I'm looking at an Emerald Spa M570. It looks pretty nice and my wife and I like it a little better than the other spas we've seen. (Dynasty, Sundance, Sunrise, and Catalina.) The Catalina was around the same price and had similar features. The Sundance was the same price, but with less features. The Dynasty and Sundance were more costly (about $9000, as opposed to around $7000 for the Emerald).

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with Emerald Spas. Any opinions or advice are appreciated. We plan to wet-test the Emerald before we buy it.

I hope I catch you before you buy the Emerald Spa you were asking about. We purchased an Emerald Spa 4 yrs. ago in Chicago. There was only one authorized dealer in Chicago for Emerald -- that should have been our first clue. Almost immediately we began having serious problems, including leakage. The spa sits in my sunroom, still under warranty mind you, and has been out of commission for the past 2+ years. The authorized dealer closed. Then there was more than a year before another one opened in Chicago.

The company refuses to honor our warranty for this nearly $8K lemon. They expect me to pay to ship it back to Michigan, where they are located -- you can imagine what that would cost. We have had their dealer out nearly 10 times in the last 6 months and there latest is to use a liquid leak sealer. Well each time they came, within 2 days I had approx 400 gallons of water draining all over my sunroom floor -- wetvac like you wouldn't believe.

They won't stand behind their product. My husband, who did the research and swore their product was good, fought with them for over a year to get them to come out. He desparately needed the Spa for therapeutic reasons. He died in March 2007 from a 6 month battle with Cancer. NEVER getting them to come out and pick up this lemon and bring us another one.

Bottom line, it cannot be fixed. The Customer service is non-existent. Employee turnover is a problem. The guy we emailed and phoned for about a year is now gone.

RUN as fast as you can from this product. It has been a real nightmare. I have no alternative but to seek legal counsel when you have a company that takes your $8K and won't stand behind their Warranty.