Would a crackdown on point renting help availability?

Disney COULD do more to make renting less attractive, but it wouldn't impact availability. People are going to use their points. If they aren't using them themselves and they can't rent, they'll sell their ownership to someone who will use their points. Since there are enough points for functionally full occupancy year round, the real question is "how fast does a given unit book at a given time of year." It doesn't matter if it is the dead calm of late January at Disney, or the busy holiday season, DVC will be booked - or pretty close to it - by the time of your vacation. As members gain experience, they learn that to make the most of their membership, they have to book early.

What Disney could do - they could make it impossible for non-members staying at a DVC resort to book the Dining Plan or MDE - and tie those benefits to membership (or staying with a reservation through Disney at a Disney hotel or DVC). They could make it known that members received "priority" on room requests and room ready (they don't currently) so that if you aren't a member, your chances of getting the coveted dumpster view go up or your chances of having to wait until after 6pm to check in go up. They could lower their own prices on hotel rooms or the benefits of hotel booking to make renting DVC less attractive But with DVC being their cash cow, I suspect they feel that renting is currently a plus for them - they get more people exposure to the savings and benefits of a DVC membership. More than a few members started as renters, and renters who are delighted are more likely to buy than ones that can't get the dining plan and have to wait until 6:30 to get a room that overlooks the dumpster.

As to runners (of anything from strolling through a 5k in an hour to running competitively for a full marathon), DVC is the perfect match for those that do Run Disney events as a repeat hobby - they make frequent trips, staying on site is important to them, they have a love of Disney (or they'd be running in their local events and not bothering to go to Disney). Run Disney events are crowded - they sell out. They can make Star Wars Weekend look like January at the Mall of America. While I would guess that a small percentage of DVC owners have ever done a Run Disney event, I'd bet that the number of Run Disney participants that owns DVC - and therefore disproportionately books those weekends, is a lot higher.
 
MountainMouse said:
Yea, we've already covered this. The debate mostly is to what extent Nd does it significantly impact availability.
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...and that's pretty easy :). Every WDW DVC offering has a fixed total number of points. The total number of points may not change. It's in our contracts :).

It affects me not one whit if Disney, with the points they own, or anyone else, with the points they own, wishes to rent something. If the total number of points may not change? Well, sort of what we signed up for :).

Nope - I simply commented on WDW's ability to shoot themselves in the kneecaps :). But then again, no one at WDW has asked me to sit on the board :). It's their funeral if they wish to compete with themselves :). The only universal truth - when you compete with yourself, you WILL loose :).
 
crisi said:
Disney COULD do more to make renting less attractive, but it wouldn't impact availability. People are going to use their points. If they aren't using them themselves and they can't rent, they'll sell their ownership to someone who will use their points. Since there are enough points for functionally full occupancy year round, the real question is "how fast does a given unit book at a given time of year." It doesn't matter if it is the dead calm of late January at Disney, or the busy holiday season, DVC will be booked - or pretty close to it - by the time of your vacation. As members gain experience, they learn that to make the most of their membership, they have to book early.

What Disney could do - they could make it impossible for non-members staying at a DVC resort to book the Dining Plan or MDE - and tie those benefits to membership (or staying with a reservation through Disney at a Disney hotel or DVC). They could make it known that members received "priority" on room requests and room ready (they don't currently) so that if you aren't a member, your chances of getting the coveted dumpster view go up or your chances of having to wait until after 6pm to check in go up. They could lower their own prices on hotel rooms or the benefits of hotel booking to make renting DVC less attractive But with DVC being their cash cow, I suspect they feel that renting is currently a plus for them - they get more people exposure to the savings and benefits of a DVC membership. More than a few members started as renters, and renters who are delighted are more likely to buy than ones that can't get the dining plan and have to wait until 6:30 to get a room that overlooks the dumpster.
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I agree there are many things they could do. I don't think limiting the DP is one that'd be on the table because it's a profit for Disney. Likely the best and easiest one is to make each change a cancelation and rebooking. Another is a VIP system that requires the member be present. As I noted previously, any and every such change will be a victim of the law of unintended consequences or will affect owners as well as renters as a minimum. I've long said that there should be a formal priority system for villa assignments and that it should be in the following order. Owner at that resort, owner at other DVC resort using points, cash guests including through MS, DVC owners exchanging in through RCI or BVTC, other RCI or BVTC exchangers. If they want to limit those using the members points, then add another category where the member is not on the reservation but the reservation is using points below cash guest.
 


One thing to keep in mind is it would be difficult to distinguish between reservations renting to strangers, reservations renting to family/friends, reservations gifted to family/friends. So if you gift a honeymoon trip to your child, would you want them to be treated low on the list? No dining plan? As Dean said, unintended consequences.

