duped anyone by my stopping to pay, especially the TS. BUT, you could have a “hardship” clause in your contract. Send a certified letter with a return receipt request and tell them you are in hardship and you can no longer pay. I did that on my third (yes, I was stupid enough to buy 3, the first 2 were cash deals, the 3rd was financed). I did have a hardship clause and my debt was IMMEDIATEly cancelled. Give it a try first, and then stop paying anyway.
I ‘JUST STOPPED PAYING” Wyndham 3 months ago. I “owed” $129K on the total mortgage. Payments were $1200/mo. Maint pays were $300. Do the math. It just wasn’t worth it. I stopped, they intimidated because that’s ALL they can do with the possible exception of a little mark on your credit report which will be looked at as a “timeshare” and understood and even “overlooked” by major creditors.
I did hire Ann Pelligrino as a representing attorney for $3k who has so far just sent Wyndham a letter. They said they “specalize” in TS recoveries. Will have to wait and see……
Not sure if you would actually need an attorney. Just follow the guidelines on these posts. But the one thing you DO need to do is to notify your TS of your intentions as well as your rationale;
“financial hardship” being the most plausible and effective. Forget about telling them that they lied and misrepresented. They KNOW THIS. Document all paper work you receive. You must be explicit in telling them that you “…do not wish them to continue billing” (you), and that you are not going to be making any more payments and request a DIL. Also, if you are paying through any type of auto-pay be sure to close it. CANCEL your card (get another with a different # and CLOSE the specific bank account. They have ways to continue to bill.
we had a Marriott weeks 2-3 years ago that we could no longer pay the mortgage on. we had the screaming in-house collector after 60 days, who put a late payment on our credit record, and then the rational people sent us a DIL form after about 4 months.
They might say that you need to pay the current maintenance before they will give you a DIL, but that is just a bluff. Just sign the DIL and don’t make the maintenance payment.
bill SORRY TO ASK BUT what is a DIL?
Dr. Jose – what happened to your TS? Did you receive DIL? Please give us an update, it helps the ones who are still in the process. thanks!
A shout out to J! Atta Boy! That’s what I’ve been trying to get across to everyone, STOP stressing, forgetaboutit, move on and enjoy what you have. What can man do to you…..
NOTHING! I’m proud of you J.
Way to go J and Mary, your encouraging words make mine and perhaps many others’ life so easy. NO MORE TS for me ever and no more worries.
Thanks,
Ruth
My timeshare with Wyndham is paid off, but I stopped paying the maintenance fees two years ago. I got a few phone calls and a few letters, but nothing major. Then last year I filed for bankruptcy, and my attorney got them to issue me a DIL. Only problem is that my ex is also on the title, so his name is on the DIL. I have no idea where he is and no contact with him anymore. Nobody is going to notarize the DIL without his signature, so the DIL is useless to me.
At first I was really stressing about this timeshare. Even after my bankruptcy. But you know what? I don’t care anymore! Look, my credit is already ruined from the bankruptcy….but practically EVERYONE’S credit is ruined right now. Heck, our country is in a depression right now! So why should I be stressed out over this anymore?
As someone pointed out in another post, nobody here has said that they’ve been sued, taken to court, taken to jail, had charges pressed against them, nothing like that! The worst thing that’s happened is the harassing phone calls and letters. That’s it!
It hurts me to read these posts and to see how fearful and stressed so many people are about these timeshares. And I understand completely, because I’ve been there, and I’ve felt the stress myself, so I totally understand how everyone feels. But I truly do not believe that it’s worth the stress and worry.
I’m not proud that I had to file for bankruptcy. And I’ve drastically changed my life so that I never find myself in that position again. It really woke me up. I’m grateful that I now have a fresh start and a clean slate. Bad credit is not the end of the world. More people have bad credit than good right now, anyway. At least, that is my opinion.
So after what I’ve been through, I’ll be damned if I allow a shady, no good timeshare company to intimidate or harass me into parting with what little money I have. And I strongly encourage all of you who are stressing over your timeshare to stop. Just stop. It’s that simple, please believe me! Don’t give them anymore of your money. It’s a bottomless pit, and we all need that money for other things now…mortgage, car payments, bills, gas, food!
The main thing that seems to be getting to people is the threatening letters and phone calls. You cannot allow yourself to be intimidated by these! Look, the reason they are so threatening by these two outlets because THAT IS ALL THEY HAVE!! If these companies truly had a leg to stand on in the courts, then that’s the route they would go! If they really stood a chance in court, we would all have been served with court papers by now, right?
The only thing they have going for them to get their hands on your money is intimidation tactics. Phone calls and letters. That’s it! It’s kind of pathetic if you think about it! The only power they have is intimidation, and they only have that power if YOU allow them to have it. DON’T let them have that power over you!
If they mail you a letter, tear it up and throw it away! If they are calling you constantly, threaten to sue them for harassment, or simply hang up!
We all have a lot of worries right now. The U.S. is in a crisis, and we are all suffering right now. Everyone needs to prioritize what they choose to focus on to make their lives easier while we endure this crisis. Timeshare should not even be on your list of things to focus on!
I hope I’m not sounding preachy, I really don’t mean to come off that way at all. It just genuinely hurts my heart every time I read a posting from someone who is scared, worried and intimidated by these disgusting timeshare companies. I want to tell them that it will be alright! I want to tell them that they should shift their focus onto their families, their homes, their jobs….the things that really matter….because these timeshares do not matter at all.
I wish I could give you all a big hug. It will be alright. We’ll all be alright. Please be strong. Please don’t worry. These timeshare companies are a joke, and that is how you need to treat them….as a great big joke! Focus on the things that matter….timeshare payments are NOT on the list!
Hi Everyone,
We just send our deed in lieu yesterday by FedEx. It should reach them today, I kept every paper for my record made copies of them. We never got any threatening calls, we stopped paying in March and whoever called me for promotions or anything regarding my TS I told them how we were fooled and were lied too, I made it a point to get Phone Nos. of reconciliation dept. and whoever can resolve my issue I called them. Once a representative called me demanding fees I told her also about our story that how we got duped into buying TS and there were all lies and we didn’t get what we bought. I think word got out but whatever the reason maybe, last we got the deed to sign and send them back. The Sales guy who sold us the TS called us last week and said that we are going to get our down payment back ( Maybe another lie? maybe not) within 10 days. I am hopeful cause we could use that money for more Imp. stuff in life. Now I am wiser not to trust anyone. I’ll once again keep you posted once I call them back to see whats happening to my TS- thanks – Ruth
Ruth, could you be more specific or give some pointers on what you were mentioning about being fulled and lied to?
Hi Stas,
At the sales presentation In November 2010 we were told that 3000 points could buy us up to 4 international tickets and 6 nights stay at any hotels. We can book hotels immediately without any advance notice but when we tried to book we didn’t get any availability in 10 different locations, all we got in return was $ 300 vouchers- no tickets and no 6 nights stay. This $ 300 voucher we could use for stay or tickets it was like bargaining for something and actually getting peanuts. When we called the QA manager , she simply said the sales manager will contact you tomorrow which never happened. After calling many times I was told that I can upgrade my points to 10000 ( Meaning I needed to pay more towards my monthly payments) which will get me around $ 1000 vouchers, which was again of no use. I asked them to take the TS back they said they can’t do that, I begged them to downgrade it to lesser value so that my monthly payment will go low. They said they cannot do that , they told me to keep paying or foreclose it and asked me specifically not to call them back again because they were unable to help me. So at that point I was very angry because at the sales pitch they were like we are here to help you, this TS is an investment, you can lower your interest rate and blah blah blah. I feel like such a fool and will never be able to trust anyone in life now. Anyways we decided to stop payment in March and then they just called us one day like 15 time but I never picked up the phone. Later when I did pick up the phone I told the lady what happened with me and that my TS is in dispute. I tried to get as many phone nos. as possible from these customer reps. and made it a point to call all of them and tell them my story. They all were sympathetic but obviously offered no help, because the window to cancel our TS was over. So then we stopped paying our TS mortgage and maintenance fees from March. We got our deed in May. We signed it and send it back with the hope that we’ll receive a letter stating we are removed of all the obligation. This whole 6 months were a nightmare to me as I have 2 small kids and we are way under our house mortgage, with me not working. These TS people have no conscience and hopefully this whole industry goes down soon. Thanks- Ruth
Hi All
Is there anyone in Canada that has stopped paying their maintenace fees?
What was the consequences?
Hi, I am Canadian and I bought my timeshare in March 2010 and stopped paying in September 2010. So far my credit is okay and the harassing phone calls and letters have stopped. This week I received a letter that my account has been cancelled.
Hi Barb
Did you own your timeshare out right before you stopped paying the maintenace fee?
I totally agree with RON! Have NO fear, just walk away. You can google your particular TS on the internet and find out how many (A LOT) law suits they have against them. Take Ron’s advice, RUN – don’t walk away, and don’t be afraid.
Hi,
Yes I walked away from my timeshare. There was a minor blip on my credit report about the maintenance fees company. If you are not concerned about the credit hit, then no worries. They don’t want to go near a court – they are criminals. They do better lurking in the shadows and caring people like the lowlife scum they are. They have no legal ability to do anything except asking collection agencies to bother you. They cannot garnish your wages or issue any kind of lien. I have seen here that some of the scum do pretend they can so they can scare people into believing so. Any lawyer can tell you they have no such powers or rights. Walk away. Walk away. Walk away. The only solution to timeshares.
I have no idea, but does anybody out there in this group know? Has anyone had their credit affected from a TS problem? I am in NC, therefore, we are untouchable at least as far as liens against us of any kind. As far as credit, I don’t care.
If I stop paying my TS (which is in the USA) will it affect my credit rating (in Canada?)
