Timeshare User's Group (TUG) Reveals Timeshare Secrets

Bill Rogers of TUG will share with you their knowledge of timesharing and the timeshare industry
An extended Q& A session is included.
This timeshare webinar is hosted by Gail Bennett

Have a question on timeshare? Need a good timeshare tip? Meet the founders of TUG - the place where timeshare enthusiasts gather to help each other and discuss timeshare topics. Since 1993, TUG provides an unbiased source of consumer-oriented information on timesharing and timeshare resorts.

Topics covered:

• How TUG helps thousands of timeshare owners.
• What TUG's free Online Timeshare Forums can do for you and help you get a better timeshare deal.
• Finding the best way to buy a timeshare and save $1,000's!
• Determining which timeshares to buy - Not all Red (Prime) weeks are equal.
• Getting the best deals on exchanges and rentals!

Plus many other timeshare secrets revealed.

If you're looking for more information, have questions or want to learn some timeshare secrets, this is the place! In this Free 30-minute Webinar, Bill and Brian Rogers of TUG will share with you their knowledge of timesharing and the timeshare industry, as well answer all your questions. An extended Q & A session is included.

Timeshare User's Group (TUG) Reveals Timeshare Secrets

Listen to the Extended Q&A Session!

Webinar Transcript

• Introduction
• About TUG
• How to Buy a Timeshare
• How to Sell a Timeshare
• How to Get the Best Exchanges
• Little Known Timeshare Secrets
• Questions & Answer Session with TUG

Gail: Hello, and good evening. Welcome, all, to Holiday’s sixth customized interactive timeshare webinar. I’m here on site on a cold, rainy, but beautiful Seattle evening. Thank you so much to all of you who’ve taken time out of the busy holiday season to spend it with us and the Timeshare User’s Group, as we reveal Timeshare Secrets.

Tonight’s webinar is sure to be an extremely insightful one. I want to welcome you all and let you know that we want to make this webinar as interactive as possible. If you’ll notice on your computer screen, you can send us questions. Feel free to do so at any time during the webinar. You can also adjust your happy face. This is the attendee satisfaction level, that being you. If you like what you’re hearing, give me a happy face. If not, give me a frown. This will help give us an idea if we’re covering points of interest that are important to you, our listener.

Hi, I’m Gail Bennett with the Holiday Group, and I’ll be spending the next 20 minutes with Bill Rogers, the founder of the Timeshare Users Group, as we reveal the secrets of timesharing. Now, depending on the number of questions we get and the flow of events, I’ll try to get some of those questions answered during the webinar. But if I can’t, we will definitely address them at the end of the session. As a matter of fact, our question and answer part of the webinar has proven to be very popular as we get so many wonderful questions. And between Bill and myself, I’m sure we’ll have some insightful answers for you.

This interactive and information-packed session will cover TUG, what and who is TUG, how to buy a timeshare, how to sell a timeshare, how to get the best exchanges, and little known timeshare secrets. So, without further delay, let’s get started. Tonight, I’m very excited to have with us Bill Rogers, the founder of the Timeshare Users Group or TUG, as it’s known. As Bill explains about himself, “I’m not in the timeshare business, but I have been an individual timeshare owner for almost 20 years.” By running TUG for over 14 years, Bill has probably more experience than anyone of us that actually work in the industry.

As their TUG motto states, “Knowledge is power.” And Bill, through TUG, has been able to provide his knowledge to many timeshare owners. He’s been self-employed in the computer software and service business since 1982. And prior to that, he was a Navy aviator and account executive with Merrill Lynch. Welcome, Bill, and I want to say congratulations on your online forum, reaching 20,000 members it was?

Bill: We’re over 22,000 now, Gail.

Gail: Wow, very nice, so congratulations!

Bill: Thanks.

Gail: Hello, and welcome.

Bill: Well, I’m glad to be here. I don’t want to tell you that it’s about 70 degrees and nice out here in Florida right now, as opposed to your Seattle weather. We’ll avoid that right now. What I’d like to do is just cover briefly, what TUG is about for those that probably are not familiar with it and how we got started. While we’re doing this, if we can get a poll of those people that are online and how many are actually . . .

Gail: OK, so folks, what you want to do is go ahead and answer his question, “Do you own a timeshare?” We’ll take a quick poll of our audience to see who owns and who doesn’t. So, if you would, go ahead and click that answer in.

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Bill: And while we’re doing this, I’ll go ahead and cover TUG. Basically, we started the group over 14 years ago. We did it because I own at a Marriott property, probably one of the nicest properties that Marriott has in Hilton Head. And we got a bad exchange through RCI on the basis of a picture, back 15 years ago, all you had was a directory. And you had to go by a very small picture and indications of exactly what was available at that timeshare. And they said they had tennis and that was the main reason we were looking for it and it was on a beach. Well, when we drive up to this place, it’s a World War II converted motel with the original furniture and you wouldn’t have stayed there if somebody paid you. And I asked the manager about the tennis facility, and he says, “Oh, we haven’t even had a tennis net for five years and you’re actually parking on the tennis court.”

So, needless to say, we weren’t very happy, and we felt we’d been ripped off, trading our Gold Star, five star Crown Resort, this place. And so, after that, we started collecting information, as far as when we’d go places. We’ll go to check out various resorts in the area, so that we can find out what they’re like. And about that time, Prodigy was an online service. I don’t know how many of you might be familiar with that, but they had a bulletin board. And Fern Medina [?] actually ran the timeshare section of the Prodigy bulletin board and there was quite a few of us on there that we’d exchange reviews and information, much like what we’re doing here on TUG now. But, Prodigy would not allow us to archive anything.

So, a few of us started keeping the reviews, and once we got enough of them, we actually set up our own group, set up our own bulletin board. And when the web came along, we actually set up what we now have as the Timeshare Users Group. It’s grown immensely over the years. We actually have two dedicated servers, as far as to handle our traffic, one basically, for our bulletin board, which is so active, and one for our member only sessions and the information that we have available. So, that’s basically how TUG got started and what we’re doing. We’re a group of individual owners, just like I see most of you out there. Looks like about half of you are actually TUG members, already, so if the other half gets a chance, we’d love to have you over at TUG2.net, check it out, see what’s going on.

Gail: And also, Bill, just to let you know, I don’t know if you caught the first poll, 97 percent of the audience do own timeshares, so we have a large group of listeners, who are timeshare owners.

Bill: Yeah, because of that, what I’ll probably do, our first big topic was how to buy a timeshare, so I’ll probably just briefly go over that, instead of go over in detail and get into some of the other aspects of the seminar that most of you want to do.

Gail: Good.

Bill: Go ahead, Gail, I’m sorry.

