Vida Vacations & Grand Mayan lies

thanks

The US Treasury recently sanctioned a Mexican cartel that supplies the US with Fentanyl and timeshare exit scams: https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy1315 There have been many Vida and Grand Mayan complaints with Vida promising your other timeshare can be sold, but only forwarded the owner to SellMyTimeshareNow charging about $1800 for a listing that rarely sells meaning they are stuck with two timeshares.

IP, you are trying to associate Vidanta with the Jalisco Cartel - not nice! Ridiculous comment that should have been edited! Timeshares are resold, every day of the week, including through SMTN. Redweek.com knows that and is irresponsible to accept your posting. Owners, go to tugbbs,com and investigate the resale market, and read the forums. You will learn about the T/S market if you pay attention. Quality timeshares can be sold at reasonable prices, others not so much so. Timeshares are not investments for the majority, but a tiny minority have the ability to rent them, often for profit. Vida does not refer their buyers to any resellers, but a sales rep might suggest one or another, although policy restricts them.

Over the years, some of these posts have reflected the intellect of children instead of grown-ups, who imply that the resort is to blame for poor decisions made by prospective buyers who get their advice from the ill informed, and inexperienced folks. As for being compelled to stay at a sales table, don't they know how to say NO....and get up and go!

endscams wrote:

As for being compelled to stay at a sales table, don't they know how to say NO....and get up and go!

I get what you are saying here. Yes, no one is forced to stay at a sales table longer than the agreed-upon time (usually 90 minutes). Yes, the person can get up and walk away after 90 minutes. However, as unwise as this may seem, the person came in for the gift. The agreement was a gift in exchange for staying there 90 minutes, not 3.5 hours. However, the sales people withhold this gift well beyond the 90 minutes until the prospective buyer agrees to buy. Unfortunately for the prospective buyer, there is really no enforcement of giving the gift at the 90-minute mark, so the person either has to sign the papers and buy, or continue and wait for the gift while the sales people wear him down.

LC, whoa! No, you don't have to buy or continue. The incentive to tour the resort is called a "gift", primarily by the OPC on the streets, those who arranged for your tour, which was incentivized by the gift. You'll find this shocking no doubt, but some folks actually buy, and some attend with the intention of buying. You can search the percentages online. You may also realize that the sales reps will persist until the process somehow comes to a grinding halt, so to speak. In other words, the prospects demand to speak to a manager (who will be a closer), or the prospects actually stand up and state that the presentation is over. You remind the sales rep that you have fulfilled your part of the deal and you do not wish to buy "any part of the program". You might say that because on the way out (the exit) you will be pitched a low cost intro program, for lack of a better name. Gives you a taste of the resort timeshare industry, designed to convince you to convert to a membership. Which is not so bad if I may say so. Time is on the side of the buyer, time to figure it all out but to try it. Sorry to say, many owners and the disenchanted gripe because they do not understand the program or understand the terms and conditions of what they may eventually buy. That is a good part of the problem, with the industry at fault.

The "buy today or it's gone" proposition is a faulty marketing technique, and leaves a sour taste in one's mouth with many good, qualified prospects. The reason they use it is because they doubt anyone would ever come back to a sales room to buy (as you are on vacation). And the majority don't as they are too pissed off anyway. But some would if they weren't so damn mad. Royal Resorts is a major resort developer that didn't use that tactic and were a success. And far as I know, their owners are also relatively successful selling their memberships - those who wish to. Sales people in the T/S business can be dishonest to the core. Too bad they aren't let go, but sales reps generally can be hard to come by. The industry that now bears close watching is the vacation rentals industry, which like T/S, lacks ethics and governance.

Someone needs to come forward with suggestions on "how to sell a Vidante membership". Apparently they within do not sell your membership, and apparently no real estate agent sells memberships. Where does one head to get rid of their membership. This is a topic that needs much transparency on moving forward.