Hi Mary,Ron and Laura
Thanks for your replies. Ron the deed in lieu says that once we sign this and send them back they cancel everything from our record. I just talked to a representative and he says that our maintenance fees will be cancelled too, it says in the deed contract on the paper. I am going to copy and keep everything for my record. We are going to get it notarized tomorrow and send them with registered mail. Laura ours is with Hilton grand Vegas. I hope to get a positive reply on this . I’ll again keep all of you posted and let you know in a week or so of whats happening. As for them sending back me a paper saying that we are done with TS, that I don’t know but I am going to call them again in couple of days demanding a letter from them stating we are released of everything. Thanks-Ruth
Thanks for the information. Congratulations, I hope this works out for you! Have a great week.
Thanks, glad I could help. Again, this is PERSONALLY what I would do. Have NO fear, what can man do to you? Trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, and cast all your cares on HIM. That’s real freedom. God Bless.
Either way, if they won’t give you a written settlement, or they foreclose, they may OR may NOT be able to affect your credit rating. As far as I’m concerned, they way our nation is going, WHEN not if its credit rating fails, so do all of ours. I stopped worrying about debts, credit ratings and am much more happy, have NO credit cards or loans except house/car. So much less to worry about. I finally became convinced that the best way to be happy was to let go of what consumed me and what I feared most, which was debt and collectors. This is just my personal opinion regarding the “letting go” part. Legally, they should be agreeable to give you a written statement, paid in full, so to speak, for the deed in lieu of foreclosure, that’s what it means, you are trading your TS for the paid in full outcome.
Thanks Mary,
That totally makes sense. I will post once I hear from my TS.
Ruth
Hi Ruth,
I am assuming that your TS is financed in addition to your maintenance fees that you pay each month/year, correct? If so, a deed in lieu of foreclosure allows you to virtually hand over the property in exchange for the debt being cancelled. You must be sure you get it in writing that IF you sign these papers, there will be no further financial or legal recourse on their part. It should get you off the hook. If the $12,000 you’re speaking of is the debt on the TS and if you want to keep the TS, you could possibly negotiate to make up payments, or begin from this point forward by starting your payments again. If you don’t want the TS, just let it go. Remember to get it in writing that this deed in lieu of foreclosure settles the debt once and for all. RELAX!
Thanks for replying back Mary, Thats so sweet of you. No I don’t want anything to do with this TS anymore. They lied to us and promised something else and sold something else to us. I’ll call them and try to negotiate.What if they don’t settle the debt and just wants us to sign the deed, in that case should one sign or just let the TS go to foreclosure? Thanks again– Ruth
Ruth: Just out of curiosity, who is your timeshare with?
PLEASE HELP ME
Hello everyone,
I just received deed in lieu of foreclosure. What does this mean? It says to return it to them in 15 days to stop pending legal action. What should I do? Is this good or bad, should I sign the papers or just wait and not reply to them? If I sign the papers do I need to pay them the whole balance of $12,000.. Please, please help me here as I just have 10 days left to reply. Will signing the deed remove me of all ties with the timeshare I no longer wish to own. Please let me know how this process has worked out for you! I’ll keep posting my story again. Ron, Radha, Mary if you are reading this help me out here Please. And I’ll keep posting the updates.
Thanks,
Ruth
This sounds weird. Usually a deed in lieu of foreclosure is an option that many owners who only owe maintenance fees and want out. Some companies will offer to receive a deed in lieu instead of going through the foreclosure process. I would have been happy to go this route but since they didn’t want to work with me, I opted for the walk away option (the only other choice really). I can’t imagine you would pay $12000 for something you don’t want. This sounds not right, and possibly a continuation of the scam. Don’t believe the 10 days part either – that also sounds like a scam.
Hi, Ron is correct.
It has been 3 years since I left Timeshare., Dont pay them, they cant do any thing.
Just dare…
is there any lawyers reading this?
http://www.kauai.gov/portals/0/planning/SFVR/Timeshare%20law%20514E.pdf
Section 514E-11 sec 3.
does that mean what i think it means? if during sales presentation i was offered a free stay in the hotel “IF I MAKE A PURCHASE TODAY”, without anything written about it, that does violate sec 3 right?
SEC 5, more than once salesperson referred to this as an investment. He used the “investement” throughout the whole presentation.
I am not sure what to do. I had trouble paying my Silverleaf last year but in January set up payment arrangements and they agreed to defer some the late fees. Well, they came back in March and said the payments were set up incorrectly and if I did not pay an addition $400+ by the end of March they would foreclose. Interestingly enough they are still taking payments out of the checking account. Well, they called again today and again we set up payment arrangements. The manager then came on the phone and said again these were not good enough and they needed an extra $400+ or would foreclose. I told them to go ahead because at this point I don’t know what to do. They set up arrangements, which I kept, then they came back and wanted more, threatened to foreclose but are still taking the payments out of my account. What is the point of making payments if they are going to foreclose anyway. I know $400+ does not sound like much but I am having a great deal of trouble making the arrangements we set up. Any comments that would better help me understand this situation are greatly appreciated. Thanks!
You need to go to your bank and stop the payment out of your account personally. It will cost you about $30 to do a stop payment, and that is your right! Do it now before they milk you of anymore money. Don’t worry about the consequences cause there aren’t any. Those of us on this blog are proof of it. I haven’t read where anyone has been sued, taken to court, has had a lien put on their property or had their wages garnished. Totally agree with Janet.
yes… i did this as well with my bank and had to pay $30 to block off any charges from the specific company that you want to. so far they are not able to take any deductions from my bank account.
ALL who are on auto debit need to go to bank and pay fee to stop the payment. It will not stop the problems, but you can still issue a cease and desist letter to stop the collection attempts. That’s the law. DO IT! It’s not worth losing anymore money over this crap. DO NOT be afraid. They are more afraid of YOU than you should be of them.
Hi Mari, We have a TS on silverleaf too here in TX and i cancelled the property 2 weeks ago because of financial difficulties, i stopped the payment but they keep calling me that we cannot cancel the TS because it’s a secured loan. Also, they keep asking me, to lower our monthly payment, but no matter how much they will lower we can’t really afford! My question to you is, are they calling you too and asking the same question what they asked me? Did they tell you that you cannot cancel the property. Please let know. I will apprciate anything you can share.
My TS is on the island of St. Thomas, USVI. IF you enter into negotiations you are harming yourself, and your re-setting your time given you to let the clock run out on this debt. As far as it being a “secured” loan, what are they securing you???, a week a year??? IF it’s a secured loan the ONLY thing they can take away from you is what is up for security, which is the TS. If you don’t want it, it doesn’t matter. Let them repo it. As one person stated on this site, he/she did a bankruptcy and included the TS and the judge just laughed at it saying it was of no consequence. Send the cease and desist letter I’ve posted on this site. If you can’t find it, let me know and I’ll re-send it. Mail it CERTIFIED/RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED so you have PROOF that they got it, cause they have to SIGN for it and then the receipt part of it is sent back to you as proof that they got it. Once they receive it, BY LAW they CANNOT contact you anymore, period, by any method; mail, fax, email, phone. IF they think they can repo the TS, then that’s the blessing. Don’t stress over it.
Mary – what is the cease and desist letter for? I sent it by fax, but still getting calls. Thanks!
Hello Mandie, Here another timeshare cancellation scenario: We’ve had it since 2007! We are with Westgate Resorts, headquarters is in Gatlinburg, TN. Current on Maintenance fees and monthly pymts. Bad investment cant afford it anymore… Owe about $7300! What are the tendencies of Westgate? What are the TN laws according to timeshares as real estate?
For those concerned about their credit reports
By US federal law, all 3 of the major credit reporting agencies are required to provide you with a FREE copy of your credit report, once every 12 months, for the asking.
Foreclosures, as well as other negative items on your credit report are supposed to be removed after 7 years, but this isn’t always done, so it pays to check your credit report every year. If any negative item past 7 years remains, all you have to do is write a letter to the credit reporting agency advising them, and it will be removed. (Bankruptcies however remain for 10 years.) I recommend sending your letter via certified mail.
Even before that 7 year period however, it is possible to have negative items removed that you feel are inaccurate or incorrect. All you have to do is write a letter to each one of the 3 credit bureaus that have placed that negative item on your report, and dispute any and all negative items you do not agree with.
After disputing a negative item, the credit bureau then sends a letter to the creditor, who is required to provide proof that you owe that debt. The credit bureaus only give creditors about 30 days to respond, and if they don’t respond within that 30 days, the disputed item is removed from your credit report.
Responding to these types of requests costs your creditors both time and money, and you might be surprised how many of them simply don’t respond. Especially not for debts that are: a) for smaller amounts, b) more than a couple years old, or c) they have too many more important things to concern themselves with, d) they don’t have any extra personnel they are willing to spare the time on to look up your records, e) their record keeping never was the best and who knows where your file might be? and/or f) they already transferred the debt to a collection agency, wrote it off their books, and don’t care enough about your credit report to bother exerting any further effort on a “lost cause.”
The Federal Trade Commission provides very good instructions on how to go about obtaining your annual FREE credit report instantly, from the ONLY official website, set up by the 3 major credit reporting bureaus for that very purpose, as well as how to dispute negative items and have them removed from your credit report, at their official govt. site, here: http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/credit/cre21.shtm
Best of luck to all.
After 5 months of not paying on our timeshare, we just received a Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure on our Wyndham timeshare. It does not, however, take care of the maintenance fees that we owe. I believe my husband is just going to pay those so we can FINALLY be done with it. Stick to your guns when they keep calling you. Don’t give in and let them talk you in to making a payment!