Gail: Quick question, as you were talking about how you got TUG started, at what point did you really notice it like starting to snowball, where people were really coming on and getting involved with the organization? Because I know that you said it started back in 1987, was it?

Bill: The main breakthrough on TUG, we started getting a lot of play in media. Kiplinger’s actually did an article, one of the very first ones, actually, the first year, talking about the group and how it meshed so well with the web, and people could get on and interact with one another. And basically, the web was designed for something like this, where individuals could chat with one another or post information about different things and interact, much like we’re doing right here with the webinar. And it became a permanent archive for database, the information, and you could, basically, access any time you wanted. So, it’s been going great guns every since day one. As I say right now, the bulletin board is so active. AARP just did an article on it this week, and we ballooned another thousand registered members just this week. So, it’s incredible what can be done and the information that’s available out there through the site.

Gail: That’s very nice.

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Bill: What I’d like to do now, briefly, as I say 97 percent are actually owners, if you’re like me, we didn’t know what we were doing when we initially got started in timesharing. Nobody ever gave us a presentation to buy a timeshare. We’d always go for the free gift. And the very first thing and last thing we’d say before we’d go into one, “We’re not buying anything, no matter what.” That’s sort of the standard joke in the timeshare industry. And about one out of 10 or one out of 20 of us, after three hours, being hit over the head, we’ll walk out a timeshare owner, not knowing what we did or why we spent $15,000 or more on a thing.

And that’s one of the problems with buying timeshares. There’s very few people out there that realize there’s other ways to do it. Holiday with resales and TUG with their Class 5’s and all the other ways. The way to buy timeshares, as most of us now know, are through resale. That’s the way to go. If you were going to buy new, the only reason to do that would be if it’s the only resort in an area and you just absolutely have to have that resort, instead of waiting for a year or two to get in a position where you can pick up a resale on it.

Gail: The other existing statistic I did hear, though, was that most people who got involved with timeshare actually purchased it new, and so, if not for having to chance upon, be it free tickets or a free toaster or free whatever, they probably would have never even considered that. Have you ever heard that?

Bill: Oh, sure, and that’s why I said, that’s the way most of us get involved in timesharing because we, one, don’t know any better, and we’re out there for the free gift, unfortunately. So, we’re in a position where that’s our only experience with timeshares until after we buy it, and then, we go online and say, “Well, what did I get?” and try and find out more about it. And then, we find out there’s probably better ways to do it. And that’s the nice thing about TUG now. They’ve got the information available where everybody can go online, find out the best ways to do it. I’ve got some notes here on how to buy a timeshare. I would always recommend buying in an area that you enjoy vacationing in already, because that way, you’ve always got that as your backup. The better you buy, usually, or could afford, the better and easier it is to trade. That’s one of the secrets of exchanging we’ll get into a little later.

If you think about like two bedrooms as a minimum because it has a higher trading power, it doesn’t really make too much difference whether you buy RCI or II. They both have good resorts, they both have bad resorts. It’s more a matter of getting into the resort field that you’re mostly interested, whether it’s Marriott or Hilton or Hyatt, Wilmot or one of those. And then, take advantage of the situations that are out there. Resales are, by far, the only way to go. You can save at least 50 cents on the dollar. In some cases, it’s even better than that. Look at our information as far as on TUG for the best resorts in the area, the Top 10 List, the reviews.

As far as deeded and points, it’s a matter of preference. If you’re locked in to a certain time, deeded is much better because you know you’ve always got that week that you can go to. And if I have to take July 4th every year, then I’d go deed it. If I’ve got more flexibility, then the point system is pretty good. And I’m not really going to cover too much into the how to buy area since most people have already bought.

Gail: I will say that there are still that small percentage that haven’t. And I have a couple of questions that did pop up.

Bill: Sure.

Gail: Which kind of covers what you’re saying. I’m just going to address them. I’ve got Frances asking, “I’m new to timeshares, so I’m very interested in them, but very wary of unexpected traps of ownership transfer fees, limitations. I’m looking for great flexibility of use and location. So, what information can you give me, what do I look out for and what pitfalls do I avoid?”

Bill: Someone like that, the timeshare industry has matured quite a bit in the last 10 or 15 years with the advent of the brand names coming in, the Marriott’s, the Hilton’s, the Hyatt’s, Disney. All of those have extremely good programs. And as long as you go with one of those, you’re in a position, where you’re going to get the best of both worlds. You know that 10, 15 years down the road, the timeshares are still going to be maintained and kept up. If you ever have to do anything with it, sell it or rent it, you’re going to get a higher premium for the brand name than you might for an individual resort that’s all by itself. And the homeowners association might be in trouble or something like that. So, I would highly recommend, if you can afford it, go with the brand name resorts or those that have been around long enough and have a proven track record. And that information’s available on the TUG site.

Gail: And also, Bill, what about points versus weeks? Any thoughts on that, or deeded versus right to use?

Bill: Right to use is, more or less, a lease. The deeded, you’ve got forever. It makes it nice, as I say, if you can only go, like you’ve got kids in school and you can only go during the summer and you always go to the same place, deeded is the way to go. You’ve always got that week, it’s always available at the resort, and you never have to worry about it. If you’ve got flexibility, you’re retired, can go on the spur of notice, you just want to go for a weekend, that kind of thing, well points is the way to go. I think you’re a point owner, yourself, aren’t you, Gail?

Gail: Yes, I am. I just used mine to go to the British Virgin Islands on the Elite Yacht Experience on a catamaran. It was awesome!

Bill: And that’s the flexibility you have. And I think you’d mentioned the fact that you can get more than one unit available if you have enough points.

Gail: Yeah.

Bill: And you and others can go at the same time.

Gail: And I’ve got four units, and that’s exactly correct. With my points, I’ve got four units for week number seven in Puerta Vallarta for 2008, so I’m bringing my family and a couple of neighbors and some friends, so it’ll be awesome.

Bill: Great. Everybody online will want to go with you, too.

Gail: It’s a shameless plug for the Holiday Group.

Bill: There you go. The only other thing as far as U.S. and international, I would definitely buy U.S. if I lived in the U.S. The reason being is the laws. Every state, the timeshare industry is controlled by the states, themselves, and it’s usually the real estate commission that does that. Where you get into the international resorts, there’s been some problems with the international resorts going under and then, trying to get your money back. You’re always hearing horror stories. Back in the U.S., you only have limited access to some of the legal systems in these other countries. So, I would much prefer buying a resort in the U.S., Canada and then, actually, if I wanted to go to an international resort, using the trade system to do that, instead of owning on an international level.

Gail: So, really, you don’t really have a true and fast formula to purchase a timeshare?

