Any experience with Sierra Rentals and Resales??

[tapdancing]

The agent that I have been speaking with is Charles. I just find it wierd how i get him everytime i call. - gomezlor

Has anyone tried to call the Buyer - Joy a Residence Club?
I went online and sent in a request like I was interested in buying a timeshare from them a few days ago and no one has responded yet. I sent the email inquiring on what plans they have to expand beyond there current location Playa de Carmen. I also tried to call the number and it rings for like 3 mins and then disconnects. I am not sure if today is a Holiday in Mexico or not but I would think they should atleast have an answering machine. I emailed them Thursday and no one has responded yet?

Hey guys try to reach out to these folks and let me know.
I tried 1866 644 4231

 

[dmurphys]

The agent that I have been speaking with is Charles. I just find it wierd how i get him everytime i call. - gomezlor

Has anyone tried to call the Buyer - Joy a Residence Club?
I went online and sent in a request like I was interested in buying a timeshare from them a few days ago and no one has responded yet. I sent the email inquiring on what plans they have to expand beyond there current location Playa de Carmen. I also tried to call the number and it rings for like 3 mins and then disconnects. I am not sure if today is a Holiday in Mexico or not but I would think they should atleast have an answering machine. I emailed them Thursday and no one has responded yet?

Hey guys try to reach out to these folks and let me know.
I tried 1866 644 4231

gomezlor - I've been speaking with Michael Johnson as well.

tapdancing - I just tried to call the 866 number...no answer. However, I did call 1-310-295-2580 and got a message that they were closed..which makes sense since it's around 7:00 pm pst. Anyway, I'll call again tomorrow.

 

[gomezlor]

Tapdancing - I think that they each have their own phone number, because the number I used when Jeff was my contact was different from the phone number for Michael. I would guess that's why you get the same person every time you call.

Have any of you tried calling Resorts Advantage? I was able to reach them without any difficulty. I'll try reaching Joy a Residence Club tomorrow. There is strength in numbers, so lets continue to keep each other informed.

 

[tapdancing]

Velas

Hey Guys,
When I tried the 310 295 2580 and it rings to voicemail did you dial out of the country? I dont understand cause when I dial the number straight, the lady on the Answering maching said she was with Joy Residence Club. I called like 10am there time and no one picked up and no one has responded to my email either. I am really wondering about what kind of company this is, this Joy Residence. Have you all tried to reach this company with any success?

 

[tapdancing]

Velas

Has anyone gathered any further information on this deal from Sierra?

 

[tapdancing]

Hey Guys I do see this on the website for Joy Residence Club:

Joy ARC in currently in negotiations with a prominent Timeshare Reseller to provide the above units.
If, by chance, you currently own at Velas Vallarta or Sandos Royal Elite and are interested in selling,
please contact corporate sales with Sierra Resort Services at 1-866-516-2521 or by email at:
corporatesales@sierraresortservices.com
or, contact our office at:

This might work.

 

[chuckie7]

Hey gomezlor
My wife and I are trying to decide if we are going to go with them. I requested like you did the seller and whether this is going to be sold or put on a list. When they respond to my questions then I'll go from there. I want to know if yours goes through, give us an update when you can.

tapdancing did you ever get a response from Michael Johnson when you asked him who the seller is? I asked in email so I can have it in writing who the seller is, what the escrow company is, whether we'll get our money back and how if the sale does not go through to get his response and told him that I'm not sending the money until I get answers but he never emailed me back! I even sent it twice coz he kept calling me (saying he has "taxes" ready to go and to fax the signed transfer form with payment form) even if I specifically and told him I can't answer my phone at work and prefer emails. So I'm still leery, coz why won't he email his response and if he wants my business and "wants me to be comfortable" he should answer my questions, right?

 

[chuckie7]

I went to Joy A Residence website and posted a question/feedback:
"I am interested in selling my Velas Vallarta villa. I saw in your website that you want to expand and buy units there. What are the terms of the sale? Can you give me info on the process/requirements? How long is the process? Do you pay for the transfer fees?"
Hopefully I'll get a response directly from Joy Residence Club.

