# Report on Welk "Owner's Update"



## Guitarmom (Jul 8, 2016)

Last night, we sat through the only kind of "Owner's Update" we're willing to: a phone call. We weren't on Welk's turf, and Welk wasn't on ours. We watched a Power Point presentation over the Internet while we all talked on speakerphone.

I thought that this would be another attempt to get us to give up our deeded floating week at Welk Villas on the Green and switch to Platinum Points. It wasn't. My other wild guess was that they'd say, "Pay us $5,000 and we'll take back your deed and you are guaranteed II trades to Welk for ten years." It wasn't that pricey, but it also wasn't that good.

I'm writing this so that any other Welk owners who get this call will know what it's all about and can save an hour of their lives!

It all started friendly, friendly, of course. We'll call our "Owner's Services" rep Butch (not his real name, but he sounded like a "Butch.") He claimed to be a retired airline pilot from Florida; he sounded more like surfer from California who'd smoked way too many cigarettes.

First, he assessed us, our age, what we owned and how much we used Welk. Given that I've never "lost" a week, he told me that I ought to teach classes in properly using timeshares. Butter, butter, butter. EVERYONE ELSE, of course, hardly ever uses their timeshares and they just waste their money year after year.

Next, he started with the Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt method of Sales 101. He named a MF almost $100 over our actual MF and repeatedly stated that it was going to go up, up, up until it practically doubled. His reasoning was that Welk has such incredible amenities that we, the owners, have to pay for but that get used only by locals for Day Use. He said the city used to subsidize the two Welk golf courses, but that now Welk will have to cover all their own costs. He told us that we were getting up in age and that when we die, our heirs would have to accept the timeshare and be saddled with the ever-rising MF, that there is no way to get rid of a timeshare, even through bankruptcy. We were stuck, but he had our ticket out.

He zipped past a couple of screens in his Power Point, saying (butter, butter) that we already understood trading so we don't need to review that. Then he took us to the screen labeled "Program Overview." As quickly as he could, he took us through the bullet points:
- Pay as you go
- Allows owners to "trade in" their deed
- Using the network, members have access to thousands of resorts and hotels
- No more Maintenance Fees or taxes
- Only pay for what you use
- No depositing
- No waiting
- Simple to use: The Welk Discount Travel Network.

He then took us to https://www.vacationowners.net/membership/ where he showed all the fabulous hotels we could get at incredible prices starting today. They were all over the world. (Salesmanship 102: listen to your prospect, and when they tell you that all their family lives in Escondido so that's their vacation of choice, don't show them hotels in Mazatlan.)

"Butch, Butch, Butch," we said, "we vacation in San Diego, not Mazatlan. What's available at Welk?" He showed us hotel after hotel in San Diego; granted we'd said "San Diego," but nothing showed up at Welk. Note that the hotel prices were good, generally in $80/night range for a $150/night hotel, and generally about $40/night less than the great corporate rates to which we have access.

"Butch, what's available at Welk?" Sure enough, he showed us Welk ... Welk in Cathedral City (i.e. the desert) in July! Sure, the nightly rate was incredible, but we absolutely will not take a desert vacation in July. Call us silly!

We said, "Show us Welk availability in Escondido." He said he couldn't get back to that screen and took us to eBay to show us all the one penney timeshares for sale there. None of them were Welk. I told him that I search eBay regularly and that Welk timeshares go for $5,000 and up. He told me that this is his job, that he checks eBay every day, and that Welk is always up for sale for one penney (not that he could find one). I told him that if I wanted to buy one on eBay for one penney, Welk would exercise its Right of First Refusal and I wouldn't get it anyway. He grunted.

He finally got around to prices. He mentioned our $1000 MF and compared it to the Welk Discount Travel Network fee of $159/year. He told us that every day in the Welk Sales Office, they sell memberships to the Welk Discount Travel Network for $17,000, but he had a special price for us today: $3,695 and we're free of our deed and all future maintenance fees.

"Great," we said, "but can we book at Welk?" He said, "Look at all these great hotels you can stay at, and you don't have to stay a whole week!"

We said, "We really need to see how many weeks are available at Welk." He countered that with my floating week, I have to wait for something to be deposited. "No, Butch," I said, "I don't care what week I look at, I can always book it." He argued with me, but facts are facts: I've never looked up a week at Villas on the Green without being able to book it.

