I am a longtime timeshare owner who has owned weeks on four continents plus the Caribbean (down to just three, now) and served on the board of one of my resorts and as board president for a number of years. I have always bought my weeks on the resale market which is much cheaper than buying at developer prices. Marketing costs because of all those freebies they have to give away to get people through their pitch amounts to about 60% of what a buyer pays when they buy from a developer.

Still I sometimes do developer tours to get the gifts. It is easy to get the developer sales weasels to let you escape with your prize. Just ask if their prices are similar to the resale market (it helps to specifically mention eBay which is the bargain basement of the resale market). I also like to mention the very low maintenance fees of my week in South Africa and ask if theirs is close. The last one we did was at Massanutten, and we started with a free lunch fot the family. After about 10 minutes into the lunch, the sales weasel got up and went to get out gifts. When we finished the free lunch, we left with our gifts. If you know the right things to say, it is easy to escape their clutches.