Bill: No, everything’s different. It’s just like buying a car. If you need a van for the kids, that’s what you want to get. If you’re looking for a sports car, if that’s what you want to do. And that’s the same thing with timeshares. Depending on your needs and what you’re trying to do, there’s a timeshare available out there. And this takes an educational process, an understanding of what is available, how it best suits your lifestyle and then, going in and determining which one of those resorts or systems is best for you. And so, for me to say, “This is the best one to get,” that might be for me, but it’s not for somebody else.

Gail: And the other thing you did mention, Bill, just a little bit earlier was that you said to stick with name brands. And Dave wants to know, “Is there a downfall to purchasing main brands via the resale approach?”

Bill: On the resale, it’s not too bad because the prices are fairly even across the board. You are going to pay more for a name brand than you would an off brand. And it’s sort of like cars, you pay more for the Mercedes’ or the Jaguar’s than you would the normal Chevrolet’s or Ford’s. You get more. And it’s a matter of lifestyle. If you want to pay a higher price and get a nicer resort, that’s up to you. Plus, as I say, on the long run, I think you’re better off doing that just because you now 15, 20 years down the road . . . I’ve been a Marriott owner for 20 years, and I know that Marriott’s still in good shape and they’re taking care of it, basically, because they have to protect their brand image. Had I owned at an independent resort about three blocks away in Hilton Head, it’s having problems. It’s just an independent and they’ve had a lot of dropouts. And these are the things you’ve got to look out for in the long run. And most of the brand resorts, you’re not going to have that problem.

Gail: Right. Now, what are your views on getting, and we’ll wrap this up for buying timeshares, what are your views on getting title insurance with the purchase of a timeshare?

Bill: If you go through a broker or you’re using a closing agent, you will have no problems in regard to that. They do all that for you as part of your closing price. I’m sure you guys do that at Holiday, also.

Gail: Yeah, we’ve got the guarantee. Not title insurance, but our guarantee.

Bill: Yeah, and that’s why I say anybody that’s a licensed broker or something like that, you’re in a position where that’s part of the sale. If you’re buying from an individual, you would want to use either a closing or transfer agent just to protect yourself in that regard, also.

Gail: OK, very good. Thanks so much, Bill.

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Bill: OK. If we go into the sales side of it, I’d be willing to bet at least 35 to 40 percent of the people that get involved in TUG are joining to either sell or find out what to do with their timeshare. The main reason being is the educational part. They’ve bought something, they don’t know how to use it, they’re frustrated, they can’t get what they want with their trade. And so now, they either just want to get rid of it or do something with it. And on the sell side, there’s some real major rip offs going on out there you have to be very careful of.

These major up front fees, there are organizations out there that will, basically, charge you to take their timeshare away from you. They’ll scare you to death and tell you you can’t get rid of it, it’ll go to your heirs and they’ll want $2,000 or $3,000 to take it off your hands. Well, never do that. If you’ve got a timeshare that’s fully paid for, you’ll be able to sell it, even if it’s for $1.00, to somebody else. There’s no reason to pay these outrageous fees and get ripped off in that area.

Same goes true for timeshare brokers that are asking these outrageous up front fees. I keep seeing time and time again on a bulletin board, where it says, “This is either the third or fourth broker I’ve paid $300.00 or $400.00 to, and I’m not getting any action.” If you’re going to work with a broker, work on a commission only basis. That’s the way to protect yourself. They don’t get any money unless they sell the thing. And the legitimate people that are out there selling, work on that.

The other problem you’re going to have, though, because these are hard to sell, especially on your own, is the cost involved. You’re in a position where the brokerage fees nowadays on selling a timeshare, even legitimate brokerage fees, are anywhere from 25 to 35 percent and a minimum of $1,000. So, this is not something that’s easy to do. We’ve got our own classified ads. They do very well, if you price it right. There’s a whole section on TUG that walks you through step by step on how to actually sell a timeshare once you’ve got somebody wants to buy it, how to handle it, how to do the transfer and all these things.
A couple other alternatives that I’d like to mention as far as selling or getting rid of timeshares, there are some charities out there, if you’ve got a fully paid timeshare and you want to donate it to a charity as a tax write-off, there are some ways to do that, also. And we’ve got information on that on TUG. And there are, actually, some resorts that are out there that will take your timeshare back if it’s fully paid for. You give them a quick claim deed and they’ll take it back.

So, if I were in a position where I was thinking about selling a timeshare, the very first people I’d get in touch with is the homeowners association, see what their policy is, see if they’ve got a broker. A lot of them have licenses or agreements. Even some have in house brokers that do a pretty good job of actually trying to sell it. And then, as I say, use TUG for the ads and take advantage of the information that we’ve got there.

Gail: Bill, why do you say that on the resale market, the price that you pay for the timeshare is so low, compared to what the developer sells it for?

Bill: It’s the marketing cost. And this is why you always want to look at resales when you’re buying a timeshare. The numbers are staggering when it comes right down to it. And I’ll give you some actual examples. If you were to buy a timeshare, let’s say, they’re selling them for $15,000, out of that $15,000, the average marketing cost is almost 50 percent. And that’s the free gift that everybody gives to get you to come in the door, the commission, the advertising, the set up for their boiling room operations or their sales operations.

So, with that $15,000 you paid, almost $7,500 of that is developer’s costs at selling that timeshare to you. And the person actually buying the timeshare from the developers is paying for everybody else’s gift, also. Not everybody that goes in there buys, and you get dozens of gifts that each buyer’s actually having to pay for. So, that’s why the cost. When you look at the development, if it’s $15,000, you’ll look at resale is probably about half of that, for $7,500.

Gail: One thing I kind of appreciate is I attended a timeshare presentation where the sales person said to me, “Only one out of 10 families can afford to purchase a timeshare from the developer.” And what you’re basically saying is the ones who buy are paying for the nine families who didn’t purchase, but got the gift.

Bill: Oh, sure, and that’s what they are. Somebody’s got to pay for it, and that’s where the cost is in the one person that does buy. And in some cases, depending on the competition, you’re talking about Orlando or Brenton or Vegas where they’ve got tons of timeshares available, the marketing costs in some of those places is over 60 percent just because the competition is so high. So, yeah, definitely, resale is the way to go. You guys are in the right side of the market as far as providing resales to the general public. And for those that out there, definitely look at resales.

Gail: OK, awesome.

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Bill: Looks like we’re getting into the exchanges and how to do it the best way. Exchanges, the secret of exchanges really, is the quality of the resort you own. And this is done before you even buy your resort. I like to compare it to people buying cars. If we were going to have a system where we traded cars, if you had a Jaguar or a Mercedes and wanted to go somewhere else and used somebody else’s car, they’d be happy to trade with you for another Jaguar or Mercedes or BMW. But, if you were to go out and buy an old beat up Volkswagen or 15-year-old Ford Explorer, which I actually happen to own, and I tried to go to Hawaii and trade for a BMW, they’d just laugh at me.

