Post reply

Re: Sunterra sold to Diamond Resorts LLC (by Jackie G.):

Ok, so if i understand this correctly, if we simply do NOT give in to the pressure to convert to points, we will be able to retain our fee simple timeshare? And we can still get any of the 52 weeks? Because that is the exact reason we bought it when it was Embassy. It seems totally unfair to sell us something with the benefit of something attractive like that and then yank it away. We had gone to a LOT of timeshare presentations for a lot of different companies, and that's what sold us on Embassy in the first place!

When we went last year, we were pressured very hard at our "owner update" to buy another week and said if we upgraded our ownership by adding another week, we could upgrade to an ocean front for either or both weeks by purchasing points to make up any difference for $90 a week, I believe it was. What they didn't tell us was that, of course, that was only if an ocean view was available and of course they are quite limited in supply on this property. In fact, they offered to get us an ocean front for our current stay if we bought the other week. Unfortunately, when they checked with the registration desk, none were available. That was a pretty good indication of what we were likely to encounter-- and most telling is it was not a prime summertime week or holiday week that we were there-- kind of in-between whale season and summertime and the resort was not very full-- except apparently the ocean front rooms!

Stupidly, because of the fast-talking salesperson (Charles) and pressure from the VP or whoever supposedly had the authority to offer us more benefits, we bought a second week. It was LOTS of pressure like a car salesman-- and no offense meant to used car salesmen because I used to be one and I know some places can be brutal (which is why I didn't work in T.O. house). When we got home we talked about it and thought about it and decided it wasn't really what we wanted and we used our right to cancel within 7 days. Of course we got a call from the salesperson telling us what a mistake we'd made after we sent in our form, but I know we made the right decision. I think this year we're going to look at Marriott and Westin. Anyone have any recommendations there?