How to get out of a timeshare?

Have the executor of your fake estate write them a letter stating your deceased and inquiring about the cash value.
 
sferguson524 said:
It’s in there :) at the end.
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What I was getting at is that you're paying the membership dues for the first four years as well. From what I can see, the fewest number of points that will get you a 1 bedroom unit like the one you stayed in is 44 in August. At $7.86 per point per year, that's $345 per night in dues for the least expensive one bedroom in August. The most expensive one bedroom in August would be $455 per night.

ja_user said:
"then we get to vacation for the cost of the annual dues/maintenance"

So you are saying this is under, and will continue to be under the cost of renting a similiar place? So much so that spending the Capital was worth it?
What do you think the yearly increases on this Maintenance will be?
How many years do you expect to take this same vacation?
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Disney is a little different than most timeshares. Rather that buying a particular week in a particular building, you buy points and select a home resort. The home resort determines how much your dues will be. This year for Aulani, dues are $7.86 per point. If you did want to stay in a one bedroom unit for a week, that would be between 245 and 434 points, depending on the time of year and how good of a view you wanted. That's a range of $1925 to $3411, plus your capital outlay. Disney says that dues will increase between three and six percent per year. I hope it's on the lower end of that range, but Disney has been aggressively raising rates the last couple of years.

Dues vary according to your home resort, and ranges from $6.40 to $9.48 per point per year, with the older properties having some of the higher rates, especially if they're not in Orlando. There's a chart here, Disney really socked it to its members this year. Also, 50 years after the property was brought online, ownership reverts to Disney. For @sferguson524 it's not an issue, Aulani doesn't revert to Disney until 2060. but some of the older properties in Orlando revert to Disney in 2042. I'd expect after 10 years or so, the value of contracts on those resorts will start to decline.

The main reason that someone would buy at a certain resort is that they would be able to reserve a unit 11 months in advance, whereas they can only reserve units in other Disney resorts seven months in advance. Like most things involving the House of Mouse, spontaneity is rarely an option. The only personal experience I have with Disney's timeshare operation was that I stayed in Saratoga Springs with my family for five nights about 12 years ago. At the time, the "owners" of the other Disney Vacation Club properties kind of looked down their noses at Saratoga, I thought it was pretty wonderful. The only downside was that it was sort of on the edge of Disney World, location wise, but there were advantages to that as well. To my mind, the weakest part of Disney World is that there are too many shops and not enough restaurants, and having quick access to the rest of Orlando was helpful.

The way I stayed at Saratoga Springs was to rent points from an owner. I found a DVC owner on a message board who had points he wasn't going to use that year, and I paid him to make us a reservation. The upside to this was that it was much less expensive than going through Disney, but the downside is that you are at the owner's mercy in that he handles all relations with Disney. If he fails to make the correct reservation and you pay him, you're pretty much out of luck. If this bothers you, there are brokers you can go through, they will charge you some percentage for their service. We very much enjoyed our stay there and would have gladly gone back on our second trip, but that one involved a Friday and Saturday stay, and was too expensive for our budget. Instead we stayed in one of the "cabins" (really a HUD park model manufactured vacation home with wood siding) in Fort Wilderness. That five night stay in Saratoga at the end of May would now be $3000 - $3500 from a DVC broker, probably 10% less directly from an owner. So yeah, $600 - $700 per night - ouch. The same rented from Disney would be $1000 - $1200 per night.

