Are you thinking of buying a timeshare at Anfi del Mar or Anfi Tauro on Gran Canaria?
READ THIS FIRST!
In 2015 the Spanish Supreme Court made a number of landmark rulings to the effect that Anfi Group’s timeshare contracts sold since 1999, along with many other Spanish timeshare contracts, were sold in breach of Spanish and EU timeshare law. The Supreme Court has held that such contracts may be declared NULL and VOID. As a consequence of those decisions, Anfi is currently receiving hundreds of claims from owners seeking to have their contracts declared null and void and claiming repayment of all sums paid.
Before you sign a contract to buy an Anfi timeshare, you are strongly recommended to ensure that you have been given all the information you are required to be given by EU and Spanish law AND that the contract you have been asked to sign is legally correct.
Statements made to you verbally or included in a handwritten note by your Anfi Sales representative that are not reflected in your formal written contract ARE OBVIOUSLY NOT PART OF YOUR CONTRACT and you will have no legal right to enforce any such statement. In addition, many members’ experiences indicate that such statements should also be ignored as an indication of what to expect when you own at Anfi.
Deposits and cooling off periods
Your rights under EU official timeshare law include:
Timeshare as an ‘investment’
Listen carefully to the sales patter – was it ever suggested to you that your purchase of an Anfi timeshare was an ‘investment’ and/or that it might increase in value over time?
If so, that was also illegal under EU timeshare law.
‘For ever’ contracts
Spanish timeshare law 42/1998, which was also the subject of the Spanish Supreme Court rulings, states very clearly that since 1999 the maximum period for a Spanish timeshare contract is 50 years. Timeshare contracts that are ‘unlimited in period of time’ or ‘in perpetuity’ are in breach of this law. This has been carried forward into the current laws that succeed 42/1998
Where and when?
Spanish timeshare law 42/1998 and the law that superseded it also requires that your contract specifically identifies the apartment and the week(s) when you are entitled to occupy it. It is not sufficient if this information is provided in another document that is not part of your contract. So ‘floating week’ and ‘points’ contracts that do not include this information are also in breach of the law.
The European Consumer Centre published this summary of your legal rights:
http://www.ukecc.net/consumer-topics/timeshare-and-holiday-clubs.cfm
===============================================================================
ANFI UK cannot provide advice on Spanish law, but if you wish to seek independent legal advice on your contract we can refer you to reputable Spanish lawyers already advising many Anfi UK Members who can advise you. Please contact the Committee Secretary on secretary@anfiukmembers.co.uk for more information.
===============================================================================
As well as the legal issues, please also think about the financial risks and ask your Anfi Sales representative to provide written answers from the Director of Anfi Sales to these questions:
What will the maintenance fees be?
Ask about historic increases in maintenance fees? Anfi UK can also provide further information about this – contact secretary@anfiukmembers.co.uk. Note that maintenance fees are likely to increase year on year until the end of your contract period.
EU advice before buying a timeshare is:
‘Consider the long-term, or even everlasting (up to 50 years in Spain), effect of committing to a timeshare. Think carefully whether you will still want/be able to use it in some 10 or 20 years. Will your children, who may inherit your timeshare and be obliged to keep up the maintenance payments, want to use it?’
Anfi UK has many members who are no longer able to use their timeshares, e.g. because their poor health prevents them from flying. Many members are also worried about saddling their families with annual maintenance fees to pay after they are long gone.
Will Anfi Group buy back my contract if I want to leave, for whatever reason – what price will they pay? Is this in my contract?
Anfi has no general ‘buy-back’ policy at the moment, though they will occasionally buyback fixed weeks or weeks in highly desirable apartments such as two and three beds and penthouses that they know they can resell easily. The price paid is normally a fraction of the original purchase price.
If Anfi will not buy back, your only option to get out of the obligation to pay maintenance, other than legal action, may be to give your week(s) back to Anfi for free, i.e. for no payment at all.
Is there a good ‘resale market’ and what price could I hope to achieve? If I sold my timeshare week privately would my purchaser have the same rights as me, e.g. to join Anfi Vacation Club (AVC)
There is a resale market for fixed weeks but, as a result of both the Spanish Supreme Court ruling that ‘floating weeks’ are illegal and Anfi’s policy of refusing to allow resale owners to join AVC, floating weeks are very, very difficult to sell on the resale market.
See this page on Anfi’s own website http://anfi.com/en/have-you-just-joined/resale.htm
Does Anfi Group hold the Spanish Costas concession for the beach front, plaza and marina and, if not, how could that impact on your enjoyment of your holidays at Anfi in the future?
Anfi used to hold the concession but lost it to a company called Narval a couple of years ago. Narval now controls the marina and the plaza area as well as the beach. Various facilities previously provided by Anfi on the sea front, e.g. the mini-golf course and the tennis courts, have had to be closed as they were not permitted business activities to be carried on in the seafront area. Narval is owned by a relative of Santana Cazorla, one of the shareholders of Anfi Group.
The shareholders of the Anfi Group are now IPA Lopesan and Santana Cazorla.