There is a market for resales and rentals, most run by resale companies. Sellers of weeks have to be aware of cheating companies who hide their identity, demand front up money, and simply disappear after sucking in the money. Timeshare-Markt.de is an European-wide non-profit private market with modest advertising fees where owners sell directly to buyers and weeks can be rented from members. Other comparable good markets are Anfi UK Rentals & Resales and TSP Agency.
This markets would be superfluous if Anfi itself would provide such a service for modest fees.
At transferring the membership from the seller to the buyer with issuing a new certificate both, seller and buyer, have to pay a transfer fee of 350 € per week. This fee has been increased over the years by more than factor 5 and is often seen by members as a means to make profit and hinder private resell.
Restrictions of privately bought weeks
Anfi’s page Anfi resale lists the disadvantiges of buying not from them from their point of view.
Members with privately bought weeks are not allowed to join the Anfi Vacation Club (AVC, the internal exchange company of Anfi) and the weeks cannot be exchanged over external exchange companies. Wheres fixed weeks of the resale market can be used without exchange as if bought by Anfi, floating weeks are much devaluated. Owners of floating weeks often complain about booking problems or in other words so called ‘original’ weeks bought directly from Anfi seem to have booking priority over privately bought weeks. All this does not mean that Anfi is not able to fulfill the contract by offering some weeks. But the member may not be interested in them for private reasons.
Floating weeks are illegal according to the Spanish Supreme Court rulings, see illegality of contracts if the contract (here certificate) does not show week and apartment number.
Anfi’s buy-back program
Anfi has an own rental and buy-back program, if available. Because there is no legal obligation by Anfi to buy weeks back the programm serves mainly Anfi’s own interest. Because Anfi Sales has to pay the maintenance fee for unoccupied not sold weeks the buy-back program seems to be demand-oriented which can vary over the time. It is mostly restricted to fixed weeks, preferable of high demand (high season, high level, penthouses, and apartments with more than 1 sleeping room). Often flexible weeks are not bought back. Members get only a small fraction of the original purchase price back.
Procedure of transfer of weeks
The buyer has to transfer the agreed money to the bank account of the owner. Paying with instalment plan is also possible. The buyer may need for his security a notary with an escrow bank account which may impose considerable cost if buyer and seller are in different countries.
The transfer of weeks from the owner to the buyer has to follow the rules of Anfi. The procedure is as follows:
(1) The owner sends the original certificate with the seller and buyer section on the back filled out and the seller section signed (no notary is necessary to witness the signature) to the buyer as a registered letter.
(2) The buyer signs the buyer section (no notary is necessary to witness the signature) and sends the certificate with a registered letter to the Anfi Customer Service to request the transfer.
(3) Anfi will then send to the owner the “Acknowledgement of private Resell of Club Membership” form and to the buyer a copy of this for information only. The owner fills the form out, lets his signature witness by his notary, and sends the form with a registered letter to the buyer.
(4) The buyer lets his signature witness by his notary too and sends the form with a registered letter back to the Anfi Customer Service.
(5) The seller as well as the buyer are requested by Anfi with the “allowance” form to take the transfer fee of 350 Euro per week from the credit card. To transfer the fee to the bank account of Anfi is also possible.
(6) The buyer has to request his membership certificate from the Anfi Customer Service.
The rights of the new owner depend on the Spanish Law, on the agreed club constitution, and (for floating weeks) on the exchange rules. Optionally the buyer can request from the seller the full original membership contract with all its enclosures to ensure that the title of ownership goes over to him with all rights.