What got me started investigating this was our original trip to Disney, with a four and a six year old. I was looking for somewhere to stay and was disappointed that Disney's lodging was almost all standard hotel rooms, which is not what we want. I wasn't sure how often we'd get back to Disney if our daughters really loved it, but no matter how I ran the numbers, I couldn't justify buying DVC, renting owner points always came out ahead. Turns out it didn't matter, while they enjoyed their trip to Disney, they weren't that enthralled by it to go back very often, so we just visited twice. At this point in my life I'm probably never going to darken Disney's doorstep again, and I'm fine with that. i wouldn't mind one more ride on the Aerosmith Rock n Roller Coaster at Hollywood Studios, but it's not worth the effort or expense.

sferguson524 said:
We'll likely keep going to Auliani even as the kids (4 and 11) get older. They loved the beach and pools. We loved the fact that we can have them go to the on property kids club (included) and have some adult time. Can also go to WDW (Fiancee's bucket list). I think the expenditure of capital was worth it for the time being, when it stops being worth it, there's the resale market to offload the points.
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I'm trying to square up your purchase price with the points needed to get a week at Aulani. Looking at the resale market points are going for $110 or so, and you'd need at least 245 to get a one bedroom unit for a week, and that's at a time when your children are in school It looks like you could get a standard view unit in June for 260 points. It's my understanding that the lower point units go quickly, and you may need to up a level, then next step up is 310 points. If you're going to go in August, then it's 300 - 350 points. Point chart for Aulani is here.
 
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But you also have to want to go to Disney, many years in a row.
 
You can also trade your cash for someplace you want to go.
 
If I want to go to the mouse i.just book a hotel. Enough supply in the area to keep prices in check. The problem is not the hotel, the admission for the park during peak months is now up to $199/person :-0
 
Salty said:
That whooshing sound was his point passing you by.
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And you are missing my point. You don't have to go or even want to go to Disney many years in a row in order to come out ahead. You can buy a Disney timeshare, never go to Disney and still come out ahead.
 
FormerHangie said:
What I was getting at is that you're paying the membership dues for the first four years as well. From what I can see, the fewest number of points that will get you a 1 bedroom unit like the one you stayed in is 44 in August. At $7.86 per point per year, that's $345 per night in dues for the least expensive one bedroom in August. The most expensive one bedroom in August would be $455 per night.



Disney is a little different than most timeshares. Rather that buying a particular week in a particular building, you buy points and select a home resort. The home resort determines how much your dues will be. This year for Aulani, dues are $7.86 per point. If you did want to stay in a one bedroom unit for a week, that would be between 245 and 434 points, depending on the time of year and how good of a view you wanted. That's a range of $1925 to $3411, plus your capital outlay. Disney says that dues will increase between three and six percent per year. I hope it's on the lower end of that range, but Disney has been aggressively raising rates the last couple of years.

Dues vary according to your home resort, and ranges from $6.40 to $9.48 per point per year, with the older properties having some of the higher rates, especially if they're not in Orlando. There's a chart here, Disney really socked it to its members this year. Also, 50 years after the property was brought online, ownership reverts to Disney. For @sferguson524 it's not an issue, Aulani doesn't revert to Disney until 2060. but some of the older properties in Orlando revert to Disney in 2042. I'd expect after 10 years or so, the value of contracts on those resorts will start to decline.

The main reason that someone would buy at a certain resort is that they would be able to reserve a unit 11 months in advance, whereas they can only reserve units in other Disney resorts seven months in advance. Like most things involving the House of Mouse, spontaneity is rarely an option. The only personal experience I have with Disney's timeshare operation was that I stayed in Saratoga Springs with my family for five nights about 12 years ago. At the time, the "owners" of the other Disney Vacation Club properties kind of looked down their noses at Saratoga, I thought it was pretty wonderful. The only downside was that it was sort of on the edge of Disney World, location wise, but there were advantages to that as well. To my mind, the weakest part of Disney World is that there are too many shops and not enough restaurants, and having quick access to the rest of Orlando was helpful.

The way I stayed at Saratoga Springs was to rent points from an owner. I found a DVC owner on a message board who had points he wasn't going to use that year, and I paid him to make us a reservation. The upside to this was that it was much less expensive than going through Disney, but the downside is that you are at the owner's mercy in that he handles all relations with Disney. If he fails to make the correct reservation and you pay him, you're pretty much out of luck. If this bothers you, there are brokers you can go through, they will charge you some percentage for their service. We very much enjoyed our stay there and would have gladly gone back on our second trip, but that one involved a Friday and Saturday stay, and was too expensive for our budget. Instead we stayed in one of the "cabins" (really a HUD park model manufactured vacation home with wood siding) in Fort Wilderness. That five night stay in Saratoga at the end of May would now be $3000 - $3500 from a DVC broker, probably 10% less directly from an owner. So yeah, $600 - $700 per night - ouch. The same rented from Disney would be $1000 - $1200 per night.

