Disney vacation account vs. regular savings?

[Avery&Todd]

I'm ready to start saving for our WDW vacation in June 2016, and I'm trying to figure out if I should open a Disney vacation account or just stick the money in a regular savings account.

I've been buying Disney gift cards and I'm up to $550 in gift cards now..

Anyone have any experience with these accounts?

THANKS!

 

[Marionnette]

I'm ready to start saving for our WDW vacation in June 2016, and I'm trying to figure out if I should open a Disney vacation account or just stick the money in a regular savings account.

I've been buying Disney gift cards and I'm up to $550 in gift cards now..

Anyone have any experience with these accounts?

THANKS!

The DVA does not pay any interest but you will "earn" a $20 Disney GC for every $1000 spent on "qualifying" purchases. The advantage of using one would be if you are able to purchase Disney GCs at a discount and want to consolidate them into a single account number. The disadvantage would be that you tie your money up in Disney GCs. If you need a refund of your money, it will go back on Disney GCs if that's how you funded the account.

A regular savings account will at least pay interest and provide you with some flexibility in the event of an emergency need for cash. The interest rate will be somewhat low but if you are adding to it regularly over 2 or more years, it will actually do better than the DVA.

I see no reason why you could not do a little of both. Save in a regular saving account and only fund the DVA for as much as you absolutely know that you will spend at Disney in the very near future. Adding those Disney GCs to it would be a good start.

Edited 6/01/2107 because this thread was bumped:
I no longer recommend using the DVA except at the very last minute and only to pay for your Disney vacation in multiples of $1,000. Gift cards can be combined on the disneygiftcard.com website if you find that a stack of $50 GCs is too unwieldy.

 

[eliza61]

Marionnette, pretty much sums it up for me.

I like flexibility and I generally don't like having a chunk of change sitting somewhere for over a year not earning interest. I like the idea of doing both if you want the 20 dollar discount.

 

[finny1981]

We opened our DVA and will put the money in there a little before our 45 day pay off point so we can get the $20 gift cards. Until then it will sit in our savings to get any interest we can on it.

 

[lagoonc]

I'm ready to start saving for our WDW vacation in June 2016, and I'm trying to figure out if I should open a Disney vacation account or just stick the money in a regular savings account.

I've been buying Disney gift cards and I'm up to $550 in gift cards now..

Anyone have any experience with these accounts?

THANKS!

H&R Block had a bonus this year where if you received a portion of your tax refund back in gift cards, they gave you a 10% bonus. I chose target gift cards and then used them to purchase disney gift cards with my 5% target Redcard discount. It was a fantastic deal, but the end result was a very large amount of $50 Disney giftcards.
I opened a Disney Vacation Account only to combine about half the giftcards into one amount that I could use to pay for tickets and for that, it worked perfectly. I just calculated the amount I would need for tickets, and added enough to cover that. I only had the account opened for about a week when I used the amount I needed for tickets and had no issues at all using it. You enter your account number as if it were a giftcard.
I kept the rest of the gift cards for spending while on the trip, and actually came back with a few, so now I have added those to the account to start saving for my next trip!
I don't think you can put Disney gift cards into a savings account, so if you already have gift cards and want an easy way to combine them to pay for tickets, room or package, this is a pretty painless way to do it.
I can't speak to the $20 bonus per $1000 as of yet, because it doesn't apply until 120 days of the account being opened.

 

[coastalhh]

I'm ready to start saving for our WDW vacation in June 2016, and I'm trying to figure out if I should open a Disney vacation account or just stick the money in a regular savings account.

I've been buying Disney gift cards and I'm up to $550 in gift cards now..

Anyone have any experience with these accounts?

THANKS!

Regular savings gets you basically nothing. Disney vacation account can be funded with disney gift cards. I get 150 in gift cards from SAMs for 143. I pay for them through walmart gift cards where I get 2% on my disney visa.

That is over 6% right there.

Then you get 2% back in Disney gift cards for every 1000 spent from the vacation account


That is much much better than savings account.


I wouldn't put a huge ammount in that could be in the stock market but over 1000 a year it is certainly a nice feature if you know you will be spending at least that much at Disney.

 

[4under4]

The lack of "interest" is more than offset by the discounted/cashback options available for acquiring gift cards. The $20 back per $1000 is more than most savings accounts would give on that same amount. As others have said, you can do both by waiting until close to your trip to purchase & add the gift cards, but for those that pick them up here and there, it's a great way to consolidate as you go.