There was a rumor a few years ago that any changes to the reservation, including names of guests, would be a cancel/rebook. I emailed member satisfaction because frequently I book at 11 months in my name only and then add friends later. They called me and said it wasn't true. I mentioned that the rumor was to curtail renting. The member satisfaction cm said "well, renting is against the rules". Uh, no.
 
From the perspective of this topic, I think the Disney cares about one thing only. Putting heads in beds. I don't buy into the opinion that once you buy and Disney gets your money, they don't care what you do with your points. They want more of your money. They want you or someone else, staying in a DVC resort, buying tickets, eating their food, and buying souvenirs. It would be a disaster for Disney if a significant % of DVC rooms sat empty on a regular basis as points perhaps expire. They can't rent the DVC rooms they have now. If renting helps keep heads in beds on property, then they are all for it. In some respects, renters do some work for Disney. And if occupancy rates remain high they just build more rooms. JMHO.
 
Goofy DVC said:
From the perspective of this topic, I think the Disney cares about one thing only. Putting heads in beds. I don't buy into the opinion that once you buy and Disney gets your money, they don't care what you do with your points. They want more of your money. They want you or someone else, staying in a DVC resort, buying tickets, eating their food, and buying souvenirs. It would be a disaster for Disney if a significant % of DVC rooms sat empty on a regular basis as points perhaps expire. They can't rent the DVC rooms they have now. If renting helps keep heads in beds on property, then they are all for it. In some respects, renters do some work for Disney. And if occupancy rates remain high they just build more rooms. JMHO.
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I agree with the premise that Disney wants heads in beds, however, I don't know that I agree that a rental crackdown would impact that. Those folks that couldn't rent may just go directly through Disney.
 


Disney wants it all where possible. I suspect that a renter is the most likely person to buy on property at that time but it's also a lost potential revenue. The reality is they want everything but can't have everything. They've created the issue by expressly allowing rentals, it'd still be a legal requirement but they could reign it in a lot tighter had they not done that. It's just like the fact that EVERY resale is a lost potential retail sale.
 
DebbieB said:
One thing to keep in mind is it would be difficult to distinguish between reservations renting to strangers, reservations renting to family/friends, reservations gifted to family/friends. So if you gift a honeymoon trip to your child, would you want them to be treated low on the list? No dining plan? As Dean said, unintended consequences.

There was a rumor a few years ago that any changes to the reservation, including names of guests, would be a cancel/rebook. I emailed member satisfaction because frequently I book at 11 months in my name only and then add friends later. They called me and said it wasn't true. I mentioned that the rumor was to curtail renting. The member satisfaction cm said "well, renting is against the rules". Uh, no.
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Me, yeah. I would rather I get preference in request and room ready over non-members every trip than my kid gets preference on their honeymoon once. Right now, they don't get preference on their honeymoon anyway - so they could end up with the dumpster view at 6:30 by "unluck of the draw." A cab works from the airport, and no dining plan isn't a big deal.

However, I think its in Disney's best interest to give preference to renters "see how wonderful DVC is" so that renters become owners. So I'm not holding my breath.
 
What's the actual change that you're looking for?

1. Do you want DVC to go member-only? As in, if you're not a member or staying in a room with a member, you may not stay at a DVC resort?

2. Do you want members to only be allowed book rooms for family members? No friends, coworkers, etc - just people who are related to you somehow?

3. Do you want to ban any kind of renting for pay? It's OK to book a room for people you're not related to, but no money can change hands?


Because in all of those cases, there's a room being used by a non-member that is now not available to you.


If change #1 were enacted, the membership would be up in arms. A big part of the draw for many of us is the ability to gift stays to friends and family. DVC uses that as a selling point. I don't think Disney could get away with making that change retroactively; it would have to apply only to new resorts. And it would significantly impact sales of those resorts, I think. It's also important to many of us to be able to rent for financial reasons - there have been a few years where i couldn't go because I couldn't get the time off work. At least I could rent and get my maintenance fees covered.

If you think that's too draconian, and you want only family to be allowed to stay (change #2).......how do you enforce that? Do I have to show some sort of proof that my daughter is indeed my daughter when I book for her, since she's married and has a different last name?

Maybe change #3 sounds good - just ban all renting for pay. But again, how do you enforce it? How do I prove to Disney that I'm not receiving compensation? And what constitutes compensation? If my daughter gives me a gift card as a thank-you after her family comes back from their trip, am I in trouble?
 
Lynne M said:
What's the actual change that you're looking for?

1. Do you want DVC to go member-only? As in, if you're not a member or staying in a room with a member, you may not stay at a DVC resort?

2. Do you want members to only be allowed book rooms for family members? No friends, coworkers, etc - just people who are related to you somehow?

3. Do you want to ban any kind of renting for pay? It's OK to book a room for people you're not related to, but no money can change hands?


