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Your Best Line with the Sales Staff

altiste1

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When staying at timeshare properties, my wife and I occasionally give in to the entreaty to attend a sales presentation. Having suffered through enough of them, we want to claim whatever incentive they offer without staying a minute beyond the promised length of the presentation - which as we all know is a promise worth less than the carbon dioxide exhaled in making the promise. After attempting a couple of different approaches, we've settled on a line that emphasizes that we're so new to timesharing (and to the particular developer's program) that we're just not sure we can commit to this - "yet." That has worked to get both the sales person and the "manager" (or whoever that is who comes in after the salesperson to lean even harder on us) off our backs and us out the door on time. We've tried telling them how we'll never pay above resale prices, but that just raises the sales guy's hackles (and often elicits some outrageous lies from him) and it ends up being unpleasant for all involved.

What's your favorite line to keep the presentation to the allotted time and still get your freebie?
 

VacayKat

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The “Hey, we are at 60 minutes and we have a reservation that we need to make” often works. We tend to make it clear up front that we have plans we have to make which often moves the BS along faster. Another line that works about 50% of the time is: “we just dont have the disposable income right now, we are paying too many higher education fees right now and we will not finance a timeshare purchase.” (Only have about 5 more years before we can’t use that any more) One other hint is if the sales site is off property do not under any circumstances take their shuttle, you’re a hostage and no line works.
 

DaveNV

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*at elapsed time* "Excuse me, but my spouse is diabetic, and needs to take medication. We need to leave - right now."

Dave
 

Rolltydr

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*at elapsed time* "Excuse me, but my spouse is diabetic, and needs to take medication. We need to leave - right now."

Dave
Good one! Unfortunate, if true, but still, an excellent reason to escape. Do they ever offer to meet you in your room in 30 minutes to complete the presentation?
 

DaveNV

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Good one! Unfortunate, if true, but still, an excellent reason to escape. Do they ever offer to meet you in your room in 30 minutes to complete the presentation?

It is true, and I've only used it a few times. (The best was with a car rental at San Francisco airport. They didn't have any of our midsize rentals on hand, and wanted us to wait. After 30 minutes or so of waiting, I pulled the diabetic card on them. They gave us a brand new Cadillac SUV for the same price as a midsize sedan, and sent us on our way.

I've only fallen for the "We'll meet you in your room" thing once. At the Grand Desert, in Las Vegas, many years ago. The guy wouldn't leave. I about had to throw him out.

Dave
 

easyrider

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We only do presentations if we are staying more than a week. Occasionally, when we have nothing else going on, we will go on a few just to check out other resorts and get the gifts. On one presentation when we told the salesman to wrap it up. He brought over the sales manager who explained that 1 out of 3 people at these presentations see the value of the membership and buy. With my nicest smile , I reached out my hand to shake his. I think he thought we were in. While we were shaking hands I said congratulations, I'm glad we could help, you only need to talk to 1 more person.

They let us go. I think the manager thought it was funny because he smiled and waved when we left.

Bill
 

rickandcindy23

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"I am rickandcindy23 on TUG."
 

Sugarcubesea

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*at elapsed time* "Excuse me, but my spouse is diabetic, and needs to take medication. We need to leave - right now."

Dave
We used that a few years ago as I actually have a daughter who is a Type 1 Diabetic. At the 90 minute mark I could see was looking down. I gave her a snack to bring her blood sugar up told them we had fulfilled our end of the agreement of 90 minutes and we needed to leave . They quickly gave us our gift and we were out the door
 

chellej

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I have often been excused at about the 10-minute mark...not a line just the truth... when asked if I own any other timeshares I just tell them at my high point I owned 26 weeks...all bought resale. The smart ones realize quickly that I am a waste of their time and want to quickly move on. On 2 occasions they were overbooked and after several preliminary questions were given the gift and excused without ever being assigned a salesperson. Happened once at Grand timber Lodge and once at Bali Hai.
 

melissy123

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We seem to usually travel with another couple. At the rare times when both couples have been enticed to attend a timeshare presentation, our friends are done and out in half an hour or less. Their line: we travel with our friends all the time for free, why would we buy anything.
 
