Why shouldnt I pay an Advertising company up front?

[SMTN Rep]

I was just wondering why you should not pay an advertising company like SellMyTimeshareNow to advertise a timeshare???

I know that people say that "there is no motivation to sell" but if it is a for sale by owner website than wouldnt the motivation fall on you to price it aggressivly???

I was just wondering.

 

[Icarus]

How much does SellMyTimeShareNow charge to list a timeshare for sale? I couldn't find that information on the web site. Is it there? I only found a contact form. It's certainly possible that the information is there, but I didn't see it. Is there a fee schedule somewhere on the web site that shows all the fees somebody would have to pay to not only list there, but also if they sell through your web site?

If we're talking about something like redweek or TUG classifieds where there's a relatively small fee to list your timeshare for sale and no other charges, that's probably not an issue for most of us. On the other hand, if the fee is excessive, there's really no reason to pay anything other than a small listing fee upfront if you want to sell your own timeshare. By small, I mean no more than $30 - $40 in the worst case, which is similar to what you might have to pay to list it for sale on an auction site.

The advice about not paying an upfront fee to sell a timeshare is for people to avoid services that promise to sell your timeshare for a large up-front fee. They generally do not deliver and their entire business model is based on simply collecting that large up-front fee.

-David

 

[SMTN Rep]

I am not trying to start an ad here. There is an upfront fee but my point is if you speak to one of the people at sellmytimesharenow and we are not overpricing your timeshare, we are providing triffic rankings, and we received over 274 million dollars in offers last year than why is it "wrong" to pay to advertise with a well known company?


Please be professional, I am not at all being rude but just trying to understand. Thank you

 

[Icarus]

Can you answer my questions about the fee schedules?

I was still editing my first reply when you replied to it. You might want to re-read it.

I think I answered what most people mean when they say you shouldn't pay an upfront fee, and I'm curious to understand what your fee schedules are. It's hard to answer the question you posed without knowing what sort of fees somebody might have to pay at each end of the transaction in order to sell through your site.

Also, the fact that they aren't listed anywhere on the web site would raise a red-flag with me. A web site can make any claims it wants to. But how can anybody verify them? Typically with timeshare sales, we generally have to rely on each other and word of mouth to know who's honest and who isn't.

-David

 

[SMTN Rep]

icarus we charge a $599 fee. We do not hide that we just also know that when people put information in with our company they want to know what it is worth, what offers we have been receiving, and what we offer them in return for a $599 ad expense.

With that being said I think that a lot of the problem with timeshares not being sold with some "upfront fee" companies is OVERPRICING. not too many people realize that timeshares depreciate in value and they dont like to hear that so they go and list with another company that will charge more in some instances and will listen to some companies that are scams and promise the world and try to sell their timeshare for something like 200% of their original purchase price cause some company promised them the sale.

 

[Icarus]

I agree with you about pricing your timeshare correctly if you want to sell it, but I would always advise people not to pay such a large fee when trying to sell a timeshare.

There are many people in this community that are knowledgeable about ts values and how to buy and sell them. We have lots of serial buyers and sellers and even a person that runs a timeshare closing service as part of our community. So most people here would advise people not to pay a fee like that to sell their timeshare. If they want to list it for sale with a licensed broker and pay a commission on the back end of the sale after the deal is consummated, that's a different story. There's really no need to pay any upfront fee like that to sell a timeshare. Then again, TUG members are probably not your target market.

-David

 

[Steve]

Traditional real estate agents are paid when the transaction is completed. This creates a strong incentive for the agent to:

1) Make sure the seller prices the property appropriately so it will sell.

2) Work hard to get the property sold as he/she needs a paycheck.

Charging a large upfront fee on a relatively low value item like a timeshare takes away a lot of the incentive for the agent to get it priced right and then work hard to sell it. Indeed, many of the timeshares that I have seen on up-front-fee resale sights listed for $5000 to $10,000...or more...are only worth around $500. This is the plain truth.

I have bought and sold many timeshares and it is amazing what I have been told I could sell a few of my less-than-stellar weeks for by timeshare resale companies! The fact is, many people would be better off giving away their timeshares (if a charity or individual would take them) rather than paying your upfront fee because the timeshare isn't even worth as much as the fee.

Even for the timeshares that can command a decent resale value, the commissions are relatively low. For example, a $5000 timeshare with a 10% commission upon sale will only result in a $500 commission...less than your upfront fee.

Let's face it, the real money being made by the upfront fee companies is in the upfront fees...not the commissions. Savvy resale people in the timeshare industry quickly realize that they will make a lot more money...and a lot faster money...by taking "listings" with the hefty upfront fee than they will by actually trying to sell the timeshares. It may sound cynical, but it is just reality.

Steve

 

[SMTN Rep]

Icarus thank you for your feedback. I do have a question for you though, If someone wants the exposure that we provide and they ARE going to pay an upfront fee wouldnt it make sense to go with a company that tells you to keep your prices low, and a company that gets traffic hits and targets buyers?

I do however understand that their are cheaper methods like you are saying but I speak to about 100 potential sellers a day that contact me and I have about 80 of them tell me that they are going to list with another company cause they are lying to them ( false promises of guaranteed sales, buyers waiting for them...., I have even heard that a company promised to fly people to the resort personally and give them a tour. ) and obviously people love to hear that their timeshare that they paid $13000 for is not amazingly worth something like $27000 with a "guaranteed sale".

 

[dchilds]

What does SellMyTimeshareNow offer for the extra $550 over RedWeek, or more over any other site, some of which are free?

The only way I would be willing to pay anything over $100 would be at the end of a successful transaction, not in advance. I would probably be willing to pay 5% of the final price, with a cap of about $500 in fees for any sale over $10,000.

If you want to make that kind of money on a transaction, I would suggest you start with a $29 listing fee, with a fee of 5% of the purchase price after a successful sale.

 

[SMTN Rep]

Steve you are 100% right when you say that conventional real estate agents work really hard to get houses and conventional real estate sold.. I used to be an agent. But we both realize that timeshares are not conventional real estate, there is no genuine timeshare MLS... And there is not a "set value" of timeshares. I also think that you know some brokers charge a minimal fee of upwords of $1000 in some instances and with no real MLS and not that many people targeted by brokers, the question will remain. if someone is willing to pay an upfront fee wouldnt you think it would at least make sense to go with one that is trying to help?

 

[TUGBrian]

why do different employees of your company constantly register names to start threads like these?

your employees already participate in other threads about SMTN when they are brought up. I have changed your name as business names are not allowed. Nor are you allowed to start threads to promote your business.

I dont know how to make the rules of the site any more clear.

Thread closed as it was started specifically to promote your business...you could have taken the time to search for the numerous other threads about your organization and address specific concerns...but you didnt.

The fact that people are replying and you are getting exactly the sort of exposure you were looking for in the first place does not excuse you breaking the rules to begin with. Had you posted this during normal business hours it would have been closed before the first reply...however you conveniently chose to start the thread at 12:30am eastern time and I didnt notice it until 2 hours later.