So, if you think about timeshares the same way, the better you own, the easier it is to trade. Just about 95 percent of anybody that we’ve ever talked to in regards to having problems, “I never get what I want, there’s nothing available where I want to go,” naturally, everybody asks for the very best in every area. And only those people that own the very best in other areas are going to be able to be eligible for that. So, that’s the secret in timeshare and exchanging is buy as soon as you can. Get something that’s high demand in a prime area and then, use that as trading. As a matter of fact, you will find that those people that own the nicer resorts can actually trade among themselves. We’ve got our own direct exchange database on our website, and those people that own the nicer resorts just swap among themselves. And it doesn’t cost them anything.

Gail: Bill, do you notice the difference between, because we just did the polling for exchange companies that our audience is attached to or affiliated with, and it’s almost fairly a split with RCI and II with about 12 percent not really doing too much with theirs, but probably using it at the resort. Do you notice the difference between availability with the RCI group, versus the II group, or not so much?

Bill: There again, it depends on the quality of the resort you have. If you’ve got a junk resort, you’re going to have problems no matter where you are. If you’ve got a nice resort, you can usually get good trades. And that, more importantly, whether you’re involved with RCI or II, either way, or even the independents. There’s some independents like the San Francisco exchange that only takes the nicer resorts. They try to avoid the problems with the low end. As far as secrets go, if you’ve got a resort and you’re trying to trade it, you’re trying to get the good deals, you’ve got to go with that system where you put in a request.

If you search online and you can do it quite often, you’re only seeing the stuff that no one else has picked up after the fact that the matches have been made to the people that have put in their online request. And the more flexibility you have in that area, the better chance that you’re going to have a trade. Naturally, if you’re doing a trade, you want to have your unit in at least a year in advance. That gives you the maximum trading power. You put in your possible request, put in the best resorts in the best areas that you’re willing to accept and give yourself some time. Constantly go in and check. One of the sections on our bulletin board is called “Sightings in distress areas,” and these are people that have gone in. We’ve got people that actually go in daily, practically, and look at what’s available online in both RCI and II. And if they see something that’s significant, they’ll post it on there and say, “Hey, I just spotted Marriott’s week in Hawaii for such and such that available, you might want to check it out.”

Gail: I’ve got Spence asking me the question to you, “Explain the witching hour.” What’s he talking about?

Bill: That’s when they’re posting the new stuff. In other words, it’s all computerized. And in some cases, they do it several times a day. I’m not behind the scenes in the inside information on RCI and II, although we do have an ex-RCI member that does a lot of posting on TUG. But, that’s when they actually post the update to their database. So, in some cases, I saw where it was 5:30 in the morning. And depending on where you were, I didn’t look that close. But that’s why I say, if you have the request first and they match, it’s not going to make any difference. You won’t see the good stuff because somebody else is already going to get it when it gets matched up automatically. All you’re going to see is stuff that nobody has matched so far. And that’s why it’s so important to put in your request and give it pretty good flexibility in regard to that.

Gail: As you mentioned earlier, I’m an RCI points member, myself, and I’ve really never had a lot of difficulty in getting what I want. Does the rule that you’re saying about the banking early, frequent online checking, that sort of stuff, it doesn’t really apply to a points product, does it?

Bill: Well, points inventory comes and goes, too. You’ve got to check. Often, you’ve got to have your request in. The exchange systems, all of them, whether it’s RCI or the independents, it’s a constant flow system. They constantly get deposits all the time and they constantly fill requests. And so, what they might have right now might not even be close to what they have tomorrow. And that’s why if you have your request in, the computer will automatically match anything that matches your request, without you having to go in and constantly look. If you constantly look, you might see something, though, that looks exciting that you didn’t think about.

Gail: Yeah.

Bill: And that’s the nice thing about actually being more flexible and looking at the online availability. And I find that all the time, you know? I’ll go in and look and say, “Hey, this is something I didn’t think about,” or, “Oh, that’s a nice resort, I know about that. And I’ve been thinking about going to it, and it’s availability, I might take it.” And so, the more flexible you are, the better off you’re going to have as far as exchanging. And there again, if you’ve got a prime time week, you’ve got a two-bedroom, it’s a nice resort, you’re not going to have any problem exchanging. If you’ve got an off season week, let’s say a Cape Cod, it’s a studio, in the middle of January, you’re never going to get any trades. And I’ve actually had people tell me that, say, there’s thousands of units available in Florida. And somebody will call up and ask the exchange rep, “I’ll take anything in Florida.” And they’re told, “Well, we don’t have anything.” Well, there’s stuff out there. They just don’t have anything that qualifies for the trading power of their particular resort.

Gail: Right.

Bill: And then again, exchange now, the cost involved is really starting to get on up there, by the time you add in the cost of the membership, in regard to the exchange companies and the exchange fees. If you can do your own trades, as I say, those people with the nice resorts, that’s one of the other advantages of having something decent, can usually trade among themselves. The people that own at the Royal’s or the Marriott’s or the Disney’s, they can swap one on one without paying a nickel to anybody else.

Gail: You mean, do the exchange through the Marriott?

Bill: A private exchange, a direct exchange.

Gail: A direct, not through the Marriott system?

Bill: Not through anybody. We’ve got our own database online that people are doing that.

Gail: OK, so that would be finding . . .

Bill: In other words, if somebody contacted me, I own the Heritage Club at Hilton Head and somebody had the Disney at Vero Beach and wanted to trade me for this year, we’d just contact the various resorts and, say, “John Doe’s going to use my unit this year, I’m going to use his,” and we’re gone, didn’t cost us a nickel.

Gail: And that’s kind of what the TUG Forum is about?

Bill: That’s what the direct exchange part of the forum is about.

Gail: OK, very nice, very nice.

Bill: That’s why I say that’s another advantage of having a super resort.

Gail: What about fractionals? Do you guys get a lot of people with fractionals?

Bill: We’re getting more and more of that, but for the most part, that’s probably less than five percent of the business that’s out there, and it’s sort of a different criteria. They have their own exchange. Matter of fact, RCI has its own exchange program just for their upper end fractionals.

Gail: OK.

Bill: And most people don’t even know it exists.

Gail: I’ve got a question from David, saying, “How can I exchange my Marriott Orlando for Marriott Aruba?” And I know it’s kind of specific, but maybe you could use it as an example.