Jeannie,
Good for you, I stopped paying Feb 2010 Wyndham TS ,and Ive been waiting for the deed in lieu of foreclosure..but what i received was 1099-A IRS thing/ but i put the cost of the contract so it is wash…Im still waiting for any foreclosure documents, my credit is lowered now but I dont care anymore.
has anyone ever gotten sued by a timeshare?? i have a westage and have stopped paying for about 5 months now. i was breaking my head trying to figure out a way that i can make this go away but in all honesty, even that costs money, which i dont’ have. so i have decided to stop paying. at this point, i don’t really care about my credit (has gone down due to bills that were paid late) but what i don’t want is for these jerks to come back at me for the rest of the money, in which case the judge will probably side with the TS and make me pay it – so there goes my money, my credit and my sanity. I have had Westgate since 2004, purchase for $7300 and by now in calculating the number, I have paid Westgate over $11,000. the last time i spoke to a Westgate rep and asked them how much I owed towards the property, they said over $5000!!!! NOPE, DONT’ WANT TO DO THIS ANYMORE. This really pissed me off and I refuse to give another dime. but it seems as if we are not protected but they are!! so i’m afraid of being sued over this POS TS.
anyone ever been sued?
Sounds just like my story. NOPE, just don’t want to do this anymore. We stopped paying our maint. fees 2 YEARS ago and they just now started with the calls. I immediately faxed them a cease letter, and that WILL stop the calls. As far as I know there are no federal laws (which they claim there are) governing timeshares. Some timeshares are hooked to your credit, some are not, but I don’t care if mine is or not, my credit is ruined anyway, and in case any of the folks out there reading this don’t already know this…IF THE FEDERAL GOV’T looses it’s AAA credit rating, SO DO WE, so credit ratings are soon a pointless issue. We will be sucked down the sink hole along with the gov’t. Yes, I know I sound like Glenn Beck, but I’ve known this for more years than he’s been on FOX. I’m not even late on my car or house payments but if I’m the least bit LATE the start harassing me. Between yesterday/today I told Bank of Amer to go after people who don’t pay their bills and leave me alone. I’ve NEVER missed a house payment. I know I am straying from the course of this topic, but it all feeds into one another. DO NOT BE SCARED. Stand up, you DO have rights, and DO NOT let anyone intimidate you! We are all going to lose anyway. The only way we can fight the system is to vote every 2/4 years, otherwise there is no other voice we have. I do not apologize if I’ve offended anyone, but the truth’s the truth. Get ready for it…it only gets worse!
After being pressured to no end on our last vac My wife signed a new contract with diamond resorts. after we got home she lost her job and I was injured at work. We asked for help but were denied. We never since the start of contract made pmt or took possession of property. We notified them we were relinquishing our “points” .the harrassing calls and letters are starting. All I can say is do not ever get involved in a timeshare and if they continue I will make the trip to some of their properties and be sure to start warning all prospective people to RUN RUN RUN!!!!
Hi All,
In my case we are stopping payment on TS on the fact that we were mis leaded, cheated and the TS was sold under false pretense. We realized it within two months and I am fighting with all the people involved. Got the little weasels on my Tape- recorder, cheating words and everything false, god knows if I can use this against them. Little help here please. Stopped paying since this month.. thanks
We have a timeshare with DRI. We stopped paying in February. I originally called and let them know we couldn’t pay any longer. Was told they could do nothing. Then I went on their forum and posted my issue. Was contacted again and then told they could do nothing. So I stopped payment. Now I am getting calls but have an app to block them and auto hang up. LOL. So I eventually got a certified letter that had a mutual release form in it. On the form is says that the TS must be paid in full. That isn’t happening. I owe on this and will not send them $10k just to give it right back to them. It’s total bull. I sent them an email about their practices, the fact that maintenance fees are out of control and that they have now made the TS more costly than just booking a vacation on my own. I could never find an open week that fit my schedule anyway. I always had to settle for less. Then I got rooms that were smelly and outdated. What the hell are the maintenance fees for? I think they are to pad the TS exec’s pockets. My vacations will be cheaper without the TS and I’ll be able to go whenever and wherever I want. So I’m walking, and not even stressing. I don’t care about my credit score. It’s never that hard to find someone to loan you money. Even higher interest rates will still cost thousands less than paying into a bottomless pit of timeshare for years to come.
My husband and I are apparently big suckers. We have two TS with Wyndham and one with Orange Lake. We did use them and enjoyed them, but finally just could not pay them anymore. So we made our last payment to Orange Lake in June or July, 2010, and stopped paying Wyndham in October 2010. Wyndham has called frequently, both home and my work phone, but those calls stopped a while ago and it was turned over to collections. (We still owe on all 3 contracts). Orange Lake called a few times, and keeps sending statements, but they have been much less bothersome. Over the weekend we received a letter from Orange Lake saying our account was being cancelled due to non-payment. I’m not sure if that means we are done with them or not, but it sounds promising.
Ah, another orange lake user.
To be honest, the years that I have had the timeshare, I have had holidays in the US, Tenerife and here in the UK. They all have been rearly good and haven’t had a problem.
Then I lost my job. When the redundancy money ran out 10 months later, I called orangelake to discuss the situation. Out of work 10 months, blah blah, used my redundancy money to keep up payments etc. They wernt interested. I stopped payments around Dec 2010. Eventually I got a call from Frank. He was understanding, explained what was going to happen, good. Mind at rest.
Week later got another phone call demanding payment. Then got emails “we have some important information for you”… Rearly ?? Ok, phoned to get your credit card is about to expire, please process a new number. Luckily I used a prepaid dollar credit card so no unexpected payments went out…
I got a job on march so I was able to make a payment with my remaining savings. Now i discover my new wage allows us to scrape through with a few pounds left after paying the mortgage and utility bills.
My wife had a conversation with them yesterday to discuss options and there revised payment plan is $550 instead of the $347 we were paying. How is that helping us ?
At this time, I would rearly like to keep the timeshare but just can not afford it and OL just do not want to help. I offered $50 per month until such time when I can increase the payments to pay off the delinquency but, they aren’t interested
So I feel my only option is to stop payments completely.
Elane please post updates and I will do likewise. If anybody else has received a DIL, please let me know as OL suggested advertising in my local newspaper ??? Erm… Don’t think so…
Cheers
Pete
Pete,
You know, Me too i enjoyed the TS benefits, but when crisis come, especially on this hard economy ,its not our priority people loose their homes why cant loose the TS ? its just a luxury. Hope this become an issue or headlines I’ve been waiting ..Me too Ive lost my good credit,but at least I have saved the money,we can recover credit score. ,but we have to save our future..its a curse for our children it wil be passed on generation to generation never ending charges..so we have have to stop it now,we can have good vacation without buying TS.
One more thing, as long as you are paying your mortgage and maintenance fees, these scums( sales people, managers) are very goody goody and very sweet to you, they will promise to be there for you, to help you, but the minute you have some dispute or you stop paying they don’t even want to talk to you its just as if you are a disease and your phones are not going to be answered. The QA ??? Manager won’t even talk to you with whom you signed the paper, he’ll simply say i’ll call you tomorrow which never happens. RON is absolutely right just walk away, and same goes for these other spammers who say they will help you rid of your TS, no they just want your hard earned money. I’ll post my experience again about how its going.. thanks.
to all,
I will keep you posted as everyone keep me posted and whst ever work we can all benefit!! Thanks Jackie
To all,
I guess I will stay with transfer america and spend 1700.00 and see what happens. If they do indeed put someone, a compay- else on the deed It will get me off the hook. If in one/two/five years or whenever from now they come back at me I’ll keep the paperwork and just refuse at that point to pay anymore. If this does work I’ll let you all know and give you my rep name, if you tell them i sent ya i get 100.00 and that will help me eat the cost. If this does work it is worth the money and WE ALL should benefit cause I know how all of you guys feel-IT HORRIBLE!!
We did use a transfer company. It cost $1900, we gave them the deed. They e-mailed a poa form that we signed and sent back. After a couple of months I called the resort and the title to our week had been transferred to a corporation that had something to do with wine. No maintenance fee ($600) statement this year for the first year in 20. We did utilize our week, exchanging it every year, and at first it made sense because for a reasonable amount, about $350 we had a nice week in a one bedroom with full kitchen, usually a bath and a half, and usually a jacuzzi. Now, with the maintenance fee, the exchange fee, and the RCI membership we were paying over $800 for that week. One thing with a transfer company, you need to have your unit paid for, and your maintenance fee needs to be current. I was apprehensive after we paid the transfer company’s representatives. We had actually walked out of the meeting. But when we got to our car we decided to just take a chance and hope for the best. It worked out. We are rid of the timeshare. I’m sure the transfer co. made out like bandits. They got the fee from us, and the title transfer co. was part of their co. Then They bundled a bunch of the timeshares from the resort we were in and,I’m sure,sold them for a good price. I wouldn’t bet every timeshare transfer co. is legitimate, because as we all know, that industry is full of scammers. And I think I have talked to all of them, but we got lucky.
Hi Dave
Were looking at a transfer company right now. Which one did you use?
I say Don’t pay another single penny on this timeshare crap. In fact, I just got my postal “return receipt” from my cease and desist letter I sent to the collection agency. They can no longer contact me in any way, shape, or form. It only cost me $5.00 and change. Only their FEAR tactics are causing these “transfer” companies to arise. Have you thought that maybe these “transfer” companies are owned by your TIMESHARE COMPANY? Think twice before you give such money away after you’ve already paid SO much already. Take back your RIGHTS and kick them in the rear. Refuse their fear mongering and just launch your return attack. Here is a sample of a cease and desist letter:
To: (company name, address, date)
From: (you)
Re: Hereby cease and desist from all further contact with me concerning the collection efforts regarding my MAINTENANCE FEES.
