In 1980, a Reno timeshare was created by Plaza Resort Club, Inc. (Developer). You could buy a week or more of stays at a 17 story hi-rise with 103 units and become an owner/member in the Plaza Resort Club Association (Association). According to a lawsuit in the Second Judicial District Court of Nevada (CV19-00294), all but 137 of the 5253 available timeshare weeks were sold by Developer (Exhibit 1).
The Association’s 17 story hi-rise is worth $20M (103 units x 486sf per unit x $400sf = $20M). 2350 timeshare owners were current with their Association dues in 2016, for the operation of the Association’s hi-rise (Exhibit 8). In addition to timeshare dues and fees, this property generated, and continues to generate, significant hotel room revenue from the Association’s hi-rise.
The Association was/is governed by a fiduciary Board of Directors (BOD). For 36 years, Developer fully controlled the Association BOD and used its management company, R.J.B. Management Co. (RJB), to manage the Association. The Developer, Association and RJB were controlled by the same small group of people. The Developer used RJB to obtain “significant” (Exhibit 8) management fees from timeshare owners for decades. Other expenses, the largest being payroll, were paid by Association dues.
In June 2016, the Association president announced the Association was insolvent and would close at the end of 2016. There would be no residual value from the Association’s hi-rise. There was no mention of the Association’s Reserve Fund, required by Nevada law. This Reserve Fund should have contained $2M, or more.
https://www.redweek.com/resources/ask-r ... f-business
R. Richard Drechsler:
“Dick Drechsler has been the president of the Plaza Resort Club HOA since its inception....
Two years ago, Drechsler and the rest of the HOA Board saw the handwriting on the wall.
The timeshare was going to run out of money.”
Various transactions occurred before and after the announced insolvency of the Association:
Between 2013-2015, Developer transferred 585 timeshare weeks to the Association (footnote 1). These Developer transfers to the Association were recorded with declared values (DV) as high as $2472, while the Association transferred 44 timeshare weeks to the Developer at an average DV of $524. It is believed timeshare weeks were churned for decades.
On 8/5/16, RRD Transfer Company Inc. (RRD) was registered with the Nevada Secretary of State (SOS). The name on the registration was Randell R. Drechsler, president of the Association and Developer insider (Exhibit 9).
On 9/1/16, Plaza Resort Club, LLC (Fitzgerald), was registered with the SOS (Exhibit 2). Robert N. Fitzgerald is the owner and sole officer. Fitzgerald is a property developer. His other interests include Reno Quality Homes, Inc., High Valley Development, LLC, Northern Nevada Homes, LLC (NNH Group, LLC), Surebrec Holdings, LLC, and control of the Mountain View Estates Community Association BOD.
On 9/1/16, Developer was held harmless by the Association and Fitzgerald, for all delinquent timeshare dues owed by Developer to the Association (Exhibit 6).
On 9/1/16, Developer sold 547 timeshare weeks and other property rights to Fitzgerald for $200k, (Exhibit 4).
On 9/1/16, Association transferred 473 timeshare weeks to Fitzgerald (Exhibit 6).
On 9/1/16, Fitzgerald agreed to fund a timeshare deed recovery program with $700k, to the Association’s subcontractor RRD, including an immediate $10k advance for RRD startup costs (Exhibit 6).
Shortly after acquiring control Fitzgerald rebranded the property from Plaza Resort Club [Association] to Plaza Resort Club Hotel, and culled employees.
On 11/10/16, Fitzgerald began recording liens on timeshare owner’s delinquent on their dues. Between 11/10/16 and 10/17/17, Fitzgerald recorded 2019 liens totaling $4.6M (footnote 2). Prior to Fitzgerald taking control of the Association, the Association had not recorded a lien for delinquent timeshare dues since 2005. This benefited Developer and its control of the Association in several ways. Delinquent timeshare owners would be ineligible to use their timeshare week(s) or vote on Association matters. More importantly, these timeshare owner delinquencies were carried, and grew, on the Association books, while Developer generated significant hotel room revenue from the Association’s hi-rise without paying the exorbitant timeshare dues. Fitzgerald has recorded 2482 liens while recording 356 lien releases.
On 6/12/17 and 6/30/17, Fitzgerald sold two (2) timeshare weeks (footnote 3). The previous Association president had partly attributed the insolvency of the Association to the inability to re-sell the timeshare weeks and the Nevada licensing requirements. These timeshare sales were recorded with a DV of $500 each.
On 9/25/17, RRD was dissolved with the SOS.
In September 2017, Fitzgerald received an $11M offer for the Association’s hi-rise (Exhibit 7).
On 12/5/17, Fitzgerald received 827 timeshare weeks from the Association (footnote 4). These timeshare weeks were obtained from a “public auction”, in which Fitzgerald was the high and only bidder of $1 per timeshare week. This represents a 16% interest in the Association’s hi-rise, acquired by Fitzgerald for $827.