We were literally held hostage in the sales room for many hours. Each closer drawing the 12 rectangles on the notepad telling you how your 1 week can bring in so much rental income. We were fortunate to buy there 20 plus years ago. When we bought it wasn’t even built. There were 4 model units Mayan palace and a big hole dug where the big pool was going. We bought a 1 week lock off for $6500. We negotiated red time and no maintenance fees unless we go. Over the years we did some upgrades. Obviously when you want to it’s great. As owners we went from Mayan palace to grand Mayan. Then to grand bliss. Other small upgrades as well: Then we were all set. However one time (the last time we went) we didn’t want to. They hunted us down to do the presentation. We said no. I had already had issues as an owner simply trying to book the grand bliss (they didn’t build enough of them) so we were down graded to grand Mayan with a pass that let us use the bliss facilities: they made me beg for a room in the first 5 building on the second floor. Took them 1/2 hour to make that happen. I stood at the desk telling them I will not budge as an owner. (They clearly don’t respect those that have already purchased). Eventually the room I wanted materialized. Back to them harassing us to do the “presentation”…. We were badgered so much we finally agreed. BIG BIG BIG MISTAKE!!! We told person number 1 don’t waste your time we have kids in college and we have upgraded numerous times. We are all set. She took that as a challenge. We went through 5 closers. The 5th one a lovely woman said what will it take to make this upgrade work. We laughed. It was at $15,000 My husband was so fed up and many hours had gone by. It’s the equivalent to mental torture. My husband scribbled the dollar sign out and made the 1 a dollar sign. He said $5000. For grand luxxe Which we don’t even want because their pool area is ugly. The woman takes the offer goes away and when she returns she said your offer has been accepted congratulations!!! Shook our hands and said she was going to get our ids do the contract so we could leave. We were in shock. Truly thought she would come back say sorry and we could leave: She doesn’t come back. We sat there for 1/2 hour and nothing. Then this American man came to the table and said “ our insulting offer was NOT accepted and that he would get our ids because we were rude and needed to leave immediately “!! My husband lost it. He said we wanted to leave hours ago: we are owners here. This is a shakedown and disgusting. I left to go to the front desk. On the way I started to realize we lost an entire day of our vacation to this nonsense. We go to escape and relax. Unacceptable!!! I got to the desk and got really emotional. Nervous breakdown crying… they couldn’t console me. They (the front desk people felt bad). They are awful at check in but this this was beyond comprehension. Management called an hour later. They bought us dinner and told us we had the rest of the week to decide if we wanted to upgrade. The new offer they were willing to accept was $6200 for the grand luxe. We waited till the day we were leaving to decline. I have not gone back since.

sharonh624 wrote:

Someone needs to come forward with suggestions on "how to sell a Vidante membership". <snip>

Don't hold your breath waiting for any such suggestions...

Sorry (and please don't shoot the messenger), but it would take a magician to impart any resale value to a Vida RTU (right to use) membership. Since the "membership" is essentially worthless in the resale market, it is also basically impossible to sell.

Unless you intend to use your RTU membership on a regular basis, your best bet might be to just walk away, pay nothing further and don't ever look back. It's hard to accept bidding farewell to whatever money you have already paid to date, but the simple truth is that there is no magic act that can impart any resale market value to this RTU membership. It's entirely up to you whether or not you want to try to extract some value by regularly using your RTU membership, or instead just walk away now and regard the whole experience as an expensive lesson learned and just put it all behind you — permanently. Selling is not a realistic option.

Joan: I've written over 500 articles about timeshare and have heard from many harmed by Mexico timeshares and fraudulent exit companies and lawyers . The Canadian government has issued a warning: "The government of Canada has issued a new travel advisory for Canadians to be aware of high pressure sales tactics used to sell timeshares in Mexico. In a new advisory, the Government of Canada is informing its citizens to do their homework and be diligent before signing any timeshare contracts." Oct 11, 2019 I interviewed Timeshare Specialist, one of the many legitimate resale brokers I have interacted with since 2016. In our CrimeShare interview, a timeshare expert discusses his wire fraud data base. Earl explains how he was ripped off for $51k US by a Mexico timeshare and $51k by a Mexican wire fraud outfit that said they had a buyer for his timeshare. Earl is a 100% disabled Canadian armed forces retiree. https://tarda.org/f/timeshare-specialists%E2%80%99-timeshare-exit-scam-hotline I also edited and wrote the Foreword for a book written by former Mexico Timeshare executive Wayne Robinson. If he didn't work at the Mexico resort, he knows everything about them.

Lance, Having heard from over 2,000 timeshare buyers, I've noticed one ethnic group in particular that is overly polite. Mustering the force it would take to walk out is not in their DNA. Also, many seniors (of which I am one) were also raised to be polite. The Indians say, "Never judge your neighbor unless you've walked a mile in their shoes." Greeters are experts in hooking people into presentations. I began our nonprofit after experiencing this in the extreme in 2015 at a timeshare resort: Hospitality greeter, "We had so many complaints, now it is a group presentations." Me, "Will I be paired with a sales agent?" Greeter, "No! Not unless you have questions in the last ten minutes. There have been some significant changes. I (the greeter) attended and learned a lot!" So we kept our mouths shut the entire presentation, but were still beat up for three hours with devious ways of preventing an exit. We didn't buy anything. I wrote a fairy tale about the experience. I also wrote to the late attorney Bob Massi, host of the FOX show Property Man, and ended up, with my husband, being interviewed by Mr. Massi about our experience on his show. He had aired a segment about the Queen of Versailles. It wasn't about Westgate timeshare, it was about the owners 90,000 square foot house, but he was flooded with timeshare complaints.

IP, good job done. The cartel apparently has discovered how they can profit from white collar crime in the T/S industry, so they have set up T/S associated companies. Wire fraud has been around a long time, almost becoming victims ourselves years ago. Corrupt sales people sell the lists of buyers and prospects. Despite all the horror stories, we should distinguish between legit companies and bad. Vidanta is legit, Vallarta Gardens is not, as 2 examples.