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jules54

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We seem to usually travel with another couple. At the rare times when both couples have been enticed to attend a timeshare presentation, our friends are done and out in half an hour or less. Their line: we travel with our friends all the time for free, why would we buy anything.
I love this one. We also travel with others quite often.
I also like to tell the true story of the Mexican Timeshare Company that I helped the FBI prosecute and send to prison 2 officers of the company. Especially in Mexico the sales guy can’t get us out of there fast enough, especially if he is from the US or Canada. The men charged and convicted were both US citizens if your wondering how this was even possible. The charge I believe was crime of fraud of US citizens by another US citizen.
 

sun starved Gayle

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I have only attended one timeshare presentation about 18 years ago, because I really wanted to see the property they were pushing.
I had read here on TUG to make a list of what you owned, what you paid for it and what you have traded it for and bring to the presentation. At that time, I owned a $300.00 unit in South Africa (as it seems almost everybody and their dog here on TUG did ) which had wonderful trading power. I truthfully listed The Manhattan Club, a couple Hawaii properties and the two bedroom condo we were presently staying in in Whistler BC as trades.
The salesperson looked at the list, left and returned with her sales manager who looked at my husband and said “Your wife is a genius.” Believe me, I have gotten a LOT of use out of that quote over the years!
After that, we got a quick tour of the property which is now the Embarc Whistler, and $100.00 Visa card which we used on a nice sushi dinner in Whistler Village.
I have never done another tour. I just do not have the stomach for it.
 

DaveNV

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My first-ever timeshare stay was at Hacienda Del Mar in Cabo. We were guests of my brother and his (now-ex) wife. They had bought the year before at that location, and invited us to join them on their first stay. We attended the "Owner's Update" sales pitch with them, and the salesman kept nudging me, and making rude comments about how I was a cheapskate for not buying my own timeshare. I finally had enough of his attitude, and I told him "I am a guest of my brother, staying here for free. Why would I want to buy anything, especially here, when I can stay for nothing, and especially from you, someone who is such a a$$hole?" It shut the guy right up, and the presentation ended shortly after.

I don't generally do sales presentations, because I don't want to waste my time. :D

Dave
 
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moonstone

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77,000 RCI points (Sunrise Ridge Resort, TN)
We seem to usually travel with another couple. At the rare times when both couples have been enticed to attend a timeshare presentation, our friends are done and out in half an hour or less. Their line: we travel with our friends all the time for free, why would we buy anything.

Our DS uses a similar line. He tells them 'my parents got a free week (its actually a points pkg) and let me use it, so why would we buy something?'

~Diane
 
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moonstone

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Many years ago I started telling the sales person that we were only there at their invitation for a free gift and we were not going to be buying anything no matter what the cost was. I also confirm what the presentation time will be and tell them I will be setting the alarm on my phone with a 5 minute warning and we will be leaving when it goes off. We stick to it and only once had a salesman tell us he wasn't finished the presentation. I told him he should have talked faster, stood up, thanked him for his time, and asked which way to gifting. I also tell them that I am a long time member of TUG. If any sales folk sent closers over we politely told them we had fulfilled our time obligation and were not interested in paying anything for something we could get for free.

~Diane
 

jehb2

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Well last presentation the sales person walked out on me and didn’t come back. And I wasn’t finished with him.

He started to explain to me how converting my points to HHonors points was a good deal. I went on a rant. I told him my week might get me a 1 1/2 nights at a hotel and that Hilton is constantly devaluing HHonors points. He said that’s not true. I said in 2000 I could get 6 nights at Hilton Hawaiian village for 60,000 points now 1 night costs 60,000+ points.

He showed me he had a reservation for a Hilton Hotel in Madrid, Spain which he booked using HHonors points. I borrowed his keyboard and logged into Hilton.com. I showed him that room only costs $148 USD. And if I booked it using converted club points it would costs me $428.00 USD. He jumped up and said “I have other customers.” He left and didn’t come back.

Yes, yes I know. I shouldn’t go to owner updates. I let my husband talk me into it. He said we could let the kids do something fun with the $200 Hilton resort bucks. As it turned out the kids used the bucks on our last day to play with water activities. That was cool.
 

wackymother

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I had some success with "I really like that big bathtub in the unit. I'm going to go home and use the $18,000 [or whatever] to remodel our bathroom with a tub just like it! Then I can use it all the time. Thanks for opening my eyes to the possibilities!" We actually did go home and redo our bathroom and get a new big tub.

Over the years, needing a new roof and other home improvements have filled in for the tub.
 

rhonda

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I just bought a boat. That one worked pretty well this past Friday.
?????

I sense more to this story ... should we tug that string a bit ... ??? What happened on Friday? Did you sell the boat, buy from a timeshare developer, ... ???
 

rhonda

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I just bought a boat. That one worked pretty well this past Friday.
For a very long time ours was, perhaps, a bit similar: I wanted a tractor. I was NOT approving any large expenditures until I got my tractor and didn't mind repeating that point during an owner's update. (Of course, now that tractor is long paid off ... )
 
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