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Timeshare Ownership
In its simplest form, Timeshare - which is sometimes known as Interval Ownership - is a convenient way of taking a similar (or even the same) holiday each year. A timeshare owner purchases the right to occupy an apartment, villa or other facility (such as a narrow boat) for one or more defined periods of time (otherwise known as intervals). A timeshare interval is thus a specified period of time (almost invariably a week) in a designated holiday venue.
Thereafter, until the end of the contracted period, an Owner may use the purchased interval (or intervals) for annual holidays, proving any associated maintenance fees have always been paid on time. The Owner takes up residence at their resort on the designated change-over day at the start of their interval(s) and relinquishes occupancy on the change-over day at the end of their purchased interval(s).
Ownership Rights and Tenure
It is important to note that Timeshare Owners purchase “rights of occupancy” and (other than in exceptional circumstances) do not own a share of any associated property. In some cases, the property is owned by the resort developer, who is the person or company who built the timeshare resort and who may currently operate it. In other cases (including Club Las Calas), the title deeds to the apartments and the property on which they stand are held by a Trust Company, for the benefit of the Members and the protection of their interests.
The length of time for which these rights of occupancy are granted will be set down in the contract for the purchase of the interval, or intervals. Often, it will be a specified number of years (for example 25 or 30) but in other cases the rights will, effectively, be granted in perpetuity, although this will be subject to any conditions set out in the Constitution of the Club concerned. The latter is the situation at Club Las Calas, where, subject to meeting the requirements of the Club Constitution, Members are entitled to continue to occupy their apartment weeks for as longs as the Club remains in existence.
Timeshare Calendars
The start day of the first interval of each year will always be defined and is usually the first change-over day of the year. At Club Las Calas, for example, change-over day is Thursday, so the start of Week 1 in our timeshare calendar is the first Thursday of the year.
Weeks are numbered sequentially from Week 1 to Week 52. Occasionally, due to the vagaries of the calendar, there is also a Week 53 but, because it does not occur every year, it is not possible to purchase a Week 53 interval. Instead, special arrangements are made for the use of Week 53 intervals. These arrangements are usually specified in the Constitution of the relevant Timeshare Club, as is the case at Club Las Calas.
To access a copy of the Club Las Calas Thursday to Thursday calendar for the period 2006 to 2009 please click here
Fixed and Floating Time
In many cases, the timeshare interval is specified in terms of calendar dates – for example: Week 12 - in a designated apartment. This is known as Fixed Time and, assuming that all maintenance fees have been paid, the Member concerned will be entitled to occupy the specified apartment for the designated calendar week (or weeks) every year until the end of the contract. In the example above, this would be from the change-over day at the start of Week 12 until the change-over day at the start of Week 13.
At Club Las Calas, 134 of the 147 apartments operate on Fixed Time.
Alternatively, the interval may be defined in terms of its duration – for example: one week – in a specified apartment (or perhaps in a type of apartment). This is known as Floating Time and means that, providing the associated maintenance fees have been paid, the Owner can take a holiday of the specified duration at any time of the year, subject to giving sufficient notice to the managers of the resort and, of course, to space being available.
Floating Time operates in 13 of the 147 apartments at Club Las Calas (largely for historical reasons).
Exchanges
Whilst taking a holiday each year in a favourite location may be very enjoyable, it is the possibilities offered by exchanges that attract many people to timeshare ownership.
The principle of such exchanges is very simple: an owner at a particular resort puts one or more their weeks into a “space bank”, which entitles him or her to take out of the space bank an equivalent number of weeks deposited by an owner (or owners) at another resort (or resorts). For example, an Owner of two weeks at Club Las Calas in Lanzarote might deposit those two weeks in the Space Bank and subsequently take out of the Space Bank two weeks at a resort in Florida, USA.
Most exchange systems operate on a like-for-like basis, so someone depositing an interval in a one-bedroom apartment can normally expect to take out an equivalent week in a similar one-bedroom apartment. The relative value of intervals in various types of apartment at different resorts is based upon their “Trading Power”, which is explained below. In most cases, owners may make a level “trade” or trade down and only in exceptional circumstances will it be possible to trade up (i.e. to a higher standard apartment than the one they have banked).
