VacationOwnership.com is excited to be a part of the conference and excited about the growth and changes at our own company and the growth and changes in the timeshare and vacation ownership industries.
The conference kicks off with Paul Nursey of the Canadian Tourism Commission presenting the Opening Address, followed by Keynote Speaker, Howard Nusbaum President and CEO of the American Resort Development Association, ARDA.
VacationOwnership.com’s founder, Jason Tremblay will speak on the panel, “Secondary Market = Primary Concerns,” which will collectively look at issues of the timeshare resale marketplace, including timeshare owner needs and HOA challenges.
This panel includes speakers: Brendan Hawkins, Julie Thompson, and Jeff Ingram, with Moderator Rob Webb who is the senior hospitality partner at the law firm of Baker Hostetler.
Jason will also be part of the Closing Plenary Session, called, “The Last Word: Ask the Experts.”
Described as, “an all-star panel of some of the world’s most prominent professionals,” the panel includes:
Ross Perlmutter, president/CEO of the Canadian Resort Development Association (CRDA)
Gordon Gurnick, president, RCI
Howard Nusbaum president/CEO ARDA
David Callaghan, vice president resort sales and service Interval International;
Rob Webb, senior hospitality partner Baker Hostetler
and Craig Morganson, CEO Holiday Systems International.
Follow this link to read the complete media announcement from VacationOwnership.com: CLICK HERE.
CRDA Canadian Timeshare Conference … Not Business as Usual
The message of this year’s Canadian Resort Development Association Annual Timeshare Conference is the powerful and timely reminder: “It’s not business as usual anymore.”
As Craig M. Nash, Chairman, President, and CEO of Interval Leisure Group has said, it’s, “not your father’s timeshare … The recent financial fiasco has taught us that our traditional way of doing business doesn’t work so well any more … we’ve had to reevaluate our business model, rethink our product specs, and rechannel our marketing programs. In short, we’ve had to recreate ourselves.”
When Craig Nash says this, it goes without saying that he’s talking about more than, Interval International timeshare exchange; he’s talking about the timeshare and vacation ownership industry as a whole, including Canadian timeshare. Because certainly those who fail to change, fail to reinvent themselves and their businesses in ways that keep them timely and responsive to a changing market place, well, they simply … fail.
CRDA Canadian Resort Development Association Annual Canadian Timeshare Conference 2012
The Resort Development Summit at this year’s CRDA Canadian timeshare conference will bring together some of the top visionaries and most proactive thinkers in the global resort industry.
They will be challenging the way we all think about, and respond to, topics like these and other relevant issues of business today:
Here is an excerpt from an article that appeared this week on The Canadian Finance Blog, the Canadian Source for Personal Finance.
This portion of “The Smart Consumer’s Approach to Buying Timeshare Resales” is reprinted here with permission. However, it is only a small portion of this informative article that is helpful to anyone, from any country, who is interested in learning more about timeshare on the secondary market.
Until the fall of 2007, Canadian timeshare buyers had, for at least thirty years, been in the position of paying for United States timeshare with Canadian dollars at an exchange rate that worked against Canadians. But as the US dollar has weakened, the playing field has become leveler. During the past few years, parity has shifted back and forth between the US dollar and the Canadian Loonie, but has remained roughly equivalent.
As long as the US dollar remains weak, Canadian consumers can head south to enjoy warmer winters in United States timeshares, taking advantage of the competitive prices of timeshare resales as well as a Canadian dollar that has strong buying power in the US.
For Canadians interested in buying Canada timeshare, global economic challenges again work to the benefit of Canadian buyers. American and European buyers have tightened their belts, cutting back on purchases of luxurious ski resort or mountain retreat timeshares in Canada, creating reduced demand and driving the price of Canadian vacation ownership even lower.
Buy Safe and Buy Smart
If you see the value in locking in the price of a lifetime of vacation accommodations at today’s prices and recognize the convenience and time savings of having a pre-paid, pre-planned vacation that rolls around year after year, then a timeshare resale is likely to be a great purchase for you. Know before you buy, that timeshares are an investment in vacationing, not a traditional investment from which you seek to gain financial return or appreciation.