Bill: That’s where you’ve got to do the request first, especially if it’s II. II has a system, where you can actually ask before you deposit your week for a trade. And if they don’t make the trade, then you don’t have to deposit the week, you can actually use your Orlando week. And that’s one of the ways to do it. It puts a little more pressure on the exchange company because if they can’t make the match, then they don’t make any money.

Gail: OK.

Bill: The problem you have in that particular trade is Orlando, even though it’s probably the number one tourist location in the entire world is not a good timeshare trader. The reason is supply and demand. And supply and demand is what determines all of the exchange trading power. There are over 50 resorts in Orlando, itself, and some of them are mega resorts that have over 1,000 units. So, you can imagine how many actual exchanges are deposited every week from Orlando resorts into the exchange systems.

Gail: So, Orlando’s a bit saturated?

Bill: It is oversaturated, as far as from the exchange point of view. You can get some great deals there, basically, because of the competition. And if you use them, it’s great. You get good prices and nice resorts. But, if you ever want to trade them, it’s very tough to do unless you have a Holiday week or a high demand, summer week somewhere. And that’s the problem, your gentleman that asked, or whoever it was that asked about trading out of Orlando, the Marriott, even though Marriott’s a top of the line company, trying to get another Marriott somewhere else, the trading powers are not even close.

Gail: OK, thanks very much. We’ll go ahead and move on, then. We want to get to the secrets of timeshare.

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Bill: OK, we’ll just cover a few of them here and then, we can get into more into the actual question and answer period here. The main thing that we’ve seen, one of the main reasons to be involved in timeshares, naturally, is the exchange program, a chance to travel throughout the world and not only use the timeshare that you own at, but to actually, go to other places and exchange it. And that’s the bread and butter and that’s what everybody sells when they’re selling a timeshare. But the little known secrets, those people that are flexible are retirees or people that can go on a spur of the moment notice can get incredible values by going and using what they call either last minute trades or getaways, or bonus trades. And this is excess inventory that the exchange systems always have.

And in a situation, RCI has what they call last call. So, you don’t even have to grade in or use your own week. They’ve got inventory available. And it’s a set fee, where if you use a studio, it’s $199.00 or a bedroom, one bedroom’s $219.00 or a two-bedroom’s $249.00, anywhere that they have those units available. They’ve also got getaways that are beyond the $240.00 and they can range up a couple hundred dollars more. And II has the exact same thing. II or Interval International, their prices seem to be a little pricier on their last minute inventory.

So, the RCI is, by far, the way to go, as far as bargain deals last minute. I was just looking, there’s always stuff available in Orlando. If I wanted to go, matter of fact I actually looked up an example to give you a price idea. This weekend, there are Westgate resorts available in Orlando. Westgate’s a large resort there in Orlando. And if you were to go, it’s a two-bedroom resort, it’s what I compared it on. If you use the RCI last call exchange for this weekend, it would cost you $249.00 for the entire week in a two-bedroom there in the Westgate in Orlando.

If you got the exact same resort, this is what’s weird, the exact same unit through the getaway program RCI has, you’d wind up paying $279.00. Now, RCI also has a public rental program. It’s called EV Rentals that the general public, without even owning a timeshare can take advantage of. And if you were to buy their Westgate, it’s the very same resort, two-bedroom, their price is $373.00 through that. Now, because Westgate is dual affiliated, they’re also part of Interval International, and the difference, if you were to do the exact same resort through Interval’s getaway program, would be $619.00.

Gail: And how do those two compare to your forum because you said that you had a last minute . . . ?

Bill: We do. Our last minute, there’s a maximum charge on our last minute for posting on a free forum is $700 for the week, and it depends how close it is. You get some deals in there that are incredible. And it’s got to be 45 days or less.

Gail: So, in that instance, probably the RCI currently that you’re speaking of would be everybody’s best bet?

Bill: Well, you’re not going to get quite the quality you will on the TUG last minute. Like their resorts, the Royals that are in there, for one reason or other, somebody had to cancel out or sickness or something like that and they’ve only got two weeks to rent it. And if you were to go right to the resort, itself, they’re not going to be available on these last call situations, you’d spend thousands to try to get in there, where the maximum they can get on our last minute exchange rental program is the $700.00, and in some cases, it’s cheaper than that. I’ve got a note in here the Ray Harper, Ray and Darling Harper story is incredible. They were, back in 1999, he retired and for 26 straight weeks, they used leftover or RCI inventory and traveled throughout the United States and never once paid more than $200.00 for a week. And this was ’99, which was about eight years, so you’d pay probably $100.00 or so dollars.

Gail: Was that RCI?

Bill: Through RCI. He also had a couple of Interval exchanges that were involved with that. It’s in our advice section. You can actually get the details. But he used the RCI. Fifteen RCI, basically, is what it’s called, last call situations, bonus weeks for II. He had five of those. He had bonus weeks for the getaway. For 26 straight weeks, he just went from one timeshare to another and never spent more than $200.00 to get those particular trades.

Gail: Wow, that’s awesome!

Bill: Yeah, that’s the flexibility. You can go in right now and this is what I did with the Westgate. There are literally hundreds and hundreds of units available, you know, this weekend, if you could go for a week that are, like I said, $249.00 for a two-bedroom. And that’s some of the things that a lot of people don’t take advantage or even know about. I mean, even if you just go for a long weekend. Right here, the weather’s going to be great. I could whip down to Daytona Beach and get some beautiful place for two or three nights, pay $250.00 and not even stay the whole week and be hundreds of dollars ahead for the week. And that’s the kind of things you can do with these last minute inventory situations.

One of the other secrets, and a lot of people get burned on this, trying to determine if I’m going to trade my week and I have a floating week with either Marriott or somebody like that, don’t let the resort, itself . . . one of the options you usually have is deposit with RCI for an exchange or something like that when you put in how you want to use the week for the next year. Well, don’t do that. The reason being is the resorts, themselves, are going to deposit the least demand weeks that they have available. And what you’re going to have for trading power is going to be a lot less when it comes time to try to give your exchanges.

So, what you want to do is go find out which week you’re eligible for. If you can pick up July 4th or Christmas week or whatever happens, even if you’re not planning on using it, lock that week in as if you were going to use it and then, deposit that week with the exchange company, and you’re going to have a much higher trading power than you would if you just let Marriott or Hilton or whoever it happened to be deposit their excess week in your behalf for your trade.

Gail: And I’m assuming that the only way that you can make that successful is by requesting the deposit early. I know that I worked at a timeshare resort in the reservations department in Orlando, Silverlake Resort, actually. And a lot of times, if we had a savvy timeshare owner, what they would do is because all the weeks at Silverlake Resort are floating weeks, so a savvy owner, even though he had a floating week, would say, “Well, what week are you depositing for me?” And they would make a specific request so that they could get that week put into their RCI account to get a better trade advantage. But they had to do it early on, in order to make that happen.

