We have gotten our best timeshare education from tours. I learned about points more recently and knew I wanted them. I also learned about TUG from a Fairfield presentation on Maui, where Fairfield has no timeshares.
Anyway, the guy was very nice, knew we were not interested in what he was selling and just spent some time on small talk. I mentioned Timesharing Today, he mentioned TUG and talked about owning many timeshares over the years and the difficult adjustment of moving to Hawaii after loving his trades there.
Rick hates it when I ask a lot of questions, which I do not have to do anymore because I know more than they do.
The more questions you ask, the more determined they are to sell you. The Sunterra presentation on Maui required me to pretend to not know much, but I wanted to know more about Sunterra. I asked questions directly related to Sunterra and the guy got a little disturbed when I kept telling him that dividing the number of years by the sales price is not the way to determine the true cost of the purchase. I kept reminding him to add in the MAINTENANCE FEES.
I was nice the entire time, though, and was feeling a little guilty because I talked one couple into rescinding their purchase while waiting in the lobby for my husband and mother-in-law to find a parking place. There was a fire in the parking garage and the fire trucks were not allowing anyone into the resort while the fire was being put out. I was bored. This couple was waiting for their friends to come out of the tour. I told them about resales and they walked over to the desk to rescind while I was sitting there (they promised not to tell them it was because of the information I gave them). Then their friends came out and asked where they went, I told that couple about TUG and gave them my email address. They are still looking for the perfect timeshare for purchase. The other couple bought a Marriott resale.