Because in all of those cases, there's a room being used by a non-member that is now not available to you.


If change #1 were enacted, the membership would be up in arms. A big part of the draw for many of us is the ability to gift stays to friends and family. DVC uses that as a selling point. I don't think Disney could get away with making that change retroactively; it would have to apply only to new resorts. And it would significantly impact sales of those resorts, I think. It's also important to many of us to be able to rent for financial reasons - there have been a few years where i couldn't go because I couldn't get the time off work. At least I could rent and get my maintenance fees covered.

If you think that's too draconian, and you want only family to be allowed to stay (change #2).......how do you enforce that? Do I have to show some sort of proof that my daughter is indeed my daughter when I book for her, since she's married and has a different last name?

Maybe change #3 sounds good - just ban all renting for pay. But again, how do you enforce it? How do I prove to Disney that I'm not receiving compensation? And what constitutes compensation? If my daughter gives me a gift card as a thank-you after her family comes back from their trip, am I in trouble?
Click to expand...

The big issue with all of those is DVC rents rooms through CRO to non-members. Kind of hard to enforce when they are doing it with points they own.
 
DebbieB said:
The big issue with all of those is DVC rents rooms through CRO to non-members. Kind of hard to enforce when they are doing it with points they own.
Click to expand...

Seems like it would be virtually impossible without some sort of challenge if they tried. The largest "individual" point renter can only be DVC.
 
MountainMouse said:
I agree with the premise that Disney wants heads in beds, however, I don't know that I agree that a rental crackdown would impact that. Those folks that couldn't rent may just go directly through Disney.
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I agree that SOME would rent thru Disney, but my bet is that they would want to spend the same amount of money as if they were renting points. That being the case, they would look to rent moderates. The moderates that Disney needs no help renting. Case in point, we decided on a last minute trip for this weekend and when I went online every single moderate and value was completely booked. However, just about every single deluxe resort had availability between 400 and $500 per night that included VGF and the new Poly villas. Disney needs help renting those high end rooms. We decided to pass and not go.
My point is that if renting was limited in some way, it would indeed create more availability.
One final point, look at how many small point rentals are available thru different brokers. If they did not rent, more rooms would be open.
All that being said, I stick to my belief that Disney supports the renting, because it puts heads in beds and money in their pockets.
 
Goofy DVC said:
I agree that SOME would rent thru Disney, but my bet is that they would want to spend the same amount of money as if they were renting points. That being the case, they would look to rent moderates. The moderates that Disney needs no help renting. Case in point, we decided on a last minute trip for this weekend and when I went online every single moderate and value was completely booked. However, just about every single deluxe resort had availability between 400 and $500 per night that included VGF and the new Poly villas. Disney needs help renting those high end rooms. We decided to pass and not go.
My point is that if renting was limited in some way, it would indeed create more availability.
One final point, look at how many small point rentals are available thru different brokers. If they did not rent, more rooms would be open.
All that being said, I stick to my belief that Disney supports the renting, because it puts heads in beds and money in their pockets.
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I doubt many villas would go unused in any situation, members would use their points for the most part even if they couldn't rent. Even if they did, those go to CRO at 60 days out in the form of breakage inventory. Then proceeds go to reduce MF up to 2.5%. Not everyone would rent through DVC but some would.
 
I am looking to book marathon weekend and NOT run. We want it because our college kids (mine and SIL's) will still be off on break. It's a low crowd time and low points so we have decided to make that our family trip for the next several years (then DH and I will do F&W). I didn't realize, at first, that is was also marathon weekend. We picked it for low crowd and college kids being off.
 
Goofy DVC said:
My point is that if renting was limited in some way, it would indeed create more availability.
Click to expand...

So your premise is that if renting was more limited, more members would waste points? I kind of doubt that. I think more members would find DVC doesn't work for them and sell their points.

I have 150 points that did me quite well when my kids wanted Disney vacations, and with high schoolers we struggle to use. At this point, I have three choices - sell DVC (but my daughter will likely use it for college breaks, she isn't Disney'd out, my son is - and we might use the points for ourselves in retirement), rent them, or waste points. I'm not wasting them, so we've rented them because I foresee a time just a few years from now when my daughter uses them for Spring Break or my husband and I for a mid-winter get away. If that option weren't available, I wouldn't spend nearly $2000 a year in dues to not use the points, I'd sell them - to someone who would presumably use the points, therefore, netting out with the same availability for everyone else.

(My son will be a Senior in high school next year, we are banking this years points and letting my daughter bring a friend while he stays home under the watchful eye of grandparents so the house doesn't get trashed in a party).