Signed: (you)
Now, send it CERTIFIED MAIL, RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED via post office. Keep ALL receipts. If you do NOT receive your receipt back which is your verification that they did receive your cease/desist letter, it WILL hold up in court if they continue to pursue you. NOW GO FOR IT!
for the link to the Timeshare user group with duscussions about another shill talking about Ann Pellegrino
search on google for
pellegrino law office tugbbs
the only posts by this “guest” were the three in this thread, and they were never heard from before or since.
Those of us who have really been through it are telling you there is no lawyer, no donation company, no timeshare escape company anywhere that wants to help you. There is only one option – walk away, walk away, walk away. Why do people insist on continuing to believe there is a magic solution. The criminals stole from you once, if you let them continue to rob you, then you have no one else to blame but yourself. Don’t listen to any advice besides walking away. It is not genuine, and there are other motives involved. Can’t make it any clearer.
I completely agree with Ron. A year ago, I was fool enough to be talked into buying a week with Vacation Village in Florida (near Disney), so I could be a good grandma…yes, I was guilted into it. Never did see my actual unit, only a demo. I tried to cancel the deal after being home and back to work….realizing I had made a big financial mistake. I was not within their 10 day recession limit to cancel, so they would not help me. I have not made any payments other than the down payment, and have received all the threats via phone and mail as you others have.. Contacted a local lawyer by phone, and he advised as Ron did to just ignore them. It will cost them a lot of money to sue through the court system in both Florida and the state I live in, so after they get their jollies out of harassing (don’t know how long that may be) will offer a deal to take it back. If it really is that great of a place, you would think they would be “johnny on the spot” to just sell it to another person who can afford it and enjoy it. I will never step foot on the property again and will never refer any friends.
It has been reported on my credit report. I have to live with that. These TS sales tactics really need to be reprimanded publicly and penalized for the pressure method they use. Thanks for being there Ron….it takes continued reminders to keep the posters calm and not to chase the so called TS rescuers that will just take more money.
on Thursday, more than three years after we stopped making payments to a florida timeshare, I received a letter saying that they were going to turn our account over to CUI. They also had a sentence in red that we should consider giving the weeks back to the association.
I called yesterday, and they had me fax back a copy of their letter saying that we wanted to give back the weeks, and told me that they would send a quit claim deed.
We are hoping the deed arrives so that we can have this one go away.
We have several weeks that bought many years ago on ebay, that we can no longer afford, so these are only maintenance fees that we have not paid for more than three years.
Hello All,
Update on my situation. Fist I have not finished on paying on my TS. I have stopped making payments on my TS and Maintenace fees since Nov of 2009. I have a TS with Palm Beach Shores. For the last almost 2 years I was receiving phone calls on my home and cell phone to make a payment. For the new people on the site just take the time to read through all of them, before asking questions. You may find your answer in one of the posts.
I am an American and I live in the midwest. So far my credit has not taken a hit. I have paid my credit cards, home mortgage, car payment on time. My credit cards I pay in full each month. All they (TS) can do is look into your credit. I noticed on my credit they do a hard inquiry which can do a little effect on your credit score, but no major damage. I have notice on my credit report that the collection agency (who is trying to get the money for unpaid maintenance fee) listed is on there now, but still no major hit on my credit score. My credit score is 723 which is pretty good since I have not made a payment with them in almost 2 years.
Anyway, I received a phone call (message) saying they will not call me anymore that they will move on to the next step (whatever that is). So a week or so went by and I got another call for me to contact them to make a payment…LOL Mind you…I have not picked up the phone or answered their calls. Cause all they are going to do is ask for a payment even if it’s for a $10.
Don’t make one payment…than it will start the whole process again!
For you who are worried about your credit score…who cares. Just ask yourself this one simple question. What’s more impotant? Keeping a roof over your head and make ends meet or pay on a timeshare you will never be able to use? So stop asking questions about what’s going to happen to you. If you take the time to actually read some of the other posts you will get your answers.
I am prepared for my credit score to take a hit, but at least I won’t be stuck with them for the rest of my living life. I can deal with bad credit. AFter all they weren’t listed on my credit score when I was making my payments on time. So, why would they be listed when I’m started stopping making payments???? Answer yourself that question.
For you guys who are out of the country. Why are you so worried??? They can’t do anything to you. It’s a lot easier for you to walk away vs. a USA citizen. No, they can’t stop you from coming into the country…that’s absurd.
Thanks Erica,
In the same boat as yourself, but still have a long long way to go. I will post my whole story one day. Still waiting on something. We just made 2 principal payments plus one down payment and not yet paid any maintenance fees ( The first maint. fee was due this month) and now stopped the payment since this month. We realized that we were mis leaded within 2 months of signing our contract which was in November 2010. My pleadings and calls to all the managers, sales department, reconciliation department didn’t change anything yet. So we stopped paying since march. Hopefully we get some positive answers because once the Manager was asking me ” is this about the money or is it about the misunderstanding in our sales pitch?” I said there is no misunderstanding but its clearly a white lie you told us. They don’t want me to call them anymore now unless it is for TS club points or I want to upgrade my TS ( yeah right). So whoever calls me regarding the promotions and some other things regarding this particular TS, I start with my story about how I was duped by them. Hope everyone gets to know about my story and somebody from anywhere helps me and thousands others like me who were lied to and got cheated. Thanks to all the TS owners for being there for each other and I am all for a big march and exposing these guys, TV station, news Channels, News papers, community awareness whatever, I am all for it. Thanks once again.
heck yeah! this crazy companies got the guts to report us when we dont pay them and we were paying them on freaking time, they dont. well, keep me posted. i stopped paying this march 2011 after waking up on the hell of timeshare. lets see how it goes. I havent heard of anybody who went to jail for not paying debts. hopefully we get a deed in lieu of foreclosure. they said the foreclosure only takes 90 days instead of 180 days. not sure. lets see.. keep us updated.
Keziah,
Hi! Is your TS fully paid? We just paid the down payment and 2 months mortgage , when we realized that they mis-leaded us, Stopped paying them since March 2011 too, so we are in the same boat unless your TS is fully paid off. I’ll keep you posted and I am going to call there sales department in few days which is in Florida and ask them to take this TS back, lets see what happens. Now I am glad that we realized this fraud early and didn’t pay them year after year. We bought in Nov 2010, and stopped in March 2011. Is anybody in this forum knows anyone from TV channels, Oprah, news paper if so please come forward and lets help each other. I visited a TV station last Thursday a field trip for daughter, but now I feel that I should get in touch with them somehow and expose this fraud, GOD Please help me. Thanks,Ruth..
Let doing it let me know and
I am ready to help you, I got
more people scammed from TS
so I can email them. Let me know.
Hi ruth,
I’m not fully paid. We have this since 2007. We’ll lets see how this whole thing turns out. I just spoke with a lawyer today and he said he’s gonna talk to another florida lawyer and look for a way out. This is a night mare but not paying them, feels good. I was thinking about writing them a letter, telling them i could not pay them anymore. i dont know what to do. some people say, dont talk to them at all and wait for WDILF.. so im still hanging in here! Goodluck!
I don’t think writing does anything at all. I tried writing to Wyndham when we first started having money problems, a couple of years ago. I never got a response. I think they probably just laughed and tossed the letter.
the key is not to send them any money since that only resets the clock that lets them harass you for up to four years (statute of limitation).
in the worst case, they can harass you for almost the statutory time, but then will have to either foreclose or do a deed in lieu.
I will never understand the logic they have that somehow the collection agency will get you to pay if you haven’t paid in the first year or two. I think they will change to shorter times since more and more people are unable to make payments these days, and the timeshare companies need to resell the weeks to someone who can pay the fees.
Bill & Mile, (to others on list, I apologize, you can ignore this)
OK, I started this and I’m sorry. I did not mean to imply I endorse nor necessarily recommend Ms. Pellegrino Esq. I was merely relating my experience how I dealt with my TS affliction. Bill, if you are so afflicted you have my deepest sympathies and I hope you find relief soon and inexpensively in whatever manner you see fit.
I am just an average joe like you, working at a university here in the midwest for the next 3 years (until the grant runs out or the congress cuts the funding) and had managed to finally pay off the mortgage on the albatross. Had I known about the “if it’s not on your credit report” aspect I would have defaulted because I don’t recall it ever appearing but it may have.
Be that as it may, I wasn’t comfortable with stiffing these guys, fearing the wrath of bill collectors hounding me and my aging parents who live with me, I chose to enlist Ms Pellegrino. By what I’ve learned in just the most recent postings had I just suffered the calling all I would have had was 1099 Misc earnings to pay taxes on for the maint. fees, along with the calls and letters of course.
So, Bill it’s your choice. Mile, it too is your choice to contract with Ms Pellegrino, I hope she helps you like they did me. Bill, what ever you choose to do, my you find the least expensive option that makes your problem go away and your life better. May all time share salesmen/corporations/moguls go straight to Satan’s pit, this goes for car salesmen and some lawyers (my exe’s in particular).
Sincerely, Wayne
Thank you for your comments, You are a good person try to share your thoughts and I appreciated you did is been very helpful to me. Have a great day.
HI,
Let me say first that the credit report story being pushed, that if they don’t show the payment they can’t report — is totally wrong.
The problem hitting your credit report is the collection agencies that report that you are having collection activity against you. So all those creeps that call you looking for you to send money are the ones who report you as in collection — not even saying that it is a timeshare.
Also,
It is the general feeling that people like Mile are shills for scams
here is a link to the timeshare user groups about these people
and the shilling they are doing to get people for lawyers
Oh my gosh you really are a sick man.