Bill: Sure, and you want to do that. Most of them are a year to 13 months in advance, and as soon as you’ve got the opportunity to lock in that particular week that has the highest trading power, that’s the one you want to get. And even if your resort won’t do that for you, you can do it just like you were going to use that week, yourself. The resort doesn’t have to know you’re going to deposit with II or RCI until after the fact. You can always change your mind. So, lock in your best week.

One of the easiest ways to find out what the best weeks are, and I have this question quite a bit. Somebody says, “Well, I own a floating week. Which week should I get?” And the easy way to find out is just contact the resort, itself, and get their rental fees. Naturally, the week that has the highest rental fee is the one that has the highest demand.

Gail: All right.

Bill: And that’s the one you want to lock in for your week that you’re going to use, and that’s the one you’ll deposit with the exchanges to get the highest trade. And same way now that the point system’s out there, a lot of people ask me, well which resorts are the best or we’re in this particular area. And it’s fairly easy to find out, not only through TUG and our reviews and rankings, but through RCI with their point schedule. Each one of their points, every resort has what it takes to get into their prime time week or what it takes to get a one bedroom here or one bedroom there. And all you have to do is the one that has the highest number of points to get in is going to be the highest trading power, usually.

Gail: Right.

Bill: And that’s fairly easy to get and find out, too. Another secret, and this is sort of an inside thing and makes the membership in TUG more than worthwhile is on our bulletin board, we have a member only segment, where the members get in there and these are the people that live and die in timeshares and are on the exchange systems and seeing inventory and stuff like that. When they see something spectacular, they’ll usually post it on our bulletin board for the members, so that one of the members can pick up this resort if they’re not going to plan on using it, themselves. And that’s a goldmine, to be honest with you, for the exchange program.

A couple other features, the owners’ promo. Almost every new resort out there has some kind of promo. If it’s a new resort, current owners can usually refer future owners or clients to the resort for some kind of special, whether it’s two days at the resort for a discounted price or whatever it happens to be.

Gail: Now, would they be obligated to go through a . . . ?

Bill: They are, usually, obligated to go through the promo. That’s why they’re getting the discounted price, go through the presentation.

Gail: Do you recommend that, Bill, to have people . . . ?

Bill: I actually do for someone that’s unfamiliar with timeshares, as long as they’ve educated themselves before they go on the presentation because if you’ve never been to a timeshare and never used one, you need to find out about it. And actually, our site’s good, your site’s good. It’s got a lot of information, but until you actually sit down and look at the resort, see what it’s like, go through a presentation where they can explain how theirs is set up. Now, their program might not be good for you, but that’s why I say, if you go through a couple of them, you’ve got a better evaluation of what’s out there and how it works, whether it’s better for points or whether you’re better for deeded, or whatever it is. And so, for someone new.

Now, if it’s someone going out I never knew and everybody always calls me when I go on exchanges, come by and take the presentation, we’ll give you a $150.00 gift certificate, whatever, and first of all, I explain to them I’m involved in TUG, so I don’t want to do that, and I’m not going to buy, anyhow. I feel that that’s kind of a rip off for individuals doing that, just trying to take advantage of the thing, especially if they know they’re not going to do anything.

Gail: And my other thought is, because you are going to a sales presentation, how much of the information is trustworthy?

Bill: Well, there, again, that’s why the education is the secret to timesharing. The more you know before you go to the things, the better off you’re going to be.

Gail: Have better questions to ask?

Bill: Yeah, and plus, the same thing. Anything that’s said doesn’t mean a thing. It’s what’s in writing that means everything. And, unfortunately, if you’ve ever read a timeshare contract, it’ll drive you crazy kind of thing, you know? And you go back, and say, “Well, my salesman told me I could do this, this and this,” and they say, “Well, I’m sorry, that’s not part of our organization or the way it works.” And you have no recourse at that stage of the game. So, know what you’re doing before you do it and you’re much better off.

Gail: OK, and we’re going to go ahead and get into, if you’re done with your section, Bill, get into the question and answers, but can you explain the difference between the TUG website, the TUG Timeshare Forum and the TUG Classified link?

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Bill: The TUG website, it covers everything. It has links to all the different TUG features, that’s the TUG2.net. The Forum, itself, is humongous. As a matter of fact, I was on Google stats the other day, and the stats on our website actually had 54,000 pages on the Forum that are indexed through Google. So, you can imagine the amount of information there. And we’re just sort of touching and briefly, highlighting only a handful. And there’s the people that run the Forum, the volunteers that are involved with TUG. TUG wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the member volunteers. Ryan and I tried to keep the site up and running, but it’s all the individual volunteers that have their own individual areas and run them that is the heart and soul to TUG. And they’re just strictly member volunteers that take their time and keep it going for everybody so that we can all share in the information that’s available out there.

Gail: One of the features on your website that I really enjoy, and I use it often here at work, is the TUG Resort Rating. I call it the TUG Richter Scale. And the higher the number, the more that I know the quality of the resort, especially for somebody who’s never been there and who is interested in purchasing there, the quality of the resort. Explain a little bit about how the rating is determined.

Bill: The ratings are all determined by the input from the individual members that have actually gone to the resorts, themselves, whether they’re owners or exchangers or last minute trade people that have gone there. And after they’ve gone, hopefully, we get most of them to write a review on the resort, so that they can talk about the various aspects of it, what they like, what they didn’t like, and then, rate the resort on a scale of one to 10, with 10 being the absolute best resort you’ve ever been to, and one being the dump of the world, I guess. And that’s taking an average of all those inputs. It’s done automatically through our computers and it’ll output the ratings, based on all the inputs that are there. And it’s very accurate, as far as trying to get a good feedback.

You’re going to have some discrepancies, you know, if somebody hits the rainy weather or they’ve got a refrigerator that’s not working and that’s not a general thing for the entire complex, they might hit something one time where they’ve had a bad experience with a maid or something like that, they might give it a worse score than it is. But that’s one of the reasons I like the reviews probably more than I do the ratings. I let the ratings sort of give me a point, let me know where the better resort’s in, but reading the reviews and finding out what the members have done or liked and what’s available at the various resorts is probably a lot more feedback than anything. And we have a lot of people that have actually bought retail, either through Holiday or something, places they’ve never been to. And they can do that comfortably by just reading the ratings and reviews of other members that are out there on the website. We’ve got Top 10 list on every single area. We’ve got a Top 30 list that’s published information that people can see what are the best resorts that TUG members think are out there. And usually, if you buy any of those and get a good deal on them, you’re in pretty good shape.

Gail: Bill, is there a cost to join TUG?

