When I posted my TRUE experiences at Westgate Resorts in Orlando Florida of April 3, 1998, I got hundreds of email messages from readers all over the world that had similar stories.
On April 25, 2003, I received a second email message from a "Westgate Salesperson" (I cannot verify this, the salesperson used an adelphia.net account). Here is the interchange with the salesperson's message to me and my responses:
Lisa:
Let me first say that I grew up on Toastmasters and enjoy debating. Thank you for writing back! I am definitely very interested to hear thoughts on this from "the other point of view". I hope you take my comments as a counterpoint to your opinions on Westgate and spending, the way in which they were meant.
Westgate Salesperson:
Westgate doesn't abuse the 90 minutes. The people on tour are not obligated to stay past 90 minutes. In training, we are told to "KISS" and go quickly, we are told to tell the truth, I always did. It's not necessary to lie to make a timeshare sale. This product sells itself. I don't brush anything off as unimportant or deny anything. You obviously enjoy putting words in people's mouths. I don't believe that any morally abhorrent things are going on at Westgate that don't go on at any other sales facility in the entire world. What you are not understanding is that on any given day of the year and Westgate is only closed 2 days out of the year, there are 80-200 families touring each one of their resorts. That translates to approximately 300,000-600,000 families that are touring Westgate every year. Westgate has been selling timeshare since 1982. I'm sure that if the problem was as big as you seem to think it is that the Florida Real Estate Commission would have shut their operations down years ago since timeshare is highly regulated by FREC. As for being lied to or coerced into buying something, in Florida the consumer is given a 10 day right of recission when purchasing a timeshare which is plenty of time to go over all of the signed documents after the fact and cancel if you so choose.
Lisa:
Your statement that tourers are not obligated to remain is false in my experience and in those who have written me. After 90 minutes, every time any person who wrote me asked for their ticket, it was denied to them. In some cases the salespeople walked out on them, abandoning the person over 30 minutes from the starting spot. In others the salespeople insisted the person must get other 'stamps' on their form before they could leave, which took many more hours. In my case I asked many times to get my tickets and leave. I was told I *had* to go through more layers before I could. You read the stories. So in essence you are saying is that I could have walked out without my tickets after 90 minutes. True. I could have walked out immediately, too. But if Westgate promises "for 90 minutes you will receive X" then they have an obligation to do that. At 90 minutes, the person should receive their tickets. The person can still choose to stay and buy! They can choose to leave. But if one side of a contract has fulfilled their obligation, the other should as well. That's what a contract is all about. To do otherwise is unethical and in fact illegal.
You personally may not lie. But many, many of your coworkers lie and say things which are untrue in order to get the contract signed. I have many stories citing specific cases. Once the contract is signed and the verbal offer is followed up on, the visitor is told that it is not in writing and therefore not valid. For you to say that what goes on at Westgate also goes on elsewhere is an avoidance of the issue. Part of being a moral being is to do what's right regardless of whether others choose to do wrong. Not only for yourself and your own self-worth, but for the example you are giving to your children. You say "I don't believe that any morally abhorrent things are going on at Westgate that don't go on at any other sales facility in the entire world." Those are your actual words. Does it not bother you to be part of an organization that does morally abhorrent things - regardless of whether others also do them or not? Does it not bother you that your children are learning that these morally abhorrent things are things "my mommy or daddy" associates with?
Many people have written me saying they tried to cancel within the 10 days and were hassled, told they could not and threatened with legal action. It may be the law, but as with other things involving Westgate, it can often come down to what Westgate can do, not what Westgate should do.
The people who have complained about Westgate to the BBB, AG and so on have gotten little to no follow-up with those agencies. Perhaps they are complaining to the wrong organizations. I will investigate the FREC and see how I can redirect people there, thank you for that information.