Do you need help to manage your anger???
to Wayne I was just contacted by Pelegrino this even wants 2500 to file fraud against Wyndham. My TS is also paid in full and said they may not be able to get any money back for me and if they do they get 10% of my settlement. Why would they charge me 5 times the price you
paid if it is not just one more scam. Please let me know how you make out with this lawtyer
That is an absurd amount of increase in fees between 2009 and 2011. I have previously disavowed any kind of recommendation of Ms Pellegrino but with the prices she has been quoting recent people like you and Mile(?) and her $3000 number I can only say this again,
I do *not* recommend Ms Pellegrino. If you choose to use her services, do so knowing her prices have changed immensely since my experience in 2009. I have had no contact after I sent my package to their offices in 2009, so I am *assuming* my deal is done. My evidence is no calls from collectors and no mail from Celebrity.
I apologize to all those who pinned their hopes on using Ms Pellegrino for a reasonable fee, I have nothing to do with her personally and again I say, All I did was use her services and relate the tale to the group. Some faction(s) want to pillory me by saying I shill for these people and I do not.
I believe now is good time to unsubscribe from this group. The angry tenor of some contributors detracts from the benefit people garner from hearing peoples escape stories. If I had different circumstances, I would have done what many have advocated and simply stopped paying which would have solved the problem eventually, given mine was paid off.
All the best to those who are shackled by a TS. May you be free if you seek it, and may your fees stay reasonable if you like your TS. Mine was an albatross.
-Wayne
I think it is pretty obvious that this board has now been attacked by someone trying to get everyone to sign up with Ann Pelegrino.
Shame on you!
You have now lost any possible belief that what you are posting over and over is real.
Go take your user-frienldy lawyer to another site, along with the donation site and those who will just take your TS.
Mr.Bill don’t get nasty I am not pretend that anybody sign with her what are you talking about Sr. I am in the same boat us every one here, I don’t know her, she isn’t mine friend I got her information from a guy in this page march 6/2011, he share he’s experience my apologies to you Sr. for my comment, I share the information for who ever need that’s all, very sad that we can’t express our thoughts or good Ideas because people insulting other people. Have a blessing day.
you should just go away
it is obvious that you are a troll trying to get business for a lawyer. You say you paid a lawyer who did nothing, but now you are ready to pay $3000 more to another lawyer because someone here said they did well.
just about everyone of your messages has her name with your recommendation, and your e-mail so that you can collect e-mail addresses to send spam to hard sell people to use your lawyer.
do you think that because all of us are stuck with a Timeshare we can no longer afford that we will send you money?
or are you just a new version of a Nigerian scheme to steal down payments?
Hi Mile,
I am in TOTAL agreement with you!! Like you, I gave some advice and was treated like a criminal by a few disgruntled folks. They don’t want to hear possible solutions; just complaints. I wish you all of the best.
PS: Are you Croatian?
Here’s my story: I found this website sometime last year and feel compelled to write because I feel sorry for you guys who are so scared, because even though I am a little bit, it’s just not worth it when there’s so many other important things in life to focus on.
Purchased a Fairfield Resourt TS at the end of 1996.
It’s pd off, and pretty much unused. The maint. fees dbld from $400 to $800 by 2007.
I had tried to sell it and/or give it away to no avail.
Maint fees due in Jan. 2008—I made the decision to not send any more good money after bad and to deal with the consequences when the time comes.
After a month or so, a company called Aspen called looking for payment. I told them they could have my TS–yeah, right. Tried calling Fairfield to talk to someone about having them just take it back—couldn’t get anyone.
Phone calls for collection kept coming–I just let them go to voicemail.
July, 2008 I got my 1st (threatening) letter. I filed it.
Dec, 2008 a 2nd letter–filed it.
June, 2009 a letter from Pinnacle-new collection agency.
To this date, I get a couple phone calls a week from Pinnacle and a couple of letters from them a year. All phone calls go to voice mail which I then delete.
I check my free credit report every year–which everyone is entitled to.
As of a month ago, 3 years after I stopped paying, I don’t see anything about my delinquent maint. fees on my credit report.
I purchased my Timeshare in Fla. and I live in NJ.
I owed no principle only maint. fees.
I also own 2 homes of which one has a mortgage. After loosing my job and using most all my unemployment to pay the mortgage, I finally had to stop paying that last year. Now THAT is on my credit report, but not the past due TS maint. fees.
However, what I did receive for each of the 3 years was a 1099 Misc. for the unpd maint. fees which is supposed to be considered income on my tax return. (I don’t know if an unpd mortgage on a time share would hit your credit report).
To sum up, I think I’ve convinced myself that given the terrible state of the economy–especially housing in the dumps and unemployment at record highs with no end in site–I’m not sure of the TS owners legal rights, but I can’t believe they’re going to have much luck in the courts trying to collect from us unfortunates who bought into these loosing investments. Actually, I’m hoping there is some kind of outcry that gets this into the national spotlight, so that some sort of resolution can be made. In the meantime, I can wait for the consequences.
Does anyone have knowledge of or have had dealings with “Timeshare Answers”. A company (NOTLAWYERS)that will get a Release of Lein from the TS companys. I’m working with them, and will keep everyone posted as to their results. TR
I have been “working” with them since Oct./Nov. . Once the fees are paid in full you don’t seem to hear a lot out of them. I have 3 contracts so I had to pay the fee 3 times. I’ll let you know how it goes but so far I am feeling scammed again.
Please they can’t putting you in jail, better advise from another person get lawyer a good one, I am hiring now one that I got from here her name is ann pellegrinno google her, the person in this time share forum said that she helped him to get ready his time share, of course I wasn’t the lucky one she charged him $500 dollares, I guess because the propierty was pay in full, for me they want it
$3000 cash before the case star but I’m planning to do because we don’t ruinning out credit, so I have not other choices, good luck my email is milegon@yahoo.com
be careful. Dont pay any upfront fees.. and 3000 is a lot. Check that person first, i dont think we should trust her.
No upfront fees ever!!! Once bitten twice shy.. I am still waiting for answers to my Questions above.
Milena
My property is paid in full also and they want 2500 for me and 10 % if I get any cash refund from Wyndham. Sorry not taking the plunge yet? Sounds like yet another scam!!!!
Hi Barb,
Because my timeshare was paid in full, I was able to donate it thru Timeshare Angels and get a $5000 tax credit. Call them to see if you qualify for donation! Like you, I had maintenance fees quarterly and was still able to donate it at ZERO cost!! It’s worth a try. Their number is: (510)744-1875. Good luck!!
Hi Ron,
I am sure there are answers to my question here but I don’t know whom to trust now. Please let me know if I still owe money to my TS and then stop paying what would happen? Can they really seize your property if you have signed lien? And once foreclosed how much is the IRS tax we need to pay. Is there such thing as perpetuity on your time share maintenance? Is there anyone who stopped paying and got rid of TS forever. Please let me know. Can they really drag you to the court and put you behind bars? what if you don’t have any assets and still owe a huge amount on your house mortgage, in such case what happens to your home? Can they come after your kids for the payment? I read somewhere when they call parents for money, but what really happens after the foreclosure, what is the process.. Please please answer these questions. Thanks in advance -Rucha
I’m in a similar boat as you. I owe a lot on my timeshare mortgage and stopped payments for both mortgage and maintenance fees about 6 months ago. I would really like to know someone who walked away and wasn’t sued from this. My mortgage has now gone to collections. My initial thought is to just walk away from it and let it foreclose and take a hit on my credit, based on the majority advice in this blog, but after getting a collections letter, I thought I should ask a lawyer if there is anything that can be done on their end to get me out of the contract. He said that because I owe so much, they will not just let it go, it will not foreclose, that they will sue me, take all my assets, take my savings, if any, and garnish my wages to get their payment. That this just won’t go away. I asked why I can’t just foreclose like any other mortgage out there and he said it is not the same kind of debt or contract so they won’t. I don’t know if he is being honest or just trying for my money.
Some say on this blog that they won’t garnish wages or take anything, but I would like to hear from someone who still owed a lot on their mortgage, walked away and nothing came of it other than a hit in credit. I seem to read a lot from those that don’t owe on their timeshare and walked away from must maintenance fees and wonder if I am in a different situation when I owe $30K+ still on my timeshare. Thanks!
Ally,
I have/had a contract with Wyndham owed $60,000+ on the remaining balance on the mortgage. I stopped payments in Oct. 2010 & I received a DIL in FEb. I also have 2 smaller contracts that I stopped payments on in Nov. and I am waiting for DIL on those. We took a hit on our credit but, no foreclosure, no garnish & no selling off my assets. I don’t know who you talked to but just STOP payments!I was amazed that my larger conrtact was actually let go first! Good luck!
Wow, that is great Susan! That is exactly the scenario I am hoping for. I haven’t received a DIL yet or anything from them other than to pay up and I stopped in November 2010. It is now with collections. Did you contact them in any way asking for the DIL or did you have lawyer send them a DIL request? Or did you just wait it out and eventually they sent that to you? I’m with Tahiti Village so it might be different with them. Did yours ever go to collections? Were you ever threatened you would be sued or wages garnished? Just wondering if that is expected but nothing comes of it or if it is real and they actually do it to people. Thanks so much for you reply.
Ally,
Mine did go to collections-so I got all the calls and put up with it for about 2 weeks then I sent them a fax to stop calling my home, cell & work numbers & they did- now I only get letters which is great. I did not ask for the DIL they just sent it. They to my knowledge are not allowed to garnish wages and the only form of “sueing” they do is to foreclose. That cost them money so they would rather you give it back in the DIL form. Just wait it out ! Good Luck!
Thanks so much for your reply! I appreciate it and it gives me much comfort!
Forgot to mention that all creditors stopped calling after they received a bankruptcy notice. My other username is wazzat here and they were all screened anyway. Wynless sent my deed release to my lawyers last week and I won’t be paying them another cent. It has to go to my hearing trustee and then Wynless. If returned to Wynless within 10 days I’ll receive a $125 check from Wynless. Not nearly the $33k I’d spent on the Fairfield TS. WHEN WYNLESS TALKED ME INTO CONSOLIDATING LAST SPRING, THEY TOOK AWAY ALL MY RIGHTS TO COLLECT ANYTHING I’D SPENT. But, I became a VIP in Wash., D.C. National Harbor! FEEL THE PRESTIGE!
