conversation: User (16semesters): "I see on reddit a some comments about how owning timeshares “can be a good deal” and thought it was prudent to point out this is just not true in any evidence I could find. They are a really predatory and deceptive business whether resale or points based and especially when bought from the developer. Let’s go through the options if you **own** a timeshare:\n\n* You buy from a developer/direct -\n\nThey immediately decrease in value if bought from the developer, sometimes to literal worthlessness or even negative value. Every. Single. Timeshare. Decreases. I don’t care if it’s Disney Vacation Club or whatever the salesperson told you. You buy it from the developer and you just wasted tens of thousands of dollars. Check Ebay if you don’t believe me or literally any of the resale sites. You just lost thousands of dollars. Find a single one that has increased in value vs inflation, post the link and I’ll buy the first person gold. Even DVC which is considered the most valuable timeshare currency sells for under initial purchase value when accounting for inflation.\n\n* You buy/gifted from a reseller/family member -\n\nLet’s say you get it for literally zero dollars on ebay. Pretty sweet right, free vacation? Wrong. Maintenance fees will be very expensive. At least 500-800$ yearly. So you are paying 500-800 a year, to hopefully go on vacation to the same place at the same time (if the word “points” just jumped into your brain, go to the next paragraph).  This may be a discount of 0%-50%. So this is the one thing I will conceded this may provide you with a *small* discount. So a small discount to have a liability and complete lack of flexibility in a vacation is a terrible financial tradeoff. People that post that “the same room/condo would be 5k that week!” are always quoting the developers “stated rate” which is not market at all and basically made up. Give me an exact example if you think I’m wrong along with screen shot of your maintenance fees and again, gold to the first person.\n\n* “But 16semesters, I get points! I have plenty of flexibility”\n\nPoints are garbage. Garbage. They oftentimes include an additional fee to use a different resort. No matter what the salesperson told you, there *are* byzantine rules on dates, switching out, etc. They are restrictive and expire after *at most* 3 years. They sell for fractions of their “value” on resale sites. Why would points be selling for so little on the resale market if they are such good deals? Wouldn't it be prudent to just buy the points at a significant discount and use those instead? Let me know your company your timeshare is through and I can promise I'll find points well below "retail".\n\nA lot of people also get second hand information on these things from family members that may be inaccurate or outdated so I’d caution passing off “well my aunt only pays X” unless you’ve seen some proof.  It’s okay if you’ve been scam by a timeshare or someone in your family has. I’ve been scammed on other scams before, it doesn’t make you stupid. I write this post on the personal finance subreddit so that people can be informed moving forward. If anyone has disagreements or something I missed let me know."
  Self: "Curious if you know how inheriting one works. My in laws are terrified that my FIL's parents will pass their timeshare down to them and they don't want it. "
  Autarch_Kade (Autarch_Kade): "You can let the timeshare die with the family member.  Often times that's one of the only ways to get out of the timeshare for a family."
  Thelithical (Thelithical): "What if someone about to die offered to accept all timeshares ever as a gift (or as a $.01 eBay auction).\n\nWould it technically work and bankrupt a lot of these companies?\n"
  spacejamjim (spacejamjim): "Would not work. The buyers would be placed as the owners of the deed and forced to pay the maintenance fees. They want you to resell the shit so someone keeps paying the maintenance fees "
  