Westgate Salesperson:
There you go again putting words in my mouth. My job was simply to help these people understand that rent is throwing money away and owning is putting it back in your own pocket. When a person didn't purchase from me, I didn't degrade them. I told them that if they weren't going to buy with us to buy with someone, stop renting and throwing your money away. I have listened time and time again to people bitching about their nasty, dirty, unsafe accomodations but they continue the cycle. It's almost like the welfare system if you can believe it. There are problems with the timeshare system and their are problems with the hotel industry. There's nothing wrong with Westgate's policies as far as I can see. I don't understand why you feel that Westgate's prices are high or that you would have to pay their high interest rate. There is no pre-payment penalty on their financing. I signed their contract and paid mine in cash. Yes, there are resales out there and there's nothing wrong with purchasing a resale if you can find the week that you are looking for.
Lisa:
If you did not degrade your people, then are you sure the 'second' and 'third' tier levels did not? I agree that my primary saleswoman was relatively nice and friendly. While she refused to answer real questions, she would only counter-offer and not yell when I asked questions and had objections. It was the manager and superior that then yelled at me, scolded me and made fun of me. This story is the same with just about everybody who writes in. It is the 'clean-up crew' that starts insulting the visitors - apparently with the purpose of getting the visitors to leave without their tickets. Does each of your clients receive their tickets promptly after 90 minutes with no hassle? If so, I will gladly suggest that people ask for you when they arrive.
As far as the prices. I have started asking the people who wrote me what they were quoted, out of interest. Quotes mostly range from $18,000 to $25,000 for a week. Interest rates quoted are around 17% to 18%. This turns out, with a 30-year loan, to be around $4,300/yr. Add to that the current "maintenance" and taxes which are $585 or more according to my contacts. So now you're at almost $5000/yr for a weekly "vacation". This vacation does not include maid service (another $25/day). And in comparison, you could stay at Disney's Grand Floridian, a very lush hotel and spa, for a mere $2688/wk. Heck, you can rent a week at Westgate on ebay for $450/week in prime season. That is less than the maintenance charge that a "real" owner pays.
To me, paying $5000 a year for something you can get for $450 - for 30 years in a row - isn't a reasonable thing to do. You keep comparing this as renting an apartment vs buying a house. That's an extremely poor analogy. First, in terms of simple purchase price, the analogy is more like buying a car from a reputable dealer for its cost, or buying a car from a guy on the street for 10 times its value because that guy has pushed you against a wall. Even if both cases you really WANT that object - the timeshare - if you were able to properly evaluate your choices you would buy it at the most efficient cost. But your *salesperson* is not allowing that normal decision process to occur. When you buy something, you should be able to shop around. Westgate forces you to buy on the spot - and actively harasses you if you wish to investigate the market first. I have heard this from every person who wrote in. What other industry forces you to sign immediately at 10x the market cost, and refuses to provide a contracted-for asset if you refuse?
Also, your house analogy is incorrect on the asset side. Once you sign the contract, your "asset" is now only 10% or less of its value. This isn't owning something for posterity. It's buying something that is not worth buying because of the huge cost differential and the huge depreciation. It's like buying a car in San Francisco because you're visiting there for a week instead of renting it, buying it at 10 times its normal cost, putting out 90% of that cash into a "bottomless well" (with less than 10% resale value) - and paying more in car taxes for that ownership than you would in rental fees.
Westgate Salesperson:
***With all due respect, you say that at your salary, your time was worth more than the ticket price of the tickets they gave you, but you went out of curiosity. I don't buy this. You knew when you signed the contract that it was a SALES presentation. Typically this means that they are going to try their hardest to sell you something. This is not a sightseeing tour. At Westgate, we have what is called a courtesy tour. This is someone who is curious about the resort that walks in the door and tells us that they would like to tour. They don't get a freebee and this tour is not charged against the salesperson's stats. You state that you choose to spend your money on companies that are ethical and that make monetary sense so you've obviously been shopping the timeshare industry. I'm curious about who you own your timeshare with. Is it Hilton, Hyatt, Marriott, or maybe Disney??? All of these companies followed in Westgate's footsteps by becoming part of the timeshare industry. Maybe you had a "stupid" salesperson. Maybe you were the first person that she ever toured. Maybe she didn't know what she was talking about. I don't know. It really surprises me that you ran to your car after this presentation and wrote down what was said to you on the tour but it never ocurred to you to write down the salesperson's name or the manager's name.
