using your timeshare for an exchange is a JOKE!!!!

Interval is the company who make the exchanges and I put in my request in 2/12/14 I have a 2 bedroom at Tahit Village and my exchange is for 2 bedroom 5 star in WPB florida and to this day no good response to this request. I know for a fact that timeshare company hold back rooms in order for them to sell or rent and even use as a getaway. No Fair to all the owners who want to use their timeshare and can not. So I sent a certified letter to Interval the CEO and my management mortage company and Tahit village. informing them that It will cost me over $ 2000. to book 2 hotel rooms for 1 week. I want to be reinbuse for that expense due to the fact they can not forfull their promise to find me a condo in the area I want to me.

Exchanging is always a crap shoot solely dependent on supply and demand.

the system needs to be changed to work for the owner not the greedy timeshare and exchange company. Too many owners and not enough condos to go around does not seem fair to the owners to use.

The reason I got rid of two timeshares is because I went through the nightmare of trying to get an exchange that I wanted. When I first bought timeshares back in the late 80's and early 90's there was never a problem exchanging them. Then corporate greed kicked in when Cendant bought RCI and decided to sell the better weeks on the open market to make more profits. Evidently the other exchange companies caught on and saw that they could deprive us of our choices and make more money.

I would never purchase another timeshare or join a vacation club. You can go on this site or other sites and rent them from owners for less than they pay in maintenance fees. I hope the timeshare industry self destructs over time due to their greed and maybe bring back ownership to the way it was meant to work.

I think there's something to your complaints and there are other big problems with the industry. They sell you something that you can't give away and try to keep you trapped. They were crying foul when owners "sold" their weeks to non-existant people. There should be a law that they're required to take it back or at least never do anything to stand in the way of a subsequent sale. Having said all that, I often exchange for better places than I own. And get in a couple of extra weeks a year. I'm getting plenty of use out of my timeshare ownership and exchange membership. When I bought I wasn't under any illusion about an "investment" or that it would be dirt cheap vacationing. I saw it as a way to get better accommodations than I would ever spend the money to get otherwise.

I have had a time share for over 30 years. I always exchange my week. I always give different places and dates.

Thanks for agreeing with me yes years ago when I first bought and got sucked into 3 timeshares that I have now and trying to sell 1 that is paid off I never did have a problem getting a exchange and now its impossible yes I was told by a shell vacation rep at a update meeting they intentionally hold back rooms and interval will not admit to it. If you have any good suggestions to sell off my all my timeshares let me know. Nothing is working I have it up for sale on Red week. Susan

My question is- why are you writing your management company demanding to be reimbursed? Did your contract state that they guarantee that you would be able to travel anywhere at anytime using an exchange company. You mentioned you desired trip and when you set up your search. You did not mention the time frame that you are trying to travel.

Another thing you may not realize is that weeks are held back and given to those that Interval decides has more trading power. So even if you request nice an early, every time anyone deposits what Interval considers a better week bumps ahead of you in line. Vegas is nice but there is almost always availability through all of the exchange companies. This means that for most if not all of the year it is overbuilt with timeshares. This is fine if you want to go to other overbuilt areas like Orlando and Branson, etc but not so much if you want to go anywhere that has more demand than supply.

They do hold back some units to rent but I don't think that is where your problem lies. The Shell salesman was just telling you that to get you to buy into their system. If you came on another day, that same salesperson would be telling you how great Interval is and that you could use their wonderful TS to exchange anywhere in the Interval International directory.

The only places I know of to sell a timeshare are here at Redweek and Timeshare Users Group TUG. And if you look at the prices people are asking and getting, it's not pretty. I'm a member of RCI. I was in Interval International for a couple of years. I found that II was higher end resorts and they only had one or two thousand resorts. RCI included a wider variety (more of the middle and lesser valued resorts) and they had 6 or 7 thousand at the time. I may be way off on these numbers, but RCI had 3 times as many resorts as II. My week is a gold crown, but not a highly sought after place (Hot Springs Village Arkanas) so I don't expect a lot. I go to Florida every winter for 2 or 3 weeks. Numerous times to Orlando because it's so easy, but I'm tired of Orlando and usually try to go farther south now.

Exchange is a joke???? Exchanging thru Interval seems to work for us. My son and his family flew out Friday for a week at the Marriott Kauai Beach Club. I exchanged a week from Marriott Grand Chateau in Las Vegas, another "overbuilt" timeshare location.

Exchanging thru Interval does work. I have a reservation confirmed for Marriott Barony Beach Club in Hilton Head in August and also exchanged last year for Marriott Custom House in Boston for June. Can you imagine how many Marriott points it would take to get these prime weeks? I'm grateful for the Interval alternative.

Interval does cater to developers like Marriott. I almost exclusively use II only for Marriott to Marriott and Starwood to Starwood. Sometimes I will use an occasional M studio for a 2 br Hyatt week. Even in overbuilt places these exchanges get bumps up. If you own an independent TS and are trading in II, you will always get bumped behind these owners doing internal trades thanks to the preference period II gives them.

Since Starwood started letting SVN members bank points and Marriott developed the destination program trading for peak times with confirmation several months in advance, trading even in these systems have become more difficult but far from impossible.

donp196 wrote:

The reason I got rid of two timeshares is because I went through the nightmare of trying to get an exchange that I wanted. When I first bought timeshares back in the late 80's and early 90's there was never a problem exchanging them. Then corporate greed kicked in when Cendant bought RCI and decided to sell the better weeks on the open market to make more profits. Evidently the other exchange companies caught on and saw that they could deprive us of our choices and make more money.

I would never purchase another timeshare or join a vacation club. You can go on this site or other sites and rent them from owners for less than they pay in maintenance fees. I hope the timeshare industry self destructs over time due to their greed and maybe bring back ownership to the way it was meant to work.

If you don't mind me asking, which company were your prior timeshares with?

Also, I would like to thank you for the careful typing you do or proof reading/correcting. Some people's posts have so many misspellings and grammatical mistakes, I often don't have a clue what they are trying to say.