Chapter7 bankruptcy cost me $1500 plus another hundred in costs. They won’t take my car, house or attach wages. Nor take my 401k or IRAs. If I had a lot of life insurance, vacation property, a large valuable collection, lots of cash, they’d take those. But I don’t have a house, or anything worth them chasing after. Visited the lawyer referral and 3 lawyer before deciding which to use. In Pa. you must take a pre bankruptcy course and a post-hearing bankruptcy course. 2 “education” courses contacted me and I paid for and took the post BK course before the hearing. They didn’t send the certificate to my lawyer and it was a waste of $15 because I hadn’t attended the hearing as yet. These educators charge $15-$35 per course. Before you go to a BK lawyer you’ll need 2 years previous Income tax filings, monthly bill statements, wage and any income statements, deeds to property and burial, any money accounts and investment statements, list of belongings, life insurance, etc. Be prepared. LAWYERS HAVE FREE CONSULTATIONS, USE THEM. It’s an involved process and you may feel humiliated at times. I’m waiting for final approval after 6 weeks. But no more payments on credit cards or TS. Stopped paying Wynless Jan.12 2011. Quit paying credit cards last month. That’s $1750 Wynless didn’t get. It’ll affect my credit for 10 years. But 2 years from now I can finance a vehicle purchase or purchase a mortgage. Start with credit cards then also if wanted. My beneficiaries won’t be paying Wynless any maintenance fees for the rest of their life. Worth it?
My husband and I tried to file bankruptcy. We thought surely if anyone qualified, we would, since we are up to our eyeballs in debt and my husband has been out of work for over two years. But after being told we would qualify and to stop paying on our credit cards, we were eventually told we did not qualify because my husband’s parents had opened college accounts for our kids and put them in my husband’s name. Even though we had never put a dime into those accounts, it made our assets too high, so we were disqualified. Now we are months behind on all our cards with no way to catch up.
Talk about being between a rock and a hard place. I extend my sympathy to you and hope better times come your way.
Hi-
Sounds like my husband and I are in the same boat as everyone else here. We live in Arizona. We purchased our Worldmark by Trendwest, now Worldmark by Wyndham, timeshare in 2003 and still owe $15000. My husband was unemployed when we got behind on our payments. I made a payment last month and was told that if I made another payment this month I wouldn’t go to collection. Well I received a collection agency notice today in the mail demanding the entire balance in full in 30 days. We haven’t used the timeshare in several years and can’t afford to keep it. We are not homeowners. We don’t know what happens when you stop paying. Do they ‘foreclose’ on use to use the timeshare and are the able to garnish wages? Should I call the collection agency?
I appreciate any tips you can give me!
Cherrie you made another mistake making a payment. i talked to Wyndham financial and they said there’s no first right of refusal. NO BUYBACK. But after 190 days OF NO PAYMENT they would send me a deed in lieu of foreclosure. I didn’t trust them with that either and filed for chapter7 bankruptcy. My lawyer said they could sue during the 190 days and I wasn’t going to give them a chance. When I found out for certain they rent TS even before they allow owners to use I lost all interest. Wyndham is increasing costs, decreasing availability, running TS sales in its own interest. I gave up 2 good Fairfield TSs signing a Wyndham contract. Lost $33k investment but won’t pay them another cent.
IF YOU FILE CHAPTER7 bankruptcy you will lose your credit rating for 10 years. But you won’t be paying the timeshare. Big savings. They can’t take your house, car, attach wages, IRAs, 401ks. If you have other valuable property making it worth their while to sue you they can take your collections, vacation home, guns, if its worth their cost. You may also be liable for any savings or other investments you cashed in the near past. On the flip side you can rebuild your credit by buying a car or taking on a mortgage after 2 or 3 years. Not at the lowest interest rate. you also will most likely receive credit card offers with higher APRs. Pay TS fees forever or bankruptcy? A number of bankruptcy lawyers will provide FREE CONSULTATIONS. Just be prepared to take all papers showing investments, property, loans, bank accounts, past 2 year’s income tax filing. Chapter7 lawyer cost me $1500 and 7 weeks time. Visited the local lawyer’s referral service and visited 3 lawyers. didn’t pay TS since Jan.12 2011. Credit cards since last month. Savings before lawyer expense-$2000. TS savings after-priceless, won’t be leaving beneficiaries any TS debt.
hi. we got a timeshare at west gate resort in florida. we have it since 2007 and now it is being a pain in the butt. We still owe them about 16000 i think and in contract for 10 yrs. we know we are wasting money on this but now i’ve found this website, i thinking of what i should do. Theres 3 of us written on the deed, we were all friends but it looks like it was named just on one person and she receives all the IRS and she is the one who pays the westgate. Now, we are planning not to start paying this april after reading this entire thread. But my question is, how do you think it will affect our credit score? do you think, it will affect the 3 of us or just the main person? we are planning to foreclose this crazy timeshare. one of us owns a condo and she was wondering if foreclosing this thing will affect her mortgage though she’s not the main person Do we just stop paying them and they will give us a note of foreclosure in few months? Do you think they’ll bring us to court? oh my go? it scares the heck out of me since were filing american citizenship on november.. Should we go ahead and look for an attorney or wait until they give us notice? we need help!!!!
AND DO YOU THINK WE SHOULD STILL CONTACT WESTGATE OR NOT?
We have buyer’s regret too. We bought a TS at Westgate by Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas and now we are trying to get rid of this Albatros.We are presently work with an attorney, but no feedback from him yet.
i am looking for a lawyer too. let me know how it worked for you. are you fully paid with westgate? we still owe them about 16000 i think. we are planning to stop paying this april and see how that goes.
I will hired and State Attorney her name is Ann Pellegrino, google her, her name is the ladyofjustices, it is another guy that got ready the time share with her
hope we do too. We don’t want to have bad credit so is better with a lawyer good one of course, we have another lawyer didn’t do anything for us, she has her office in Largo florida, let me know if you want more information about milegon@lyahoo.com
OK, Folks, Stop being so logical and nice about the timeshare companies and collectors. They are thugs, criminals trying to extort money from you after they already robbed you once. Don’t let them suck you into any conversation at all. Just don’t do it!!!!! I don’t know how much clearer to be. Its what you need to do to be free of these evil scum.
What we as a group need to do is get the word out that major corporations like Wyndham, Marriot, Fairfield, and others behind these criminal conspiracies, and they should be held accountable in the world of public opinion. Anything we can do to spread the word and disparage their reputations we should, until it becomes a liability for them to be part of this evil.
Lets doing, please we need to made this public, we
can’t let other people get rip their money like
they did we us, let doing milegon@yahoo.com
I have more people 1 can’t doing it self we are
a lot of people so lets doing now. I am tired to
pay and pay try to sell, pay a lawyer didn’t do
anything, please please I am here for who ever want
to do something.
TIMESHARES SHOULD BE ILLEGAL. IF YOU CAN’T MAKE YOUR HOUSE PAYMENT YOU LOSE YOUR HOUSE, SAME WITH CARS, YOU DON’T PAY, THEY REPO. IF MAD-LYN O’HARE GOT PRAYER TAKEN OUT OF SCHOOLS, WHY CAN’T WE ALL BAN TOGETHER AND GET A LAW PASSED MAKING TIMESHARES ILLEGAL??? BUYING A TIMESHARE MEANS A LIFETIME SENTENCE OF MAINTENANCE AND SPECIAL ASSESSMENT FEES. OR IT MEANS GOING THROUGH HELL TRYING TO GET RID OF IT. HOW CAN WE GET A LAW PASSED MAKING TIMESHARES ILLEGAL???
Agree with you, why we all exchange emails and do that pleas we all talking but haven’t done anything against them that’s why they
continued to scam people, please my email is milegon@yahoo.com
Thank you all for sharing your situations with the rest of us who are struggling through this. I stopped payment in January and tried talking with the TS rep about our situation and she just got nasty and
started threatening me that they could do so much more then just foreclosure. It took everything I had
to make the decision not to keep paying this debt. I had no chose unless I wanted to lose my house which
I can’t do. So far I’ve just received phone calls which I refuse to answer after my bad experience with my
first phone call with their people. I’ve gotten a few emails in which I am debating whether to communicate they way with one person of my choosing to see if there is a way to resolve this situation. I have a feeling this won’t work so what does everyone think. Should I respond maybe once through an email since I won’t be talking to the nasty lady again. Thanks for you input. Eddie
Harassing phone calls? SCREEN YOUR CALLS PEOPLE. With your answering machine, or voicemail. Are you running to the phone everytime it rings? Get over it. My phone message reads “You have reached _____ all calls are screened and SOLICITOR’S CALLS ARE NOT ACCEPTED”. Nips 98% of all sales in the bud. Mike from Wyndham was on the line one time I picked up and I told him I wasn’t here. They still called but all we heard was the phone ringing. Anyone you know would leave a message. Some may be rude and press the phone buttons so that they leave a loud buzzing as a message. I pickup and do the same back. ERRRRRRRRRRRRR.
If that’s what they did they are blatent violation for FCC laws. They should be fined $1000 for each offense if the FCC would just enforce it own rules.
Thanks for your quick reply. Hopefully, they don’t keep calling them and hopefully they don’t have anyone else’s number. I have no idea how they got my parents, especially since they never called me. I am wondering, is it worth it to pay for a lawyer to get involved to help get this process over with, either a deed in lieu or foreclosure or is it not necessary and I should save that money as well and just wait out the storm?
