Q: I like Mazatlan. My family and I go there often and we would like to buy a time share condominium. If we don’t use it, we can rent it and get a little income? What should we watch out for?
A: I like Mexico, too, but time-share units (particularly those bought on holidays) are not an investment, but almost always a self-inflicted financial wound.
To begin with, they are not real estate. They may have a use as a holiday place.
Most time-share owners (in Mexico) never intended to buy in the first place; they are swept away by high pressure sales pitches and cleverly disguised promotions.
Reality:
– A 200-suite development selling 50 weeks (assuming two weeks for maintenance) needs to find 10,000 buyers! They will be selling units against you forever -and keep the best weeks.
– Like a new car … by the time you drive it off the lot, it loses half its value. The landscape in Central America is littered with fraudulent deals. In North America, there may not be fraud, but sharp losses in value and ongoing costs are common.
– There are dozens of government websites in the U.S. warning about time-share and time-share re-sales (Google TIME SHARE travel scams, holiday scams, legal scams, resale scams.)
If you absolutely need to buy one, get a used one. Chances are you get it at half price. Better yet, don’t buy it at all.
Be the first to post a comment.