Timeshare Closing Services, Inc.

Maybe a problem, most likely not.

Maybe their fault, maybe not.

2/8/08: I called the Recorder's office and learned that the Warranty Deed had been recorded. I called the resort contracts person and learned she had not heard from TCS. I emailed TCS to ask them to FAX the deed to the resort, to expedite the transfer to our name, so we could do our 2008 stuff with the resort. I gave them a FAX number and toll free number to the contracts person at the resort.

I never heard from TCS.

Today, 2/20, I called TCS. They said the Recorder said the Deed never got to them (had not been recorded). They said they left me a message 2/9/08. They said they would call the Recorder.

They did and I did, each of us talking to the Recorder's office, people I know.

TCS called me to say the Deed had been recorded and they were going to get an email copy of it and forward it to the resort and to me. Then they were going to have a certified copy of the Deed sent to them, which they said had to be so they can do their closing company stuff.

So, the official status: Lost in the mail.

No excuse or apology given for not following up, contacting me, the last two weeks. TCS's version is suspect, since I know the Recorder knows it was recorded 1/8/08, and they would not have told TCS that it had not been.

This jibes with my experience with TCS and with other reports about them over the last few years. When the sun comes up in the east every morning for many years, looking for it to come up in the west is my fault, not the sun's. So what can we learn from this?

If using TCS (or any closing company), don't count on them to be pro-active. Call the recorder's office in the county where you are buying and ask them if additional fees can expedite the process. In 99.9% of the counties in the US, you can pay a nominal fee to get the deed faxed to you as soon as it's recorded/reviewed. Find out what that fee is for the county in question. Then, when you send your money for the purchase to TCS (or any other closing company), send in the extra fee for the fax and print a little sticky note to include with the deed to be recorded. Request of TCS that they put that sticky note with the deed and send in the extra $ you sent to the recorder. This should be the text of the sticky note:

"I've included an extra $x for fax fees. After recording, please fax deed to xxx-xxx-xxxx." Specifically tell TCS you want that sticky on the deed when they send it in.

Then, as soon as you get the fax, fax it to the management company of the timeshare and ask them to change their records to reflect you as the new owner.

OR, if there are additional fees/forms to be submitted by TCS (as in the case with Fairfield and some other timeshares), immediately email or fax the deed to TCS, inform them that the deed has been recorded, and ask them to use the fax copy to begin the process with the management company. The management company isn't expecting an original deed, they can work from the fax copy. Then it's up to me to begin calling the management company every few days to check on the progress. TCS won't do so. If the management company says they're waiting on tcs for something, call tcs and prod them.

Bottom line, it's more important to you than it is to TCS, so you need to be involved every step of the way. I'm not lecturing you, jlb, just providing these suggestions for others who read here. Nor am I saying that this is the way it SHOULD be. This is just the way it is, so we adjust or we let TCS dictate the process. They do many closings per week and get very little money for each closing (though it may seem like a lot to you), so they aren't going to change the way they do business.

Kinda hard to avoid using them when they are the closing service for an eBay reseller. If I'm not mistaken, an eBay seller with 100%, or thereabouts.

If they are problematic, that should have been reflected in the eBay rating, a caveat emptor.

JLB, you of all people can't seriously be suggesting that you had no idea that TCS might be, ahem, a bit "slow"...

However, your observations are related---those ebay fronts do have pristine feedback ratings, they do require TCS, and TCS is slow. I've found that the fronts doing the selling are VERY sensitive to their ebay feedback. So, when I want to nudge TCS, I have the seller do it.

Things seem to happen faster that way---prior to submitting feedback, of course.

JLB said:

Kinda hard to avoid using them when they are the closing service for an eBay reseller. If I'm not mistaken, an eBay seller with 100%, or thereabouts.

If they are problematic, that should have been reflected in the eBay rating, a caveat emptor.

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I have had the same problem with TCS - for months I have been trying to finish this deal. Now the maintenance fees are late - because they have not sent the last of the papers in yet. The resort is helping me a lot - they have been dealing with TCS the last couple of weeks, TCS stopped answering my calls and I cant get an answer from them at all. When I talked to the resort person last week she said it should be final in about 10 days - they are just waiting for the last paper, and they do understand and have it on record that I have been trying to pay the fees.

I would not deal with them again, even if I found another great deal. This should have been finished sometime in September.

I believe that's a compliment. Thanks.

bnoble said:

JLB, you of all people

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I see nowhere in my post where I was suggesting I did not know that, but, yes, I did not know that.

