Time-Shares

This article on time-shares has a lot of facts about the industry. I liked its advice that:

time-shares can be a perfectly reasonable purchase — just stay informed. The basic idea is to buy a place that you'll want to visit every year or that is in high demand among other travelers.

I'm able to take advantage of using a time-share through the generosity of relatives. I don't own a time-share myself. The greatest benefit to me is the ability to exchange weeks through services like RCI and Interval International.

The story cites an average cost of a one week time-share of $16,000. That's a lot higher than I expected. There are much better deals than that average, as I've found prices of $3,500 for a week at the last time-share where I stayed. It was an older property, but I still found it very nice, and would consider buying a week there at some point in the future.