DVC - For couples or for families?

[Louise Potts]

Only you can make that determination, but I mean if you're looking for anecdotes, it's just my wife and I. No kids, now or in the future, and we have DVC.

Renting points to be sure it's for you is always good advice, I'm just not necessarily sure it will help in this particular situation if you already have experience at the resorts.

One big piece of advice given here is to buy for your current travel patterns, and expect patterns to change as your kids get older, move out, etc. You know what's kind of nice? You don't have to worry about that part. Planning at 11 months out is tougher with kids (or so I'm reading). But if it's just you two, you've been in the same jobs for a while, you know when you can and can't realistically take time off, that makes owning DVC a lot easier. Of course your travel patterns are likely to change in time, but a big variable a lot of others have isn't there for you. Plus, unless you're looking to bring other family members or just want extra space, you should always be fine renting studios. That's also kinda nice.

These are all the things we thought about before we bought DVC.

Thanks so much for your tips!

 

[zavandor]

This thread made me laugh. My favorite DVC trips are solo!

I am another solo traveler: as long as you visit Disney parks regularly, DVC can be a good option. Best savings are when comparing a DVC studio vs an hotel room or a 2 bedroom vs two hotel rooms. A couple won't save much if they book a one bedroom, but the upgrade in lodging is significant.

 

[Dean]

Hey! Thanks for your reply, so am I able to rent out a DVC property from a current DVC owner before I decide to join myself? How do I do that? Thanks so much for your help!

Not only are you able to do so, most of us would recommend it. This is a big financial decision with long term implications. IMO one needs a certain amount of knowledge AND experience to do it well. The areas of benefit include Disney on property, DVC specifically and timeshares in general. The more knowledge and experience you have, the better choices you'll make. The biggest decision is whether DVC makes sense at all but the other components are very important also if DVC makes sense in general. Without a decent amount of knowledge in at least 2 of the 3 areas, it's difficult to make an informed decision whether to buy in to DVC or not.

There are a number of places you can find private rentals including places like ebay, redweeks and her on DIS. There several companies where you can rent as well that act as a go between to members.

 

[CraigInPA]

My wife and I have no children. We stay in a studio for 10 nights every year. When we were children, our parents took us to WDW and our families of five stayed in a regular hotel room (mine at the Poly, hers at the Contemporary). Back then, we didn't feel the need to have tons of space and we all got along in the room. I'm sure that a DVC studio, even the "notoriously small" BLT studio, would be fine for 2 adults and a 10 year old.

For the rest of your questions, I'd suggest you do some more research.

The first question you need to ask yourself is how often you will be going to WDW in the future? If you're planning on going every 3 years, DVC might not be good for you. If you are planning on going every year, DVC may be a good fit for you. For my wife and I, having been to WDW every year for 15+ years, DVC was a good fit for us.

The second question you need to ask yourself is whether you can book travel between 7 and 11 months in advance? If you cannot, DVC will not be a good fit for you.

The third question you need to ask yourself is whether you feel you need accommodations at a deluxe resort, or would you be just as happy in a value resort such as All Stars? For my wife and I, this was another easy decision. We'd become used to staying in deluxe resorts, and the one night we stayed in a value caused us to never want to stay there again.

The fourth question you need to ask yourself is what resort is the one for you? Do you want to be close to MK, Epcot, DHS, or AK, or Disney Springs? Is there a resort where you stayed that really is "the one" for you? For my wife and I, we loved the Poly. This is where were going to buy, but when DVC announced which longhouses were being converted to DVC, we decided to look elsewhere. Our criteria was to be within walking distance of at least one park. That meant that our choices were BLT (MK), BWV (DHS, Epcot), or BCV (DHS,Epcot). We eliminated BWV because of theme (clown pool, eeek!). We made our decision by renting points from owners and staying a week each at BCV and BLT. Before we stayed, we were sure we wanted BCV. After staying there a week, we knew that we wouldn't be happy there. After staying at BLT, and loving all of it, we purchased BLT resale and then added on some direct points. One of the things that we needed to "try out" by renting is whether the lack of daily housekeeping would be an issue. We found it was not.

The fifth question you need to ask yourself is when do you travel? This relates to which use year you will be buying. There's a sticky in this forum that explains use year. I suggest you read it.

The sixth question need to determine is how many points do you need? Once you have chosen a resort and figured out when you are likely to travel, you can consult the point charts.

