Scoop du Jour: The State of Timeshare
-by Scoop
January 29, 2010 — Posted on the NorthJersey.com website recently was a very abbreviated piece from Gannet News Service by Roger Yu, dated 01-17-2010, telling their readers what most of us within the timeshare industry have known for some time and although the content is not entirely correct, it is worth consideration.
“The recession has been particularly tough on the timeshare business. Sales are down; defaults are up. Resort development has come to a standstill, and thousands of salespeople have been laid off.
“Scams targeting owners desperate to get out from under payments are resulting in consumer complaints and actions from state attorneys general all over the country.
“Sales dropped 48 percent in 2008 and 40 percent in 2009. They are likely remain flat in 2010, estimates Howard Nusbaum, CEO of ARDA (American Resort Development Association)”.
Nussbaum apparently “blames the slowdown on customers’ inability to get independent financing and the industry’s difficulties repackaging and reselling mortgages they used to provide buyers.”
On the surface that is all mostly true but the ‘missing-link’ in this story goes way beyond what Roger Yu shared with his audience as he forgot to mention other factors that led to the Timeshare industry’s woes.
Yu failed to mention, for example, that anyone in upper management (and the developers, too) who didn’t see the crash coming down the chute like a freight train on fire and gone wild were, IMO, incompetent, arrogant, ignorant, greedy and slothful, etc. and quite frankly not fit for their highly paid position and they should have been fired the moment the locomotive hit the school bus.
That includes the senior folks at ARDA (American Resort Development Association), too, and what is alarming is that too many of these people who hold positions of responsibility are still at the helm. And as long as they are, they’ll likely not see the next bullet speeding towards the industry and we’ll have to deal with a ‘replay’ that may again harm thousands more industry personnel (and owners) who’ll be left holding the proverbial empty bag!
There is so much more to this story and topics too that in the next episode of Scoop Du Jour my harangue will be dedicated to everyone working in Timeshare, whether as an employee or a 1099 I/C and how that relationship with developers may be structured in such a manner to hopefully protect ‘associates’ from future calamities and the consequences of events such as the ones just endured by most.
Scoop
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Looking forward to your follow up!
Your posts always show me that you really have some indepth knowledge about this. Quite a valuable read i must say.
When is part two coming???