In calculating the “trading power” of a timeshare interval deposited in the space bank, an exchange organisation (such as RCI) will take into account a number of factors, including:
- How far in advance of its activation date the interval has been deposited;
- The size and quality of the apartment (and the facilities it contains);
- The popularity of the resort (and the holiday destination in which it is situated);
- The time of year, especially in cases where there are marked differences in the seasons.
Exchange Organisations
The largest timeshare exchange system in the world is that operated by RCI, which offers thousands of resort destinations world-wide. Club Las Calas is fully affiliated to RCI and a high proportion of Club Las Calas Owners are also Members of RCI. In the past 12 months, many such Members have banked their Las Calas weeks and, in return, have undertaken RCI exchanges to resorts all over Europe, the Canary Island and the United States of America, as well as to more exotic locations such as Mexico and the Virgin Islands.
For more information about the world of RCI, visit their website at http://www.rci.com.
In addition to RCI, Club Las Calas also honours exchanges made through Dial-an-Exchange. Although it is a smaller organisation, Dial-an-Exchange offers a range of world-wide exchange opportunities. However, unlike RCI, it does not operate on a strict like-for-like basis. Membership of Dial-an-Exchange is free to any bona fide Club Las Calas timeshare owner.
To learn more about Dial-an-Exchange, visit their website at www.dialanexchange.com.
The other large timeshare exchange system is operated by Interval International (sometimes abbreviated to II). However, please note that Club Las Calas is not currently affiliated to Interval International and therefore weeks at Club Las Calas cannot be used within the II exchange system.
The Interval International’s website may be found at www.intervalworld.com.
Points Systems
All of the transactions described above involve swapping whole weeks and, while such exchange systems have worked well for many years (and continue to do so), they have two distinct disadvantages:
- Firstly, not everyone wants to take their holidays in seven-day chunks. For example, if the unit of exchange is a whole week (or multiples of a week), it is almost impossible to cater for long weekends or other short breaks.
- Secondly, owners who “trade down” (i.e. they accept apartments of lesser trading power than the ones they have banked) do not receive back any “change”. For example, let us consider the owner of a Week 51 interval (i.e. Christmas Week) in a large, high quality apartment at a popular ski resort. Such an interval would be likely to have excellent trading power and, if the owner were to trade down, he or she might well not realise the full exchange potential of their week.
To overcome these shortcomings and to offer timeshare owners greater flexibility, a number of companies in the timeshare industry have established “points systems” to allow holiday exchanges for periods which are not an exact number of weeks. Furthermore, in setting up these points systems, the scope has been widened to embrace cruises, hotel accommodation, car hire and other associated services.
The principle behind such systems is the publishing of a table of points values for all holidays and other activities covered by the scheme. For example, a week at a popular Florida resort at Christmas might be valued at 90,000 points, while a week in a UK resort out of season might be worth 30,000 points. A weekend in Las Vegas might “cost” 25,000 points.
Holidays are traded at their points values, so the owner of the Florida week depicted above could, in theory, obtain a three-week, out-of-season holiday at the UK resort described. Equally, an owner in the UK resort would have to offer the equivalent of three weeks in his or her own resort in order to obtain a Christmas week in Florida. However, he or she could offer the equivalent of one week in exchange for a weekend break in Las Vegas and still have 5,000 points left over, which might, for example, be set against the cost of a hire car.
Members of points schemes obtain their points in one of three ways:
- Converting their existing timeshare interval(s) to points;
- Purchasing a specific interval (or intervals) in the form of points;
- Purchasing so-called “pure” points (either by themselves or in addition to an existing points holding).
For each of the above methods, there are associated costs, which will vary from scheme to scheme. Where points are tied to a specific interval or intervals, most points schemes offer special arrangements to allow owners to make use of their own interval if they so wish.
The advantages of points schemes are:
- Flexibility – owners can take holidays of varying durations and use points to purchase ancillary services;
- Transparency – there is a clearly published scale of points values: “What you see is what you get”.
The current major drawback of points schemes is the initial cost of purchasing (or converting to) points.
Currently, club Las Calas is not accredited to any points scheme. However, owners are free to convert their intervals to points, if they so wish, and the resort does accept inbound exchanges by owners of RCI Points. The latter is RCI’s own points scheme and is not only one of one of the largest in the world but offers access to the full range of RCI resorts.
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