Countless Timeshare owners find themselves in the difficult situation of wanting to end their ownership but not knowing how! Combine that with little to no help, or in many cases awful advice provided by the resort or developer and its no surprise an entire timeshare exit industry has been created for the sole purpose of exploiting owners ignorance about their options and to part them from even more of their money!
These companies are literally everywhere you look on the internet, on tv/radio, even in your mailbox in the form of post cards all providing the exact same claim of a guarantee to "Cancel or Get you out of your Timeshare" If this sounds like you, this article will not only be an eye opener for you, but will save you from throwing away thousands of dollars and it wont cost you a dime!
Timeshare Exit Companies Sound Perfect Whats the Catch?
"We Guarantee that we can get you out of your Timeshare!" is an extremely attractive marketing pitch! Its what so many owners are desperate to hear as a solution to allow them to end their ownership!
There is a reason for the age old saying "If it sounds too good to be true" exists, and Timeshare Exit/Cancellation companies are no different! As you will discover in reading this article the solutions that these companies charge ridiculously high fees for (many thousands of dollars) can be accomplished by any owner without paying these companies aa dime and achieve the exact same results!
Dont believe me? Keep on reading! This article is going to blow your mind!
History of Timeshare Exit/Cancellation Schemes
The Timeshare Exit Industry got its start years ago from companies that would mass mail tens of thousands of post cards to owners offering to host a paid for dinner and presentation where they could guarantee to get them out of their timeshare! This message was extremely popular because even then it was difficult to sell a timeshare and most if not all resorts had no organized program to take back unwanted timeshares thus leaving owners to "figure it out" for themselves.
After months if not years of failed attempts and or paying large upfront fees to resale scammers (a whole different topic) countless owners began to feel there was simply no way for them to get rid of the virtual anchor around their necks that was a Timeshare!
This simple dynamic made it very easy for unscrupulous individuals to exploit owners desperate for a solution because it offered a "guarantee" to end their timeshare ownership, and that marketing pitch was so wildly successful it still exists to this day!
The original timeshare exit companies would trick owners into thinking they were signing over their timeshare right then and there during the "dinner" and they would never have to worry about it again thus making it far easier to swallow the multi-thousand-dollar cost the owner had to pay! What actually happened is that the owner was instead signing over power of attorney for the company to instead either have a partner company list the timeshare on ebay (or even TUG) for $1 and offer to cover all closing costs which was easily far less than the amount paid by the unlucky owner! Or worse, the company would take action to transfer the deed into an assetless LLC created for the sole purpose of abandonment leaving resorts and developers with little to no recourse on collecting any maintenance fees moving forward.
This process went on for many years and captured thousands and thousands of owners in its net until the industry took action to prevent the transfer of ownerships into these bogus LLCs as well as many of the larger developers began offering surrender/deedback programs that owners could use to give back unwanted timeshares.
This gave rise to the timeshare exit/cancellation industry we know today that utilizes the same shady tactics and marketing that worked so well in the past, but with a twist on the "solution" they utilize to follow thru with the claim that they can "end your timeshare ownership, guaranteed!"
How do Timeshare Exit Companies Work?
Today the exit companies all operate using the exact same strategies already available to owners, default and deedback!
The only thing that separates these companies today is the marketing pitch they use to lure in unsuspecting owners and convince them to pay thousands and thousands of dollars for their help or to enter their "program" that almost always includes the mention of a guarantee for you to be out of your timeshare!
To put it simply, there are only 3 solutions to get out of a timeshare. Find a new owner for it, give it back to the resort, or stop paying for it. Thats it! There are no magic strategies or legal loopholes or "new laws" out there that have been kept secret from owners despite the claims from these companies but there is no way they can convince all these owners to pay these huge fees if they tell you the whole truth!
What sounds better to you?
"Our program fee is $5000, all you have to do is stop paying for your timeshare and eventually youll be free! "
or
"Once you sign up with us, we represent you and will take care of everything moving forward in securing your exit from your timeshare with your resort! You can ignore all further communication from your timeshare and simply tell them that you are now our client and everything must go through us now. All you have to do is sit back and wait for your ownership to be over!"
Just what do you think happens when you ignore everything your resort sends you moving forward including bills/late fee notices/etc and more importantly stop paying?
There is noone "fighting for you", there is no effort from any of these companies on your behalf to change the situation in any way shape or form for you benefit other than perhaps a simple form letter sent from them to the resort demanding that you be let out of your contract which is promptly ignored because they know as well as anyone the plan here is not to engage in some legal battle vs simply have the owner stop paying.
We even made an entire youtube video short explaining this "guaranteed exit solution"! Check it out here:
Cant I just stop paying for my Timeshare myself?