The seventh question you need to ask yourself is whether to buy direct or resale. Disney will happily sell you direct points for most resorts, but they're pushing their current resorts (CCV and Aulani) and you'd need to ask about buying an older resort. Older resorts will typically require you to get on a wait list. If you are buying resale, through one of the brokers, you'll have to wait until a contract that matches the number of points, use year, and resort to show up. You may find that the exact number of points you calculate you need isn't common. You may have to buy a few more or few less points. If less, you can buy additional points direct from Disney (there's a minimum number per resort, usually 25). If more, you'll be banking those extra points forward, and adding an extra day to your trip occasionally on the banked points.

And the last question your need to ask yourself is how you are going to pay for it? Generally, it's not a great idea to finance a DVC purchase from a financial perspective. While some people have made it work, it greatly increases your cost basis if you aren't paying it off in a year.

Good luck, and let us know how it works out for you.

 

[mrcase77]

Hey! Thanks for your reply, so am I able to rent out a DVC property from a current DVC owner before I decide to join myself? How do I do that? Thanks so much for your help!

So, my disclaimer is that I've only read about it and gone through the booking process so there are probably better people to explain. But, from what I've read you have 3 options.

1. You can book a DVC villa through Disney sort of the normal way. The pros of this is that you get the flexibility of a normal rental (as far as being able to change dates or cancel). The con is that it's super expensive.

For the next two options, you rent points. Each rental is worth so many points per night. You have to figure out how many points you need to rent the condo you want for the length of stay you want. There are calculators online that let you enter dates and show you how many points you'd need for a given rental. You then have to find someone to rent you that number of points one of two ways.

2. You can rent points from an individual. From what I understand, this is mainly advisable if you personally know and trust the individual since you're giving them the money and counting on them to book the reservation for you. And if their membership with DVC should lapse, you're be SOL. But individuals tend to rent points cheaper than option 3.

3. You can rent points through a brokerage (which is what I'm doing). The brokerage finds owners for you and, in theory, if something goes sideways with the owner the brokerage will make it right. The gotchas here are that brokerages charge a little more per point (but it's still way less cheaper than option 1), and that basically all sales are final. You can't cancel or move the dates once you booked so vacation insurance is super important and you need to be really sure about your dates.

Also, for all of these...for the more popular ones, you have to book way in advance. To give you an idea, I booked a garden view studio at Boardwalk for next Feb because the regular views had been sold out. Again, there are things online that kind of tell you what's popular or people here seem to know as well.

Please someone chime in if I got anything wrong. Also, you can find a bunch of videos and articles online describing all this in more detail and expertise.

 

[iheartglaciers]

Hey! Thanks for your reply, so am I able to rent out a DVC property from a current DVC owner before I decide to join myself? How do I do that? Thanks so much for your help!

I rented directly from an owner here on Disboards (there’s a rental board) and through a brokerage before I was an owner. Both experiences were great.

 

[CarolMN]

Hey! Thanks for your reply, so am I able to rent out a DVC property from a current DVC owner before I decide to join myself? How do I do that? Thanks so much for your help!

Yes, you can.

You can rent a reservation from an individual owner (take a look at the DIS Rent/Trade Forum) or you can go through a broker, such as our DIS DVC Forum sponsor, www.dvcrequest.com

If you use the R/T Board, be sure to read the pinned thread near the top of that forum called
**How to use this Board** - PLEASE READ BEFORE POSTING - Updated 02/27/2018

You may also find this thread helpful:
DVC Rent/Trade board rules Summary

Be sure to do your due diligence before sending someone any money. Lots of helpful advice in the DVC Resource Summary, especially post #11:

https://www.disboards.com/threads/t...r-updated-january-2018.3655476/#post-58628456

 

[Bshapiro]

Hey! Thanks for your reply, so am I able to rent out a DVC property from a current DVC owner before I decide to join myself? How do I do that? Thanks so much for your help!

I've used David's DVC to rent points for my previous two trips and if I don't end up buying in time for our 2019 trip will use him again. His website is great, has a cost calculator so you can easily figure out dates and costs for all the DVC resorts. Also lots of good info about the properties, pictures, videos etc. https://www.dvcrequest.com

There are a few others companies that rent points.

 

[Bruin_mouse]

If you're planning on going every 3 years, DVC might not be good for you. If you are planning on going every year, DVC may be a good fit for you.

Respectfully, and you're not definitely not the only person that says this on here, this logic makes no sense to me. Whether you go every year or every 3 years, the value ratio of staying cash in deluxe accommodations to DVC stays the same. If I go every three years, I buy less points. If I go every year, I buy a lot more points. If trojan_mouse goes for a week every year, and I go for a week every three years, we'd both have to pay $5,000 cash (made up number) to stay in deluxe accommodations for the week we're there. Assuming that resale DVC points (outside the extreme contract point amounts) are roughly the same price per point, we have the exact same analysis of accommodation cash price versus the money needed to purchase a DVC contract sufficient to stay in equivalent accommodations. The only difference is in the amount of points we each need to purchase.