What got me started investigating this was our original trip to Disney, with a four and a six year old. I was looking for somewhere to stay and was disappointed that Disney's lodging was almost all standard hotel rooms, which is not what we want. I wasn't sure how often we'd get back to Disney if our daughters really loved it, but no matter how I ran the numbers, I couldn't justify buying DVC, renting owner points always came out ahead. Turns out it didn't matter, while they enjoyed their trip to Disney, they weren't that enthralled by it to go back very often, so we just visited twice. At this point in my life I'm probably never going to darken Disney's doorstep again, and I'm fine with that. i wouldn't mind one more ride on the Aerosmith Rock n Roller Coaster at Hollywood Studios, but it's not worth the effort or expense.



I'm trying to square up your purchase price with the points needed to get a week at Aulani. Looking at the resale market points are going for $110 or so, and you'd need at least 245 to get a one bedroom unit for a week, and that's at a time when your children are in school It looks like you could get a standard view unit in June for 260 points. It's my understanding that the lower point units go quickly, and you may need to up a level, then next step up is 310 points. If you're going to go in August, then it's 300 - 350 points. Point chart for Aulani is here.
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Sure looks an awful lot like work.
 
asicer said:
And you are missing my point. You don't have to go or even want to go to Disney many years in a row in order to come out ahead. You can buy a Disney timeshare, never go to Disney and still come out ahead.
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I bought season passes at Disney this year, but I hadn't been in a Disney park in 10 years. Nonetheless we've used our points without any issues. There is a lot of flexibility.
 
As a lifelong car guy, I think time share salespeople are relentless closers! They actually had me thinking about it on our honeymoon, of course we were 22 at the time. I know it was a terrible deal and we walked away. The maintenance fee was about what we paid for the room for the week and this was 32 years ago! I felt bad for a couple in the lobby as we waited on the bus to the airport, they were so excited, they had bought 2!! I know for some folks it works out, but most people I know that have them, wish they didn't!
 
N747JB said:
As a lifelong car guy, I think time share salespeople are relentless closers! They actually had me thinking about it on our honeymoon, of course we were 22 at the time.
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Selling a time share to a car salesman is like selling a chest freezer to an Eskimo.
 
Marriott went to a point system as well, which was the last straw for the in-laws. Huge ripoff from the previous arrangement of trading weeks for various locations.
 
Sat through a timeshare presentation in Tahoe about 10 years ago. It started off in a nice room with models of a bunch of their properties. Within 20 minutes we were sitting in a cubicle with a whiteboard. At one point, after being told no a bunch of times, our sales rep left to find someone else to try to close us. We overheard some people a few cubes over that had decided to buy, and they weren't done with them yet. Before our sales rep got back, those people purchased "earthquake insurance", you know, just in case. They wanted $45,000 for a typical two-bedroom lockoff unit. Later, I looked at a timeshare resale site and people were trying to dump the same unit for under $10,000. Now, I just rent them from people on VRBO.
 
In Branson you can pay people to try to find someone to give your timeshare to. AFter all that capitol you the maintenance gets high and the only way to give it away is to try to find another sucker..
 
StevieTimes said:
I saw the commercial, did a little research, and it seems like they hire lawyers. I was thinking about "cutting out the middle man", so to speak, and just going right to a lawyer. I'm not sure if they provide extra services that are worthwhile or not.

Thanks for saying that though, that's what I'm looking for is stuff like this.
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I know nothing about this particular operation, but many timeshare exit companies are scams. Proceed with caution.
 
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