In June 2018, Fitzgerald received a $7M offer for the Association’s hi-rise (Exhibit 7).
On 7/9/18, the Washoe County Assessor put a remarkable note in the tax records of APN 011-041-11 (Exhibit 10):
“TIMESHARE - OWNER OF RECORD IS PROPERTY MANAGER FOR TIMESHARE -
REVIEW DEEDS ON RECORD FOR TRUE OWNERSHIP VESTING OF 5,253 OWNERS.”
On 2/5/19, Max Haynes (Haynes) sued Fitzgerald (CV19-00294) saying Fitzgerald cut him out of the deal.
On 4/28/20, Fitzgerald was approved for a forgivable Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan (9282207200) for $190k. Fitzgerald reported 25 employees.
On 2/8/21, Fitzgerald was approved for a PPP loan (5455848408) for $271k. Fitzgerald reported 17 employees.
Employees were paid by Association dues on timeshare owners. Fitzgerald has only a handful of true employees including John Allen Wolf, who is General Manager, Association president/director, and son-in-law of Fitzgerald. Further, Fitzgerald’s employees are believed to be included in the management fees paid by Association dues.
On 4/12/21, Haynes and Fitzgerald dismissed CV19-00294 without disclosing the resolution. The Association was never represented. Fitzgerald was also sued in CV20-00823 for fraud, misrepresentation, and unjust enrichment. He was previously sued in 2:17-cv-01272-RFB-DJA.
Fitzgerald has accumulated 78% of available timeshare weeks in the Association’s hi-rise, with another 1% pending transfer from the Association. This obligated Fitzgerald to pay millions of dollars in timeshare dues annually; the same dues paid by other timeshare owners. The WCR DV on Fitzgerald’s timeshare week recordings ranged from $1 (1166 weeks) to $500. The total DV for Fitzgerald’s 78% interest in the Association’s hi-rise is $1.4M.
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Since 2016, timeshare owners have been coerced to surrender their timeshare weeks. In many cases, they were compelled to pay large fees to surrender their timeshares. It began with the threat of bankruptcy which was caused by the Association’s conflicted BOD. It was an idle but effective threat. The Association would have never filed bankruptcy because the Bankruptcy Trustee would have examined the Association’s books. Fitzgerald now uses liens to pressure timeshare owners to surrender their timeshare weeks. Further, the Association, controlled by Fitzgerald, is recording opaque summary Deeds to Fitzgerald which make it nearly impossible to follow the chain of title (footnote 5).
In collusion with the Developer, RJB and the Association’s BOD, Fitzgerald quickly obtained control of the Association’s valuable hi-rise, its BOD, the lucrative management of the Association, and the substantial hotel room revenue from the Association’s hi-rise.
It is estimated Developer obtained upwards of $100M from this timeshare and its hotel room revenue. Now Fitzgerald is in control. The conflicted BOD for the Association, past and present, have never acted as fiduciaries for the Association. The non-profit status of this Association should be revoked.
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Footnotes:
1 - On 12/28/15, 175 timeshare weeks were transferred to the Association in one summary Deed. Washoe County Recorder (WCR) Document 4545474.
2 - WCR Documents 4652109, 4658175, 4720061 and 4754215.
3 - WCR Documents 4712725 and 4719715.
4 - WCR Document 4769125.
5 - WCR Grantee as Plaza Resort Club, LLC. 30 Deeds representing thousands of timeshare weeks.
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Exhibit 1 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 2 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 3 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 4 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 5 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 6 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 7 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 8 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Exhibit 9 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... CV19-00294
Exhibit 10 https://www.scribd.com/document/4483965 ... -of-Nevada
Plaza Resort Club. 121 West Street, Reno, NV 89501. APN: 011-041-11.
Plaza Resort Club. 121 West Street, Reno, NV 89501. APN: 011-041-11.
Last edited by PRC on Wed Nov 03, 2021 6:02 pm, edited 6 times in total.
Re: Plaza Resort Club. 121 West Street, Reno, NV 89501. APN: 011-041-11.
Is there a pending law suite that will possibly compensate those who forfeited their timeshares?
Re: Plaza Resort Club. 121 West Street, Reno, NV 89501. APN: 011-041-11.
I have almost all the documentation from my dealings with the Plaza Resort Club. The one thing I am missing is their letter claiming they were out of Money and I could switch to another timeshare which the annual fees were a lot more money or I could deed my unit back to them. At that time I was trying det rid of the unit. Thought I could just give it to them. I then get informed that I have to pay them over $300 just to give it to them. I thought this was shady. I ended up paying the $167 cause that was what I owed on maintenance fee for the prior year 2017. I had heard that they continued to operate after that instead of closing down. I did not know how to pursue a claim against them but felt they had engaged in some illegal behavior. If anyone has more info on what is going on with them I'd be interested to know.