That was when he admitted that he didn't know how to look up Welk and went to get help. An "Internet Specialist" took over the call and searched for any availability at Welk San Diego for the rest of the year.

One week, December 11 - 18, showed up for $849. I said, "Yup, I've already seen that week available on RCI or II for the same price. So what this means is if we join this club, we'll no longer be able to book freely at Welk." The Internet Specialist quickly turned the call back over to Butch.

My hubby asked Butch, "Is there any way we can join this club without turning over our deed?" The answer was a flat no. Then Butch launched back into Fear, Doubt, and Uncertainty and warned us that our MF was going to double and that we'd be sorry if we didn't get rid of our deed now.

Bottom line: We said "no."

One last note: https://vacationowners.net/membership is quite odd. First of all, if this is the Welk Discount Travel Network, why isn't "Welk" mentioned anywhere on the site? Furthermore, after the call was over, we typed that URL and it re-directed us to a different URL. True, it was a sign-in page, probably to be expected, but none of the fancy photos of happy, vacationing families showed up. I also Googled "Vacation Owners" and nothing remotely close to that URL showed up. Very, very odd. I find this "Welk Discount Travel Network" to be quite suspicious. 

Conclusion: I believe that Welk wants to get back every deed that's out there. They'll then, internally, convert it to Platinum Points and sell another $40,000 package to some poor, overwhelmed couple who thought that getting free theater tickets was a good idea. When I asked here on TUG whether anyone knew what this Owner's Update was about, over 250 people viewed the post and not one person replied. No one knew! This makes me think that only those of us with a deed are being offered this. Welk must want to keep all its Platinum Points owners, but is desperate to get deeds back.

What do you all think?


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## mjm1 (Jul 8, 2016)

Thanks for sharing your experience on the call. Seems strange to me as well. glad you passed as is doesn't seem like a good deal.

I know that Welk is trying to get more inventory. I shared a while back that they have set up a separate company to buy back Platinum Points. I'm not sure if they buy back deeds too. They then turn around and sell the points. We decided to sell our points back to them to better balance our portfolio.

Mike


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## Guitarmom (Jul 8, 2016)

So they paid you to get your points back?


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## MuranoJo (Jul 9, 2016)

Guitarmom said:


> When I asked here on TUG whether anyone knew what this Owner's Update was about, over 250 people viewed the post and not one person replied. No one knew! This makes me think that only those of us with a deed are being offered this. Welk must want to keep all its Platinum Points owners, but is desperate to get deeds back.
> 
> What do you all think?


Well..., there were a few of us that responded to your other post.  
Not that we claimed we were owners, nor that we knew for sure.  It would be interesting to see other owner replies who've gone down this path.

Me, I'm still not convinced this was truly Welk, nor that it's a ploy to get weeks back.  Sounds to me like a misleading sales pitch for a travel club.  But, that's JMO.


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## Guitarmom (Jul 10, 2016)

MuranoJo said:


> Well..., there were a few of us that responded to your other post.
> Not that we claimed we were owners, nor that we knew for sure.  It would be interesting to see other owner replies who've gone down this path.
> 
> Me, I'm still not convinced this was truly Welk, nor that it's a ploy to get weeks back.  Sounds to me like a misleading sales pitch for a travel club.  But, that's JMO.



Good point, and I'm sorry that I was unclear. I posted two questions, one of which got no replies. See http://tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=243096 (no answers as of today, 7/10/2016). I appreciated everyone who replied to my second question. Thank you.

Your comment about not being truly Welk is, upon further reflection, intriguing. I'm starting to agree that it probably wasn't Welk.
Strike 1:When I called the number from my Caller ID, they answered "Welk." But now that I've checked, that Caller ID number didn't match the direct line to Welk. I should have checked that earlier!!!
Strike 2: I just Googled "Welk Discount Travel Network" and it doesn't seem to exist; my post is the only actual return on Google.
Strike 3: Nothing even close gets returned when I Google www.vacationowners.net, or "Vacation Owners" or anything similar. This doesn't seem to exist. I'm a web designer by trade, so I know it's possible they were using data from, say, Trivago and building a phony site in real time. After all, I myself had seen that December 11 Welk week on a site!

