Yesterday, I received a tempting offer in my email from IHG. For $249 and 2 hours of my time attending a timeshare presentation, I could get a 3-night stay at Holiday Inn Club Vacations Galveston Seaside Resort plus 20,000 IHG points. I’ve had my eye on this resort for quite some time because it’s within driving distance and right on the beach. It has an infinity pool, movie theatre, mini-golf and more!
Offer Details
The offer is for up to 4 people for 3 nights in a 1-bedroom villa:
- $249 package fee
- Book by 11/16/22
- 12 months to use the nights
- Get 20k IHG points
Alternatively, for just $149, you can stay at centrally located partner hotel (I’m assuming one of the other IHG properties on Galveston).
When I saw this deal, I was initially very excited. My daughter and I have a cruise out of Galveston next year, and perhaps we could stay at the beachfront resort for 3 nights before our cruise. The Galveston Seaside Resort is almost impossible to book on points, and it’s frequently blocked out for cash stays as well. I could suffer through the timeshare presentation and just keep saying no.
However, upon reading the fine print, I realized I could not use this offer based on these requirements:
- Both spouses must attend timeshare presentation
- Must have income of $50k plus
- Gainfully employed with no bankruptcies
- Age 25+
- No timeshare tours within the past 12 months
My husband doesn’t have any more days off work next year, and his travel schedule is already full. So, since he couldn’t come with me, we will have to pass. But, if I had received this offer when my kids were younger and money was tighter, I absolutely would have jumped on it.
Holiday Inn Club Vacations has similar reduced vacation offers for other properties if you are willing to sit through the timeshare presentation. See this page for more details.
The Thing about Timeshare Presentations
It’s been years, so I think I’ve forgotten how much I hate timeshare presentations. I wrote about my experience with timeshare presentations on this blog several years ago. In my experience:
- The math for buying a timeshare never works out in your favor
- The presentation always take longer than they say
- You must say “no” to several layers of managers before they let you go
However, sitting through a timeshare presentation is just another tool to travel to a cheaper vacation. And, IHG is not the only game in town. Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt and several other timeshare-specific companies also have similar or even better incentives to sit through a timeshare presentation.
So, I can’t make this specific timeshare offer work with my family’s schedule. But, for some families, this is a great deal if you have the strength to say no during the sales pitch.
Author: Nancy
Nancy lives near Dallas, Texas, with her husband and three kids. Her favorite vacations include the beach, cruising and everything Disney.
So here’s a question. You show up with your daughter, they ask ‘where’s your husband’, you say we’re divorced. How’re they going to know the difference?
@ChickB Hmmm….good question!
I’ve done this a lot at Marriott Vacation Club in Ko Olina next to the Disney Aulani. At the end of saying no many times, they offer an Encore package to return at a significantly discounted rate for 5 nights in the next 2 years, plus 30k Bonvoy points. I use Bonvoy points to add on a few more days to make the long flight worthwhile. When you return for your package, you just say no again, get to the end, they offer another Encore package, and you can repeat the process for another discounted trip in the next two years. I’ve done it 3 times now.
To answer ChickB’s questions, the Marriott package has a disclaimer that if both people don’t show up they will charge you the full fare for your room. You need to have a credit card on file beforehand which is where they would charge you. Not sure if that’s how the others do it but I assume it’s something similar.
@Robert I love the Ko Olina area! Maybe I need to look into doing that offer.
I know I’m way late returning to this discussion, but how would they know you’re married in the first place is the question. Unlike a marriage certificate that affirmatively proves that you are (or have been in the past) married, there is no document that affirmatively proves you’re not married. So they’d have to have some evidence that you have been married, and then require proof that you no longer are. That seems unlikely.
I did a Hilton timeshare presentation last year and it was surprisingly low-pressure and didn’t take nearly as long as expected. I think it was billed as a 2-hour window but it only took about 1h15min. It was such a good deal that I signed up for another one (planning on doing one in Orlando in January.. $149 for 4 nights in a 1-bedrooom studio along with 25k HH points and a $100 coupon off a Hilton stay within one year… hard to beat that!)
@bc Wow, it’s nice to hear your good experience at a Hilton timeshare presentation. They really are a great way to travel on the cheap if you can put up with the hard sales pitch.
Fair point, I think I overlooked the “divorced” part of your initial comment. In my experiences, the offer letters were always issued to both my wife and I with both names included. To accept the offer you need to provide a credit card and sign a contract as I mentioned earlier acknowledging that both of us need to show up or we would be billed to the card on file. So in our case if we signed saying both people on the offer would attend and only one did, I felt that they would have grounds to charge us, regardless if we were divorced or not. I don’t have a legal background though so I’m just guessing. If anyone has experience challenging this I’d love to hear about it!