Bill: There is. Our first year membership fee is $15.00, and then, our renewals, you can either renew, and it’s not an automatic renewal. You have to renew and say you want to, it’s $10.00 per year or $25.00 for three years. And we have a lot of ways where members, the active members usually get free renewals by either submitting reviews or providing referrals to other members. So, we’ve got a lot of people that have actually, even the volunteers all get free memberships, naturally. But we have a lot of people that have only paid the one time $15.00 membership fee and been members for 14 years.

Gail: So, by contributing their information and knowledge, they get to maintain the membership?

Bill: That is correct.

Gail: Awesome! That’s an awesome concept, I like that. OK, well let’s go ahead and get to some of these questions. One question that I had was a gal asked, she owns at a Gold Crown Resort, and we’re going to touch on trading. It seems like I’m getting a lot of trading questions.

Bill: Sure, with most being owners, that’s probably going to be the case.

Gail: Yeah, she owns at a Gold Crown Resort, but for some reason, she’s blocked from getting Silver Crown properties. Is this true? Have you heard anything about it? What are your thoughts?

Bill: There are some restrictions. The exchange companies put this in a long time, well, not so long ago, but they did it to protect the owners of the nicer resorts. They have a limit, a cutoff line, where it’s an arbitrary number. If your resort has a trading power of whatever it happens to be, 10 that will only allow you to see resorts available down to a level of seven. And the reason being is they found that if they allow those people that have the nice resorts to go to less than nice resorts, in their opinion, they get complaints all the time, even though they warn them ahead of time.

I know one specific instance, where someone had probably one of the top resorts in the world, and they said, “Well, I want to go to this area, and I know it’s not as good, and I want to trade anyhow.” And they did, and sure as everybody said, they said it was terrible and complained, the whole kit and caboodle just because they’re used to a different resort style than what might be available on a lower level. And that’s what’s happening here. They’re limiting those people with the nicer resorts going to less than nice just because they don’t want the complaints, “Look at this, I’ve got all this super nice place.”

And that’s really how we started TUG when it gets right down to it. I had one of the top resorts in the world with the Heritage Club there at Marriott, and traded for a dump, converted motel, or basically, it was two rooms. They knocked out a hole in the wall and made one the bedroom and one the sitting room and called it a one-bedroom timeshare. And I wasn’t too happy. And that’s what happens and why they limit it that way. And it’s the same way going the other way.

Gail: Right.

Bill: Those people who have the resorts, they might be a level five or six will never see the Gold Crown resorts because they’ve all been taken by Gold Crown people, or Five Star, whatever it happens to be. You know, you’ve got a channel, based on the quality of the resorts that you own at, and the supply and demand of the resort that you own at that determines what you actually see and have available through their inventories. Now, that all goes out the window when you get down to their last minute exchanges. You can take whatever’s available.
Gail: We had talked earlier about when you own a floating week and you go to deposit, a lot of people don’t realize that they actually have some control over the week that the resort deposits on their behalf to get better trading power. Got a listener out there that says, “Not all floating week resorts let you pick the week to deposit. Is this true? Do you know anything about this?”

Bill: That’s why I say, if you do it yourself, in other words, you don’t let the resort do the deposit. You actually do the selection, based on the fact that you’re going to use that resort week. In other words, pick the week.

Gail: You make the reservation.

Bill: The best week out, just like you were planning on making reservations there and going to use Christmas week at XYZ Resort. Then, once you’ve got that locked in, you contact the exchange company directly and say, “Hey, I own Christmas week at this Marriott and I’d like to deposit that week, I changed my mind.” Or, “I’m just going to deposit . . .” Don’t ask me, it’s all done online, but, “I’m going to deposit that and try to get an exchange for that.” Whereas, if you contacted Marriott and say, “Yeah, I want to exchange my week this year. Go ahead and make a deposit for me on my behalf with the II Exchange Company, they’re going to pick the less week available and your trading power is going to be that much less. You actually make your request through the resort to get the best week possible as if you were going to use it, yourself.

Gail: But doesn’t the resort have to cooperate, and RCI have to cooperate? Isn’t there some sort of contract agreement between the resort and RCI about what weeks they can take or that’s not so?

Bill: Not so much, like I say, when you’re making the request from your resort, you’re doing it on the intention that you’re using that week. It has nothing to do with the exchange company. I can go in today and set in July the 4th for Hilton Head, get that week, if it’s available. And if I decide I want to exchange that week, I deposit it with the exchange company. Marriott has no control over what I do with that week once I’ve got it firmed up in my system, in a reserve for me.

Gail: I can share this little tidbit of information out to everybody because I did work in a reservations department at a floating timeshare resort. In the public offering statement or the condo docs, where the developer has to actually write down how he intends on managing the resort, how reservations are handled, in there, you will find reservation deposit rules. And at our particular resort, if you did your deposit and your reservation between June and November prior to the New Year being there, you could actually select the week that you wanted.

Oftentimes, what I noticed was that a lot of people would do kind of what you were saying, Bill, is they had like this week deposited and, of course, our reservation department wanted to accommodate. But if it was like in March or April or halfway through the year, it was because we didn’t have availability, that we couldn’t really provide that for the consumer. So, one thing that a lot of people who own timeshare can do is read your condo docs, your public offering statement. And in there in the fine print somewhere, you can probably find a loophole that can allow you to do what you’re saying there, Bill.

Bill: Well, that’s knowing which weeks are available there, too. In Marriott, we can make reservations 13 months and a half. That’s standard, 12, 13 months, whatever it is. So, if I’m coming up and I have a floating week available and it comes Christmas, I want to be on the horn the first day that that week is available to reserve that particular week. Now if I use it, then I’ve got a great week. If I decide later I want to use it to trade, I’m going to have the best trading power week for that particular week.

Gail: OK, great. Let’s go ahead and get some more questions. Let’s see. I’ve got a lot of questions about people asking your thoughts on points versus deeded and if you had a particular formula on how to get the best deal in a points property.

Bill: Points, as you know, are almost all equal. It’s just a matter of how many points you’re getting for what price.

Gail: Yes.

Bill: If you get a Fairfield or an RCI point system, it’s the number of points for X amount of dollars. And they’ll trade for anything. So, it’s going into the numbers and determining where the best deals are. Not so much where the best resorts are, but where you get the most points for the least amount of money.

Gail: The least amount of maintenance fee.

Bill: And the maintenance fee involved, too. Well, the maintenance fee is usually based on the total number of points.

