An Introduction To Timeshare Offers

This is a guest post written by The Timeshare Guru. If you enjoy this post then make sure to check out their site. I’m a newbie when it comes to these offers, so I’d appreciate readers sharing their thoughts/tips/best practices in the comments as well. 

Introduction

It is no secret that timeshares have an awful reputation. When I mention timeshares, most people immediately believe that they are scams, awful deals or only for retirees. Most people are usually introduced through to the world of timeshares while on vacation and agree to attend a presentation for a couple of hours in exchange for money, free meals, points, activities or some other perk.

If you have been to these timeshare presentations, you know that they can be brutal. High pressure sales tactics, being passed to many different salesman before you can claim your gift, and being stuck in these presentations far longer than your agreed time commitment. These high-pressure sales tactics are definitely one reason that timeshares have such a bad reputation.

Despite the reputation, in my opinion, timeshares can be a terrific way to travel in luxury accommodations for very little cost while having tons more space than a typical hotel room if you understand the systems, are flexible, plan far in advance (1 or 2 years) and have a vacation style where you normally stay in one destination for at least 7 days.

Sample Offers

Regardless of whether you think timeshares are great or if you think they are a scam, the offers that you can receive to sit through a sales presentation can be extremely valuable. These types of offers generally come via e-mail or snail mail and generally offer a very reasonable package deal of 2 or 3 nights where you pay a small upfront fee (generally $200-$300) for accommodations in a one or two-bedroom timeshare unit in exchange for agreeing to sit through a timeshare presentation. Many times, you can receive also receive hotel bonus points for attending these types of presentations.

For example, I have recently received an offer from Hilton where, for a $249 upfront fee, you can receive a 2-night stay in New York City in a Hilton hotel in midtown, receive 5,000 Honors points, and receive two $100 vouchers, just for sitting through a sale presentation. You can’t argue that this is not a very valuable offer. The vouchers and points are basically worth the upfront fee of $249 and the nightly hotel rate usually will cost upwards of $249 per night if not much, much more.

The Hyatt Residence Club lists offers on its website where you can receive a 1 bedroom for 3 nights for $199 (total) at the Hyatt Wild Oak Ranch in San Antonio, Texas. Rates at this property can be as much as $400+ per night during high season.

All the major hotel brands have timeshares including Hyatt, Marriott, Hilton, Wyndham, Four Seasons, and Starwood (the timeshares are now called Vistana). All of these timeshares developers provide similar type of introductory offers. Some of better than others but most offers are very valuable and can be a wonderful way of getting a cheap vacation and even profiting from the experience!

How To Get Targeted For Offers

If you wanted to get targeted for these offers, I highly recommend requesting information from the developers. You can request information online and most will immediately contact you. Be honest that you are inquiring about potential ownership and wanted to learn more. Ask if there are any offers for you to experience the properties.

Some will offer deals immediately and others will target you down the road based on the information that you inputted such as state of residence and annual income. They want to make sure that you earn enough to afford a timeshare, I’ve personally never been asked to verify this information.

Here are some good starting points for requesting information:

Once you get on their mailing list, I find that you will start receiving various offers to participate in these vacation offers. Generally, they prohibit you from getting the offers more than once per year but each timeshare is different so you need to read the fine print.
The “catch” of all these offers are that you need to sit through the sales presentation. Sales presentations can be pleasant and informative or they can be a high-pressured sales event where they hold you hostage for hours beyond the agreed time commitment. Most timeshare presentations offered by the main companies listed above can be decent since they have a brand to protect.

Warning & Precautions

Nobody goes into a sales presentation wanting to purchase a timeshare. They know that so they have responses to every single excuse on the book. In my experience, I have found that there are a few good tactics to use to end the presentation quickly.

  1. The Truth: Tell them that you have no interest in purchasing a timeshare and only came out for the benefits. Most salespeople are commission based so they may not want to waste their time on a definitive “no”. Many times, the salespeople are professional and appreciate the honesty. This isn’t always the case so be prepared with some pushback or attitude.
  2. Travel Locations: Timeshare salespeople are very cunning in crafting responses to all potential reasons not to purchase. However, one thing that can be difficult is for them to invent timeshare locations. When they ask you where you want to travel, you can tell them: Bora Bora, Tahiti, Alaska, Denmark, Perth, Australia, and Dubai to name a few. There are timeshares all over the world but if you name a few of these places where there are no timeshares, it can be a difficult comeback to try to get you to buy one where there are no timeshares in all your desired vacation spots. It is kind of hard to say, “purchase a timeshare even though you can’t use it in any of your desired travel locations”.
  3. Research: You can also inform them that you are simply learning about timeshares and will not be purchasing anything today. You can tell them that you have appointments with various other timeshares and will be evaluating all the programs. They will likely indicate that the offer prices are only good for today and if you leave you cannot receive the same offers. Fine – don’t be fooled. You can always buy a timeshare anytime you want – GUARANTEED!

