My husband and I visited Puerto Vallarta in June 2005 and ended up purchasing a timeshare at Velas Vallarta. We already owned a timeshare in Las Vegas. However, we were told that we could rent some of our weeks. This sounded like a good opportunity to us, we could use the rental possibilities to pay off the time share and we would have additional weeks for personal travel. We were sold by a Mr Greg Melton (known as Rojo), he even put us on to a rental agency Elizabeth at Resorts International, we paid a registration fee however to date have not gotten any rental options.

We were contacted via email by Mr Melton (Rojo) on May 6, 2007 indicating that he had found someone who was interested in taking some weeks at US$1600.00 after maintenance. He indicated that developers of Hotel Bel Air , which was under construction in the Marina in Puerto Vallarta, wanted to rent weeks to bring their clients to invest in pre-construction. I checked online and saw listing for hotel Bel Air on a few sites (including red week and deluxe mexico destinations) there were not any rental options available. This seemed natural since, he indicated that the hotel was still under construction. We stupidly trusted Mr Melton (Rojo), seeing that we originally purchased from him, and forwarded US$109.00 per week to indicate that we were willing to give up 9 Velas Weeks, 9 Bonus Velas Weeks and 9 HSI weeks. Mr Melton (Rojo) indicated that we should transfer the money to the Accountant ABERTANO AGAMA MEZA via Western Union. Mr Melton (Rojo) constantly kept in contact with us via telephone and email, I have attached the emails for additional information. Mr Melton (Rojo) indicated that the weeks were doing so well that they wanted more, so again we transferred more money. Mr Melton (Rojo) even indicated that because he had sold over one million in time share he was in some time share professionals club and could get us a good deal on tickets and accommodation in Puerto Vallarta. We discussed it and decided it would have been nice to visit Puerto Vallarta again and asked him to get us a place to stay from November 10, 2007 to November 17, 2007. Mr Melton (Rojo) then indicated that he will also be able to get our airline tickets at a reduced price via a wholesaler, so we indicated that we were interested in coming along with two other couples.

Mr Melton (Rojo) enquired if he were to be able to get a better price on the rental, if we would give him a commission of US$50.00 per week, we agreed thinking that he would be seeking our interest. Mr Melton (Rojo) asked us to send him an email indicating that we would be willing to give up additional weeks if they were to give us a better rental rate, so that he could show the email to his boss, which we did. Mr Melton (Rojo) then came back to us indicating that they would pay more money only if we were willing to give up ALL the rest of our weeks. We went to the bank, borrowed additional money and forwarded it to him with additional money for our airline tickets, which he said he was getting at US 898 per person from Trinidad to Puerto Vallarta.

Mr Melton then told us that he had gotten a fare of US 542 per person for our friends who were coming from New York. They indicated that they would be coming and would transfer the money; however, due to personal commitments they were not able to transfer the money. He indicated that he went and paid for the tickets and because of this he had incurred a bank charge of US $500.00 because his check bounced. We felt sorry and kept asking us to send the money, he even asked us to loan him some money to cover till the next week when he would receive his commission from Bel Air. We sent up US $500 to help because we felt responsible; he gave us another name to forward the money to. Our friends got the money for their tickets to us and we forwarded it Mr Melton at the second name.

The details of ALL transfers made are as follows:

DATE
TRACKING NUMBER
RECEIVER
AMOUNT
SEND
TOTAL

US$
CHARGE
OUTPUT

11-May-07
949-200-9884
ABERTANO AGAMA MEZA
2943
120
3,063.00

22-May-07
652-172-5507
ABERTANO AGAMA MEZA
2180
100
2,280.00

24-May-07
180-415-5241
ABERTANO AGAMA MEZA
1635
70
1,705.00

29-May-07
169-241-4070
ABERTANO AGAMA MEZA
3379
140
3,519.00

20-Jun-07
948-939-2433
ABERTANO AGAMA MEZA
2688
120
2,808.00

26-Jun-07
484-903-1083
RAUL ARIZA OLVERA
500
37
537.00

2-Jul-07
326-229-7130
RAUL ARIZA OLVERA
1,084.00
55.00
1,139.00

TOTAL

14,409.00
642.00
15,051.00

After we forwarded that money to him we have not been able to contact him via email or telephone. I tried calling the number for Bel Air 52 (0) 322 221 0800 however no one is answering the number. I do not know where to turn at this time, I lost my savings and have gone into debt to forward this money to him. We believed that we would have gotten back a return to be able to put a down payment on a house now we have just found ourselves in additional debt. Any assistance to recover our money would be greatly appreciated.

Please feel free to forward to anyone who may be able to help or to anyone who may be able to avoid this happening to someone else.