 

[Louise Potts]

My wife and I have no children. We stay in a studio for 10 nights every year. When we were children, our parents took us to WDW and our families of five stayed in a regular hotel room (mine at the Poly, hers at the Contemporary). Back then, we didn't feel the need to have tons of space and we all got along in the room. I'm sure that a DVC studio, even the "notoriously small" BLT studio, would be fine for 2 adults and a 10 year old.

For the rest of your questions, I'd suggest you do some more research.

The first question you need to ask yourself is how often you will be going to WDW in the future? If you're planning on going every 3 years, DVC might not be good for you. If you are planning on going every year, DVC may be a good fit for you. For my wife and I, having been to WDW every year for 15+ years, DVC was a good fit for us.

The second question you need to ask yourself is whether you can book travel between 7 and 11 months in advance? If you cannot, DVC will not be a good fit for you.

The third question you need to ask yourself is whether you feel you need accommodations at a deluxe resort, or would you be just as happy in a value resort such as All Stars? For my wife and I, this was another easy decision. We'd become used to staying in deluxe resorts, and the one night we stayed in a value caused us to never want to stay there again.

The fourth question you need to ask yourself is what resort is the one for you? Do you want to be close to MK, Epcot, DHS, or AK, or Disney Springs? Is there a resort where you stayed that really is "the one" for you? For my wife and I, we loved the Poly. This is where were going to buy, but when DVC announced which longhouses were being converted to DVC, we decided to look elsewhere. Our criteria was to be within walking distance of at least one park. That meant that our choices were BLT (MK), BWV (DHS, Epcot), or BCV (DHS,Epcot). We eliminated BWV because of theme (clown pool, eeek!). We made our decision by renting points from owners and staying a week each at BCV and BLT. Before we stayed, we were sure we wanted BCV. After staying there a week, we knew that we wouldn't be happy there. After staying at BLT, and loving all of it, we purchased BLT resale and then added on some direct points. One of the things that we needed to "try out" by renting is whether the lack of daily housekeeping would be an issue. We found it was not.

The fifth question you need to ask yourself is when do you travel? This relates to which use year you will be buying. There's a sticky in this forum that explains use year. I suggest you read it.

The sixth question need to determine is how many points do you need? Once you have chosen a resort and figured out when you are likely to travel, you can consult the point charts.

The seventh question you need to ask yourself is whether to buy direct or resale. Disney will happily sell you direct points for most resorts, but they're pushing their current resorts (CCV and Aulani) and you'd need to ask about buying an older resort. Older resorts will typically require you to get on a wait list. If you are buying resale, through one of the brokers, you'll have to wait until a contract that matches the number of points, use year, and resort to show up. You may find that the exact number of points you calculate you need isn't common. You may have to buy a few more or few less points. If less, you can buy additional points direct from Disney (there's a minimum number per resort, usually 25). If more, you'll be banking those extra points forward, and adding an extra day to your trip occasionally on the banked points.

And the last question your need to ask yourself is how you are going to pay for it? Generally, it's not a great idea to finance a DVC purchase from a financial perspective. While some people have made it work, it greatly increases your cost basis if you aren't paying it off in a year.

Good luck, and let us know how it works out for you.

Wow thanks so much for such a detailed reply! Lots of things to think about there - thanks so much and yes i agree the clown pool is terrifying!

 

[Louise Potts]

So, my disclaimer is that I've only read about it and gone through the booking process so there are probably better people to explain. But, from what I've read you have 3 options.

1. You can book a DVC villa through Disney sort of the normal way. The pros of this is that you get the flexibility of a normal rental (as far as being able to change dates or cancel). The con is that it's super expensive.

For the next two options, you rent points. Each rental is worth so many points per night. You have to figure out how many points you need to rent the condo you want for the length of stay you want. There are calculators online that let you enter dates and show you how many points you'd need for a given rental. You then have to find someone to rent you that number of points one of two ways.

2. You can rent points from an individual. From what I understand, this is mainly advisable if you personally know and trust the individual since you're giving them the money and counting on them to book the reservation for you. And if their membership with DVC should lapse, you're be SOL. But individuals tend to rent points cheaper than option 3.

