Complaint Review: Coral Resorts - Internet

My wife and I are writing this to send a message to Coral Resorts and all other owners who have been taken just like us.  We have now given the "developer week"  scam a little more time and are 100% certain it is a complete lie.  Luckily we have the lie/promise/proposal in writing (see attachment).  Our attorney has advised us to contact as many owners as possible from this point, as she has spoken to several that have had the same issues with Coral Resorts, and we live in Ohio.  We don't have the time or the resources as of the moment to do so, so for know this post will have to do.  


We will try to shorten the tragic tale for you, and just give a little background info.  We purchased with them 5 yrs ago-Lied too-BIG TIME.  Not enough points( told all vacations should be booked last min for better deals), the Developer week will rent and pay us $900-$1200/yr, the golf package can be used anywhere/anytime, the salesperson got our hopes up on Europe/etc. as he kept showing us pictures how he used his points in Turkey or Greece.


Of course we couldn't even get back to Hilton Head when our kids were out of school with the amount of points we had.  From what we have read on here, this sounds like the standard sales pitch at the resort, as we have been back for "owner updates" and heard the same chatter amongst the room.  My wife and I swore that if we ever did business with this company again, we would get everything in writing.  For the last several years we resisted any upgrades, but on our last owner "update," we gave in. 


 Our owner services rep we will call "Michelle" (not her real name, but for now we have been advised not to use them).  She was very nice, but with good reason, she wanted us to buy something.  We had a nice discusion about our kids and we were aware that what we had could not bring us back to Hilton Head when they were out of school.  She listened and presented us with a week that would be Deeded a spring break week every year.  We knew this would work, but it would cost more money.  At the time, and presently, we made it clear that we cannot afford to upgrade.  


She then presented us with "changes that have been made with the developer week program."  If we owned one previously and we upgraded, that it would go to "Platinum" status, which would guarantee rental income if we did not use it.  The rental income she quoted of $1600/wk on 2 weeks($3200/yr written by her on the form) would easily pay for the upgrade as it is only an $8500 purchase, and a $175/mo payment.  We knew what platinum status was from previously being denied reservations from RCI/owner services because we did not have enough points to come during platinum season.  She said that the platinum weeks stay full, as was proved from our phone calls.  


Given that these things had merit and we needed to get a week when our kids were out of school we chose to talk about it.  My wife and I chatted for several minutes without her and agreed that this change would serve us well, IF everything was in writing and kosher.  She came back to the table and we told her our only condition was that the rent money must be in writing and guaranteed or we could not afford it.  She said no problem, and we went ahead with the deal.  As you can see from her copy (which she didn't want to give us) we were promised $3200/yr for 2012/13/14.  Clearly this never happened and will not, which brings us to where we are now.  Stuck, and mislead into a purchase we cannot afford when we were just trying to do the right thing for our family.  


We even gave the sales rep the benefit of the doubt for a while.  When we called last yr about our check, we were told January 2013 is when it begins.  In the meantime the only calls we tried to make to verify this would be coming in January 2013 were to the developer week hotline and a woman named Kate Swisher.

She couldn't have been more rude and cold to us.  Granted we may have vented a bit and given her too much backround info, but we may have never been nearly as upset if she did not take the tone that she did.

A little sympathy would have at least counted for something.  She questioned our decision, and gave off the impression several times that we should have never believed that particular sales rep in the first place.

Thanks so much for making an already frustrated customer feel dumber, great approach.  

Apparently this is encouraged at the resort as the other girls at Reba management were right on her level in giving us a warm and fuzzy feeling about our purchase.  It was almost as if they expected everyone to be mad when they called, because they probably are.  

Well, January has come and gone and sure enough, no check.  No one at Reba Mgmt or Owner Services seems to know what we are talking about.  They probably think we are crazy, or stupid.  To put and end to this madness we finally consulted an attorney.  She feels that since we have the promise in writing, we will get our contract cancelled and receive all of our money back.  She also put us in touch with 2 other owners in our area that are in the same boat.  One did an identical upgrade it seems with an "Amy" in owner services who was quoted more income than we were and intends to pursue legal action. The other one has just recently purchased for the first time and feels that they were mislead as well by a younger salesperson and his manager, which ourselves and RCI even have verified for them.  This has to stop.  We are people trying to spend time with our families at a nice place in an affordable way.  If any other owners wish to contact us that are in the same boat, please feel free to do so through the site.  Understand that we have kids and can only devote so much time to this headache.  

We intend to keep our payment current until April when we come down to Hilton Head and speak to other owners about it as well.  We are confident that we will come home in april with our money returned to us or rent checks in hand and will make many other owners and prospective customers aware of what this company does and how they treat people