This is all highly suspicious.


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## MuranoJo (Jul 10, 2016)

Guitarmom said:


> Good point, and I'm sorry that I was unclear. I posted two questions, one of which got no replies. See http://tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=243096 (no answers as of today, 7/10/2016). I appreciated everyone who replied to my second question. Thank you.
> 
> Your comment about not being truly Welk is, upon further reflection, intriguing. I'm starting to agree that it probably wasn't Welk.
> Strike 1:When I called the number from my Caller ID, they answered "Welk." But now that I've checked, that Caller ID number didn't match the direct line to Welk. I should have checked that earlier!!!
> ...



Oh, I wasn't aware of your second question posted elsewhere.
Sure doesn't sound too solid to me, given your 3 strikes above.  Have you called Welk directly to see if they're familiar with this?

The only thing that made me hesitate was that they did a (sounds like) 1:1 (?) ppt presentation for you.  That sounds like a bit more of an investment than most scams would do.

Regardless, it's not a good deal IMO and good thing you passed.


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## Guitarmom (Jul 11, 2016)

*It's Real*



MuranoJo said:


> Oh, I wasn't aware of your second question posted elsewhere.
> Sure doesn't sound too solid to me, given your 3 strikes above.  Have you called Welk directly to see if they're familiar with this?
> 
> The only thing that made me hesitate was that they did a (sounds like) 1:1 (?) ppt presentation for you.  That sounds like a bit more of an investment than most scams would do.
> ...


Amen, it's a good thing to have said no to!

I called Welk today, through their regular phone number, and the program is legitimate. Owner's Services informed me that this is a new program being done under their auspices. The rep used language like "we have authorized this program" and similar phrases. That means they probably hired an outside company to handle this, but Welk hopes we'll bit.

So, once again, Welk is offering a bad deal to folks. No surprise there! :hysterical: However, it's good to know that I wasn't being lied to.

How sad when that's the nicest thing I can say about the sales organization. They're awfully lucky that I love vacationing there, because their sales sharks certainly leave a horrid taste in my mouth.


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## mjm1 (Jul 11, 2016)

Guitarmom said:


> Amen, it's a good thing to have said no to!
> 
> I called Welk today, through their regular phone number, and the program is legitimate. Owner's Services informed me that this is a new program being done under their auspices. The rep used language like "we have authorized this program" and similar phrases. That means they probably hired an outside company to handle this, but Welk hopes we'll bit.
> 
> ...



Interesting. I agree that their sales department is bad. It seemed they had improved, but not as much as they shared with us.

Mike


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## Colt Seavers (Jul 13, 2016)

I love how the presentations when we first bought extolled the virtues of the timeshare we were buying and now they are offering to relieve us of the burden of this same timeshare, for a small fee.  It's part of the reason I have resisted joining the Marriott Destinations Club with their pitch about units no longer being available in Interval.

Of course I also love the people who complain about their timeshare that they "never use" as if that is somehow the fault of the resort.


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## Chaosdreamer (Jul 16, 2016)

Thank you, thank you, thank you! We are also owners of a deeded week at Welk and I've been bombarded with voicemail messages in the past couple of months. We've had our Resort Villa for over 20 years and stopped doing Owners Updates over a decade ago when everything morphed into a sales pitch for why we should pay more to give them back our week.


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## Guitarmom (Jul 20, 2016)

Chaosdreamer said:


> Thank you, thank you, thank you! We are also owners of a deeded week at Welk and I've been bombarded with voicemail messages in the past couple of months. We've had our Resort Villa for over 20 years and stopped doing Owners Updates over a decade ago when everything morphed into a sales pitch for why we should pay more to give them back our week.


Chaosdreamer, you are most welcome. This was exactly why I wrote such a long and winding post, so that Tuggers like you wouldn't be left with a single ounce of curiosity about what this newfangled "Owner's Update" is about.

I'm about to go post about the follow-up call I just got from Welk. @Colt Seavers, I used your line!