Timeshares have various issues but depending on your vacation style, in my opinion, timeshares can be simply awesome! They are not for everyone and there are many different systems, types of timeshare ownership, ways to exchange and nuances for each program. Regardless of your thoughts on timeshares, the offers to participate in a timeshare presentation can be immensely profitable for as little as an hour and a half of your time.

If you are interested in learning more about the intricacies of timeshares, please take a look at my blog. I’m sure that you will have many questions so please reach out and I will answer them and help you navigate the world of timeshares!

Thanks again to the Timeshare Guru for this guest blog post. My advice is that if you’re easily influenced or suspect you might fall victim to high pressure sales tactics to just give these a miss. They are very good at making these offers seem like an exceptional deal and are used to ‘travel hackers’ trying to game the system. 

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Tom
Tom (@guest_976772)
May 10, 2020 09:41

To find timeshare offers you just need to do a few Google searches for them. You can search by demographic or universal. You would the sign up with those companies. There are like 12 internet based services that are easily found. The keyword searches to do would be timeshare promos, timeshare deals, all inclusive timeshare promotions, timeshare presentations. If you add a specific demographic like Orlando then add timeshare promo you should find quite a few.

John K
John K (@guest_602588)
June 5, 2018 16:05

Just attended a Hilton Grand Vacations deal at the Park Soleil in Orlando, FL. $199 up front got us 3 nights in a 2 bedroom unit at the Tuscany in Orlando. First morning of the stay we had our appt at 11:30am. Lasted three hours, but I was chatty, probably could’ve gotten out sooner if you were a bit more disinterested. Our offer was to get the $199 reimbursed on the original payment and get a “stay the night on us” $200 voucher for a Hampton Inn (you could choose your property: Hampton, Homewood, Hilton Garden, Embassy, something else). Last, best offer:

~4,200 Hilton GV points, worth anywhere from 5-7 nights in a 1-bedroom unit, or 10-20 nights in a studio, EVERY OTHER YEAR, $17,500 + ~$750 closing costs, 10% down, high interest 10 yr note for the remainder, no prepayment penalty. Salesman offered 15,000 bonus points in advance, quite an offer, but we weren’t buying. Maintenance fees: $800-ish EVERY OTHER YEAR, plus $170 ANNUALLY for access to RCI. Great presenation, very up-front, even gave us a light lunch (hot dogs, chips, soda, donuts, coffee).

If I were buying I would’ve considered. I think in a few years after we’ve paid some more student debt/car debt off, I could see us investing in one of these for the long-term, if we could pay off the financing up-front (I hate paying high interest).

S Smith
S Smith (@guest_603541)
June 8, 2018 12:27

VRBO or similar sites. Look at the pictures, stick with a place that is professionally managed and has numerous positive feedbacks. Ya rent it, ya hang out for a few days and ya go home. No fines, fees no surcharges. No lifelong HOA or maintenance contracts haunting your grave, no planning a year or two in advance trying to get a unit in the same town/county/state as the themepark with the talking rat (or wherever) and you don’t have to decide on a buying new car or buying the right to posses points to redeem to rent a room for the next 40 years from a company that could be gone in 10.

I just went to one also (Wyndham San Antonio) and was suspicious of their lack of transparency—no direct answers, no documents to review.

Then started looking at the $1 market and realized even with that, I’m still stuck in a lifelong contract to pay maintenance fees.

Your last paragraph has me worried.
They got In your head. Snap out of it. 😜

S Smith
S Smith (@guest_603720)
June 8, 2018 20:48

Brief amendment. While making my own vacation plans I came across several negative reviews of VRBO, a site I used as a example in a previous post. Apparently a lot has changed with this site since the last time I have used it. Other similar sites may be more reliable. So once again and as always, buyer beware.

KitCat
KitCat (@guest_568578)
March 10, 2018 22:54

I just attended a presentation earlier today with Vacation Village in Weston, Florida and received, as promised, a $200 visa gift card. The $20 deposit I had to pay in advance was added to the gift card, for a grand total of $220. The whole event lasted just over 3 hours, and it was not nearly as bad as what I was expecting. I am not intimidated by sales people as I have lots of experience in sales myself, and the gimmicks they tried on me today were not very advanced and easy to overcome. I never sign anything at the first meeting, which I made clear before we all sat down. Everyone was pleasant and professional, but not overly pushy. The very last deal offered to me when they knew I was not signing a $25k contract was a $1000 deal, which was a timeshare previously owned by someone who has died before paying off his full contract. They told me that it can only be sold for the remaining balance of the contract, otherwise the company incurs capital gains taxes. I cannot verify that for sure, but the annual cost is almost a thousand dollars at this time. If were in the market for a timeshare, I would consider this company but not before doing additional research.

