How i got in the time share business part 7

By this time the sales staff had my photo on a dart board. No darts however had been issued

as i did favors for those who asked politely. I was learning quick, anything i did was considered pre- pitching to tours so i stopped talking to the googans (the names they call customers allways made me laugh) I was still buying and selling antiques,gold ,silver and collectables and would sell to the crew plenty of jewelry, those were the days of salesmen dripping gold, showing off their ostentatious wealth. I had fun holding out at one price, displaying the piece to various buyers

and then selling it for 1/2 to a favorite buyer. They would get angry and refuse to even look

at the next offering. I had just picked up a gold chinese medallion for next to nothing it had apple green jade inserts and was 22k gold. I got it in a garage sale for $50.00 it was worth no less than

$500 and i decided to have fun with it by offering it to a lady who was the daughter of the owner

of the most prestigious jewelry stores in the islands. $100 simolians and its yours...... various

people were watching...is it real? i turned to the crowd -have i ever sold crap around here?

silence...she declined; too much pressure. A smarter person said can i have it untill 4 o'clock?

and i'll let you know then, i tossed it to her and left. Of course she had it appraised and i approached a friend of hers at 3:00 and said i was busy today and if she could get the piece

and hold it untill tomorrow because i want it back. Of course she didnt have the piece just $100.

This was the best advertising ever , she never wore it to work in order to conceal her ill gotten

gain, and everybody knew it and the seed had been planted. Now they paid attention. Soon i was

beeing approached by salespeople in out of the way areas; elevators, parking lots, the bathroom,

getting in and out of the car. Hey kid let me see everything you have. These were the days of the Hunt brothers trying to corner the silver market and gold hit $800 an oz. Time magazine was reporting people buying d- flawless blue diamonds and asian rugs and antiques because the dollar and inflation left your money worthless. I was one of those guys they wrote about buying cases of silver registry dinner ware from dept. stores. The clerks were wondering why we were buying without matching pieces--but its not the floral pattern! it wont match the corinthian!

Silver almost hit $20 when it had been 3-5 for many many years. Wether they knew it or not their prices didnt reflect the lightning speed of events unfolding--a box of silverware was $80 to $150 and the melt value was $200-$300! I was amazed how one clerk knew what was happening and didnt bother to hide the inventory-all she had to do was buy or take one box to the melt place and with the proceeds gain it all in 2 days---because i did. I made a small fortune. In fact, unless it was an important piece most of my silver antiques were melted. It has been estimated that worldwide silver antiques then were melted about 50% will never be seen again.

Why time share

Inflation. If you graduated recently, my sympathies. I graduated from high school in 1973. Oil

embargo made us wait in line for up to 2 hours with a 5 gal. limit at the gas station, nothing like this had been seen since 1945. Gas went from 23 cents to 65 overnight. In grade school i was given a dime a day for lunch /sandwich-5 cents-soda 3 and 2 left for shaved ice for unauthorized

thru the fence purchase. This went on for many years, and before you knew it kids now needed

a quarter. Everybody forgets that oil scare, visiting relatives in arizona before embarking for college, they had a deal for me-you can have a car providing you keep the other 2 full of gas.

The best way was to start at 6 in the morning, driving each car back and forth, i was done in

2 to 3 hrs. My stepfather had built the largest shopping mall in the U.S. at that time and its initial success was marred by this gas fiasco. Gold went from $35 to $150 in a year. Jobs were scarce. In 73 min. wage was $1.50 and a toyota corolla was under $2000 now its $7.55 and $15,000. Here is the nitty gritty :hotel rooms by and large were under $20 and by the time i got into time share they were going over $50. the eroding dollar was a major concern. Airline and room rates were freaking people out. If you got into time share after 1986 you missed the whole commotion. Inflation wasnt the primordial scare anymore.

Waikiki penthouse part 6

The sales people did not like me very much, they were used to pushing people around and getting their way and treated customers bad if they didnt buy. this was one of the top salesrooms in the U.S. I dont know much about business but there has to be a better way. I used to look up at them in awe and respect, the manager was making in one month what on my salary

would take a year. I thought they had the smarts, education and personalities i could never have. Familiarity breeds contempt--so aptly phrased by Ben franklin. and the more i studied them the less i respected them. I couldnt be pushed around and not because i was immune

but because of the right thing to do. One day they are screaming bloody murder because i was late delivering huge cash bonuses and the manager said to my boss he would lose a few of the best of his crew to the competition as a result. Thats the nature of fast paced tracks,they leave you lose 200,000 this month and you keep your assistant that you pay peanuts to. Drop what your doing and get to the office 10 min. ago was the call. Look boss, the hostess (a retired movie star) was worried about a family that left very very upset she thought she recognized the man as a important political figure from another state and she was right, i called a friend at the hotel

they were in and confirmed it and we decided to comp every single tour or whatever it took and i went over ,he wouldnt open the door. i pleaded with them to no end beggin for mercy finally they heard me out, she had been crying from the experience. Imagine very cultured people

of power and prestige hosting ambassadors, visiting with dignitaries world wide living in mansions and being treated like schnook moochers who just fell off a garbage truck-the lady was traumatized. i offered a personal tour of the island in a lincoln diamond jubilee edition towncar,

it had parfait diamonds in the opera windows--and complementary passes to the panorama air tour.

