Gordon Newton is America’s leading timeshare exit expert, author of The Consumer’s Guide to Timeshare Exit, CEO of Newton Group, and non-attorney founder and majority owner of DC Capital Law.

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Guest Resource

Newton Group – Check out Gordon’s website for free educational resources for timeshare owners. Download the Consumer’s Guide to Timeshare Exit for free.

3 Value Bombs

1. Give yourself permission to be wrong, but take ownership and change course when needed.

2. Build around the customer’s real problem, with trust, transparency, and accountability at the core.

3. Find a way, keep solving, adapting, and never quit.

Show Notes

**Click the time stamp to jump directly to that point in the episode.

Today’s Audio MASTERCLASS: How Gordon Newton Built Trust and a Better Model in a Broken Industry

[1:38] – Gordon shares something he believes about becoming successful that most people disagree with.

Successful people need to reserve the right to be wrong, but they don’t have the right to stay wrong.
Confidence helps entrepreneurs make decisions; stubbornness keeps them defending decisions that aren’t working.
When something goes wrong, leaders should ask what they could have done differently rather than immediately looking for someone to blame.
Entrepreneurs need to identify the problem, own it, solve it, and improve the system so the same problem doesn’t happen again.
He compares entrepreneurs to firefighters: putting out fires matters, but understanding why the fire started is what prevents it from happening again.

[3:56] – Gordon talks about how he realized the real problem was a lack of trust, transparency and accountability when he entered the timeshare exit industry.

He describes the timeshare exit industry as having very little oversight or regulation compared with the timeshare sales industry.
Consumers can encounter companies making promises through websites and marketing without clearly defined services.
Timeshare agreements are legally binding contracts, yet consumers can be encouraged to enter additional contracts with exit companies based largely on promises.
Money-back guarantees can create a false sense of security because the guarantee may disappear if the company goes out of business.
He emphasizes that consumers are buying a contract and should understand exactly what services they are paying for.
Trust needs to be earned through transparency, accountability, and delivering a real service.

[6:39] – Gordon tells why did he decide the industry needed a completely different business model rather than another timeshare exit company.

His team conducted a timeshare exit study examining more than 9,000 ownership experiences.
The research found that 55% of owners had failed at least once in an attempt to exit.
More than one in four people who had failed had previously hired an exit company that failed to solve the problem.
He saw that consumers were sometimes trying to solve one financial problem only to create another through an unsuccessful exit company.
The traditional model often involved selling a service, collecting a fee, and relying on outside or in-house legal resources.
He wanted every customer to have personal legal representation from an attorney whose legal duty was to protect and prioritize the customer’s interests.
The new model was designed to put the timeshare owner at the center rather than asking consumers to rely on marketing promises.

[9:55] – Gordon tells why changing the structure of the business create a bigger competitive advantage than simply generating more leads.

The fundamental problem was figuring out how to provide personal legal representation at a cost consumers could afford.
His team redesigned the business around the question: “If my mom had a timeshare, what would I want her to do?”
The model required building a structure that could provide personal legal representation at scale.
He says the resulting model has been able to outperform what he calls the standard exit company model by 20% or more.
The biggest advantage came from solving the underlying customer problem rather than simply improving marketing.

[12:00] – A timeout to thank our sponsors.

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[15:46] – Gordon tells why educating customers has become one of his strongest growth strategies.

Consumer education wasn’t initially designed as a marketing tactic; it emerged because the industry was filled with confusion.
He found that many consumers already felt pressured or misled during their original timeshare sales experience.
The last thing they needed was another high-pressure sales presentation.
Newton Group chose the longer road of educating consumers before asking them to make a decision.
He says the company doesn’t sell timeshare exit services; it sells confidence.
Giving customers enough information to make an informed decision helps them understand why they should choose one provider over another.
Education became essential because consumers needed to understand the industry before spending another dollar.

[18:02] – Gordon talks about what has been his biggest setback, and what it taught him about leadership and extreme ownership.

After 20 years in business, he says there have been many setbacks, including hiring the wrong people, holding onto outdated processes, and outgrowing systems.
The biggest pivot came when he realized that simply improving the standard exit-company model wasn’t enough.
Instead of adding phrases such as “attorney backed” or “attorney oversight” to the marketing, he wanted to fundamentally change the relationship between the attorney and the customer.
In 2017, he helped establish the Timeshare Consumer Rights Law Firm as a non-attorney partner.
The new structure created separate and documented attorney-client relationships for Newton Group clients.
Attorneys could exercise independent professional judgment while the non-attorney team focused on education, administration, communication, customer service, and support.
He defines extreme ownership as taking responsibility for addressing problems; not necessarily believing that everything is your fault.
His company now celebrates finding and fixing problems rather than hiding them.
Sometimes the best entrepreneurial decision isn’t adding a feature or changing the marketing; it’s rebuilding the business around the customer.

[21:43] – Gordon gives his key take away.

Find a way.
Entrepreneurs can’t give up simply because other people say something is impossible.
His experience taught him to keep looking for solutions even when the conventional answer is “you can’t.”
Relentless problem-solving and persistence are fundamental parts of entrepreneurial success.

[22:34] – Call to action.

Newton Group – Check out Gordon’s website for free educational resources for timeshare owners. Download the Consumer’s Guide to Timeshare Exit for free.
Gordon encourages consumers to research first and pick up the phone afterward.

[22:04] – Thank you to our Sponsor!

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How to Build Trust and a Better Model in a Broken Industry with Gordon Newton

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