The FINANCIAL — Cushman & Wakefield | Veritas Brown is offering innovative timeshare and fractional ownership services to its customers. The services will be provided in cooperation with Wyndham Hotel Group, which plans to open three new hotels in Georgia, and RCI, the company offering the largest vacation exchange network in the world.
“Wyndham Hotel Group plans to open three new hotels in Georgia. Accordingly, they have decided to offer international organizations involved in the real estate sector the opportunity to introduce their innovative products – timeshare and fractional ownership – to Georgian consumers as well. We will support them in developing this innovative service in Georgia,” George Japaridze, Director at Cushman & Wakefield | Veritas Brown, told The FINANCIAL.
Timeshare is an arrangement whereby several joint owners have the right to use a property as a holiday home under a time-sharing scheme.
Fractional ownership is the method by which several unrelated parties can share the ownership of a high-value tangible asset, usually a jet, yacht or piece of resort real estate. One of the main motivators for a fractional purchase is the ability to share the costs of maintaining an asset that will not be used full time by any one owner.
In Japaridze’s words, timeshare and fractional ownership are innovative products in Georgia. Accordingly, adapting to them will take some time. Meanwhile, he considers them to be quite interesting products. They allow all users engaged in the same database to share their resorts. The system therefore provides for the saving of expenditure. “The affiliation fee in the timeshare and fractional ownership system is USD 15,000,” Japaridze said.
The U.S. is the leading country in the shared ownership sector. “It gives you the opportunity to not have to buy a whole property as a second home, but just for the time that you need it. In general we only spend around two to three weeks on vacation. For this reason it is pointless to buy an apartment for such a short period of time. Instead, consumers are able to buy a piece of inventory for the resorts. So it gives purchasers an opportunity to buy what they need for a long time. RCI comes in at that point,” said Ali Egilmez, Affiliate Manager at RCI.
“With RCI people are exchanging their vacation ownership with 4-5,000 hotels across 100 countries. It gives consumers the flexibility to exchange property for a different vacation. On the developers’ side, it is also beneficial, as instead of selling units to agencies, timeshare is a good alternative sales method. It can guarantee occupancy for the inventory that they sell. So, if they sell their property for 25 years to 52 people, as there are 52 weeks in a year, it means that they will not need to think about whether they will manage to find a purchaser. That creates a great cash flow. It is important to make deals professionally,” said Egilmez.
As an alternative for holiday accommodation, we can consider renting when talking about vacations. However, as Egilmez explained, when purchasing an apartment there is always financial logic behind it. “It is always a place that you like, which you own. Most importantly, a timeshare unit offers a lifestyle. A timeshare resort is mostly suitable for the middle, upper middle or lower middle classes. It is more convenient for families above middle age, with children,” he explained.
The timeshare system is most popular in the U.S., UK, France, Spain and Mexico. “In total we already have 100 countries, and Georgia will now be an additional destination. With this system Georgians will be made members, eligible for exchanging,” Egilmez told The FINANCIAL.
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