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It's not really a "donation" if it's worthless... (by KC):

josephb172 wrote:

I've found that these charities don't really want the timeshares. They only want the money that the timeshares will bring. That's why they won't take title until and unless they find a buyer and have money up front from them (the new buyers) before they will accept your unit. So you will continue to own and pay taxes and fees until it is sold.

So it can hardly be said that they are accepting a "donation" from you. Actually, all they do is act as a broker, and try to sell your unit for you. For that, they take 100% commission. Cute. You may as well sell it yourself. But the truth is, the units really can't be sold. No one wants it. I tried to give mine away, and I offer it to any person who calls me and wants to market my timeshare. No one will touch it.

If the units had value, they would be accepted as donations. But they are NOT accepted until they are carefully evaluated, if at all. Timeshares are WORTHLESS, in terms of value on the open market. They must be aggressively SOLD by a pro, in an intense selling session. That's my opinion, anyway.

I don't disagree with much of anything you've stated above, except that not ALL timeshare weeks are worthless. That said, I don't understand why ANYONE would ever expect a charity to willingly accept something that has no value?

Any and every charity, whatever their particular cause might be, needs MONEY to support it. Accepting the legal obligations of a timeshare ownership "donation" that has no value would be financial suicide for a charity. Charities don't want to accept that liability any more than the owner trying desperately to give away his / her timeshare wants it.

Let's be honest and realistic about this. If a timeshare has no market value, it's NOT truly a "donation" in the first place. Instead, it's just an effort to "dump" something that is worthless, with all of its' inherent and ongoing legal and financial obligations, onto someone else. Why on earth would they even CONSIDER accepting such a thing?

Most charities WILL, however, readily accept a timeshare week of value (i.e., one which can actually be sold). I easily donated one such week myself last year. However, the truthful bottom line is that if YOU can't sell it, THEY likely can't do so either. So, accordingly and understandably, their response to any such attempt to dump a worthless timeshare week on them will always be "No thank you"...