It was announced this morning that Elpenike Eddy-Aldava, 74, of Las Vegas, NV, was sentenced to one year and one day in prison on charges of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud. Eddy-Aldava worked as a telemarketer for a telemarketing business in Las Vegas that called up unsuspecting timeshare owners and falsely represented itself as having corporate buyers interested in buying their property.

The business, which went through a variety of name changes or referred to themselves as Showcase Resorts and Vacation Max, offered to help owners sell their timeshares to the supposed corporate buyers. The business, however, tricked timeshare owners into paying closing costs up front, asking for as much as $3,000 which owners paid to the business.

Owners eventually found out their timeshares had not actually been sold, and Showcase Resorts and Vacation Max used paid employees called “Updaters” to provide false excuses to prevent them from contacting credit card companies to cancel the transaction. The losses caused by the scheme exceeded $11,000,000.

Attention: All SellMyTimeshareNow.com Timeshare Sellers

We believe that it is of the utmost importance that we provide all our timeshare owners and sellers with the information they need to make good decisions when they get involved in the timeshare resale world. We’ve consistently offered advice on how to avoid timeshare scams.

From this story, we know that Showcase Resorts and Vacation Max employed at least two of the warning signs of a telemarketing scam: claims of a buyer waiting and cold calling. Professional timeshare sellers do not employ these methods of contacting owners. At SellMyTimeshareNow.com, we are a trusted timeshare seller promoting education for owners in order to help you feel safe selling your property through us. Call us today at 877-815-4227 for more information.