Timeshare

So went to a time share presentation tonight. Seems that Luke gave them my details the other week. When they called they said they'd give me a 1-4 night stay at one of their hotels in exchange for coming along to hear what they had to say. So I thought I had nothing to lose, so I went along.

Well it was interesting. I'd never had time share explained to me properly before, so really had no idea what it was all about. I can certainly see its benefits. You could certainly save a lot of money on good accommodation, especially overseas, although local is also very good (free in fact, conditions apply heh). The problem is that you're kinda locked into staying at one place. Which is not how I travel. When I travel, I like to stay at relatively cheap places, and use where I stay as merely somewhere to sleep, and only stay for a short time, maybe one or two nights, before going to the next place. The sort of thing you get on timeshare holidays are resort-style accommodation where you stay there and do activities there. So I don't know that I'd get a whole lot of benefit out of it.

The other gotchas include yearly strata fees. Which are $300-$600 per year depending on your package. Which kinda cancels out a lot of the benefit you'd get.

It actually was cheaper than I thought it would be. But I was not prepared to say yes to their offer. More on principle than anything else. I really really hate those offers that you have to sign up on the night right then and there to get the benefits. If you don't have the time to go off and think about it and read their documentation, then really I think you're acting a little foolishly. Of course they get a little bit rude with you after you say no. And then try and give you other options - oh you can have six months to pay the deposit, or you can "rent" points, or you can go away on a little holiday, and if you decide to join after then you get the cost of the holiday off the membership. And they question you why you don't want to do it and don't you think it's a good offer, and by this time you've been there two hours and your parking is up and you just want to get out of there. So I did, with voucher for free accommodation as promised in hand :)