 

[Marionnette]

The lack of "interest" is more than offset by the discounted/cashback options available for acquiring gift cards. The $20 back per $1000 is more than most savings accounts would give on that same amount. As others have said, you can do both by waiting until close to your trip to purchase & add the gift cards, but for those that pick them up here and there, it's a great way to consolidate as you go.

But again, you're tying your money up is "Disney" money and it takes away all flexibility. Your DVA will have to be open for 90 120 days before you can spend anything and request the GC, so you have to open it (although not fully fund it) 45 120 days before a final payment for a package is even due. And then if you have to cancel, the money goes back into the DVA.

Also, take heed that the offer for a $20 GC for every $1K spent on qualifying purchases is currently set to expire on 12/31/2017. There is no word as to whether it will be extended or perhaps changed.

I'm not against the DVA completely. I have one and used to for paying my DVC dues. Since I know that I must pay those dues annually, I purchase the Disney GCs at a reduced price and put them in the DVA the very day that I pay my dues. Disney is going to get that money every year, whether I take a vacation or not. However, if I didn't have that sunk Disney cost, I would not invest my money in discounted Disney GCs or funding a DVA unless I was confident that I would not miss the money. The small return on the money is not worth the potential cash flow problems.

Edited 6/01/2017 because this thread was bumped and contains outdated info.

 

[mavlax20]

I chose the Disney Vacation Account, because for me, if I don't have access to spending the money, it will add up. The lack of interest is ok with me, because getting the $20 GC per $1000 spent will easily add up to either a meal or some nice souvenirs. My goal had been to save $5000 for a 2017 trip and I started in January, but now I am about 1/4 of the way there, and I'm not touching it or doing anything, and its worked great for me. I'm doing much better than originally planned that I am now looking at possibly extending the planned trip from 1 week to 2 weeks.

 

[Avery&Todd]

the idea of consolidating the many $50 gift cards I have into one place does sound nice! I do buy them at Target using my Redcard! Glad to hear that I can apply all of my saved gift cards from my DVA towards one big payment on our trip!

 

[The Dirty Steve]

Here's what we do. First of all, CASH is king! Any money we save is pulled out of our accounts and placed somewhere for safe keeping. When Kroger is doing 4X points for gift cards, we will go and buy $250 in Target Gift Cards. We then use those Target Cards to buy Disney Gift Cards and then load them into our Disney Vacation Account. Since we drive a Ford Expedition, our fill up takes us to 28 gallons of fuel on fill up. Here's the break down:

Save 5% at Target for $250 Disney Gift Cards (Saves $12.50)
1000 fuel points on 28 gallons (Saves $28.00)

So, at the end of the day this purchase saves me just over 16%. Not taking into account the bonus given through the Disney Vacation Account. This is tons better than I would ever get from a savings account. It does tie up our money so we lose potential opportunity costs but at savings like these, it's a no brainer for us!!

 

[nalajms]

OP - if you're already buying Disney GC and plan to stay onsite, then DVA is a no brainer! It'll be much faster and easier to pay off your room/package using the DVA. Plus, I'm always a bit worried that one of my Disney GC isn't activated I only pick a few random ones to lookup when I get them in the mail from Target.

FWIW - I keep all my GC. I label on them the date it was loaded into DVA and store them in a MB box. I also keep a spreadsheet of when/how many cards are loaded into the DVA and when money comes out. They keep pretty good track of it, but I like to double check.

 

[eliza61]

But again, you're tying your money up is "Disney" money and it takes away all flexibility. Your DVA will have to be open for 90 days before you can request the GC, so you have to open it (although not fully fund it) 45 days before a final payment for a package is even due. And then if you have to cancel, the money goes back into the DVA.

I'm not against the DVA completely. I have one and used to for paying my DVC dues. Since I know that I must pay those dues annually, I purchase the Disney GCs at a reduced price and put them in the DVA. Disney is going to get that money every year, whether I take a vacation or not. However, if I didn't have that sunk Disney cost, I would not invest my money in discounted Disney GCs or funding a DVA unless I was confident that I would not miss the money. The small return on the money is not worth the potential cash flow problems.

+1

And as a general rule I don't go to target so getting Disney gc's for me would be a pain (the last time I was at a target was the week before Christmas to give you an idea of how often I go). so I can't take advantage of the redcard.

I do the exact same thing, since I don't have room cost and my dues are about 1000 bucks, I would only earn 20 bucks back maximum. I get my park tickets from undercover tourist because the savings is way more than the 20 bucks if I buy them through disney.