Gail: For a perfect example, we’ve got a $101,000 RCI point package that belongs to a property in the Caribbean, which is a right to use with a maintenance fee. Because it’s in the Caribbean, it’s kind of high, whereas, we’ve got a $90,000 point package with a $600.00 maintenance fee. So, oftentimes, what I’ve noticed is that since points are points are points, a lot of people who purchase points don’t want to use it at a particular resort. They’re buying it more for the flexibility. They often looked at OK, how much of my annual upkeep does it cost for me to maintain this so that I can get this flexibility every year? Do you have a particular formula that you use where one is better than the other?

Bill: Not necessarily. Like I said, you’ve just got to factor in what’s best for you and determine the price of the actual points and how that compares with the maintenance fee that’s involved. Speaking of maintenance fees and buying, there are actually, and it’s something we didn’t even realize until later down the road, that in some situations, and you have to be careful of this, and it’s one of these secrets nobody tells you about. There are timeshares out there that have zero value at high-end resorts.

Gail: Really?

Bill: And by this, I mean an actual example there is Hilton Head or any place that has a very low off season, where they close basically in January and February for all practical purposes up there. You will have, if I owned property at a high-end resort and paying $1,000 maintenance fee for that particular off week property, and it’s available for rent for $600.00 or $700.00 through the various exchange companies, what is my actual value or worth of that resort? I’m paying $1,000 for something I could pay $600.00 or $700.00 and get any time.

Gail: Very good point, very good.

Bill: And we didn’t even realize that until some of these people came in with their off season weeks and say they’re hard to sell. Or, here, I own a Marriott or here, I own a Sheraton or these high-end resorts that are top of the line. But because the maintenance fees are so high and demand is so low in the off-season, they’re paying more on maintenance fees and they could actually use the exact same resort if they rented it from the developer or the exchange company.

Gail: Yeah, very interesting. What are your thoughts, Bill, and I don’t want to get off too much on a tangent, on the Orange Lake points that they’ve got? They’re kind of new and know that TUG, the forum actually shares a lot of new information. What are members saying about that?

Bill: That would best be to go on the bulletin board. I’m not involved, I’m just an individual owner. I have owned a Marriott property. I also own at a Celebrity property in Orlando. And both of those are deeded. So, I do not have any personal experience on the point system, but there are literally hundreds, if not thousands of members. And you just mentioned on a bulletin board, where the discussion is ongoing. They talk about this and how to do things. So, personally, I can’t answer that question, but the answers are on the bulletin board, already.

Gail: So, they would go to the timeshare forums at www.tugbbs.com.

Bill: That’s correct, or they’d go to www.tug2.net and just click on forums and it’ll take you to the same.

Gail: Have you had experience with trading timeshares to get to Europe?

Bill: I missed the first part of that question, I’m sorry.

Gail: Have you had experience with trading timeshares to get to Europe? I’ve gotten some questions here from some members saying that they notice it’s very difficult to take their timeshare and get to Europe. And I didn’t know if that’s just their individual experience or group experience.

Bill: I’d be willing to bet it’s the quality of the resorts, again. Those people that have the nicer resorts usually do not have any problems. Especially, there’s a lot of the brand names that are expanding into the European area. Marriott’s’ got several over there, and a lot of the others are planning on going over there. It’s surprising, I was looking at the points chart. We were talking about points a little earlier, Gail. And the actual highest point value of any resorts that are out there, the average prime time, two-bedroom resort in U.S. runs anywhere from 45 to maybe 60, 70 thousand points to get a two-bedroom for a week during prime time. If you look at the Scandinavian countries, Norway, Sweden, they’re over 100,000 points to get the exact same thing. So, that might factor in supply and demand, too, in some areas of Europe. That’s the highest point total I’ve ever seen.

Gail: Yeah. The other thing you kind of mentioned, too, is we were talking about Orlando being saturated with so many timeshares, and it probably is not a great place to purchase to get good trade power. Do you feel that Hawaii is better?

Bill: Oh, definitely. If you’re buying a timeshare, you want to go where everybody wants to go that’s not overbuilt, Hawaii, the beaches during the summer, the snow season, snow resorts or ski resorts during the winter, the Caribbean during the winter and spring. Those are all very high demand. Sanibel, that area there along Florida in the spring. You own any of those areas and you’ll never have any problems trading if you get a fairly decent resort there because that’s where everybody wants to go. They’re not overbuilt yet. They’ve got plenty of demand and most people are using the resort, so there’s not that many exchanges available, which makes people that do exchange have a lot more trading power.

Gail: Even with the airfare to get to Hawaii, you still feel that it’s a fairly strong trader?

Bill: If you can plan far enough in advance, naturally. It’s the last minute trades that have the problems there. You can get some incredible deals, but by the time you pay the airfare on a last minute situation, it kind of negates the price of the $500.00 or $600.00 timeshare, whereas, if you’ve got a year in advance and you’re going out there, you can search for airline deals for six, eight months or so.

Gail: Right. Well, we’ve covered just about a whole full hour, here, Bill. I thank you so much. Is there any last words that you want to leave with our listeners before we sign off?

Bill: Just education is the key to timeshares. The more you know before you buy, the better off you’re going to be. If you’ve already bought, like most of us have, the education is still the key to success. Find out how to use the timeshare, find out how to best work the exchange system. A bulletin board is by far, the goldmine for that. There are literally 30 something thousand threads that are on there covering every aspect of timesharing. So the people that didn’t get their questions answered and still might have specific, I had somebody ask “What’s the best resort in Marco for week number two or three,” or something like that. Those are the kind of things you need to go on the bulletin board and post, and you’ll find all kinds of feedback from the members. More than anything else, I’d just like to thank the volunteers that help run TUG. Like I said, we wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for them.

And also, thank Holiday for hosting this and trying to get the word out so that individuals can better utilize the timeshare and understand better what the alternatives might be, as opposed to just going to a presentation and getting hit over the head and not knowing what they’re doing.

Gail: Well, I want to thank you. I’ve learned quite a bit from this. And I just want to say to the listeners that are out there, thanks so much for sticking in there and hanging out with us as we go through the question. For the questions that we were unable to get to, I will be e-mailing you back responses or Bill will, as well. But thank you to everyone and we look forward to the next webinar. Thank you so much, Bill, thank you.
Bill: Thank you.

Gail: All right, good night!

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Holiday Group, www.holidaygroup.com, is proud to host the Timeshare User's Group www.tug2.net, a self-help organization of timeshare owners and anyone else interested in timesharing. TUG collects reviews and ratings for over 4,000 timeshare resorts from TUG members and volunteers, who've been to these resorts. TUG also provides a variety of services which enhance timeshare users' awareness of the current timeshare industry. TUG currently hosts the most active Internet timeshare bulletin board (tugbbs.com) on the web. TUG includes over 21,000 registered users with over 35,000 discussion threads and more than 300,000 postings on timeshare-related questions.

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