Lisa:
We were going down to Florida for a much-needed break. We only had 3 days as I recall, we are both very, very busy individuals and this was our only vacation for 2 years or so. We were talking at the hotel about the places we were going and the person there commented that they knew of a great timeshare that happened to give tickets to one. So we said we'd give it a try for the morning because we'd never been to a timeshare before and it might be a good idea for us. I have bought a house, bought many cars, bought many other things. So I have dealt with salespeople before. What went on in that timeshare seminar was NOT a sales presentation. That was far, far different. Many writers have compared it to a police interrogation. And again, if you read the many stories on my site, you will see I was not in an isolated incident. A salesperson encourages you to buy something and answers questions honestly. They do NOT tell falsehoods, berate you and refuse to hold up their promised end of a bargain.
No, I didn't write down the names. I didn't write down the dollar figures or interest rates either. What I was upset about what what HAPPENED, not the one individual who did it, since I saw it going on in the room all around me. I was upset at Westgate, not at the woman. And again, the woman herself was semi-reasonable. It was her manager and manager-2 that were the nasty ones. To be honest, I don't remember her even mentioning their names, just "I'll get my manager" ...
I was fascinated by you saying on courtesy tours that "They don't get a freebee and this tour is not charged against the salesperson's stats." Charged against the salesperson's stats? So the salesperson is actively penalized if they let their person escape without buying? I'm starting to see what sort of a culture creates these attacks on the visitors. They are not just people you are trying to encourage to buy if it suits their needs. They are people who can *harm your stats* if you let them escape *without* buying. Working on commission is one thing - but this sounds like an entirely different level of "motivation". I've been a contractor and I have to say that any job system which penalizes you like that is going to have abuse.
Westgate Salesperson:
***Obviously when you talk about renting your rooms on the web you are painfully unaware that you are still RENTING. Westgate is offering the opportunity to PURCHASE your vacations for LIFE. This is ownership, not a lease. It can be passed on to your family. Yes, it is 10 times the cost of renting a week of vacation but there is no term. I was 28 years old when I purchased my timeshare. I paid $8400.00 for it and if you add the cost of maintainance, taxes and exchanges WITH INFLATION for 40 years, it will cost me approximately $30,000.00 to own my timeshare. If I rented the accomodations that I am accustomed to, it would cost me approximately $125-$275 per night even through the internet. After 40 years of renting, even at the LOWEST rate per night, for one week per year, WITHOUT ANY INFLATION FIGURED IN it would cost me $35,000.00. Let me ask you, what is the better deal? Especially since I have the added benefit of writing off the real estate taxes and willing it to my kids.
Lisa:
I'm quite aware that I'm still renting. Just as I'm aware, when I visit Texas, that I rent a car for my time there and don't buy a new one. I'm also aware that your maintenance and tax costs go up every year for a property that is aging. Right now it's $585/year. So even if I *owned* my timeshare and had no more purchase costs, I would still be paying more for my weekly visit than if I rented it (Westgate weekly rentals on ebay go for $200 - $450 a week). And if I sunk in all the thousands of dollars to own it, it is not an "investment" like a house is. If anything, the resale value right now is around $1500. So it is a huge loss of capital.
You talk about willing this to your kids. If you invested that $20,000 right now they would have a far larger return than you willing them a property - an old, very-used one at that point - worth $1500 that they have to continue to pay $585/yr to keep. If I spend money for a house, I expect that house to appreciate in value over the years and at least sell for what I paid for it. I would not buy a house that was sinking into the mud, that other renters were damaging, that would lose practically its entire value in a year, while I was still stuck paying for it. And I would certainly not then give that house, now valued at $1500, for my children to keep paying taxes on.
In addition to all of that, this all assumes that the property is being maintained and cared for. Again, the house analogy. With your own house, you control its cleanliness, the outside property, you can keep it well maintained. But at Westgate you are at the mercy of your "landlord" and the 51 other "roomies" you have. So it is more like being stuck in a lifetime lease on an apartment with college students roaming in and out of it all year. From the tales I have heard, there have been many instances of grimy carpets, dirty sheets, broken dishwashers, broken sliders, apartments that were rented out to other people, forced motel stays, and more. It is NOT something you own. It is something you *share* and even your shared time in there is iffy based on what your Landlord is doing or not doing at the moment.
