| Unhappy with your timeshare? Most timeshare owners will hone in on a particularly horrendous sales experience, or a specific false promise that didn’t make its way into the contract, or unrelenting maintenance fees. But few timeshare tales compare with that of Freddie and Diane from Williamsport, Tennessee who got a taste of virtually EVERY flavor of abuse from Diamond Resorts over nearly 20 years. They were so frustrated with Diamond that they forwarded a copy of their grievances to the Florida Attorney General’s office. We found it among the 2,170 pages of complaints about Diamond on file there. “From the very beginning of our relationship with Diamond Resorts International, we have been misled and blatantly lied to…” “We have been told the timeshare was a great investment, there would be low maintenance fees that would only minimally increase over time.” “Higher membership levels would give us greater booking power, free upgrades and reimbursement for airline tickets and rental cars.” “We were also told we could offset our maintenance by purchasing more points…” “We were told we could rent out our timeshare and use the funds to pay our maintenance fees.” “We have been promised a personal advisor who would be assigned to us to assist in planning our vacations and we would be given priority status in booking the best locations and dates.” Wow! That’s quite the list. But… wait for it… “None of this has happened.” Instead, Freddie and Diane report… “Some of the benefits we were said to receive like reimbursement for auto rental were taken away.” “Others like free upgrades disappeared and were replaced with paid upgrades…” “Maintenance fees at first went up minimally each year but after Diamond Resorts took over they began to increase drastically.” Their message to Diamond? “Do you ever stop??” We all know the answer to that one. Think it’s time for Diamond to stop pressuring customers for more, more, more? Tell Mark Wang. He’s the CEO of Hilton Grand Vacations, which purchased Diamond Resorts in 2021. His email is mark.wfang@hgv.com. The American Resort Development Association (ARDA) represents timeshare companies in Washington, DC. Jason Gamel is the President and CEO of ARDA. Let’s let him know that overly creative financing is a bad look for the industry. You can email him at jgamel@arda.org. Or… if you’ve heard the “good investment” sales pitch from another timeshare company, and want to let their top brass know, here is a list ARDA published of its VIPs across all its member companies. Maybe you can find your timeshare company executive and tell them about the consequences of deceitful sales practices. And if your timeshare company won’t keep its promises, you can always let us know at info@timesharefacts.com. PS: Follow us on social media. Twitter Facebook Instagram |