I don't need to make excuses for someone else's incompetence, but if I had to, here they are:

1. I relied on the eBay feedback and the overwhelming, stifling verbiage by the seller about how they bend over backwards to make sure that the customer is satisfied.

2. Sometimes things on TUG, the many threads about numerous similar-sounding closing services and resellers, just kinda all blend together with me, so that no one of them makes an impact.

3. Deep down inside, I am a cuddly teddy bear, very trusting and naive. It's been awhile since anyone has called me a nasty name, gave me a serious behavior lecture, or anything of a personally nasty nature. So, my guard was down.

4. I'm old, as it has been said here, long in the tooth. (But not old enough that I didn't catch that something was amiss.)

5. I figured I would just give them some space and let them do thier job.

6. Time flies when you're having fun.

So, now I will send an email to the reseller, letting them know that I know that TCS screwed up, and lied to me. Maybe I will be the one to post negative feedback. If this is common, why has no one else done that?

Also, no harm is really done at this point, me being available to straighten things out. I continue to amaze myself on how good I am at that.

bnoble said:

can't seriously be suggesting that you had no idea that TCS might be, ahem, a bit "slow"...

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Timeshare Closing Services, Inc

I have dealt with TCS on several occasions with no problems at all.

Deeds were recorded within 4 to 6 weeks after payment was made and contract signed.

Also the email communication was prompt. Florida deeding seems to be much faster than some other states.

South Carolina deeding can take 2 to 3 months.

In my case the finger cannot be pointed elsewhere. The recording was at the Recorder in my home county. I know them and I know the people at the resort.

On 2/8, I told TCS that I had confirmed that the Deed had been recorded. I did not hear from them until I called them today. They said the Deed never got to the Recorder, that it was lost in the mail. That was just a plain lie. Calling the Recorder and confirming what I had already told them would have been simple.

Not following up with me, not even just to Click reply and answer my email, is inexcusable.

FWIW, the Deed was recorded 1/8 and mailed back to TCS 1/10. This should have been done a month ago.

I just emailed the eBay seller, so they know.

london said:

Florida deeding seems to be much faster than some other states.

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I left negative feedback on eBay, which I had to do in order to leave the warning Beware of their closing company, Timeshare Closing Services, Inc.

Because it is the first time I have left negative feedback on eBay, I had to take a brief tutorial. Perhaps negative feedback was not appropriate, since the seller had not known about the situation, nor been given an opportunity to rectify it.

OTOH, there were some misreps in the ad, and it was the only way to post a warning about TCS. And, the seller gave no choice of closing companies. TCS is their choice, not mine.

eBay has a system for the seller to protest negative feedback, and work things out with the buyer.

The bottom line is that the closing fee is high and the service is low. Any way you cut it, 45 days after a deed has been recorded, the things at the resort should have been handled. The only way to warn others is through negative feedback.

I'm sure my TUG/timeshare/golfing buddy will chuckle when he reads this, probably on a sunny beach in Mexico, because he thinks everything I do goes this way.

And he does not sweat the small stuff.

I have used numerous timeshare closing companies and I think TCS might be the best one that I have used. On the occasions that they have taken a long time it was because the seller or the PCC had wrong information.

I hate to defend a company that I have no affiliation with but, I would use them again and like others have said this is generaly more important to us than it is to a county recorder or to a closing service. Nudging the seller is a darn good idea.

london said:

South Carolina deeding can take 2 to 3 months.

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London:

I record in SC all the time, we overnight the recordings in as soon as closing and funding takes place, we have the recorded deed back within a week and to the resort overnight as soon as we get it back from recording. Even in slow Hawaii, it does not take more than a week to get it back. Unless of course you are bulk sending them to cut your fees down. I do not believe in that. Guess that is because I am a fully licensed title company and I don't want something recording ahead of me.

Dave

It's an Orlando eBay reseller. Don't you think they and TCS are in cahoots? There was no choice in closing company.

It's hard to vouch for TCS when I told them by email on 2/8 that the Deed had been recorded on 1/8, and I did not hear from them. Then when I called them today, they said the Deed never made it to the Recorder, when I knew it had already been recorded.

Clearly they were not on top of it.

At 10:00 this morning TCS told me the Recorder was going to email them a copy of the recorded Deed, and TCS said they would email it to me. They have not nor have they called to say why they have not. At this point, should communication not be a priority?

It's frustrating that I know what is going on, that I'm talking to the Recorder and the proper person at the resort, but the closing company doesn't seem to be, doesn't seem to know what I know.

The seller's role in this was over long ago, 12/7/07. I emailed them today and haven't heard back from them either.