CJester
CJester (@guest_465507)
August 25, 2017 08:58

I love and hate timeshare presentations. But I have been greatly rewarded and keep doing them. The first was 3 nights in Orlando offered at a fair in 2001. We went, got the hard sell, 3 different closes with 2 different people. But in the end we wound up with 2 more 2 night stays. I love how they try to pit us against each other. Asking my wife, “don’t you want to travel like this?” then to me, “doesn’t she deserve to travel like this, why would you deny her?”…lol You have to be prepared as a couple before you go in to know buying is not an option and play it up when they tease. My wife would say, he never gives me anything I deserve…lol. We would play fight for our own entertainment. Every time after the first we would step it up. My favorite was being offered $50 and turning that into 4 blue man group tickets in Orlando. Which at the time were like $89 a ticket (they have since come down). In Vegas we were offered $50 and got a cirque du soliel show for 4. We had one were WE paid $100 for 4 nights in Orlando and 3 nights in Daytona beach. Had to sit through 2 presentations but $100 for 7 days? hell yes! My out is always, I love the idea, but I do not finance things. If I cannot pay for it with what I have in my pocket I cannot buy it. SO then they say well you have a credit card. ha ha Then I would say, but it only has a $500 limit. If they get too aggressive I just say, Oh I looked on my phone I can get the same thing for $2,000 on a timeshare resale site. I have learned that in Pigeon Forge Gatlinburg Area, the outside recruiters are told they have $150 per presentation… if you get them here for $30 you keep the rest. So they start low and work their way up.

Mark
Mark (@guest_407172)
May 16, 2017 19:06

“You can always buy a timeshare anytime you want – GUARANTEED!” I love this line. Seriously how is a price only valid for an hour when they are always actively pursuing new clients with all kinds of shenanigans. In general if you can’t have a day or two to think over a large purchase that will impact you for years or decades then you ought not make that purchase. Very little is ever “too good to be true”.

Shonuffharlem
Shonuffharlem (@guest_407850)
May 18, 2017 13:31

Oh it’s worse than that you can often buy a used one while their still selling new. Anyone ever at end of presentation go “I’m sold awesome resort! I found on Internet one for sale at your place for way less than your offer I’m calling the seller now!”

sil
sil (@guest_406684)
May 15, 2017 19:26

Hope someone can answer this as soon as possible. My last wyndham presentation was October 2016. I will be going to another one September 2017. I received the 6 page terms and conditions for my 4 days 3 nights package today. It states that I may not have attended a presentation in the last SIX months to qualify.

Then I received another email for the confirmation of my hotel in Seattle. It states that I may not have attended a presentation in the last TWELVE months for qualify.

Which is correct? Six or 12 months??

I don’t want to run into any problems later and not receive my free gifts.

TIA

Jackie
Jackie (@guest_406618)
May 15, 2017 16:11

Has anyone have done the Club Wyndham time share presentation with the promise of 15k Wyndham points and one night on us up to $100?

I am interested in know if there is a “catch ” to the free gift of 15k Wyndham points. Do I need to purchase anything or is it totally free and credited to my Wynham loyalty account.

TIA

yang
yang (@guest_406503)
May 15, 2017 12:15

If you want to attend a timeshare presentation, just fly to Los Cabos. Right when you step out of the terminal, you get bombarded with salesmen trying to get you to attend one. The salesmen get commission when you attend and will tell you what you need to say, but they care less if you buy or not. The salesmen will give you up to $300 USD (had to say no a few times), gourmet breakfast buffet vouchers (best meal I had on the trip), fare for round trip taxi to airport. The presentation was about 90 minutes and not as pushy as I expected. I forgot the name of the property, but it is the one that is connected to Mango Deck. I thought it was worth it and would probably do it again. This was my 4th timeshare, never see myself buying one due to the annual maintenance fees.

JR Stewart
JR Stewart (@guest_406792)
May 16, 2017 01:28

I am a multiple resort, resale, timeshare owner and 4.6m point/mile owner.

I frequently go to presentations in Mexico, when I need more Pesos 😉

You can get anywhere from various tours etc up to $400, in Pesos (about 7500). At 19:1 you can live like a king in Mexico!

always buy resale, if you must.

Daniel M
Daniel M (@guest_406193)
May 14, 2017 11:13

I am a Marriott Vacation Club Asia Pacific owner and can refer people to a free 4 day 3 night stay at Marriott Mai Khao Beach (Phuket) in exchange for attending a sales presentation. PM me at Flyertalk if you’re interested. My username is LHS323
Thanks

UAPhil
UAPhil (@guest_406079)
May 13, 2017 23:57

I’m not an expert on timeshares, but I’ve heard that they can also be a nightmare for your heirs when you pass away.

I’ve also been told there are legal firms who know how to get you out of a timeshare contract that you can’t sell, but that it will cost you $3,000-$4,000 to do so. There are shady operators in this marketplace, but I met someone who had a good experience with one such firm. My partner is a dissatisfied timeshare owner; she may take this route at some point.