I've never tried to hide that we bought developer and not just Wyndham either. Nor that Wyndham salespeople "fixed" problems for us by selling us more points. After finding TUG I learned about Owner Care and now know we most likely had other options. In the second half of 2010, 2011 and the first half of 2012 we could have been in the shoes other people are in with losing their timeshares or walking away.
I've told about that time in our lives but what I've never said what just how difficult a time it was for us when my husband got "retired" by his then company. On my 59th birthday just 5 weeks short of him turning 61. His then company was making cuts in order to sell the company. It meant that he wouldn't be able to collect the full retirement as he needed a few more years with them. I had no benefits but made enough to pay the bills and feed us. It was the increased cost of the health insurance when COBRA ran out in a few months that I didn't make enough to cover. We were older first time parents, our son had another year of college to go and was getting married on my husband's birthday. This couldn't have come at a much worse time and we were in no way financially prepared.
But that wasn't the worst of it by far. My husband had always worked even as a teenager and was completely devastated at losing his job. He was depressed and I wasn't seeing just how bad it was nor for how long it went on. He kept telling me he was fired which wasn't true at all. To get him to stop saying that I got him to agree that he wouldn't tell anyone about him losing his job until after the wedding so our personal issues didn't overshadow our son and DIL's wedding. He took on planning and preparing the food for their rehearsal dinner. That gave him something else to focus on and he was glad to be able to do it because it took a lot of strain off me. I was working 50-60 hours a week and sometimes even more. After their wedding he started really hunting for another job and easily found one. Yes it was in Florida and yes we really, really wanted to get away from the Northwest Pennsylvania winters but it wasn't a job he was thrilled about taking. He went to work for the State of Florida and they pay very poorly. He made 50% of what he previously made and that increased his sense of failure. Something I wasn't aware of until a little over a year later a competitor of his old company sought him out and he was back to making what he used to.
And it gets worse. For a little over 6 months that he was in Florida on his own I was back in PA. We talked daily but it isn't the same as having your spouse there. We got through house hunting and in the weeks following when we were waiting to close I fell at work and was laid up for months afterwards. Moving our belongings was an unmitigated disaster in every aspect of it. I don't allow myself to dwell on it as it is one of those things you just have to let go of because there is nothing you can do about it now.
There are two good things I then and now hang on to from that time after my husband lost his job. One is my instant and unwavering belief that my husband losing his job meant other, better doors were going to open for us. And they did. The other is related to our timeshares. My husband lived out of them for 4 months and 1 week from the time he arrived in Florida to start the job until a week after we closed on our house. Financially that was a lifesaver! I convinced him to give the job a try by telling him that thanks to the timeshares we weren't shelling out any money for a place for him to stay if he took the job. We didn't have to put down any deposits or commit to a lease. If he didn't like the job he could quit and just stay and enjoy whatever days remained inside of the 15 day cancellation window. That him trying the job was costing us nothing but the gas money to get down there.
Bear with me because there is a little more to the story. At the time my husband lost his job we were platinum Wyndham owners which means we owned over a million points with them and we had another timeshare in RCI. The maintenance fees seemed like a crippling expense we surely didn't need at that time. I have always managed our money and paid the bills so my stress level was through the roof. After all that we'd spent to buy what we had the idea of losing it all was heartbreaking. So I gave up what little free time I had with working 50-60 hour work weeks and gave up some desperately needed sleep time too to learn how to rent and do all the work renting involves. I didn't even know point managers existed at that time or I would have gone that route. For the next several years that renting saved us from going the routes other people take.
I am happy to say that we made up for what would ;have been a larger amount of pension he lost because we made a commitment to save hard for those remaining years until my husband retired and instead of retiring at 65 he worked a few more years. And that probably put us farther ahead than we would have been if none of that had happened. Because my husband set his own work schedule and his territory was all of Florida south of Sarasota and Fort Pierce we were able to use our timeshares more even before he retired than many people do even after they retire. That made it very easy for him to keep working those few extra years. As as some of you know from my posts we are making even more use of our timeshares now. Home only 28 out of 155 nights from mid July to mid December.
We have far more reasons to be grateful for our timeshares than we have regrets for what we spent. Many of us have a story and that's ours!
Thank you for sharing your beautiful stories
@Jan M. @Fredflintstone . As my parents were refugees, I also grew up poor. My mom would stitch my sock holes instead of buying new ones. I rarely got new clothes, but used ones at Goodwill or the Salvation Army. I often wore my older sister's hand-me-downs, so I got made fun of a lot. Christmas dinner was often porridge and beans.
I remember my parents' employers both dropped them to part-time work, and my parents missed two mortgage payments. They were worried about being foreclosed upon, sued for any deficiency payments, and how they were going to afford an attorney. As they were obviously uninformed, they didn't even know they didn't have to worry about deficiency lawsuits at the time, which would have saved them a lot of stress and anxiety. They were also worried about their credit scores and whether they'd be able to buy another car if their car breaks down. That's why I take great exception to the idea TS foreclosure information is helpful only to the well-off and not to the middle-class or lower middle-class TS owners. I've been there.
From those experiences, my sisters and I committed to work hard and never return to that situation. My older sis is a doctor. My sisters and I never quit our lower-middle-class spending habits, at the chagrin of our spouses. I guess it's our fear never to return to that situation, If my wife and I spent like normal middle-class people, our net worth would be $300k, instead of $400k. I am still amazed how many middle-class folks buy their kids $10 meals twice-daily, or $100 shoes every three (3) months or every "season." Or how many middle-class fathers buy $1000 new flat-screen tvs, $1000 new smart phones, or electronics every year. Or how many middle-class mothers buy $100 shoes and a $100 purse every month, "one for each outfit."
My sisters and I both give to our parents. My older sis gives $400/month, me $200/month, and my little sis $100/month to my parents. With their SS income, it's enough for them to retire comfortably. Their house is nearly paid off.
I see disinformation to be especially concerning in the lower middle-class communities. I had another disabled client who hadn't filed taxes for ten (10) years. I asked her why she never filed taxes, told that it's actually a federal crime, and that she actually could have gotten money back with Earned Income Child Credit. She said her accountant told her she didn't have to file since she was disabled. Turns out her accountant was a "hood accountant," and not a CPA. I wondered how many lower-income folks are not getting Earned Income Child Credits from advice from "hood accountants."
Eventually, she filed three (3) years of tax returns, paid any late penalties, and got about $5.8k total back in Earned Income Child Credits. She apologized to the IRS for not filing taxes and explained her disability kept her from physically traveling to brick-and-mortar tax-filing businesses or accessing online tax-filing websites. Honestly, I don't think the IRS minded too much, since they technically owed her money. Besides the refund check, we never heard back from the IRS. I was happy that she started telling her other disabled friends with children that they too could get Earned Income Child Credits.
The point is that I actually agree that mainly the well-informed, resourceful, and well-connected TS owners know about anti-deficiency. Exit companies, such as Wesley, use anti-deficiency to draw less-informed, less resourceful, and less-connected TS owners in. Exit companies profit off their knowledge of anti-deficiency. I didn't even know about anti-deficiency until the second year of law school.
I want less-informed, less resourceful, and less-connected TS owners to know about anti-deficiency, even those that can't afford the $15 TUG membership fee. If they did, maybe they'd use TS deedback programs more and pay $3k to those exit companies less often.