It is the seller who got the negative feedback on eBay, they being the party of record there.

cancun dish said:

I have used numerous timeshare closing companies and I think TCS might be the best one that I have used.

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laura1957 said:

... Now the maintenance fees are late - because they have not sent the last of the papers in yet... [T]hey do understand and have it on record that I have been trying to pay the fees.

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I suspect that the TS resort would be willing to accept a MF payment from you, whether or not the TS has been officially transferred, as it matters little who antes up. At this point, you might want to keep the late fees from stacking up.

As to the statement in #4, that I should have been forewarned about TCS, this thread is indicative of what I was trying to say in my reply, #7, that when you read these things on TUG you wind up coming away without a clearcut feeling for whether a company is good or not.

If I was an innocent bystander reading this thread, I would conclude that TCS is a good company and that JLB is the exception, the one that fell through the cracks, or perhaps, that JLB was expecting too much when he felt that all should be concluded and the resort notified nearly three months after the transaction closed, or that the closing company should at least know as much as he knows about the transaction. The jist of comments on this thread is that JLB is too close to the situation, it being his closing, and if he was not involved personally it would be no big deal to him.

That is likely true and I likely would not even have bothered to read this thread, there being so many similar to it for practically all closing companies one time or another.

I will add that the 12/7/07 letter to me said that the closing was finished, the deed was being prepared, and I would be notified when it was sent to the Recorder. I wasn't.

In a letter from Title Outlet, Inc., on another purchase, it says this process, including notification of the resort, can take up to 30 days.

As for late maintenance fees, since I know those people and have talked to them and have let them know where things stand, they have told me that even though they are technically due Jan. 1, I will have 30 days after they bill me to pay them.

I appreciate the posts from those whose experience with TCS has been good. At least that gives me hope and reassurance.

TCS just called and said they received the deed by email and will be forwarding it on to the resort, to the FAX # I gave them, and emailing a copy to me.

I emailed the other closing company at 8:55 AM, asking if they have the Deed back, and they answered at 9:03 AM saying No, but they will be looking for it and will forward it immediately to the resort, to the same FAX # I also gave them.

FWIW, I feel I am being more than diligent in staying on top of this, more than the average person.

(How long would TCS have sat and done nothing, on their own?)

JLB said:

TCS just called and said they received the deed by email and will be forwarding it on to the resort, to the FAX # I gave them, and emailing a copy to me.

I emailed the other closing company at 8:55 AM, asking if they have the Deed back, and they answered at 9:03 AM saying No, but they will be looking for it and forward it immediately to the resort, to the same FAX # I also gave them.

FWIW, I feel I am being more than diligent in staying on top of this, more than the average person.

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I agree. Sounds like they should be paying YOU for doing their work!

A watched pot never boils.

It is 8 hours later and still no email.

JLB said:

TCS just called and said they received the deed by email and will be forwarding it on to the resort, to the FAX # I gave them, and emailing a copy to me.

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24 hours and still no email.

The person who handles transfers at the resort said she got the FAX, and she sent it on to Member Services, so we can be billed.

Since we are buying 2 weeks, from different Orlando closing services, I gave her the heads-up that another one should be arriving shortly.

I did that with the Recorder, too, so they will not think they already did it.

Guess what?

The seller/reseller just called to see if we have been taken care of.

He did not seem to disagree that TCS has not been on top of things.

We were out and about on the town in Branson, with relatives, but about an hour later, TCS sent me an email with the deed attached, and apology for not sending it the day before, when they said they would.

And, yes, it was recorded 1/8/08.

So, it appears that all that is left is for them to get us the actual deed, or a certified copy.

I just heard privately from someone who got worse service than us. They made a purchase last March and the resort just recently got notified.

Almost a year!

JLB said:

I just heard privately from someone who got worse service than us. They made a purchase last March and the resort just recently got notified.

Almost a year!

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BTW, not that you should have had to do this, but if they had not acted...
Once a deed is recorded, you can obtain a certified copy from the Recorder's Office and send it to the proper parties, yourself. Anyone can get a certified copy of anything in the public records.

Even though you'd already paid them to do it, sometimes, "if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself."

Title companies

I am a Mortgage Broker/Loan Officer by trade for residential and commercial properties. Since the buyer is the party that is paying for the closing it generally is their option to use whatever title company they would care to if they choose. That is generally their right. Is it different when buying timeshares? I have been reading of different companies using their own title companies and it does not sound like (or it just may not be offered) the buyer has a say so. Does anyone know the actual rights of the buyer on this?