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## DBI (Nov 11, 2016)

*Had similar experience*

I had similar experience with sales pitch that only "select owners" were getting this "great opportunity." It was exactly as you said with a log on webpage and an appeal to unload my TS since  they said nobody wants fixed weeks any more.  Plus, the minimum wage is going up in California they said, the annual fee can only go up; my heirs would be left with this terrible burden etc.  Bottom line is they wanted me to pay them $3,695 dollars to take back TS in exchange for some type of annual fee version of Expedia on an "exclusive webpage." Then, I'm sure they would convert my unit (fixed week) and sell it at retail to someone else. If I had read your post before I agreed to schedule the phone call I would not have bothered. Needless to say, I'm not going to take their offer. I might have considered if I could convert the fixed week to points to gain more flexibility in when I might use this but I'm definitely not going to pay them to take it off my hands. I inherited the TS from my mother and her estate is insolvent other than this TS, so it would be cheaper to just let the HO association foreclose or deed it back than paying to give it away.


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## letsgosteelers (Jan 5, 2017)

MuranoJo said:


> Well..., there were a few of us that responded to your other post.
> Not that we claimed we were owners, nor that we knew for sure.  It would be interesting to see other owner replies who've gone down this path.
> 
> Me, I'm still not convinced this was truly Welk, nor that it's a ploy to get weeks back.  Sounds to me like a misleading sales pitch for a travel club.  But, that's JMO.



Sitting in a presentation right now for vacation market network, Vacationowners.net. ... not a welk specific spiel but same concept.

Wholesale travel rates, access to huge inventory.  Not sure yet what the buy in is....waiting w anticipation.


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## Space Coast Laurie (Jan 10, 2017)

It seems there are companies pulling this "Owners Update" scam on a number of different timeshare owners.  At least one of the owners at one of our timeshare resorts got sucked into attending a presentation towards the end of the year because they told him it was a presentation by "the new management company" (our resort just changed management companies as of Jan 1st).  However, when he mentioned it on our resort's home page, the manager told him that neither the resort management nor the new management company was involved in this.  I got a call a couple weeks later with the same come-on, but upon quizzing the caller found that although it was supposedly an "Owners Update," she could not tell me the name of my resort or the management company.  It's a pity that timesharing gets such a bad name due to all the scammers.  Any time you get a call about a special deal or meeting for owners, check directly with your timeshare resort to confirm whether it's something legitimate and actually associated with the resort before you even agree to listen to their offer or attend a meeting.


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## akhank (Oct 27, 2017)

I am iin Cabo .  To get my perks from a street vendor, I signed up for an Owners update after telling them I owned at both VDP and Grand Mayan.
They picked me up and took me to a strip mall that had businesses on the ground floor and a small hotel on the  2nd.  Got the proposal to buy back my weeks (for over $100 grand based on my "equity") and join Grand Luxury Vacations costing me $30 grand.  Next day I said I wasnt ready because I couldnt find GLV anywhere on net.  They said the listing they were showing were from vcationowners.net.  They called themselves smartravel.  What is th chance Iwill make the $70 K profit If i sign up?


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## Iggyearl (Oct 27, 2017)

akhank said:


> I am iin Cabo .  To get my perks from a street vendor, I signed up for an Owners update after telling them I owned at both VDP and Grand Mayan.
> They picked me up and took me to a strip mall that had businesses on the ground floor and a small hotel on the  2nd.  Got the proposal to buy back my weeks (for over $100 grand based on my "equity") and join Grand Luxury Vacations costing me $30 grand.  Next day I said I wasnt ready because I couldnt find GLV anywhere on net.  They said the listing they were showing were from vcationowners.net.  They called themselves smartravel.  What is th chance Iwill make the $70 K profit If i sign up?



"If it sounds too good to be true....."  The goal is to get you to give them $30K.  Then you wait...  They may or may not sell your timeshares.  You may be out $30K and still own the timeshares.  Why not take the simple approach and ask them for a check for $70K and save on the waiting?  Give them your timeshares and collect a check....  I'm pretty sure that they won't agree to that.  THINK about it.........


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## TUGBrian (Oct 28, 2017)

the "trade in" gimmick is becoming more and more widespread...it clearly must work on many owners or it would have fizzeld out by now vs ramping up as significantly as is being reported across numerous timeshare developers!

just as sleazy as the original sales pitch IMO...and again further reinforces how much this industry works to find even more creative ways to part owners from their money.


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