3. You can rent points through a brokerage (which is what I'm doing). The brokerage finds owners for you and, in theory, if something goes sideways with the owner the brokerage will make it right. The gotchas here are that brokerages charge a little more per point (but it's still way less cheaper than option 1), and that basically all sales are final. You can't cancel or move the dates once you booked so vacation insurance is super important and you need to be really sure about your dates.

Also, for all of these...for the more popular ones, you have to book way in advance. To give you an idea, I booked a garden view studio at Boardwalk for next Feb because the regular views had been sold out. Again, there are things online that kind of tell you what's popular or people here seem to know as well.

Please someone chime in if I got anything wrong. Also, you can find a bunch of videos and articles online describing all this in more detail and expertise.

Thats super helpful thanks sooooo much, next Feb you are staying where I would love to stay too! I even looked at Feb just via the Disney website and it was £2000 for 1 week just for the condo! Your tips are great I will be sure to look into them - thanks!

 

[mrcase77]

Thats super helpful thanks sooooo much, next Feb you are staying where I would love to stay too! I even looked at Feb just via the Disney website and it was £2000 for 1 week just for the condo! Your tips are great I will be sure to look into them - thanks!

So, the website Carol mentioned (dvcrequest) is who I booked through actually. So far they’ve been great to work with. They’ve been super patient with me. If you want Boardwalk in February, I would hurry. I had to get the middle tier room (the garden view) because the cheap rooms were already booked up and that was a week ago. They’ve got a page that sort of says how far out different types of rooms sell out too.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

Respectfully, and you're not definitely not the only person that says this on here, this logic makes no sense to me. Whether you go every year or every 3 years, the value ratio of staying cash in deluxe accommodations to DVC stays the same. If I go every three years, I buy less points.

The reason so many of us say that every 3 years as a regular practice is not an ideal use case is because of the risks. If you have to cancel or move your dates, you potentially lose the banked points, and your borrowed points move permanent to the borrow year. Even assuming best case, there aren't a lot of stay combos where the points divide cleanly by 3, meaning most people will end up with orphaned points.

The statements against the every 3 year model of use is more about the issues in the bank/borrow cycle than anything else. It works more as an occasional, versus as the intended dominant use case for purchase.

 

[miTnosnhoJ]

We go twice a year. Once with just my wife and I in a studio or 1BR. And later with our adult kids in a 2BR. Both are great.

Respectfully, and you're not definitely not the only person that says this on here, this logic makes no sense to me. Whether you go every year or every 3 years, the value ratio of staying cash in deluxe accommodations to DVC stays the same. If I go every three years, I buy less points. If I go every year, I buy a lot more points. If trojan_mouse goes for a week every year, and I go for a week every three years, we'd both have to pay $5,000 cash (made up number) to stay in deluxe accommodations for the week we're there. Assuming that resale DVC points (outside the extreme contract point amounts) are roughly the same price per point, we have the exact same analysis of accommodation cash price versus the money needed to purchase a DVC contract sufficient to stay in equivalent accommodations. The only difference is in the amount of points we each need to purchase.

In addition to making it more risky in banking and borrowing, the other issue is the time value of money. If you consider paying out a big lump sum now for vacations in the future, then vacations close in are worth more than vacations that are years away.
So it is easier to make the numbers work if you pay out $40000 today, but get savings every year, than if you only get your saving in year 2, year 5, year 8 , year 11, etc.

 

[Bruin_mouse]

So it is easier to make the numbers work if you pay out $40000 today, but get savings every year, than if you only get your saving in year 2, year 5, year 8 , year 11, etc.

That makes some sense but you're also putting less money out upfront too, so the theoretical gains you're foregoing are much smaller and you (usually) have 30+ years to get "returns" on your money from using DVC.

I have some sympathy for the cancellation issue, but I guess view that as part of @Dean 's advice to make sure the trade offs in timesharing work for you before you purchase. I say ditto for the orphaned points issue. If you really understand DVC before you purchase you should be able to foresee that and avoid it. I will give you that a lot people don't however and just buy what they can afford at the time. This was pretty evident during the 25 point direct add on panic that went on a few months ago. A lot of people bought 25 point addons at new resorts that in practice may end up being next to useless.

 

[Dean]

That makes some sense but you're also putting less money out upfront too, so the theoretical gains you're foregoing are much smaller and you (usually) have 30+ years to get "returns" on your money from using DVC.

I have some sympathy for the cancellation issue, but I guess view that as part of @Dean 's advice to make sure the trade offs in timesharing work for you before you purchase. I say ditto for the orphaned points issue. If you really understand DVC before you purchase you should be able to foresee that and avoid it. I will give you that a lot people don't however and just buy what they can afford at the time. This was pretty evident during the 25 point direct add on panic that went on a few months ago. A lot of people bought 25 point addons at new resorts that in practice may end up being next to useless.