Maybe you are spared many of these things because you are an internal person. Maybe only internal people use your timeshare so it is clean and well kept. I imagine they take much better care of you than they do their "common person". So while many others have an impossible time trading weeks or locations, or getting maintenance, you seem to do it with great ease. That is very interesting. Maybe if you re-read the stories and thought to yourself, "Would I be happy if these things happened to ME on my vacation?" you would understand more what the issues are.
Westgate Salesperson:
Let me tell you a story about a couple in their late 70's that I met in Nassau, Bahamas last year on an exchange I made to Atlantis Resort. They had purchased their timeshare from Westgate Villas in Kissimmee in 1982 for about $1,800.00. They told me that they had traveled the world. It was the best thing they ever did. How long do you think that $1,800.00 would have lasted if they were renting hotel rooms? Would they have been able to stretch their dollars over a 20 year period and stay in places all over the caribbean? I think not. 30 years ago the average hotel room cost less than $10.00 per night and we all know that it's increase more than 5 times since then.
Lisa:
So they could have had that week for $70 when they bought. They could have put the remaining $1730 into investments. The money they wasted on "maintenance" could have bought them weeks each subsequent year without touching their investments. They could have still rented anywhere they wanted in Westgate or elsewhere, for less money, and not be locked into a given date or location (or try to switch around to get another). So their investment could have grown yearly not only through interest but also through the leftover amount not used on their vacation rental. Now, however, they have lost that $1800 and all potential interst completely. Their resale price won't even cover the purchase cost, never mind the thousands in interest they could have accrued. If they had taken that $1800 in 1982 and invested it, their nest egg could be quite large. Instead they invested it in an asset which has cost them money every year and not built up any equity for them either. It hasn't even held its value.
Westgate Salesperson:
My two year olds do care about where they stay. They understand that when we travel to Captiva next month that they will have their own room, their own beds and their own bathroom unlike the hundreds of children that I had spoken to over the course of my career at Westgate that told me they were sleeping on the floor next to their parent's bed and sharing the bathroom with their entire family. That's not the way that we live at home and that's not the way that we vacation. I really don't understand where you get "900 percent of the going rate" from. Westgate is very competitive in their pricing and in fact less expensive than Disney which is truly a lease or rental or Marriott where you are charged administrative fees for splitting your unit and you don't have the option of owning a fixed week which can create some problems with exchange. I really believe that you need to get your "facts" straight. Actually, it's been years since you went on the presentation, maybe what you really need is to get a life!
Lisa:
I was very hesitant originally on addressing this issue of yours because I know, as a parent, how defensive parents can get over their children. I did not want to turn this into a "I raise my children better than you raise yours" sort of argument. I'm still hesitant now, but you have really struck a chord in me with this and I'll try to say this delicately.
I really don't see how a 2 year old would care about having their own bathroom, unless YOU as a parent train them that this is somehow an "important thing". There are millions of 2 year olds around the world starving to death. They value FOOD. 6.5 million children die a year of malnutrition (WHO stats). That's death, not "sharing a bathroom". The last thing I would ever want to teach my own kids is to value something as trivial as "I need my own bathroom! I am 2!" It really upsets me to think of 2 year olds thinking something like "My Own Bathroom!" had any value. To me, a 2 year old being taught that is contrary to the knowledge that 23% of our globe is struggling to live on less than $1 a day. One quarter of the globe. Isn't there something better for that 2 year old to care about than "my own bathroom"? Even if it's "saving the cute tigers"? And isn't your money better spent on something other than GIVING a 2 year old his or her own bathroom and actively encouraging him or her to value it?