I will pick you up to take you to the airport you will have breakfast in kauai, lunch in maui and back in waikiki by 6 and i proffered all emolients i could, of course they could not be bought off with trinkets but at one point i made her laugh against her will...and he promised not to retaliate.

back at the office Mr. E was about to rip me a new one...he had someone call them and indeed

verified it and was surprised by my actions to ward off grave danger to his co.

How i got into the time share business part 5

Somebody snuck an errand in on me-take this shoebox to this place dont look inside,please.
It was not the first time i had this type of request-secret keys-documents-very sensitive
papers. I allways looked but my lips were sealed. This one box weighed nothing so i take a peek
very sexy undernothings with a note detailing instructions on their proper use upon his arrival that night. very explicit and creative. i was amused but concerned for his welfare, the positions
he held (not in this co.)were very high and there was a distinct ethnic problem here as well that could have
international consequences believe it or not. Later on his wife and an attorney tried to pin me
and discovered indeed international intrigue. They were not u.s. citizens just people my boss
knew.I very rarely told my boss about his friends taking advantage of me like this but this guy was smarter than i could imagine and never said anything. Because i was good at running errands i was getting outsourced- this one co. had a very big problem with compliance
and sorely needed documents from an office and they werent going to get them. I was simply asked to pick up a large manila envelope. When i got there and asked for the envelope it was like the movie "seven days of the condor" they turned white as ash expecting me to pull out a silenced ingram and wipe em all out. this guy comes back all shaking like a leaf and hands
over the documents grateful to still be alive. Whats their problem, im thinking... later i gathered
up what i thought happened...ok dont give us the documents but there are others involved with things you are not aware about and we have no control over them...and then a phone call someone is coming over. losers.

Move dont be still

When you are moving in action you make things happen and /or run into things.
When you are standing still, things run into you and things happen to you.
its okay to be still but dont expect too much to come your way.

I met this nice couple from canada, in their 70's and kinda took care of them in hawaii.
this is what they said to me-we have no children- they died in germany during the war
all of this in a heavy german accent...we have 2 gold and silver mines in B.C. we are getting old, if you want to be our helper for everything and take care of us we will leave all houses and mines to you, we dont want the gov. to get it. we had similar interests and he was impressed i knew
of his wartime unit history. I kinda felt creepy thinking how i would tell my family that i inherited all this.

I meet this nice family from seattle, and i was tasked to clean up a horrible sales scenario
created by an off-site office. Turns out he owned a shipping and moving co. and i used to do bill of ladings in puerto rico with one of his affiliates and besides making their problems go away
we got along fine. He politely as a dad could asked me to take his daughter out for dinner and dancing and he would pay. His daughter had a childhood burn scar on her face, it wasnt that bad
but apparently she was very concerned with it and shy and maybe wasnt on the desirable list back home--whatever-- i thought she was great looking and the scar gave her character, i would have dated her without thinking twice. So i take her out, we have a good time thats all nothing else. He actually seemed let down i didnt have sex with her. He actually told me directly my daughter likes you very much if you want to marry her i will make you manager at my co.
if it all works out for all concerned. I really liked her, i dont know why i backed off.
Theres a saying that god closes one door and opens another- i call it the tangent principle
more on this later.

How i got into the time share business part 5

Time share spread fast. Even in these days laws and regulations are applied or made up hastily
to accomodate the ripples created by the monster. In 1979 we had an opc generating 3-5 quality
leads from the public beaches daily. He made about 10 grand a mo.! handing out free lunch passes. It didnt take long for complaints to accumulate (bad treatment in the sales room) because the only ordinance was littering, i mean how can you apply loitering on the beach?
so the beach cops start giving him one citation after another for 5 dollars each. so his costs now went to 50.00 a month. Dont try it now, you go to jail and the resort is fined 10,000. Any area
that has never had time share sees the same learning curve. The product is great -its the treatment people get that mess it all up. Then the tour operators get bent out of shape, here you are selling tickets to the baloney pony ride for years and years whistling dixie when all of a sudden these crime scare guys are giving it for 1/2 or nothing. fair is fair they literally went out of business and went against us with everything they could muster except telling the truth,
how are you going to attack another vendor because he can afford to give it away---so they would jump on another bandwagon saying something else adding to the attack. Some companies
would go and buy the tour ((boat ride etc) heres 250,000 for your boat and operation -now go away. Florida and hawaii and vegas saw ammendments and legislation covering real estate laws to include time share and now you would need a real estate license to sell, that could slow you down a bit. Actually any tour who was mistreated in the sales and promotion aspect was very bad news, the reps could care less and the developers would pay dearly later.

Friend or foe

I am your constant companion.
I am your greatest helper or heaviest burden.
I will push you onward or drag you down to
failure.
I am completely at your command.
Half of the things you do you might as well turn
over to me and I will do them - quickly and
correctly.
I am easily managed - you must be firm with me.
Show me exactly how you want something done
and after a few lessons, I will do it automatically.
I am the servant of great people,
and alas, of all failures as well.
Those who are great, I have made great.
Those who are failures, I have made failures.
I am not a machine though
I work with the precision of a machine
plus the intelligence of a person.
You may run me for profit or run me for ruin -
it makes no difference to me.
Take me, train me, be firm with me, and
I will place the world at your feet.
Be easy with me and I will destroy you.
Who am I? I am Habit.