Here's more info on them from the site:

Chris Shannon-Co - Founder

info@joyaresidenceclub.com

1-800-530-7607

1-310-295-2580

Isla Mujeres, Quintana Roo
México

 

[tapdancing]

tapdancing did you ever get a response from Michael Johnson when you asked him who the seller is? I asked in email so I can have it in writing who the seller is, what the escrow company is, whether we'll get our money back and how if the sale does not go through to get his response and told him that I'm not sending the money until I get answers but he never emailed me back! I even sent it twice coz he kept calling me (saying he has "taxes" ready to go and to fax the signed transfer form with payment form) even if I specifically and told him I can't answer my phone at work and prefer emails. So I'm still leery, coz why won't he email his response and if he wants my business and "wants me to be comfortable" he should answer my questions, right?

Chuckie7 its so nice to hear from somebody. I am experiencing the same thing. I email my questions but they call me and leave a message for me to call them back. Honestly I think its like you were saying, legal reasons. They dont want us to have any documentation noting what they promised us - that would present a law suit. I am leery too. I talked to one of the guys and asked that question, he said that its a for sure thing and they wont cancel, but never addressed that question directly. I am going to call again and ask M Johnson and tell him that he is being recorded.

The company that holds the money in escrow is Resorts Advantage and Joy Residence is of course the company making the transaction. I was for it at first but as I try to reach out to Joy Residence I become very leery, when you call it goes straight to voicemail. Honestly I can see the picture painted: We give them our money and 3 months later we asked whats happened and they refer us to Joy Residence and all we can do is leave a message and email them. EVEN IF YOU CAN'T RESPOND CAUSE OF YOUR AGREEMENT WITH THEM, ATLEAST SEND A GENERIC EMAIL OR CALL SOMEONE BACK. It looks like a big scam. I really hope the guys earlier dont get scanned but looks shady to me.

I am not going to do it. Honestly we cant expect to make a profit off of it and thats how they are luring people in. They are doing very little to resolve my doubts.

 

[chuckie7]

I completely agree, they are definitely trying to scam us and it's a big operation. It's plain and simple: if they want our business, and they are legal they will give us more written information. M Johnson has not called today and I sent him an email last night. I guess he gave up and is looking for somebody else to scam. I have not heard back from Joy Residence though the site said they will get back to me in less than 24 hours. I will keep you posted if I do.

 

[tapdancing]

Oh my goodness. PLEASE READ THIS IF YOU ARE CONSIDERING TO PURCHASE THIS DEAL FROM SIERRA:

[Commercial link deleted - DeniseM Moderator]

On February 18 Timeshare Adventures became aware of fraudulent activity that is effecting timeshare owners across the country. A group of crooks are tele-marketing timeshare owners claiming to have a buyer for their timeshare. They are very good, fast talking sales people who persuade the timeshare owner to send them money to cover a title search (or some other lie) via Western Union and in some cases they may ask for a credit card number. They're asking for as little as $179 and as high as $3200 or even more in some cases.


This is another company but the steps look to be the same.

 

[DeniseM]

I don't know why this is a surprise to anyone. These kinds of scams are well-known, and there have been a dozen warnings in this thread that have fallen on deaf ears....

 

[ucan2]

On their way to 52?

So I've been contacted as well, looking very skeptically at this situation with all of the information presented here.

 

[blb89]

This is a Huge SCAM. The money they want is for paperwork...paperwork doesn't cost $1900+. I have received all the same offers as the above posts for our Sandos Timeshare with Gibralter as the proported escrow agent. We have already been scammed by Sierra as they took $750 to sell our extra timeshare weeks on an annual basis for $1000...in two years we have not seen a dime!

 

[chuckie7]

I spoke to someone who took their offer and he said they're in the final stages of the sale.He said he got two Inventory Progress from Sierra's Legal Department.

 

[blb89]

Let us know if they ever send see any $$$

 

[chuckie7]

My thoughts exactly. Does anyone know how many weeks they've already got or how any they still need?

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

I spoke to someone who took their offer and he said they're in the final stages of the sale.He said he got two Inventory Progress from Sierra's Legal Department.

Was it someone you found or someone they referred you to?

