Author: Staff Contributor

As part of our aggressive growth plan, Sell My Timeshare NOW has hired Jay Bade as our new Executive Director of Business Development. Jay comes to Sell My Timeshare NOW as a timeshare industry veteran with 20 years experience in timeshares. Previously he was Vice President, Eastern Region for Trading Places International.

At Trading Places International, a respected timeshare exchange company, Jay was responsible for business development in the eastern US, Mexico, Canada, and the Caribbean. Before working for Trading Places International, Jay was the Director of Club Inventory Development for Bluegreen Resorts.

Starting in Timeshare Sales

Jay began at RCI on the call center sales floor. He advanced to key client management and business development for RCI Resort Services. Jay is an experienced timeshare executive with account management experience in working with resorts, exchange services, owners associations, and inventory acquisitions. He will play a key role in our growth and expansion at Sell My Timeshare NOW. Jay’s also an avid skier and we anticipate finding him on the slopes, when he is not on the job, hard at work.

Sell My Timeshare NOW welcomes Jay Bade!

Follow this link to read Sell Timeshare NOW’s official press announcement of the hiring of Jay Bade.

The Illinois Bureau of Tourism (IBT) has expanded its ongoing “Presidential Trails” campaign and launched a new component dedicated to the life of President Barack Obama. Stops for vacationers and tourists on the recently developed “Obama Trail” include the current Capitol in Springfield; the Old State Capitol; the University of Chicago Law School, where Obama taught constitutional law; and Grant Park in Chicago, where he gave his famous victory speech after the election.

The state of Illinois already has trails to honor Presidents Lincoln, Grant, and Reagan, each of which is considered to be typically a three-day getaway to explore and follow in the footsteps of history. But the US is not the only country planning to profit from vacation and timeshare travel linked to the life of President Obama.

Somak Holidays is one of several tour companies to have launched tours honoring Barack’s African heritage. Already since the election, Somak Holidays has seen an 8 percent increase in bookings to Kenya in December alone. But visiting Chicago and Kenya, isn’t enough if you are intent on visiting all the places connected to Barack Obama.

According to MSNBC, “… to see all the places connected to Obama’s life story, you’d have to visit three countries, six time zones, and six states. Obama grew up in Hawaii and Indonesia, has roots in Kansas and Kenya, and went to school in Los Angeles, New York, and Boston. He and his wife have raised their girls in Chicago, where tourists are already seeking out Obama haunts.”

So what about timeshare opportunities in all these places? Here are only a few of the possibilities:

• New York Timeshare resales and timeshare rentals
• South Africa Timeshare resales and timeshare rentals
• Honolulu Timeshare resales and timeshare rentals
• Illinois Timeshare resales and timeshare rentals

Orlando’s Channel 9 TV has been on the trail of a Nevada-based company using some interesting tactics to attract timeshare sellers. According to reporter Todd Ulrich, the timeshare company, Apex Professionals, sends post cards to timeshare owners leading them to believe the company wants to buy their timeshare and inviting them to a meeting to learn more. The post cards say, “Now making immediate offers to timeshare owners who want to sell.”

After a seminar held in an Orlando hotel, (which Action 9 investigators sat in on) the details of the meetings were shared with timeshare industry expert Lisa Ann Schreier. Here’s Ms. Schreier’s take: “These people (Apex Professionals) wanted 35 hundred dollars and your deed which is really unconscionable as far as I’m concerned.”

That’s right, those “immediate offers” being made to timeshare owners turned out to be an offer for the timeshare owner to pay Apex $3500, and then deed their timeshare over to Apex.

Unbelievable, isn’t it?

But it is highly possible that once you sat through the company’s persuasive seminar, listened to stories of how the timeshare industry is failing, how maintenance fees for timeshares are “soaring” and heard that it is impossible to resell your timeshare, you might have walked away believing that in the long run, paying someone to take your timeshare was actually a prudent thing to do.

Not so.

Sell My Timeshare NOW averages over a $1million per day in offers to buy or rent timeshares. Timeshare resales are sold or rented every day. But don’t just take our word for it; follow this link to the Channel 9 website. View their video and see where their investigative report tells you, “Consumer experts say timeshare owners can rent, or sell at a loss, and even that would be a better deal.”

If you no longer wish to own your timeshare, you do have options and none of them should ever involve a deal like this one.

After several blog posts about layoffs and changes at Bluegreen timeshare, it is good to be able to share some positive and very interesting news about this popular timeshare company.

While the media has been focusing on what appears to be a downturn at Bluegreen, it seems that the people at Bluegreen timeshare have been going about their business, doing what they do best, which is implementing innovative new ways to serve and to interact with their clients. In keeping with this, they have turned to Maverick Network Solutions, Inc, a company that provides merchant-issued debit cards and prepaid “credit” cards.

These are the types of card that have a prepaid and typically fixed line of credit, and that normally have nothing to do with your personal creditworthiness. Instead, you are most likely to receive such a card as a gift with purchase at a retailer, or as a bonus from a company who wants to reward your loyalty or spending.

The Lowes stores, for example, ran a large promotion in 2008 issuing prepaid credit cards as a way to reimburse delivery costs for consumers purchasing major appliances at their stores. The cards had a value roughly equal to Lowe’s normal delivery charges, and were sent to purchasers after the new washer and dryer or perhaps refrigerator was delivered. Rather than discounting the price of delivery, the company chose to issue these Visa logoed cards that could be used at any retailer. Customers have proven very receptive to this type of ‘perk’ or ‘thank-you’.

Now Bluegreen timeshares is looking to get in on this strategy for building client relationships and rewarding their timeshare buyers and potential buyers. Peter J. Quadagno, the president and chief operating officer for Maverick says that in the upcoming weeks, Bluegreen timeshare will launch a Visa-branded, non-reloadable prepaid card. Bluegreen timeshare plans to use this card as an incentive for potential timeshare buyers to hear presentations.

Exciting for Bluegreen Timeshare and the Timeshare Industry

What stands out about this new approach is that it shows first that Bluegreen, despite current challenges created by the economy, is a forward-thinking company – just what so many timeshare buyers and timeshare renters have known about them all along. But just as importantly, this is evidence that timeshare developers are continuing to redefine the industry, looking for ways to market their product that are more acceptable to the consumer and which will serve the needs and the image of timeshare sales in a beneficial and positive way.

(source: www.digitaltransactions.net)