# Is anyone making money on timeshare resales?



## ibattleme11 (Oct 28, 2007)

You would think with all of the cheep EBAY timeshares someone would be making money on buying and selling timeshares.  The big hit is on the resort transfer fees (TF) and closing cost (CC).  You have a TF of usually $100.00 and CC of $400 to 250.  This goes both ways.  Let’s say you buy in at $450.00 and can sell out at $350.00.  You have an expense spread of $750.00.  This is quite costly in making a profit.  

Example - Someone sells a distressed points Wyndham timeshare contract of 750,000 points at .005 per point costing $3750.00.  One must consider the maintenance fees.  Let’s say they are $5.00 per $1000 or $3750 yearly.  This is reasonable but not great.  The preferred fee is $4.00 or $3000 yearly but at this price it would have caught someone’s eye on EBAY and shot the price to $7500 or higher.  Now you think you can sell this points contract for .008 per point on EBAY again or $6000.00 less your eBay fee $35.00 (I believe this is correct if not please inform me) less CC and TF fees of $750.00 creating a profit of $1465.00.  You should put in your ad the seller pays these fees but regardless they have to be paid.  This will increase your profit $350.00.

This seems possible to me.  There is always risk.  Is anyone doing this?  eBay is creating a cheep but viable market.  It is unfortunate eBay does not have a better tracking mechanism to see trends etc. like the stock market.  You need to track the trend on each property and point size.  I will discuss this in more detail if anyone is interested. 

Good Luck Too All
Joel


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## rickandcindy23 (Oct 28, 2007)

The eBay resellers are already making the big money on resales.  They have the reputation, too, so people feel more comfortable bidding.  A newcomer is not going to sell a timeshare for more money than the experienced folks.  As a new reseller, you won't get the traffic or the confident bidders.  A quick perusal of listings is evidence of it because those who are trying to sell their own personal weeks are getting the lowest prices, and some of those aren't getting any bids.

Of course, eBay is not the only marketplace for timeshares.  Not only are they not the only place to sell, but most people don't even know you can buy a timeshare on eBay.  

The lack of title insurance with eBay sales is a concern to me, because anything can go wrong with the transfer.  I am starting to rethink the lack of title insurance, especially after talking to a reputable reseller about the things that can go wrong.  What about a lack of all signatures, for example.  Then you resell something and find out you never legally owned it in the first place.   Terribly risky reselling something you bought on eBay, without buying title insurance.  Sure the closing companies guarantee clear and free title, but they really don't check in all cases.  For example, one timeshare we were going to buy from a reseller was in foreclosure at the resort because maintenance fees were unpaid for a long period of time.  That company sent us a recorded DEED!   This was very recent, in the last few months.  So now we have a recorded deed to a property that went back to the developer.  CRAZY!  We have yet to receive a refund, and this info came to light two months ago.  A new battle for us to fight, and I am not up for it at all.


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## tombo (Oct 28, 2007)

It is a risk to buy on e-bay, but the deals are good enough that I take the risk. Out of over 20 e-bay purchases, I have only gotten ripped off on 2. One was outright fraud, I paid in full to a company that closed themselves saving me money. They are in jail I think from the last officer I talked to. Never ever buy without using a bonded closing company.

The other one had a clear deed, but their were charge offs and collections on someone with the same name, so when I went to re-sell it they wouldn't give a clear deed until I could prove that the John Doe on my deed wasn't the same Johnd Doe that had charge offs, collections, and liens. It was a pain and a lot of hard work but I got it cleared finally.

Despite those 2 problems, (I lost about $1000 from the crook, and the other sale went through finally) I am way ahead of purchasing from places like timeshare wholesalers and gmac, etc. I still buy on e-bay but I look hard at the sellers rating, how long they have been selling on e-bay, and I always use a closing company I can research by googling their name on the web. If I don't like any of the above I don't buy no matter how good the deal is.