 

[chuckie7]

Was it someone you found or someone they referred you to?

Someone I found on my own from online posts about Velas Vallarta. His post was about starting a class action lawsuit against Velas for unscrupulous practices in selling their weeks and he was also referred to Sierra like me and the others in this forum to rent our Velas weeks and sell our other timeshares.
I emailed him and he told me he accepted Sierra's client's offer to buy his 100 weeks red season for $96000.

 

[chuckie7]

Hey guys is this the number to Resorts Advantage (the escrow company for this transaction) that some of you have contacted? 888-757-6664
https://www.ramembers.com/Common_Pages/contact.aspx

 

[tapdancing]

Does anyone know how many weeks they've already got or how any they still need?

Last I heard was that they are trying to get 52 weeks in each floor plan. Once they get those 52 weeks then they will present that to Joy Club Resort. That is when they will send the checks off. They said it should take like 90days which is 3 months. Last time i talked to them they needed 17 more on the floor plan that I purchased and that was like 2 weeks ago. So it looks like it'll be a while before they sell these.

 

[Yukon05]

FYI,

I chose not to proceed with their offers. I received different answers on the same questions from the same person, which gave me a bad feeling about this. I asked how many weeks they had left to fill for my contract type (Villa) and they said 7 one time and then 15 the next. This was back in early January I might add. If they are still giving you high numbers, I'd be leary of accepting their offer, as they said it should be completed shortly when they were attempting to lure me in.

Another thing, I called Joy A Residence Club when I was looking into this. I pretended to be an inquiring customer (didn't mention anything about Sierra). I asked what kind of business they do, etc. I forget what locations they said they deal with, but Velas Vallarta wasn't one of them. I told the guy I was most interested in Velas and if they had any plans of expanding there and he didn't make one mention of this transaction with Sierra to purchase time in Velas.

Anyways, my two cents worth.

 

[tapdancing]

FYI,
I called Joy A Residence Club when I was looking into this.

How did you reach Joy, everytime I call them it goes straight to Voicemail. But yea I mentioned this to Sierra a while back and they said that Joy is not suppose to mention this deal because of some legal agreement. Whether thats the case I dont know.

Does anyone know any way to get rid of this timeshare without having to pay an upfront fee?

 

[DeniseM]

There are two places on TUG where you can give away your TS's for free (no charge for the Ads.)

TUG Marketplace - the only cost is your TUG membership - $15 (List it for $1 and it will automatically go in the Bargain Basement Ads.)

Bargain Deals - just write a simple post with all the pertinent info. - COMPLETELY FREE!

To make it more attractive I would:

1) Pay 2010 maintenance fees

2) Pay for the title transfer (you can get a simple professional transfer for less than $100) I've used this company and the owner is a Tugger.

3) Reserve a popular holiday week in 2010 for the new owner

 

[FMM]

I also received an offer from Sierra. They tell me that this other firm is buying up as many shares as they can, "because it's cheaper than building a new resort." I asked them what their fees are, and they said I need to pay $1,500 for closing costs, to be refunded when the deal closes in a month or so.

My lawyer tells me that sellers don't normally pay for closing costs.

Originally they offered me $17,900 for my contract. Then a second saleperson called me back and asked if this comes close to the equity. I said no. She requested I send them the parts of my contract that indicate what my total equity is, because I incread the contract 2 years later, doubling my Plat. weeks. I sent them the pages via email.

The woman calls me back today, and their "expert" completely misread the contract. I had to point it out to her.

Others say that you should never prepay for anything in this biz, so this must be a scam.

Now I'm worried...they have my identity, my signature, my social sec. #, EVERYTHING...I was busy at work, and decided to quickly send them these pages...without closely looking at them.

I asked the original guy to send me an email by end of biz day confirming that he received personal info on me, and they were to destroy them (shred). He sent me the mail, but didn't word it the way I wanted, not acknowledging the nature of the info.

Am I an idiot or what? Not thinking too clearly...I'm going to make sure my Lifelock is up and running, and call the Velas ans make sure they know I'm NOT selling my contract to any other firm.

I'm going to inform Sierra that I'm not interested.

Please keep posting so I know how this turns out.