Words: Ashley Rigg
Published: 18th Nvember 2009
Fractional sell out is “European first”
The Seasons Holidays at
Forest Hills in Spain’s Sierra de Ronda Mountains has become the first European resort to sell out its fractional offering, according to market-leading portal FractionalLife.com.
Forest Hills has now sold all its 344 1/8th fractions on the 43 apartments it offered on a fractional freehold basis. Shares in the one and two bed villas ranged from £26,000 to £40,000.
Fractional Life founder Piers Brown believes it’s the first time this has happened in Europe since the beginning of the economic crisis. “Fractional Life commissioned a report into the European market earlier this year and we found only 92 developments actively selling fractional. To the best of our knowledge this is the first one to have completely sold out”.
Ticking all the right boxes
There are a number of reasons behind the sales success of Forest Hills including a good location, excellent facilities and the backing of a strong brand, Seasons Holidays. Located 45 minutes drive from Malaga airport, and six kilometres from Estepona, Forest Hills has views of the surrounding mountains, down to the Mediterranean coast and across to North Africa.
Facilities include a steam room, gymnasium, games room, outdoor heated pool, an ‘Adults Only’ sun terrace, whirlpool spa bath, a therapy suite, bar and restaurant, evening entertainment, wifi and internet access.
Up-selling timeshare
Perhaps the single biggest reason for the resorts success however are the relationships Seasons Holidays already had with the 23,000 timeshare owners on its books. The majority of the sales came from customers upgrading their timeshare deals to gain a fraction of the freehold title.
Sales and marketing director Leslie McCann said: “Forest Hills is undoubtedly one of the fastest selling fractional products in 2009. We developed our unique fractional leaseback concept as a result of our extensive experience with our timeshare and freehold buy-to-let customers”.
The news will no doubt be welcomed by agents and developers in the industry after
recent reports have highlighted the difficulty some operators are having shifting fractionalized developments.
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