Something for you time share owners to think about ...

Time-Share Owners Locked Out

By MICHAEL SASSO
The Tampa Tribune
Dec 6, 2006

A West Palm Beach investor appears to have scored a win last week by purchasing a St. Pete Beach time-share building at a big discount.

The downside: the owners of hundreds of week-long vacation intervals at Camelot by the Sea weren't even aware the complex was up for sale. They were shocked this week to discover that their condo association had failed to pay three years of property taxes, and that the building had been sold out from under them in a tax sale.

The situation at the St. Pete Beach property appears to be a rare case of what can go wrong with time-share properties.

Robert Bach, 50, of Miami arrived at Camelot by the Sea, at 1801 Gulf Way, on Saturday evening expecting to spend a leisurely week near family. His parents live nearby on St. Pete Beach and a brother-in-law also owns a time-share unit there. However, two security guards and a woman knocked on his unit's door and told him the property had been sold in a tax sale the previous week.

"They told me I was no longer the owner," Bach said Tuesday. "It was out of the blue. I had no idea." He was made to leave the property right away.

Bach and fellow time-share owners are trying to figure out what happened. According to Sam McClelland, a deputy tax collector for the Pinellas County Tax Collector, said the condo association that manages Camelot by the Sea had fallen three years behind in paying its property taxes.

The tax office sent certified letters to the Camelot Condominium Owners' Association notifying it of the late taxes, and someone at the association signed for them, McClelland said. Still, no one from the condo association came forward to pay the tax bill, he said.

Instead, an investor paid the association's back taxes on its behalf. In return, the investor essentially put a lien on the property, which entitled the investor to the back taxes plus interest. Although the exact amount of unpaid taxes was unclear Tuesday, the total of back taxes plus interest owed came to about $189,000, said Kathy Downes, a tax manager at the Pinellas County Tax Collector's Office.

Last week the Pinellas County Clerk of Court auctioned the property to a West Palm Beach firm, Luke Investments, for $2 million. The Pinellas County Property Appraiser appraised it at about $2.5 million, McClelland said. Official records show the building has 20 units, he said.

The Tribune was unable to reach Luke Investments on Tuesday.

The time-share owners want to know why their condo association failed to pay the tax bill. They have requested an emergency meeting with the association's board of directors, said Bach, who has owned a week at Camelot by the Sea for 10 years.

Several phone calls to the condo association's president, John Predmore, went unanswered Tuesday, and his voice mail was not accepting messages. Two other association board members did not return calls Tuesday.