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From: Emmy <xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> *removed for privacy (see bottom of page)
Date: Sun, 03 Aug 2003 02:52:32 -0700
To: xxxx@mayansales.net
Cc: xxxx@mayansales.net
Subject: Mayan Palace, Puerto Vallarta, Contract #PRP0374
Hi Kathy,
It is now a good month
later and we still haven't been contacted by Brian
Ehman, your sales manager, Jody Roberts, our sales lady nor Laurie
Stevens
from Global Resort Services. When we bought the so called "investment
timeshare package of $129,900" from Jody we were told that
there would be no
problems renting the weeks since Jody and Brian have done this
themselves.
They told us that all we had to do was put in the weeks early,
like in
September for the next year. They recommended Laurie Stevens
since they
dealt with her. We put in our four weeks in January and none
of them have
been rented yet.
When we had our sales presentation
with Jody, all she talked about was the
"investment aspect" of this timeshare package and she
showed us the
calculations of the return on and the return of our capital and
we were
impressed. This was better than having our money sitting in the
money
market funds in the US. When we mentioned to Jody that the economy
in the
United States was turning down, she said that Americans would
always be
taking their vacations and would much rather go to Mexico than
to Europe.
Jody told us also that we could deduct travel expenses to inspect
the
timeshare units and the association fees from our taxes but that
we did not
have to pay taxes over the income because each unit was rented
less than two
weeks per year. This too is not true when we checked this with
our tax
attorney in April. He told us that we cannot deduct any expenses
on our tax
form.
When we were sitting in
the closing room trying to make up our mind if we
should invest or not, Brian said he would try to rent the eight
weeks for us
and left the room. Within ten minutes he came back and told us
that all
eight weeks were rented! This decided us to buy and we signed
the contract.
When we signed the contract, we read sentence #7 in the Mayan
Palace
Vacation Club new member's verification statement which clearly
stated that:
"7. The company will
not rent or resell my weeks. An outside broker may be
suggested but it is understood there is no guarantee on rental
or resale,
and I acknowledge that these weeks are not being purchased for
the purpose
of rental income or resale."
We would like to know why
your whole sales presentation was geared around
the investment aspect? This sales tactic is clearly against your
own
policy. Jody and Brian knew very well that we were buying this
as an
"investment" as we had no intention of using the timeshare
condos in Puerto
Vallarta since we don't even like the project compared to the
Grand Velas or
the Buganvilias. It is way too big and impersonal for us. When
we
questioned this sentence #7, we were told that it meant that
we should not
be dependent of this rental income which we are not. It would
have been
much better if we had walked out right then but we believed Jody
and Brian
that it was that easy to rent the weeks since he proved it to
us. What a
deception! We remember Jody mentioning that a rocket scientist
did not see
the "benefit" of this investment package and he did
not buy. He was the
smart one.
During the presentation
we were also told that all our money would go to any
upgrade later which is a big selling point. Brian did tell us
that this
would not count for the allowance we got for the two timeshares
we traded in
because your company wrote them off for a dollar. We had to sign
a waiver
that we would give up our 5 day right of cancellation as we were
trading in
our two timeshares. We did not get a copy of the 5 day right
of
cancellation which is law in Mexico, nor did we receive a copy
of the
waiver.
When we met with Jody again,
we found out that the $13,600 "rent money"
would not count towards an upgrade either and this really upset
us. In our
opinion, this was "rental income" since Brian had rented
our eight weeks.
This made us suspicious but you had taken away our right of cancellation
and
this is against Mexican law. We found this out last Friday when
we talked
to the Mexican Consulate and he referred us to this law and an
attorney. We
are sure your company is well aware of this law.
When I called you a good
month ago, Kathy, I complained that none of the
weeks were rented yet and you promised to have Laurie and Brian
call us. I
also told you that we would not release the Grand Velas and you
promised to
call them to put it on hold so they haven't followed up with
us yet, but we
cannot keep this pending forever. I also asked you how much money
would
exactly go towards a purchase of an outright unit and you told
me that it
was the money we actually paid which is $63,300. When I mentioned
the
$13,600 "rental income" you told me that this really
was a reduction in
price because the Mayan Palace had taken the risk of renting
the eight
weeks. Brian told us that these weeks were rented so obviously,
this was a
lie just to make the sale! We feel the whole presentation was
a
misrepresentation but the waiver was against the law.
Consequently, we request
a refund of our $63,300 cash payment and the
trade-in allowance for both timeshares which was $53,000, unless
you can
give us back the Grand Velas and the trade-in allowance of the
Buganvilias.
We request an answer within
ten days.
(name and phone number removed for privacy)
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