Marie,
You are not alone in this situation. Though I personally didn’t experience my family being called by these collection firms but harassing is really part of their job so people will be threatened to pay. They used to harass me before too but after reading other people’s comment here, I just ignored them. I just turned up the volume of the tv to the max and put the phone near the speakers! lol. After 3 calls and not talking to them, they stopped calling me.
The collection firms are earning commissions if they get people to pay back the fees so it is really normal for them to be rude. It happened to my friend too so all he did was asked his family to hang up immediately or be rude to them as well. You just have to explain to your family though so they won’t be surprised of what’s going on before they get the chance to call your other relatives. But I wonder how they got those info, I can’t remember putting those info when I signed up.
My parents received a call this morning from an agency called Pinnacle saying that it is urgent I call him back regarding my property. He couldn’t get details of the property as he said it was a federal offense. He was awful to them on the phone. I haven’t lived with my parents in years and why would he call them instead of me? I googled the number and it thread came up that the number is a collections fraud for past due maintenance fees on timeshares that they didn’t own and multiple reportings that this company abuses the FTC laws. I haven’t pad on my timeshare mortgage or maintenance fees since October, so I am in arrear. But they will never get my money again. I am willing to foreclose if I have to. But I am wonder if anyone else has had this happen to them and what can be done? Are they going to call all my relatives? Can I get this collection agency to stop calling them? I can take the daily calls but I don’t want my family to get them, especially when he is rude like that to them.
Is anyone going to timeshares in cabo?
demand $300 usd minimum and laugh in their face everytime they tell you to buy their timeshares.
it may take 4 hours, but say no just for the hell of it until they give you the money for coming out.
Hi Ron,
This is Rucha here, Did you get any IRS Tax? We stopped this month and got a call today from TS. I said our TS is in dispute and I am happy that they are recording my call so that everything gets recorded and their dirty lies also gets recorded. Hope to hear from others at what happened to their TS. Haven’t heard from any members from almost a month now. Thanks for all you input here. I know that I am not alone.
Rucha
No – the tax thing, considering an unpaid mortgage debt a credit, only applies if you owe on the initial principle of the timeshare. It doesn’t apply to maintenance fees as there is no asset involved. I think if you owe on the initial purchase, it is more sticky than just walking away from maintenance fees (forced hotel rental fees, extortion fees, whatever). But I imagine that through proper legal channels you could argue to reduce the value of the credit, since the timeshare has zero value anyway. The IRS is a lot more customer friendly these days and will work with you if you just call talk to them plainly.
As a response to some who are looking for options on how to ditch your worthless TS (mine was for sure) here’s a short on how I got rid of mine.
I obligated myself to the TS originally in ’01 owing $6000 on it. Once the job evaporated in ’02 I managed to keep paying on the note until I finally had it paid off (and the maint fees paid along the way) in ’07. Trying to give it back to Celebrity was impossible. I buckled several times trying to not pay the maint fees but eventually got an email from a TS lawyer in Florida (unsolicited BTW). I contacted them and since the TS was paid up except for the ’09 maint fees they took my paperwork on the TS and the lawyer sent them a nasty letter telling them in effect that we were suing them for false advertising and a number of other (actual) torts applicable to the scummy practices they use to entrap new suckers.
I paid the TS lawyer $500 (if you still owe on the TS mortgage they charge $1000) and never heard another word from Celebrity since. My credit score is still in the high 700′s and aside from the other “TS resales” calls trying to sucker you out of money I have been TS free for over a year.
So, if you are trying to save your credit score you need to instead of paying on the TS hire a lawyer versed in dealing with TS companies. My impression is that you have more pull with a lawyer if they don’t come through for you (state bar assn.) whereas the TS doesn’t answer to anybody except the courts (refer back to needing a lawyer).
If this helps anybody else, great. I searched for a legal means for years before I stumbled upon a lawyer who said they knew how to deal with these scum bags. Luck for me, the lawyer did her job and I’m only out $6000+(8 * $300 avg maint.)+$500 = $8900
Do you have a name and phone number, include area code? Thanks, TR
TR,
The lawyer I used was Ann Pellegrino who operates out of Florida, number is 1-866-476-0571, website is w w w.aladyjustice.com I’d suggest a google search for timeshare lawyer and see what comes up because I feel she can’t be the only lawyer who wants to make money off of dispairing TS owners. My experience with her office was OK, no feedback after I sent in the paper trail on my TS but also no more calls from Celebrity about the maint fees. Best of luck!
Please let me know about your
experienced I call, they want
to charge me and arm and a leg
3000 dollars before the case
star I am litle be scare it a lot
money so can you please tell me
anything about her job, she
claim to help us to get ready
the contract I haven’t pay in
full, thank you Milena
milegon@yahoo.com
Milena,
My TS was paid off when I went to Ann Pellegrino’s law firm for help. Actually I was quite suspect of this bunch also because the email came unsolicited. I suspect her prices were low when I used her because she was just breaking into the market (to see if she could make any money suing the criminals) I suspect that her costs were higher than anticipated so she raised her prices to *3* times her previous advertised rate.
So, my situation was a paid up TS that I owed maint fees on. I did pay $500 up front (with trepidation) but once I mailed the info I had on the TS I didn’t hear from them again, nor from Celebrity Resorts
My credit rating did not change and no notations appear about the TS.
So, in my situation Ann P. could get rid of the TS. If you owe too much I suspect the mortgage holder will argue harder to get paid and Ann P. has to pay them off or do more work (I suspect that is where she wasn’t making enough money, paralegals need to be paid).
I checked the BBB in Florida as well as the Florida Bar Assoc. listing on her and she seemed on the up-and-up that is why I chose to pay $500 for her services. I’m satisfied but I won’t guarantee anything because I’ve never met her and only talked with her secretary/paralegal over the phone once or twice during the entire proceedings. I’ve never got anything from her office telling me it’s done, so I’m in the no-news-is-good-news mode.
I sincerely you get out from under your albatross. Mine caused me so much heartache and stress over the years.
-Wayne
Thank you so much for your information, I know your time share was pay in full mine isn’t, hope she will doing her job and I be free from those liers soon. Have a blessing day.
I just want to thank you for your information about Pellegrino Offices, my case was finalizad today, I am very happy, because I am free from the time share. How ever is there scared to do anything please, don’t be scared this women is honesty and she didn’t get any monies recovery but at list I am free and not more worry about my credit. She is the only lawyer I know contacte me all the the time and let me know updates about the cases. Please fell free to email me for help yuo, you are not along. (milegon@yahoo.com)
Who was your lawyer? Every attorney I called wanted nothing to do with timeshares, I just paid a company today 1700.00 to get rid of my timeshare this would have been good info to have.
Hi Jackie, I have somebody attacking me he argued that the lawyer Ann Pellegrino is mine personal friend, please I just share information from Mr Wayne he told everyone here about his time share and contact her last week, I just don’t want this person name bill star make trouble to me to said things that aren’t true, I am in the same boat I am tired to get rip my money, I went to bed last night at 2:30 am informed my self about new law regard to this matter and found that here in Florida a lot resellers company are under investigation for false promises to customer, like that one that I pay 2 year ago, onlytimeshare they are under investigation go to attorney general of Florida, he post all the company that are under investigation in this way we can get our money back as soon as possible, so if your have time get your money back no any company sell our time share they are scammers they want our money and never call back to tell us anything, if you want my email is milegon@yahoo.com I be more than happy to share whatever information I got. Have a blessing day.
Wayne, who was your lawyer? Jackie
Is anyone years out from walking away from this mess.So far 3 months out from stopping payments.I have paid the at least 7,000 and I still owe 12,000 to the scam. So far just phone calls and the threat of turning over to a 3rd party collection agency.Which I think they did because I get 2 or 3 unknown calls that I do not answer every day.The timeshare is from W.gate.just need to know if anyone actually have done it and got away with it. I hear a lot of advice but no one who actually has ditched the jerks.
Haven’t heard from anyone in over a year and I walked away and paid nothing to anybody. Got the creditor calls, snotty email responses from the timeshare scums, and took a small hit on my credit report. Told them to all go to hell, and I still may sue them for defamation of character for the credit report. I’m done – wouldn’t pay them a cent if they were dying on the street in front of me.
Hi Ron,
Thanks for talking about your experience…I’m not worried about my credit taking a hit, but I am worried about getting sued… I’m a Canadian (and live in Canada)… what do you think are the odds of this happening?
Thanks
Hi Alyssa,
I live in Canada and stopped paying since September 2010. So far, I get phone calls everyday and sometimes I answer but all they try to do is make payment arrangements which I will not do. This week they claim that they are cancelling my timeshare and sending me to collections. I’ll keep you posted…
Good for you, congratulations. I just question my self why if this is a debt because we all got a morgage from some where why this debt doesn’t showing on my credit report???, my lawyer said “if the lender isn’t on your credit like others, they can’t report it after you don’t pay, she claim that it cost to them a lot money to do that. So I stopped I wont pay any nickel to those alligators, the funny part is I got my complaint in a website and by accident I did checked again and the seller that rip my money, is very up sad, because he said that isn’t true, he claim to be the most honesty guy in planet to sell time shares hahaha, they all the same. Sorry Mr. seller to make public your lie-rs I am so happy that you are offended I am too for what you told me that isn’t true. My property is at ORANGE LAKE RESORT.
Any updates Ron?
I am about to enter the unpaid maintenance fee dungeon… any suggestions.
In Canada- owner of a paid Carriage Hills unit.
we asked our bank to stop payments for our timeshares (wyndham and rci) and they did. since, you have received your 1099 for irs stuff just wondering if they (timeshare co) attempted to do bank levies on your account. we realy do not have any more extra to pay them but we are afraid that they will levy the money that we only have for mortgage.
hello,hello hello
1099-A issued for TS, an abandonment there is no clear instruction on what to do with it, IRS mentioned that I will still recive 1099-c in the future therefore it will be double taxes…if that’s the case I think 1099-A is just an information purposes that the lender has acquired back the property and I have to wait for the 1099-C for forgiven debt before id will be enterd in Tax return…Any one has experiencing the confusion Please give some inputs ..// Ill appreciate it. Thanks.
