Wyndham Vacation Resorts Wyndham Vacation Owners Deceptive sales practices, fraud, entrapment, bulling, Orlando, Florida

Steven and Tenneil gave me this story:

In April, 2006, in Atlantic City, NJ, we were approached by people offering free gifts to go to a 90-minute timeshare presentation. We were told that we would be making one of the best investments possible as a young couple. In actuality we were taken advantage of because we were a young and inexperienced couple who were led to believe by high-pressure sales tactics, that this purchase was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and that rates would go up if we did not purchase today. Also that this was such a great deal we would be crazy not to take advantage of it as prices would go up drastically because timeshares were so popular.

In order to create a false sense of urgency, they said they "were willing to cut the price to make it more affordable and manageable for our budget, when they knew it was going to be a severe burden. Not only were we going to be shelling out the max we could afford to spend on a down payment, but also be paying a good chunk of both our paychecks each month to cover the various fees associated with the purchase.

Many benefits we were promised would come with our membership, turned out to be misrepresented and impossible to use. The sales rep said he would be our personal representative for anything we needed. We could never reach him when we tried. We were also promised how easy it would be for them to rent out our timeshare and, we could make enough money to pay the maintenance fees plus enough to mostly pay our loan amount. They tried to pressure us into buying more time. When we refused, the rep became rude, relentless, and unprofessional by cursing at us.

We were also harassed and badgered during "owner update" meetings at the timeshare site to purchase more, leaving us confused and frustrated. Any questions we raised were dismissed and we were assured we were doing the right thing. We crumbled under the high pressure sales tactics and are now paying for it both monetarily and emotionally.

After we signed papers, they were taken away to be signed by another party. Upon review of the document we cannot find the printed name, only a scribbled signature. The document we signed was only two pages--the final document was much larger and we didn't have the opportunity to study the larger document. Later we spoke to someone on the phone about our dissatisfaction and were told that a buy-back program was in the works and we could look into that in the future. Anyone we brought it up to later said there was no such thing.

In March 2010, we stayed at their resort at Shawnee, PA, and invited to an "owners update" with Krista Gaston. We soon realized we were in a high-pressure sales situation disguised with friendly smiles and stories by various "friendly" associates, which only served to distract us from what we were actually doing. Krista said, what a great investment we had made and then we were pressured to purchase at Shawnee. We told them that a purchase of a second timeshare would be a severe financial burden. Their response was that we could use the other timeshare as collateral and would pay minimally per month. Also, they would open a personal line of credit at Bank of America for us so that we could pay off the old one with this new credit.

The badgering and high-pressure sales tactics were heavy. With assistance from other associates, we were being badgered and harassed. At this point, we were confused and frustrated, and in that state of mind, allowed the salesperson to lead us by the hand to fill out each document, assuring us at each step that we were doing the right thing. They dismissed any questions we raised.

During the signing process, several people were talking so that we were unable to concentrate on what we were doing or given opportunity to review the documents. Later, a credit card came in the mail that we did not want. If we had known we were getting a credit card, we would have refused and not purchased this timeshare. We did not receive a copy of a signed credit card application with our documents.

They promised that we could make money by renting out our units and that our personal representative, Krista, would do the work for us. In actuality, we were never able to reach Krista or anyone else to take or return our calls, even though we had been assured they would act in our behalf. The only contact they made to us was by mail that the maintenance fees were going up.

We crumbled under high-pressure sales tactics and are now paying for it both monetarily and emotionally. We made this purchase by being connived and cajoled; we were too trusting of their promises. We would like nothing more than to give them back the timeshares and get a refund.