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A few selling procedure thoughts... (by KC):

vanessag36 wrote:

You mentioned you have sold (and rented) several timeshares yourself. Would you mind elaborating a bit and telling me how you did that? Apart from listing here, where else did you list and who dealt with the legal side once the deal went through? I have heard it's quite tricky to get the owners names changed etc. on contracts. Listing is one thing but how do buyers know they are getting what they are paying for? I know I'd be dubious buying from someone privately. Thanks in advance.

That said, I've successfully sold off four U.S. weeks (one in Vermont, one in Lake Tahoe, and two in Florida) advertising ONLY on RedWeek, MyResortNetwork and Bidshares. I don't use (and I do not recommend) either eBay or Craigslist. Craigslist somehow elicits and invites far too many slimy scammers, in my (and others') experience.

I made sure that my prices were lower than ANY other comparable weeks listed for sale at that particular resort. It's important to remember and acknowledge that NO buyer cares ONE BIT what YOU may have paid previously --- buyers (understandably) ONLY care about the lowest price they can find for themselves NOW, TODAY. In other words, you can't reasonably expect anyone to pay too much, just because YOU may have paid too much when YOU purchased. Times change and the market changes --- unfortunately, steadily DOWNWARD for timeshare resales since around late 2007 and continuing downward today.

As far as all of the closing details AFTER finding a buyer and agreeing to a price, I always leave ALL of the rest in the hands of a respected, professional timeshare closing company. Any attempted scams, or insincere buyers will be easily and promptly unveiled (and then dismissed) in that process. The closing company (not the seller) receives the funds, holds that sale money in escrow, and disburses proceeds funds to the seller ONLY upon the successful recording of a new, valid deed (a step which is also handled by the closing company) in the name of the buyer / new owner. My personal favorites for closing companies are Timeshare Transfer (Vero Beach, FL) and JRA Services (Sunrise, FL). Cost is about $300 with either one. I use ONLY one or the other of these two, personally (...but take note that there are some states where they WON'T accept or conduct closings at all). Who pays that closing cost? It's a negotiable matter between buyer and seller, but the buyer is (historically, anyhow) usually responsible for paying that cost (as well as any transfer fee required by the resort, which is never included in the closing company fee). With the resale market as weak as it is these days, some sellers now openly offer to pay all of the closing costs themselves (I've never paid the closing costs as a seller, myself).

Keep in mind that the above accurately describes the PROCESS, but if the timeshare week being offered for sale is off-season, or poor location (...or even a good location, but with expensive cost to travel to, like Hawaii), or has exorbitant annual maintenance fees or pending special assessments, legal issues, etc. then the actual MARKETABILITY and VALUE of such a "weak week" is then another story entirely. You can't "make a silk purse out of a sow's ear". The fact that there are currently over a thousand or so timeshares offered on eBay every day for pennies, many of them STILL going unclaimed even at that low price, speaks volumes about the fact that there is currently virtually NO market at all for "weak weeks". Also, with the many changes adopted by exchange companies like II and RCI in recent years, a "weak week" usually now won't warrant or obtain anything in exchange except another similar "weak week". The yesteryear days of "depositing" a rusty iron pipe and sometimes miraculously getting a gold bar in "exchange" are clearly now gone forever, which further devalues all "weak weeks", many of which are now quite nearly worthless.

I hope some of this helps you and I wish you good luck.