When my extended family goes on vacation we often learn about the local culture and do what we can to help them. Obsessing over our own "extras" would negate everything else I am trying to teach my children to value. If they have their own bathroom, that's fine. If they don't, that's fine too. They don't CARE. But I accept that that is the value system you wish your children to have. I suppose a lot of the way your first message looked down on people who "had to suffer with Best Western" concerned me too. Why does it matter where you stay? Why do you care if you have your own bathroom? Just how long do you spend in it? Would it really upset your value system to be "seen in a Best Western"? I really don't understand where you are coming from on those issues. And to then have people spend *10 times the going rate* for these items while millions starve is even more painful.
I am not trying to be contentious. I, as you might have guessed, love debating and also love exploring new cultures and people. I haven't run into someone before who has this view on the world and am trying to understand it. Even the many rich people I know are proud of their roots and gladly eat in diners and so on, it doesn't make them feel "shabby" to do so. They are proud of what they have achieved, not of where they sleep at night. So I'm curious - what makes you feel "proud" staying at Westgate? I believe that was a line you said in your last letter. What are you proud *of*? Does where you stay really have any real bearing about what you are as a person or a parent? Shouldn't what you do in your daily life be much more important?
My 900 percent rate is based on the prices given to me by the people taking these tours recently. Again, average quote for one of these weeks - $18k to $24k. Average purchase price of same weeks on ebay - $1500. That's a pretty big difference. For someone buying a timeshare, it is a HUGE immediate depreciation. I don't know of any other asset that you could purchase and immediately lose 90% of its value. Cars are thought to be pretty bad in that sense and they only lose maybe half immediately.
I believe I do have my facts straight - I am given fresh facts weekly. But if you have new information, by all means share it!
As far as getting a life, I actually have an extremely busy life. But one of those things you learn as you mature is that there should always be time made for a cause you believe in. It's not like I go out and actively seek to work on this issue. I put up my website when the event happened and I was happy to leave it like that. I started to get other peoples' stories immediately, but I just responded and said "I share your pain" and left it at that. I didn't post their responses or anything else. The ONLY reason I started posting the responses is that one of your fellow workers wrote me in late October 2002, claiming I had made up my story. He said that he had never heard ANY complaints and therefore I was a liar. As you might imagine, I was upset by his dismissal of what I went through. So I did start posting the other stories I had received, so that he could read them and make his own judgement.
That is all I do. When someone writes me, I post their story. I hardly think that is a great deal of work on my part, and the good that results from the hundreds of people who say they had a much better experience at Westgate when they were informed of what would go on makes it worth it. If you could spend 10 minutes a week doing something that helped hundreds of people, would you shirk that? I didn't ask for this work, but as it is coming to me to do, I'll not turn it away.
I suppose that's another good question for someone of a differing value system than mine. I am a person who donates a lot of time to charity and a lot of money to charity. I imagine to someone who does not do these things that 10 minutes a week on a cause might seem like time better spent watching TV or something else. To be honest I don't have much time for TV or such. So that is indeed a tradeoff I make. But I consider my life to be one I am very happy to lead. When I go to sleep at night I am content with the way in which my time and my money was spent - that I have done my fair share in helping the world become a better place. I recycle, support animal rescue organizations, help conservation lands, donate to charity, garden, earn my income and encourage my children to do all of the same. To spend my time and money on non-helpful causes would seem wasteful to me. Life is too short and precious to waste. So to me, the small amount of time I spend on this issue is time well spent.
Let's say you saved $22,500 by buying on ebay and not in a pressure-seminar. You could then:
* Send your child to a GOOD private college for a year
* PERMANENTLY save 1,250 acres of rainforest from destruction
* Cover costs for 562 African children to go to school for a year
* Sponsor 125 Indian children for a year, allowing the child to be fed, clothed, and educated
* Provide PERMANENT food and income for 120 families with a "Gift Ark"
* Completely pay for 28 Habitat for Humanity Houses
* Support 21 schools in Afghanistan for a year, helping them bring boys and girls into the modern age
To me, *this* is where hard-earned money should go. How can you in good conscience support people wasting that money on an inflated price for a timeshare?
I want to thank you again for writing. I had not done any serious research until now into just how much money is being wasted by people at Westgate seminars. I have updated my site to have this new information, and hopefully this new information will help people be better informed. And again, I greatly look forward to hearing your point of view on these topics.
My TRUE experiences at Westgate Resorts