This Week's Q & A

Q: I own a timeshare that I’d like to dump. I know the market for timeshares is limited and so anticipate having a difficult time finding a buyer. But I’ve been approached by a company offering to handle the sale for me. They claim to have a high success rate and say they are confident they’ll be able to get a price at least equal to and possibly more than I paid five years ago. They want an up-front listing fee of $400, which doesn’t seem excessive, especially if they actually manage to find a buyer. What do you think of this arrangement?

A: Frankly, not much. The $400 listing fee may not “seem excessive” if the company sells your timeshare, but it will look a lot like a waste of money if they don’t. You’re right about the limited market for timeshare resales; according to some studies, fewer than 5 percent of all timeshare owners nationally have sold their interests in the past 20 years.

Recognizing the market potential in that pool of frustrated timeshare owners, many companies, like the one you describe, are offering to find buyers that owners can’t locate on their own. While some of these sales programs may be legitimate, according to the Federal Trade Commission, most of them are “bogus.”

Before you deal with this company or any other offering to sell your timeshares, you want to verify its credentials. At a minimum, you should make sure the company’s agents are licensed to sell real estate in the area where the timeshares are located. Beyond that, check with the local Better Business Bureau, the consumer protection agency (if there is one), and the real estate licensing division (both where the company is located and in areas where it does business) to see if there is any history of violations or consumer complaints against the company or its agents.

Also ask the company to document is claims about a high sales success rate. How many timeshares has it sold over what period of time and in what developments? Ask for references, including timeshare owners the company has represented, and contact them. Were other owners satisfied with the company’s performance?

I’m always a little nervous about up-front fees that have to be paid before any services are rendered; it’s beset to avoid them if you can. (The Federal Trade Commission suggests that you opt for companies that collect their fee after they sell the timeshares, not before.) If that’s not possible, find out if the fee is refundable and if so, under what circumstances? If the company doesn’t sell the timeshares, do they get to keep the fee, or any portion of it?

Instead of dealing with a national company (which most of the companies making these pitches are), you might want to contact a real estate firm in the area in which your timeshare is located. A local firm’s knowledge of the area and of market conditions will be a definite plus; just make sure the firm handles vacation property as well as residential sales.

You also might consider trying to sell the timeshare on your own, if you haven’t already done so, by running ads in the newspaper or in vacation magazines. Also, talk to the timeshare developer or to the management company. They probably won’t be terribly helpful if there are still unsold timeshares in the development, but if all the units have been sold, the FTC suggests that you ask the developer to consider establishing an on-site resales office.

If your sales efforts fail, you might want to participate in an exchange program, through which (for a fee) you can arrange trades with other timeshare resorts in different locations. That won’t unload your unit, but it will enable you to enjoy one of the major benefits of timeshare ownership. And who knows – you might just stumble across someone else in the exchange program who is looking for precisely the timeshare opportunity that you’re trying to sell.