Hi MELHAM.
Last year I got 1099-A from Wyndham I paid taxes on it. When your fair market value more then balance on principal on timeshare you wont get 1099-C. After I paid taxes on it haven’t heard from them. Good luck.
Well, Folks now it begins. This is the first month of not paying my monthly payment. I had closed my old checking account that the timeshare had been
drafting from. They already called me and I told them my situation about my
wife having to retire early due to physical reasons. I told her I couldn’t afford it anymore and said they can have it back but she said they can’t take it back. I
said then if you have to foreclose then do so even though I know my credit will suffer. She got nasty and preceded to tell me they can do alot more damage then just foreclosing. She said they could have money taken from my wages at work. I just don’t know how much they really can do. I still owe alot on the timeshare which is not good but keeping my house is more important. I too have been ignoring the phone calls and now email. I’m sure it will get more intense as time goes on. Has anyone actually been taken to court or had their wages garnished? Eddie
i am pretty sure that they have to have a court judgement against you to garish your wages or bank accounts, and that has to be a default judgement for you to not know they are going to do that. (meaning a court date you didn’t show up for) and for that matter, if it is a court judgement, then you would have been able to argue for them to take their collateral back in lieu of payments, IE a foreclosure.
most states do not allow garnishment of wages for unpaid debts. That is saved for child support, alimony and unpaid taxes.
As Ed said, first they have to foreclose on the TS before they could even get a court order, and their lawyers are smart enough to look at credit reports to see if someone actually has assets before going to court for a judgment against cash that you don’t have.
They won’t. Think about it. People all over the US have been walking away for home loans, “home loans”!. If banks can’t force people to pay for legitimate home sales which have gone unaffordable, how does little time share weasel think they can. Its over. Everyone knows the secret now, just walk away and don’t ever speak to them again.
Update….
We stopped paying Orange Lake since September 2010 after paying them just under $2000 since March 2010. We live in Canada and so far our credit is okay. Two days ago I accidentally answered a telephone call from a rep who told me that she is from the cancellation department and wanted to know if I rather let my almost $2000 go to waste or do I want to make a payment arrangement. I told point blank that I will not pay another dime for that useless timeshare and that I lost my job since November. She proceeded to tell me that I can use my unemployment insurance to pay for it. I told her to go to hell and she claims that I will receive some kind of cancellation document in the mail shortly. I will wait and see if they actually send such documents..
Barb,
it will be 1099-c an IRS to be declared as income on your tax return.
..use your unemployment insurance to pay for it….how out of touch can these people be?
I had a similar ‘suggestion’ from my timeshare internal collections to pay my maintenance arrears. They suggested I borrow from friends or family OR take out a loan. That really made me MAD. I said a few choice words on the friends and family thing and as far as taking out a loan? Talk about out of touch. Can barely pay mortgage even after modification, only have SS as income and hubby doesn’t make much these days. Have already told them I cannot afford a payment plan with them but somehow they think I can get a personal loan and pay it back in order to pay them? HUH? Do I have stupid written on my forehead. Account is off to outside collections now.
all collectors care about is having you pay them — they don’t care about your legitimate problems — they just want you to send money so they get their cut. I’m sorry to say, but my experience is that your only choice is to pay forever or to stop paying and let them hit your credit report.
the only good news about the 1099C is that there is an IRS form to ask for forgiveness for paying taxes on the 1099C cash if you can demonstrate that your assets are lower than your liabilities — sort of like the bankruptcy rules without filing bankruptcy.
Bill,
About the 1099C..In our case there is way over 10K in the developer’s bank account for contracted weeks we paid for and can never use. It would take a whole slew of mtce fees over the next years to equal that amount and the interest it has drawn so I don’t think there is any way they can put a value on those weeks for a 1099C since they are the ones who are ahead of the game by us not paying the fees. We are the ones losing our investment. The developers should count it as a windfall.
hi,
the only thing that shows up on the 1099C is the amount due on the mortgage. It is an IRS rule to report this, but I agree that it should not apply to timeshares, and that there should be a way to argue the market value since they turn around and sell it for wnat you originally paid ot more — so how can they say there was no market value?
i purchased a timeshare with the Holiday Inn Club Vacation in Orange Lake FL in Aug 2009. Maintenance fees and payments are getting crazy. i tried sending an email to several different parties of the company and it got returned undeliverable for my salesman and the lady that processed my paperwork. It seems to have gone through to their quality assurance officer and a manager though. Will see how they respond to my situation. I anticipate missing my first payment next week, but my fees are now over a month overdue. I have paid just over $7 grand on a $20,000 dollar timeshare, but I am sure most of that went to interest. My salesman assured me that I would be able to refinance it through my bank. My banker almost laughed. No collateral, no refinance. My credit has already been hit due to some other financial matters so that does not bother me too bad. I just want out from under this timeshare!
Has anyone had closure (good or bad) with orange lake? And how long did it take? What was the outcome?
update,
i still have not paid this years maintenance and tax fees ~800 and am now almost 3 months late on my payments for the timeshare. i get a phone call once or twice a day. sometimes i answer because my cell phone is actually a company phone. today i got transfered to a higher up when i decided to go ahead and talk to them. i said yea, go ahead and foreclose on it, or do a deed in leiu, that would save me from filing bankruptcy. the guy was pissy about that, and said they do not do Deed in lieu. i said ok, foreclose on me then or i will file bankruptcy. he kept saying, i am noting that you are unable and unwilling to make a payment arangement. then he told me to forward them my lawyer stuff when i file for bankruptcy. lol. then i told him to stop calling my cell phone and start mailing all corespondence since it is a company phone. after a couple minute argument about it and me finally saying by law if i request it you cannot call my work # he finally said i would have to submit the request in writing. lol. little weasel dick.
i would prefer to not file bankruptcy, but with some other unsecured debts i have it might end up being preferable. but i think i will wait a bit longer to see what these timeshare guys will do. that will be my last option i think. Stupid Holiday Inn Vacation Club at Orange Lake
I hate to be negative, but take a look on ebay at what comparable timeshares currently sell for.
After you are done being shocked, you will understand the real downside of paying off the timeshare when you will then own something with little value.
How much is your credit rating worth to you?
I think Timeshares are great, but only in a good economy, and I don’t see that anytime soon.
bill, The reason they are on ebay is because people cannot afford them and they are trying to recoup what they have in it.
exactly.
and there are so many people with this problem that a TS week is worth less than $1,000. And for Orange Lake, the highest in the past 10 years at resale is $5,000.
yes, these are the collectors.
no matter what they might say, they only get paid if they collect from you, so their only goal is to get you to send some money. — And if you do, the clock starts all over again on getting out of the maintenance fees.
When you get a letter from the timeshare itself or the timeshare’s lawyer asking about the Deed in lieu, then is the time to respond.
From what i have read these ts people have there own collection agency…I tell them all to go fly a kite. Haven’t payed my maintenance fees in over 4 months now and Pennical collections keeps calling asking me to pay what was suppose to be 300.oo a year maintains fees has gone up to 900.00 I tell them no thanks I don’t want to give my hard earned money to liars. They already got us for 9200.00 why would i give them any more.
you should see if your phone company allows call blocking for specified numbers. Then you won’t even have the annoyance of the phone calls
Got a call today asking for payment. I answered the call this time, since I got a letter yesterday stating they needed to talk to me as they would like to work out something as they are dedicated to helping their customers. HAHA, they just pushed for payment. I told them how they were scamming people and had told us a bunch of lies. I then asked for an address to mail a letter asking them to send all inquiries and notices via mail and desist from all phone calls. I was quite angry by this time and he informed that we had signed the paper and they didn’t force us. We exchanged a few more words and I again told him I needed the address, which he then gave me. I hung up on him, and will send the letter out in the morning. NO more answering the calls as they are lying once again, and have no interest in helping anyone…..they just want their money!
i have stopped paying mine in Kingstown Reef Orlando,will this affect entry into the US if i ever intend going back on holiday?
No one will stop you to come back to US for a reason stopping the Time share. Do come back and visit as many times your visa permits. Don’t let this one bitter experience spoil your life time of great experience of vacation.
rucha is right,TS has nothing to do with your coming back here in US port of entry.
I bought one time share in Canada and one in the US and have defaulted on both . I am a Canadian Citizien. I have too many other credit cards bills and other monthly payments which I am paying on time. Will this still affect my credit score even though I am paying all my other outstanding debts on time.
@sally
yes, mine is perfect score but when i stopped mypayment in TS,it started to go down eventhough i pay everything on time except on TS. just be ready .
yes, the collectors file a collection activity notice on your report, and that lowers the score. This is just the cost of getting rid of the forever maintenance fee payment that increases each year.
http://taxes.about.com/b/2010/02/27/what-to-do-with-form-1099-a.htm Read this article. Call and find out why they sent you a 1099-A and not a 1099-C. Ask them to send to you in writing that the debt has been forgiven. Don’t assume that it has been.
HI Everyone,
Anyone here received 1099-A from Time resorts? if we paid them is it the end of our problem?
Hi everyone,
Just a thought, Can we not expose this nationally, on papers, TV, government. Its a shame that such a fraud is still going on right at this moment as I am typing. If these people are exposed then we will save some 10000 people who are going to buy time share. At least there won’t be any lies on selling these time shares and people who might buy time-share will be well aware of what they are getting into unlike the few unfortunate like us. Please let me know if anyone has taken this to the court, news paper or any others means. Please answer because I am in constant stress and feel as if its going to horribly affect my health, already lost 3 lbs. since last week. Thank you so much.