Original Message:
Re: Non-deeded right to use vacation club (by KC):
richardc1411 wrote:Our timeshare or what we thought was out timeshare is a non-deeded right to use vacation membership. We do not own anything. We fulfilled our loan obligation back in 2012. We have been paying increasing annual maintenance fees each year for something we don't own or use anymore. I had asked the company to simply take it back and cut our losses. Their response was simple. They don't offer deed buy backs. We do not have a deed for this vacation property and have never received any notice about a deed for this property. I told them that I just want to be done with it and walk away. Their response was you need to honor your contractual obligations. If you stop paying annual maintenance fees we will be forced to foreclosure on the property and it will severely impact your credit rating. Am I missing something? How can they foreclose on a non-deeded vacation property that I owe nothing for aside from annual maintenance fees. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.Thank you.
Your question is very astute and entirely appropriate --- and no, you definitely are not "missing something".
The RTU contract that you have is essentially nothing more than a "club membership". You own nothing, hence there is no deed. Because there is no deed and no ownership of anything, there is nothing on which to "foreclose", so that particular empty threat is both baseless and deceitful. All they can do if you stop paying annual fees is to terminate your "membership" --- so what?
You have not indicated whether your RTU is in the U.S. or in Mexico. In either case, there is very little likelihood that you would ever experience a credit score "hit". Since there is no loan default involved, it is highly unlikley that they would ever even bother to report the account to the credit agencies at all. If this "vacation club" is in the U.S., you might temporarily encounter some collection calls and / or letters, which can (and should) just be summarily ignored; they will give up soon enough. If this RTU is in Mexico, you would likley never even see any collection efforts at all.
Don't let those people scare you with empty threats and false claims. They are correct that you have a "contractual obligation", but that contract is for nothing more than a "membership". When you stop paying annual fees and thereby cease to "honor" your end of the contract, your "membership rights" will be terminated. Again I ask, so what? It's very little different than a gym membership. If you stop paying, you can't use that gym anymore. Once again -- so what?
Don't be intimidated by hungry hyenas who would prefer that you remain a "cash cow", continuing to pay annual fees for a "membership" that you no longer need, no longer want and don't even use. It's "no skin off their nose" whatsoever if you just walk away.