We have mentioned in many articles that the once exclusive holiday resort which was once firmly planted in the timeshare industry but sadly for timeshare owners this is no longer the case. Whilst investigating evidence for another article we were side tracked and landed on the Tripadvisor website. We were reading a review about a very disgruntled holidaymaker who stayed in a hotel in Benalmadena, southern Spain and was the unfortunate victim of sitting through a “5 to 6” hour sales presentation, unfortunately after hours of being ground down, a sale followed; here is just a snippet of the complaint:
“As a family of 5 on a single income, our priority is to feed and dress our children, not to pay for something we had no intention on buying in the first place. We wish we could turn the clock back and never set a foot in this hotel. “
In reality this has absolutely nothing to do with the content of this article and as the late Ronnie Corbett would have said “I digress”, however just below the Tripadvisor comment we noticed that Diamond Resorts Sahara Sunset Club, also in Benalmadena, was listed to book a holiday.
Diamond Resorts Sahara Sunset Club
Being inquisitive we looked at the Tripadvisor entry closely, it looked like this:
In August 2022 the rate seems to be €252 per night for a 61m2 studio apartment; however you will see above that the area highlighted in red shows a price of €190 per night. On this basis a 7 night stay would cost €1,330.
When clicking we were redirected to Tripadvisor affiliate site, booking.com, more on this in a moment. Logically, it would make sense for Diamond to mop up any spare availability as empty apartments make no money, but that isn’t true. There is an assumption that most weeks/points would have been sold over the years so the fact that in any week where apartments may be empty, the resort/developer has still collected annual maintenance fees. To then sell the week on the open market via booking.com is a 100% bonus.
A question to ask would be “is it only the vacant apartment weeks online?” The answer would appear to be no. When checking the booking.com calendar we found that in September and October all weeks seemed to be available:
Rather oddly as the calendar above indicates, holidaying at this Diamond Resort won’t allow for Friday or Saturday but we are sure there is a way round this, maybe these are check in days for the timeshare owners, those that are left.
Our comment
If the deal price offered by booking.com of €190 per night and the weekly cost of €1,330 is correct, we would venture that this is pretty close to the annual maintenance fee payable at this resort. In this case any holidaymaker may book online for around the same cost as the annual maintenance paid by a timeshare owner but with no initial outlay and no commitment to continue paying year on year and get the same benefit.
On the one hand, a timeshare developer opening their resorts to non owners is a good thing as it expands overall holiday choice for members of the public. On the other hand as an owner who has over the years paid heavily for the privilege it must feel like a kick to the guts.
All things being equal, the “open market” structure surrounding timeshare resorts globally is one more indicator that the value of owning timeshare has diminished even further to the point where involvement in any long term holiday product would be sheer folly.
In reality, why would anyone pay a large capital sum with a guarantee of nil financial return then have to contractually pay a not inconsiderable sum each year to “buy a holiday” that is available online? Then when doing the maths, the same holiday may cost the same or even be much cheaper than the contractually required annual maintenance fee. More importantly, booking online has no long term tie in. We don’t know why anyone would consider timeshare, do you?
For more information regarding this article or assistance in any other timeshare related issues please contact the TCA on 01908 881058 or email: info@TimeshareConsumerAssociation.org.uk