With regards to selling for a profit, it does happen occasionally. Usually what happens is that you buy a week by shopping hard for $500 or so less than they usually sell for. By the time you pay closing costs and resort transfer fees, you have eaten up your profit when you re-sell. I have made some big profits by selling my week on the bulletin board at a resort I stayed at.  I was staying at a resort when I looked at the bulletin board with weeks for sale and rent by owners. Weeks were for sale for $5000 to $8000 for a week I had paid less than $1500 (total) for. I listed my week for sale for $3000 and sold it within a month. I bought another week on e-bay, stayed there the next year and made over $1500 on that one. This doesn't work at places with sales offices on site because they will not let you post your week for sale. Also some resorts allow you to sell weeks on their web site, or in their newsletter. If you can buy on e-bay much cheaper than weeks are listed for in the newsletter, you can make money there too.

As a rule I buy where I want to stay and don't plan on selling or renting when I purchase. I do sell and rent weeks, but you can get beat really bad on both. I had rented 4 weeks on a beach one year and a hurricane came shutting my resort down for 8 months. I had to refund all money,pay MF's and assesments, and I couldn't even stay there myself. When I do rent a week it is usually for a little more than the MF's, so one year of not finding a renter, or a hurricane, etc, wipes out years of profits because you own the MF's no matter what.


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## BocaBum99 (Oct 28, 2007)

Lots of people make money in timeshare resales.  You just have to know what you are doing.

There is not a lot of money to be made on FF timeshare resales anymore since the prices have collapsed so much.

There are a lot of people who do very well renting Fairfields.


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## Jya-Ning (Oct 28, 2007)

eBay selling TS has at least 5 years.  If you look at the people that use it to make money, there are a lot of them selling/renting/closing over 100 TS.

So yes, there are many image ways you can think of that make money from TS and TS resell has been explored by different people.  And yes, there are still a lot of people that doing this for living.

Any other new ways will depend on the new method that can reach to general public.  If there is one coming out, there will be more new ways to use it to make money.

Jya-Ning


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## BocaBum99 (Oct 28, 2007)

Jya-Ning said:


> eBay selling TS has at least 5 years.  If you look at the people that use it to make money, there are a lot of them selling/renting/closing over 100 TS.
> 
> So yes, there are many image ways you can think of that make money from TS and TS resell has been explored by different people.  And yes, there are still a lot of people that doing this for living.
> 
> ...




Exactly.....


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## Don40 (Oct 28, 2007)

I was just looking at e-bay and not too many TS for sale currently.  There are ones listed for "crazy" money $20,000 for 154K etc. but only about 33 listed now.  Could it be resales on e-bay are drying up.  Maybe people are just turning their unwanted TS back to WYN since selling on e-bay is getting close to a total loss.  WYN might have found away of drying up the resale problem after all, make it totally worthless and people will give it back to the resorts and WYN will sell as "new" developer points.

Don


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## tombo (Oct 28, 2007)

I don't know what you are looking at, but there are currently 1146 timeshares for sale on e-bay. You might have accidentally only looked at one location or one developer. There are plenty for sale and no sign that the supply will ever end.


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## Don40 (Oct 28, 2007)

I was specifically looking at FF/WYN TS at this time, not including Worldmark.
Don


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## Jya-Ning (Oct 29, 2007)

Don40 said:


> I was just looking at e-bay and not too many TS for sale currently.  There are ones listed for "crazy" money $20,000 for 154K etc. but only about 33 listed now.  Could it be resales on e-bay are drying up.  Maybe people are just turning their unwanted TS back to WYN since selling on e-bay is getting close to a total loss.  WYN might have found away of drying up the resale problem after all, make it totally worthless and people will give it back to the resorts and WYN will sell as "new" developer points.
> 
> Don



I believe this summer there is a lot more push out, so there is less inventories now.

However, Wyndham now try to keep the sale force open even in the old resort, and they start to work with old resort to take back the inventories *When they like it*.  Also, this year, the 3 resorts I have seems are trying to keep the MF increase in expect range, so the owner will not trying to get rid of week as last few years.

But last year, 33 in a week span is kind of normal.

Jya-Ning


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