One of the many tricky things about timeshares is that there seems to be plenty of questionable, inconsistent information out there about what they are, what they aren’t, and how they work. Sadly, the timeshare developers and resorts themselves are largely responsible for this muddy landscape, as it is often in their favor to make clear answers hard to come by.
As with anything else, if you are going to make good decisions regarding timeshares, you need to have as much information as possible. Toward that end, this article is going to talk about whether or not timeshares expire and how that factor should influence your thinking about buying or owning one for your family to use. Let’s get started!
Usually, the Answer is No
Generally speaking, timeshares do not come with an expiration date. The simplest way to think about this is to think about what would happen when you purchase a home. If you buy a home, does that purchase expire at a set date in the future? Of course not – you own it until you are done with it. In fact, that ownership extends even after your own passing. If you were to die while still owning a piece of real estate, it would become part of your estate and be passed along to your heirs.
The story is basically the same with a timeshare. Once you make this purchase and officially become a timeshare owner, you shouldn’t expect that ownership to end at any specified time. With some rare exceptions, you will own the timeshare in perpetuity, until you take some type of action to end your ownership (more on that later on this page).
From one perspective, you could see this as a good thing. Once you spend the money upfront to buy a timeshare, you have the ability – and the right – to keep enjoying vacations to that timeshare over and over again as the years go by. If everything goes well, you can take countless trips with family and friends to wonderful destinations and make memories that will last a lifetime.
That’s the optimistic, positive way to look at it, but there is another side to consider. Along with the rights of timeshare ownership come the responsibilities, including the obligation to pay maintenance fees and assessments when they come along. Those costs aren’t minor, and you might find that you get tired of making these payments in the long run. In fact, you might not feel like you are getting your money’s worth with regard to how much you have to spend and how much you are able to travel. When viewed this way, the fact that your timeshare doesn’t expire will start to feel more like a burden than anything else.
Always Check the Fine Print
If you are thinking about purchasing a timeshare in the near future, it’s critical to check into the fine print of the agreement that you are signing. To be sure, everything is going to sound great when presented to you by the salesperson in charge of the presentation that you are attending. The fine print of the contract isn’t going to be highlighted in that setting – it will just be pictures of beautiful places, featuring beautiful people, and you’ll get excited about the opportunity.
But you always want to know what you are getting into when you sign up for something as costly – and long-lasting – as a timeshare. If the timeshare you purchase isn’t going to expire, you need to make sure that you are comfortable with the terms of the agreement and how they impact you moving forward. What do the maintenance fees look like and how much will they increase over time? When can you face an assessment, for what reasons, and how long will you have to make those payments? Don’t assume that everything will just go well for years to come. Think about these points and more and get all of the answers you need to be comfortable with a purchase before you start to think about financing and taking the leap to sign the contract.
This is Why You Need to Think Carefully
There are a few reasons that you need to think critically about making a timeshare purchase before you actually do it. The first, of course, is that timeshares can be quite expensive – you may be looking at spending tens of thousands of dollars or more on your timeshare, so you don’t want to rush into a buying decision with such a significant price tag attached.
The price tag of your timeshare is only the start of the discussion, however. Perhaps even a bigger factor is the difficulty that you will likely have getting rid of the timeshare when you want to be done. Perhaps the best way to think about this issue is to contrast it with the process of buying and selling a traditional single-family home. Through this lens, you’ll be able to see that purchasing a timeshare actually needs to be considered more carefully than the purchase of a home.
When you buy a house, you are getting a physical asset with a known value on the open market. Of course, that value can go up and down with the market around it, but it’s almost certain that the value won’t go to zero. When you are done with the house and you want to sell it, doing so will be no problem. Even if the market has declined – maybe you purchased the house for $300,000 and now it’s only worth $250,000 – it still has meaningful value left and you’ll have buyers available to make offers.
This usually isn’t what happens with timeshares. If you want to be done with your timeshare, you can try to sell it – but you might find that it has virtually no value on the open market. The price you paid initially for the timeshare will have no bearing at all on what someone might be willing to pay you to take over ownership. Many timeshare owners find that no one wants to buy their timeshare at any price, which is something that just doesn’t happen with regular real estate.
Looking for Other Ways to Leave
Most likely, you aren’t going to be able to rely on an expiration date to get you out of your timeshare ownership. If that isn’t going to happen, then it will be on you to find another way to end this relationship, if you choose to do so. Getting out of a timeshare can save you a significant amount of money over the long run and will open up many new possibilities for vacations moving forward.
Of course, we’ve already talked about the challenges you are likely to find when trying to sell a timeshare. You can certainly give it a shot, and perhaps you’ll be fortunate to find someone who is willing to take over ownership, but you don’t really want to count on this being successful. If you are going to have any chance of selling your timeshare and getting out of the responsibilities of ownership, throw out the notion of recovering a significant portion of what you spent initially. Most likely, that money is gone, and it isn’t coming back. Instead, accept that you might need to sell for as little as a dollar just to get someone else to become responsible for the account.
If it proves to be the case that you can’t sell your timeshare, there might be some other options available to you. For instance, you can call the developer or resort directly and ask about any programs that they may have in place to take back your ownership or allow you to exit for a fee. There is no guarantee that this kind of program will be available, or that you will qualify, but you can explore the possibility as it might prove that this will end up being the easiest way to get out and move on.
Should those two previous options fail you, the next course of action may be to reach out to a timeshare exit company with the goal of getting out of your contract as soon as possible. A good timeshare exit company will pursue a variety of methods to find a way out of the contract, but you need to be careful when picking a partner to work with in this space. Rather than choosing the first company you find, instead, take your time to pick one that is going to use a third-party escrow service to hold your money while they are working on getting results. This protection is critical so don’t use an exit service that doesn’t offer this feature.
Put the Right Team on Your Side
It’s not always easy to find good help when it comes to getting rid of a timeshare, but you have landed on the right source for this project. Give us a call right away at
833-416-8796
to learn more about what options are available and how you might be able to escape your timeshare in the near future. You are also welcome to use the live chat feature on our site to get in touch. However we hear from you, our team is excited to get started on this important matter!