I like flexibility, what I may do this year (thanks to budget board tipsters) is since I use my chase visa for every thing I may turn some of my points into a few target gc's and then do the online thing for the Disney gc's.

So for me I get 5% back on my chase visa and or my amex, on a wide variety of things, not just target. like Jan, feb and march it was on grocery's at any store. Next quarter it will be at gas.

I can than use the points to get visa gift cards/ american express gc so I get the 5% off of my visa gc and can use them to buy my tickts through UT. the only thing I really get from Disney direct is my annual pass and I get a dvc discount on that.

have you purchase your annual pass using your dva??

I guess because we've been to Disney so many times that our plans change quite often. I always start out with 10 ADR's and then by the time vacation rolls around it's down to 2, I simply don't want to be stuck with hundreds of dollars in Disney gc or target gc's

 

[nalajms]

have you purchase your annual pass using your dva??
I guess because we've been to Disney so many times that our plans change quite often. I always start out with 10 ADR's and then by the time vacation rolls around it's down to 2, I simply don't want to be stuck with hundreds of dollars in Disney gc or target gc's

Yes! Bought several since opening my DVA last year. I keep a few hundred dollars in it for "just in case". We tend to have relatives join us last minute and I buy 2 or 3 day park tickets directly from Disney. I also stock up on Disney GCs since it's not something I can really do last minute. We've been going for years, so I know roughly how much we'll spend each year. I have enough GCs to carry me through this year. Then mid summer, I'll have to start stocking up for DVC dues!

 

[Avery&Todd]

We dont have annual passes and we'll buy a "package" through Disney when I'm able to book in July-ish for next June. I'm thinking that DVA will benefit us b/c with the cost of the trip, I could end up with $100 in FREE bonus gift cards (yes!!! )

 

[Day-Day]

Here's what we do. First of all, CASH is king! Any money we save is pulled out of our accounts and placed somewhere for safe keeping. When Kroger is doing 4X points for gift cards, we will go and buy $250 in Target Gift Cards. We then use those Target Cards to buy Disney Gift Cards and then load them into our Disney Vacation Account. Since we drive a Ford Expedition, our fill up takes us to 28 gallons of fuel on fill up. Here's the break down:

Save 5% at Target for $250 Disney Gift Cards (Saves $12.50)
1000 fuel points on 28 gallons (Saves $28.00)

So, at the end of the day this purchase saves me just over 16%. Not taking into account the bonus given through the Disney Vacation Account. This is tons better than I would ever get from a savings account. It does tie up our money so we lose potential opportunity costs but at savings like these, it's a no brainer for us!!

What do you do to get the 5% discount for Disney gift cards when using the Target gift cards?

 

[nalajms]

What do you do to get the 5% discount for Disney gift cards when using the Target gift cards?

You pay for the purchase using your redcard at check out. There's also a way around that if done online. Check out the disney GC thread.

 

[Day-Day]

You pay for the purchase using your redcard at check out. There's also a way around that if done online. Check out the disney GC thread.

There are a "million" GC threads. I searched and think I found what you did. Did you have additional purchases beyond the $250 you spent using the Target Gift Cards and cover the remainder with a Target Redcard? I read that this is how others have done it in the store and also online.

 

[4under4]

There are a "million" GC threads. I searched and think I found what you did. Did you have additional purchases beyond the $250 you spent using the Target Gift Cards and cover the remainder with a Target Redcard? I read that this is how others have done it in the store and also online.

1.) Set your default payment as target redcard
2.) Add up to 8 Disney gift cards to your basket (fyi, out of stock right now, but usually available again in a week or so)
3.) Start the check out process, selecting REDcard as your payment choice
4.) On the review order page, below the "Complete Order" button is a small "pay with Target Gift Card" link - click it and follow through with entering your GC number(s)

 

[CalDisneyMomof2]

1.) Set your default payment as target redcard
2.) Add up to 8 Disney gift cards to your basket (fyi, out of stock right now, but usually available again in a week or so)
3.) Start the check out process, selecting REDcard as your payment choice
4.) On the review order page, below the "Complete Order" button is a small "pay with Target Gift Card" link - click it and follow through with entering your GC number(s)

I posted in the Disney Gift Card Deals thread already but this is currently NOT possible. You can try for yourself. Also, Disney gift cards are currently out of stock online. I just did it last week but myself and others have tried today and it will not give 5% off for ANY gift card.