The Canadian Gov't is a little late with advisories, say 25 years! IN our own back yard (Canada) we had a T/S resort called Fairmont Vacation Villas, based in Fairmont, BC. You are no doubt aware of this? One of the biggest scams in Canada, if not North America, initiated in 2012 by a new owner of Fairmont, enabled by a fraudulent bankruptcy. Developer cut up the resort, compelled us owners to pay for renos, or pay to cancel our contracts. Then developer then sold off chunks of the resort as fee simple units. Our 2 weeks in specific buildings are now owned by a condo owner. In fact we probably stayed in his unit last summer as a vac rental owner. Many more details to this matter that we can't get into here. Estimated fraud amounted to over $400 million., closer to $500. really. In dealings with the Province of Alberta, where Fairmont had a head office and most owners were located, a Gov't investigator told me they could not bring the matter to court as they did not have the $$$ or the manpower, and they would have to leave too many other unrelated cases on the table. The Gov't of Canada's role? Zip! Nad! Nothing!

I had a similar experience, to the point where one of the sales managers put his hand on my shoulder to keep me from standing up, refused to give me our credit card back, amongst a miriad of other things.

I filled out a written complaint form with guest services, kept a copy & did follow up on it after we got home. They eventually gave me 1 free week, which was better than nothing.

We are at Nuevo Vallarta now, did not fall for their enticements, did not go to the "meeting" even though we actually would have liked to see future plans & did have questions.

We had a great week & this just proves to avoid those meetings at all cost. It is really to bad.

Joan, There is a huge timeshare difference between Canadian provinces. Quebec got a law passed, organized by Embarc/Intrawest owners, after Diamond Resorts acquired them. The law amended the existing law by defining timeshare as a service contract, meaning easy cancellation. On the extreme other end, Carriage Ridge and Carriage Resorts, in Ontario, formerly Shell, then Wyndham, would not allow a release no matter how debilitating a hardship, even if no loan. They did a GoFundMe so I could attend their 2019 annual meetings. I had earlier that year attended a Florida legislative workshop where I heard Wyndham's SR VP of Legal testify that "no one needs an exit company because Wyndham has a hardship department" - except for 4,000 Canadians and other Wyndham acquired resorts that had an independent HOA. We published 23 articles written by owners, some by me. I heard from several Carriage owners who were scammed by Vida/Vidanta sales agents, promised they would get rid of Carriage if they bought from them. All they did was later send them to SMTN charging them an $800 to $1,500 fee, and none sold. The first Carriage annual meeting had to be canceled as the building only held 300, and over 1,000 showed up. Their efforts forced the sale of both resorts, so they are no longer timeshare. The deliberate suppression of the secondary market spawned the exit industry. Think what would happen if we could not sell our primary homes because of an outstanding mortgage.

Hi there,

Thank you for your accurate review of Vida Vacations and their scams! Unfortunately, we've been the victim of their scams, too. I am in the process of filing a lawsuit against them in Arizona and wanted to know if you have been able to resolve your compliant with them or know of anyone else who has been successful. Also, if you have any information on how to join a class action lawsuit again this dishonest company, I'd greatly appreciate any insight you can offer. Thanks again!

Nahid

1. Do not start work with any so call Brokers until they and Vidanta confirm they have suscesfully transfer contracts before. 2. Insist in learning the Buyer's Id and ask for a retainer (2% min) 3. Contract with a Mexican Escrow willing to represent Seller and Buyer. 4. Require disclosure of required Mex. Gov. fees (EVA, Recording, taxes, etc) 5. Hire a Mex attorney and give Power of Attorney (Poder) to pay on your behalf those fees.and permits. Do not send money to Banks for those requirements, money will be untraceaable. Exception: Is OK to pay trenasfer fee directly to VIDANTA

sharonh624 wrote:

Someone needs to come forward with suggestions on "how to sell a Vidante membership". Apparently they within do not sell your membership, and apparently no real estate agent sells memberships. Where does one head to get rid of their membership. This is a topic that needs much transparency on moving forward.

conradod wrote:

1. Do not start work with any so call Brokers until they and Vidanta confirm they have suscesfully transfer contracts before. 2. Insist in learning the Buyer's Id and ask for a retainer (2% min) 3. Contract with a Mexican Escrow willing to represent Seller and Buyer. 4. Require disclosure of required Mex. Gov. fees (EVA, Recording, taxes, etc) 5. Hire a Mex attorney and give Power of Attorney (Poder) to pay on your behalf those fees.and permits. Do not send money to Banks for those requirements, money will be untraceaable. Exception: Is OK to pay trenasfer fee directly to VIDANTA

BETTER advice --- Just STAY COMPLETELY AWAY from ALL Mexican timeshare operations --- including Vida / Vidanta.

Charged $59 US for renewal in Vida Lifestyle or Vida Vacations which I have no interest in using. Reviews are terrible. The agent I spoke with says this is standard each year and can't be avoided. Will dispute this with credit card company.