Yes, yes you can! This is the most remarkable part about this entire industry is that their marketing is so effective it convinces thousands upon thousands of owners to pay thousads upon thousnads of dollars to default on their own timeshares!
Simply put, you can accomplish the exact same result an exit company would provide by NOT paying for your timeshare yourself, and thats completely free!
And if you want to learn more about defaulting on your timeshare, here is our free guide on that What happens if I stop paying for my Timeshare?
So why would I ever pay an Exit Company?
People who pay exit copmanies simply dont know any better and think its their only option left! Especially owners who still owe on their timeshares because with a loan balance attached the ONLY reasonable exit strategy is to default because you cant give away or give back a timeshare that still has a loan balance remaining!
people also choose this becuase they dont actually WANT to default and risk their credit and dont actually realize that hiring these companies and letting them "handle it going forward" results in them no longer paying their dues! Yes, owners are unknowingly tricked into no longer paying their timeshare loan/maint fees and they pay thousands of dollars for it on top of that!
Wont defaulting on my Timeshare hurt my credit?
This depends on what you are defaulting on. A loan balance? yes, that is likely to result in a credit hit. Just your maintenance fees? Far less likely! However you hvae the exact same chance/result regardless of how you default so why would you knowingly pay a company thousands of dollars for the exact same result you could do yourself for free?
Read more on What happens if I stop paying for my Timeshare?
So how do these exit companies stay in business?
Many dont! You can find plenty of examples of these companies being targeted by attorney generals offices or losing lawsuits from timeshare developers or in the case of the one of the largest exit copmanies ever, simply closed up shop leaving thousands of customers hung out to dry! Read That Story Here and they were promoted regularly by the consumer advice "expert" Dave Ramsey who himself faces a lawsuit for promoting them to his listeners as being fully vetted!
Again all of these companies operate in the same fashion, and you can see this plain as day in all of these lawsuits and Atty Generals actions explaining how they trick owners into ending their payments to their timeshare and awaiting default/foreclosure.
The crazy part about all this is that in so many cases the timeshares are not willing to pursue a lengthy (and expensive) foreclosure process so many simply reach out to owners after enough time has passed to negotiate a surrender of the ownership back to the resort. This is of course touted as an overwhelming success by the exit company when in actuality they accomplished absolutely nothing on behalf of the timeshare owner and that exact same outcome would have taken place had the owner simply stopped paying themselves (for free).
I had a friend who used a Timeshare exit company?
That may very well be true! There are thousands of owners who were satisfied with their use of an exit company, yet all of them could have accomplished the exact same solution themselves either surrendering their ownership back to their resort willingly, or defaulting on their own and waiting for the resort to negotiate a surrender of the ownership back.
The exit company I contacted says they arent not like the others?
Of course they do! What company would willingly admit their strategy is for you to default on your own timeshare? You would never choose to pay someone for that service! Its far more successful to promote a "unique" strategy that "legally" gets you out of your Timeshare!
Want to test out the theory? Ask them for details on how they are going to get you out? Heck straight up ask them if defaulting is part of that strategy (after all, its your money and credit score at risk here). Some will go so far as to claim they will help prevent any credit hit for defaulting, but youll notice they wont guarantee that!
These are the same finely tuned sales pitches that convinced you to buy in the first place and likely told by people who sold timeshares in the past! Someone willing to lie to your face is going to make far more money working for an exit/cancellation company than they did selling timeshares!
The Final Word on Timeshare Exit/Cancellation!
The biggest red flag in the timeshare industry going on 30 years now is a company making a too good to be true promise to a timeshare owner and then asking to pay a large fee upfront and Exit companies are no different!
In fact we find more and more of these companies have altered their strategy to counter this "never pay upfront fees" mantra and have now adopted a monthly recurring fee for their "program" which is even more lucrative because they know full well in most cases it can take months or even YEARS of owner default for the resort to finally take action to recover the ownership for lack of payment!
It is quite literally the perfect strategy because they can continue to claim month after month they are "hard at work" on your case when in actuality they arent doing a thing but cashing your monthly checks! But hey, 18 months (and payments) down the road you get a letter from your resort asking you to surrender your ownership back over to them and guess what? The exit company takes credit for that success!
If we have said it once, we have said it 1000 times. The Timeshare industry has no peers when it comes to finding ways to part owners from their money and Exit/Cancellation companies are a perfect example!
If you want help discovering your real options to get out of an unwanted Timeshare, feel free to come on by our free Timeshare owner forums where you can get help and advice from owners just like you for FREE, 24 hours a day 7 days a week!
Also check out our free guide that provides the 3 options all owners have to exit any timeshare!
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