Complaint Review: Welk Resorts - Escondido California

anOn Saturday June 12th, 2012 my then boyfriend and I attended a "Tour" at Welk Resorts (a requirement to receive their "free gift - trip to Catalina for 2 nights). We showed up with several other couples it appeared and were given numbers to wait for our "tour guides". Ken Kelly called out names and took us out on a tour of the resort. Up to that point we had no idea what kind of tour this was or why we were even there aside from showing up to collect a "free gift". Mr. Kelly informed us of what an exciting place Welk Resorts was to be in, how fantastic their membership was and how lucky we were to have this wonderful opportunity sitting before us. He ommited "Time Share" from every description of Welk at every given moment when it should have been used. After almost 2 hours of touring the property we were taken to a lounge area and sat down with Mr. Kelly, notably with dozens of other couples sitting in the same scenario as we were. Mr. Kelly instructed us to promptly join the Welk Resorts family by becoming members of this elite club and gain use of all of their facilities and properties, or if one of those wasn't available we could exchange our membership points to visit any hotel in the world for a week at a time. I asked if it was a Time Share. He curtly said NO. We told him we really were not interested in purchasing a membership, he said it was a deal of a life time, that day only we could join this lifetime club of lavious luxuries for around $10,000, when I said no think you he politely said they offered financing.

Apparently it shocked him when I did not just whip out my checkbook and write him a check for $10,000 on the spot. My boyfriend Carlos told him we really weren't interested in something like a Time Share as we didn't take vacations often - I had recently opened a business and Carlos was busy running it so neither of us were in a hurry to leave it for a week on end. Mr. Kelly pushed and said it was a lifetime for planning vacations, that only $10,000 would insure out vacations for the rest of our lives. It would require us to take time off. After about 2 hours of back and forth with him, telling him we didn't want it, and him not giving us the breathing room to process what was going on and denying it was a Time Share... We finally broke down and gave in.

 I purchased a 90,000 point "membership" with bi-annual use for 1 week at a time. I put a down payment of $1,033 and agreed to monthly payments of $149.34. They told me I had to use the same debit card I put the down payment on for my monthly payments, I asked if I could mail in checks as I did not want to be on an auto-pay system with my debit card, and they said no I had to do it this way. They proceeded to flash through a stack of papers explaining the "membership" quickly and in a way that was quite difficult to understand, it still doesn't make sense to me 2 years later and I've never used it. Not once. In January of 2011 I received a letter telling me my "Maintenance Fees" were delinquent and I would be sent to collections if I didn't pay the amount of $840. No where in the discussion was I told about "maintenance fees" of any kind, I was told I had property fees (to which I replied that would make this a Time Share - they denied it again). I called Welk Resorts in August of 2011 and spoke to someone about my "maintenance fees", the man on the phone informed me my time was about to expire if I didn't extend it, again I had no idea what he was talking about - apparently the Time Share I paid for had expiration on when I could use it, another item Welk Resorts failed to inform me of. He briefly went over how the reservations went but at that point I just wanted to give it back and rescind my contract. I wasn't aware there was a time frame that I could get out of the contract, I wasn't told about it, just handed a giant stack of papers disguised in a blue binder holding large catalogs for Welk time share properties.

I sent a letter in April of 2012 to Margaret Ann Lind, quality assurance rep for my file, no response, I faxed her the letter, mailed it to her, and copied the Sales Department and Main office of Welk Resorts. 30 days later no response, I faxed and mailed another letter with a copy of the original letter. I have yet to receive even a letter or phone call responding to either letter. I contacted the Attorney General's Office for the State of California who referred me to the Department of Real Estate to file a complaint. I'm getting no resultion from this company, I don't want the time and I've never asked for my money back just to be released from a contract I was lied to to enter into. They falsified the contents of what I was agreeing to verbally and allowed me to believe it was something else, I entered into this contract under false pretences on Welk Resort Group's part for allowing sales reps to lie to their potential clients, they told me it was NOT a Time Share when infact it was, they told me I had property taxes (which are normally rolled into my mortgage and not separate) yet I got a bill for "maintenance fees", and they were so aggressive with promises they wouldn't allow us to leave despite asking to a few times. We never got the "free gift" we were lured there for in the first place either, I followed every instruction they gave me to acquire the gift and still nothing. 

I would love a reimbursement for all monies paid to Welk Resort Group, Inc but I do not require it to resolve this, I am asking to be released and held harmless from terms of the agreement entered into on June 12, 2012 between myself and Welk Resort Group, Inc, any of their affiiliates and any subsidiaries. I have never once used this Time Share and have no intentions of ever doing so. I was sold something I would not have normally purchased and feel I was pressured into buying it under stressful and pressing terms by the sales representative who was not totally forthright with me from the very beginning.