Hard to get a reservation?

[Jack23]

I am thinking about purchasing DVC. My concern is that I heard it is difficult getting a reservation. Is this true?

 

[disneynutz]

There are many variables involved, I recommend that you scan through the threads here in the DVC section of the DIS. Availability is discussed often.

Bill

 

[Deb & Bill]

Agree with Bill. It all depends. If you can't book a stay but a few weeks out, forget buying into DVC. But if you can book your home resort at 11 months out, you shouldn't be disappointed.

 

[suebeelin]

You won't have a problem if you book:
1. At your home resort
2. 11 months ahead of time

. That's what we do!

 

[Deb & Bill]

You won't have a problem if you book:
1. At your home resort
2. 11 months ahead of time

. That's what we do!

Unless you want that GFV studio when everyone else wants it. Or the AKV Concierge villa.

 

[suebeelin]

^^ that's true. We are boardwalk and BLT standard room types.

I think gcv studios could be difficult as well. Not sure if it's only at the 7mo mark...

 

[Minniesgal]

We travel between February and August and never have a problem. We book home resorts 11 months out so we always have a room and have successfully traded out elsewhere most trips.

We however have never tried to book at the busiest times.

We are great believers in buy where you want to stay and book at 11 months hence we have 3 home resorts.

 

[Dean]

I am thinking about purchasing DVC. My concern is that I heard it is difficult getting a reservation. Is this true?

I agree that the answer is "it depends". In general one needs to be realistic and plan at least 7 months out. However there are option that are difficult even day 1 at 11 months out.

 

[BEASLYBOO]

Though it's not the norm for me, I've managed to book last minute a few times but knowing that I would have to be flexible with the resort choices/accomodations available at that moment! For me the toughest is booking during food & wine, while I would love the BWV or BCV, busing it from another resort doesn't bother me enough to purchase another contract there to be able to book at 7 months. Flexibility is important in timeshare ownership.

 

[crisi]

When people say "it depends"...
DVC is sold to run at full occupancy at check in day - a little less for maintenance and such, but if there is a room available the day you check in, someone is wasting points - you will get those rooms as people have emergencies come up and end up with last minute cancellations and people do let points expire, but it isn't a lot.

Owners book their home resort at eleven months and other resorts in the system at seven months.

So sometime between 335 days out (approximately) and the day you check in the vast majority of rooms will go from available to booked. The rate at which that happens depends on the room and the time of year. If you are looking for a BWV for New Years Eve, it will likely be 11 months + 7 days as people try to walk into that reservation - there are more BWV owners who want that room that night than rooms available - and plan a year out. If you are looking for SSR in late January, you might be able to book it the night before.

Also, a night here or there is easier than wanting to book ten days in a row. Being flexible in moving resorts during your trip or moving your trip by a week or two or booking a larger or smaller room adds to the success rate.

 

[CMOORE185]

All I can give is my personal experience of booking for 15 years now.
We book at 7 months most of the time and usually get exactly what we want. We travel spring break, and summer mainly. The hardest one we have had booking is Wilderness, believe it or not. All the rest I have had great success at at seven months.

 

[ncurley]

When do you typically travel, and where would you want to stay? Generally the larger villas (AKV, SSR, and OKW) have availability at less than 7 months out for stays of a week or more. The others should be booked as close to 11 months out as possible for best availability.

We recently bought at BLT and were able to get a 2 BR lake view at about 8 months out for mid-November travel dates. Standard views were not available by then for 2BRs. There were standard views in 1BR and studios available for sporadic days I think. It took us about 3 months from start-to-finish from making an offer to having the points available to us, although it could take as little as 8-10 weeks if you are lucky and every step of the way goes smoothly. For us, the resale process was very SLOWWwwwww and each step took as long as it possibly could have (e.g. ROFR is pretty much guaranteed to be 30 days or less, for us it was exactly 30 days, estoppel took forever, getting Disney to issue the member numer took a while and I could not get member services to release it to me sooner, etc). It was a pain, but it saved us thousands over resale and was worth it in the long-run. Just realize that you probably need to buy at least 14 months in advance of when you plan to book your first stay (11 months + 3 months out).