My wife's mother died recently and included in her estate was a week at a timeshare property in Scotland that she and her late husband had bought in 1988. When my wife informed the company, Macdonald Hotels, the owner had died she was told that her parents had bought the timeshare in perpetuity and that she and her two sisters were now liable to pay the annual maintenance fee, currently £450. Not only do they have to pay this ever-increasing annual amount but our children would become liable to pay them when we die and so on for time ever more. BL, High Wycombe, Bucks
With contracts written in perpetuity timeshare ownership does not disappear when you die. Many people who bought timeshare are now retired and cannot afford the annual charge, often for a property they no longer visit, but have yet to realise the appalling legacy they will leave.
Macdonald Hotels admitted that selling timeshare is difficult and it might take some time to sell this out-of-season week. Occasionally, some go at auction for almost nothing but that does at least free you from the annual charge.
I wondered if it is possible for a timeshare owner to avoid passing on the liability to beneficiaries. You can't simply leave the timeshare out of your will because it is still part of your estate. Nor can you choose to leave it to "no one". Executors are responsible for administering the estate and also for paying the liabilities, which includes ongoing annual fees. They do not have to use their own money but would have to liquidise other assets in the estate to pay fees until the timeshare is sold.
Your wife and her sisters could refuse to accept the timeshare but they would have to renounce their entire inheritance. They can't cherry pick the assets they want.
Another thought is donating the timeshare to someone with whom you have no connection, perhaps the supreme leader of North Korea. Some owners had managed to leave their timeshare to dubious characters in eastern Europe, through a PO Box number, but this idea is flawed. Macdonald charges an annual amount split between the owners – so the fewer who pay, the more it costs the others. To complicate matters further, the constitution says you can only sell your timeshare to approved people.
Macdonald has told you it is considering whether to accept back the weeks, paying you nothing in return, but first every owner, possibly 52 people, would have to agree to surrender their ownership or switch to a different property.
You can email Margaret Dibben at your.problems@observer.co.uk or write to Margaret Dibben, Your Problems, The Observer, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Please include a phone number.