Now, I will say that one real advantage to renting over owning is the home resort window. If you bought at SSR and want to stay at BWV for Food and Wine, you are going to have to be lucky because that reservation is only available to you seven months out. If you rent, you find a BWV owner a year in advance and book at eleven months - you might even get standard view. That didn't seem fair to me as an owner. But last year I took my Girl Scouts to Hilton Head over the Summer - a reservation I knew was hard to get. So I rented points for that trip, and then rented out my points to cover the cost. I've changed my mind on this over fifteen years, I used to say I'd neither rent out my points or rent points, now I say if you want maximum resort flexibility, book early - but rent.
 
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BWV Dreamin said:
Renting always comes up when there is a lack of availability. Membership is growing, the economy is getting better, and people have more disposable income. People are using their DVC. To say it's "renting" causing these issues is short sighted.
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Any time someone is unable to book a reservation, and they're looking for something to blame, they inevitably blame one of the following:

  • Renting
  • Walking reservations

:)
 
I'm a RunDisney addict and I just bought into DVC. The "only" reason (yes, truly the only reason) I bought DVC was because I know I'll be doing almost all (if not all) the RunDisney events for the next however many years. When I sat down and did the math for my stays for EEC in May 2015, Wine & Dine, Half in January, and Princess weekend, plus a few "spontaneous" weekends here and there for special events (MNSSHP, Flower & Garden, etc), how could I not buy DVC?

RunDisney is increasing in popularity (just look at the difficulty registering for RunDisney events!). Two to three years ago, half marathons were open for days after registration started. For 2016 Princess weekend, everything was sold out by the end of the day registration opened (with the half selling out within a few hours). I suspect many RunDisney fans have the same attitude of buying DVC for RunDisney events.

What difference does it make whether DVC members are renting points or using them themselves? What needs to be considered is the potential for those points/rooms to be used at any given time. Assume, for a minute, that a DVC member was NOT renting those points, but rather using them themselves, the rooms would still be taken, and availability would still be minimal or nonexistent.

3. It's important to keep in mind the bottom line. While the perception is that Disney is the most magical place on earth and all rainbows and butterflies (it is! Don't get me wrong there), when you peek behind the curtain, they are still a business and the first rule of business is to make money. Hence, Disney will do everything in their power to ensure they are making money at all times. That will be their #1 priority. Disney just has that magical touch to mask their priorities and intentions behind pixie dust and dreams.

Therefore, if that means renting points annoys current DVC members, so be it because Disney knows that for every disgruntled DVC member who may be annoyed that they don't get the expected membership perks, or reservation they want, and threaten (or actually do) sell their membership, there are 5 more anxious disney fans waiting to fill those spots.

I've just experienced a period of annoyance when I closed on my VGF contract a few weeks ago and found I couldn't get anything in VGF for Princess Weekend. My first thought was why did I buy VGF if I'm only able to stay at SSR (which has been the case for my November/Jan/Feb trips). So I understand the frustration some members feel when they can't get the resort they want at 7-11 months. However, I accepted that it's just the name of the game with Disney being so extremely popular and I've accepted that if I want to play (aka go to Disney) I have to deal with the current situation.
 
Lynne M said:
What's the actual change that you're looking for? ....

3. Do you want to ban any kind of renting for pay? It's OK to book a room for people you're not related to, but no money can change hands? ....
Click to expand...

If there were ONE thing I would welcome - this would be it. And I can tell you how I believe it could be enforced, and why Disney should think about it....

Now - no smear on brokers.... they perform a legitimate function. There IS one hard truth to brokers - they must turn a profit. That brokers turn a profit should be the trigger for WDW to consider what I'm about to say ... there is money going someplace else, than to Disney :).

So - consider the following hypothetical...

1) ANYONE may rent points (yup, in the contract). But the MECHANISM for doing so is NOT in the contract :).
2) DVC decides that IT is the sole avenue for point rental. If you are not personally there, and don't have your "DVC Guest of Guest" code? No room :).
3) DVC will never take a profit - unless YOU do. At that point, their profit becomes everything beyond 2% of the actual value of the points rented :). Folks, for any DVC member - that "actual value of the points rented" is basic back end computer math. If WDW can't find someone competent to code it? I will - then GIVE it to them :).

Now - I made all this up :). And I guessed at the "2% of the actual value of the points rented". I also have not addressed how DVC would, or could, deal with "under the table" transactions. That's a bigger issue involving everything from DVC to scalped Event Tickets and scalped ADRs. Disney has GREAT Lawyers... I'm sure they will eventually do their job :).

The point was that there is a legal way, within the contract, to allow people to rent points, CLIP personal profit taking (or at least divert it to Disney), recover costs for the infrastructure involved (time, computer system load), and insure that DVC point Rental for DVC MEMBER profit goes extinct :).

I would welcome a move like this... the only time Sandy and I EVER "rented points" was to my son & daughter in law. We did this at COST. Probably just me - but this is sort of what I would hope other members would do... Yes, help family and friends - but do so in moderation, with no expectation of "making money".
 
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