The savings is about volume and villa type. More savings for a studio and 2 BR than a 1 BR or 3 BR. Then the more you use it the more savings you'll have and vice versa. Someone staying in a 2 BR every 3 years will save 1/3 of what someone staying EY will. They may still have a savings, they'll just have to look at the specifics. To echo the answers above, at every 3 years you have a significant risk of losing points and it really doesn't take much loss to make DVC cost more than it saves. It's too expensive and has too much risk to take much chance in that area. It's always best to use only current UY points early in the UY, the further you get from that the more risk you take. For every 3 years you have to make sure you're within 3 years, not 3 and a fraction that's past your UY. Then even if you plan it as such and anything happens (illness, work, kids activities, hurricane, etc), you'll be stuck and easily lose 1-2 years of points. I've evolved to the opinion that an every 3 year plan as a routine makes DVC an unreasonable option.

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

That makes some sense but you're also putting less money out upfront too, so the theoretical gains you're foregoing are much smaller and you (usually) have 30+ years to get "returns" on your money from using DVC.

I have some sympathy for the cancellation issue, but I guess view that as part of @Dean 's advice to make sure the trade offs in timesharing work for you before you purchase. I say ditto for the orphaned points issue. If you really understand DVC before you purchase you should be able to foresee that and avoid it. I will give you that a lot people don't however and just buy what they can afford at the time. This was pretty evident during the 25 point direct add on panic that went on a few months ago. A lot of people bought 25 point addons at new resorts that in practice may end up being next to useless.

There were a LOT of people that also thought that prior to the point reallocations several years ago. The common belief was the DVC would not ever do that. And then the change and people were coming up short on the points they needed, often less than simply adding 25 points which would be especially true for someone who was just planning to go every 3 years. There are ways around it (point transfers, waiting until 7 months and buying OTU points) but all of them cause additional work or angst in waiting. I too think the possible savings are not great enough to warrant the risk of losing all points in the case of a last minute cancellation or the risk of stranded points which will eventually eat into potential savings. Just one cancellation where you lose 3 years of points is all it likely would take to wipe out any and all savings over the life of the contract. That's too much riding on it IMO since there are other ways to pay for stays at Disney with little to no risk.

 

[LënuSëkahsëni]

I'm single/no kids and decided DVC made sense for me.

I wouldn't look at DVC as an investment but more of a prepaid vacation.

 

[Dean]

There were a LOT of people that also thought that prior to the point reallocations several years ago. The common belief was the DVC would not ever do that. And then the change and people were coming up short on the points they needed, often less than simply adding 25 points which would be especially true for someone who was just planning to go every 3 years. There are ways around it (point transfers, waiting until 7 months and buying OTU points) but all of them cause additional work or angst in waiting. I too think the possible savings are not great enough to warrant the risk of losing all points in the case of a last minute cancellation or the risk of stranded points which will eventually eat into potential savings. Just one cancellation where you lose 3 years of points is all it likely would take to wipe out any and all savings over the life of the contract. That's too much riding on it IMO since there are other ways to pay for stays at Disney with little to no risk.

Many assumed they wouldn't but some of us predicted it could happen. Certainly if one understood what they were buying into, they could have at least known it was a risk.

 

[Bruin_mouse]

Just one cancellation where you lose 3 years of points is all it likely would take to wipe out any and all savings over the life of the contract.

Huh? I'll use myself as an example. I bought a 100 point BLT contract with the thought that living in California, I don't want to put a lot off money into a WDW resort but the savings staying on property at a cheaper rate would still be worth it. To rent a 1 bedroom theme park view through Davids during Choice season for a week would be about $4,100. One very prominent DVC reseller's analysis shows that the current cost per point on a trip when owning at BLT resale is currently $9.35 point. That puts the same cost of the same stay when you own at $2,200. The savings for one trip over renting is almost equal to the cost of the trip. I'm not understanding how cancelling one trip would wipe out 42 years of savings of ownership, but that's me. (Incidentally, this analysis isn't even taking into account that point rentals are for the most part non-refundable. At least when you own you have a chance of recouping some of your costs by renting out points when you cancel.)

I get what you all are saying re: cancelling, but again, the savings don't change on a per point basis whether you go every year or every three. Ultimately it comes down to understanding the trade offs of DVC vs cash stays. That means understanding the costs of buying in, how the system works, and the risks. I happen to think the risks of buying DVC resale can be worth it for folks that go every three years versus a lifetime of paying cash, but everyone has to do their own analysis and come to a decison.