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[Q=gleng78] .... The ONLY tried and true way of actually, legally, really getting out of your timeshare contract is to hire a firm who specializes in timeshare exits to do all the paperwork, send legal documents to the resort, the county where you purchased, give them POA, and to, yes, pay them to do all of this... however, PLEASE UNDERSTAND, that as an industry insider, this is LITERALLY THE ONLY WAY TO RELIEVE YOUR OBLIGATIONS TO THE LEGALLY BINDING CONTRACT YOU SIGNED WAY BACK WHEN. [/Q] Nonsense. SOME of what this intrepid fellow initially had to say actually made good sense, including his more recent suggestion to approach the resort to accept a "deedback". However, the specific paragraph that I've isolated and quoted above from his first post is just pure, unadulterated crap and nonsense. It is obviously just a pitch for one of the (far too many) upfront fee parasites that offer empty promises of an easy and magical "exit / relief / rescue / escape" (choose whichever word you prefer, each one can be used interchangeably) from the legal obligations of timeshare ownership. Nope, sorry --- there ain't any magic beans, no pixie dust --- and no Easter Bunny or Santa Claus either. I have a strong legal and investigative background and have been a timeshare owner and user for nearly 30 years. It is certainly true that timeshare ownership is a legally binding contractual obligation. Whether the timeshare was purchased directly from a developer or in the secondary market makes no difference in terms of that legally binding obligation. To claim to "specialize in timeshare exits" is just fuzzy hype. There are certainly numerous outfits (like the one this fellow is subtly advertising for free here) which will happily take thousands of dollars from you and then, using a Power of Attorney (PoA) on your behalf, TRY to dump the timeshare on eBay for a dollar, or somewhere else for dirt cheap. If they fail to find a legitimate new "grantee", you STILL own that timeshare (and all of the associated legal obligations) --- but you now unfortunately have a few thousand dollars less in your bank account. Other promised "magical exits" have come to be nicknamed "Viking Ships". These are just phony entities, usually in the form of a bogus LLC, which will (again, for a few thousand dollars upfront) willingly become the new owner of record for your timeshare, with no intentions of ever actually paying any fees at any time in the future. However, this is essentially fraud, by pre-planned, deliberate and willful design --- and any participation in such a fraudulent scheme potentially makes any and every participant criminally culpable. Not a very wise direction in which to knowingly travel. A timeshare owner might very well have to give a low demand, low value timeshare away for FREE. They might even have to offer to pay all of the closing costs themselves just to find a new, willing "grantee". Yes, they might further even have to offer to pay the current years' maintenance fee bill themselves just to get rid of the ownership, but the transfer will at least then be clean --- and lawful. None of this is particularly good or welcome news, but paying ANY upfront fee parasite thousands of dollars for a non-existent "magical exit" is nothing but a fool's errand, plainly and simply stated. Don't fall for any such empty, meaningless (and ultimately very expensive) promises and fairy tales. Any timeshare owner willing to exert a little time and effort can accomplish the same thing entirely on their own --- WITHOUT paying any opportunistic parasites thousands of dollars. The plain, simple and straightforward truth is that there is no pixie dust or "specialist" or magic potion, with OR without a PoA, to easily or quickly make a lawful exit from the legally binding contractual obligations of timeshare ownership. Anyone who claims otherwise is just lying to you --- but will still be quite happy to take your money if, in your frazzled and desperate state, you are somehow able and willing to just "suspend disbelief" and pony up a significant portion of your hard earned income to no productive end. Please don't fall for any such nonsense --- or you will do so at your peril (and at considerable expense) just to learn a hard, painful and expensive lesson. It's your money. Forewarned is forearmed.