Look at the cost of maintenance fees and or taxes you will need to pay annually. If you want to vacation in different destinations each year, consider the exchange value of the timeshare you are purchasing. Timeshares in peak times at high-demand destinations are easier to exchange than are smaller timeshares in off-season or low-demand resorts. Look at the potential cost to exchange your timeshare. Some resorts offer timeshare owners an internal exchange at a select group of resorts for little to no exchange fee. Timeshare exchange may also be made through membership with a timeshare exchange company. Such companies vary in cost, with some charging an annual membership fee and others charging you only a flat fee at the time of exchange.
In addition to which timeshare you buy, you also have options regarding how you buy it. You may wish to purchase a timeshare resale through a timeshare by-owner service or you may want to deal only with timeshares sales facilitated by a timeshare broker. Whichever option you choose, do your homework first.
Look to see what other comparable units or intervals are selling for as resales at the resort you are considering. If you are buying through a by-owner service or timeshare broker, look for one with a large, well-established website, and ideally a company that is a member of both ARDA (the American Resort Development Association) and CRDA (the Canadian Resort Development Association). Be extra cautious of timeshare sold through online auctions, as they may have many hidden fees or costs that aren’t evident until you are deep into the closing process.
Before you buy, understand that typically purchases of timeshare are governed by the law of the country in which the timeshare stands, but can occasionally be governed by the country in which a timeshare company is headquartered. Canadian law, like those in other countries, has ramped up in recent years, taking a tougher position on timeshare sales and resales for the increased protection of the consumer. You can view the most current Canadian regulations at Can LII under the heading: Time Share and Points-Based Contracts and Business Regulation.
Consider renting timeshare at a location where you are interested in buying as a way to try before you buy. Although over 80 percent of timeshare owners use and enjoy their timeshare, vacation ownership is not the right choice for everyone. Before buying a timeshare resale, take your time to shop, study and understand what you are buying; timeshare that you don’t use is never a smart way to spend your hard earned money
Last week was the first annual Global Networking Expo & Perspective Magazine Awards Gala, held at the Atlantis Resort, Paradise Island, Bahamas—also known as, “The GNEX Conference.”
This new event to the timeshare industry brought opportunity for learning, networking, connecting. It also offered the perfect venue for looking at some of the “BURNING ISSUES” of timeshare. I enjoyed speaking on a panel, along with Ross Perlmutter, President, Canadian Resort Development Association; Ramy Filo, CEO, Classic Holiday Group; Harry Taylor, Executive Chairman, Timeshare Association Timeshare Owners Committees, Robert Webb of Baker and Hostetler; and Bryan Lunt, Chairman & CEO, Absolute World Group of Companies.
Burning Issues of Timeshare Sales and Timeshare Resales
We didn’t sidestep the difficult questions or shy away from the challenges our industry faces. We looked seriously at the consumer issues of timeshare; media perception (and misconception) about vacation ownership; and weaknesses in the both the timeshare product and its delivery to consumers.
Here are some of the points that were made in our Timeshare Burning Issues Panel:
Timeshare has to change its marketing model. Fewer and fewer people are willing to “be sold to” at a timeshare sales presentation.
The timeshare industry must accept the fact that consumers will comparison shop. The industry can’t be afraid of that or back off from it. Consumers in control, comparison shopping, is the reality of a web-connected world, where people are “armed” with iPods, iPads, and Blackberries.
Timeshare sales are an international product, sold to an international market. Seventeen percent of the timeshare resales and rentals at Sell My Timeshare NOW involve international clients.
Demand for timeshare sales, timeshare rentals, and timeshare resales via an online inventory and an online transaction is already high. As fellow panelist, Rob Webb, an attorney who specializes in real estate and hospitality law, says, “In five years, the timeshare product will be sold on the Internet. If a company is not ready for that, they’ll be out of business.”
We covered a lot of very important territory at the conference. By the way, here’s a photo from the event which shows all of us on the Burning Issues panel.
