1BR Villas?

[Brian Noble]

You might revisit that once Disney comes out with any of the prevailing discounts for that period, as that's a more realistic comparison.

 

[Add-On-Itis]

They are. After doing the math, if we stay in a savanna view studio for a week in December of 2027 we may “break even” depending on discount given for rack rate. We may be in the red just a little bit, but it will be close.

We are planning February 2028 and can’t see 2027 yet, but makes me feel good that one trip will have us pretty close to what we paid for our contract and 2 years of dues.

If you can get a 1-bedroom value. It's not too many more points than savanna studio. The laundry is just so nice, you can pack way less stuff.

 

[intamin]

If you can get a 1-bedroom value. It's not too many more points than savanna studio. The laundry is just so nice, you can pack way less stuff.

This is my game plan for my AKV points. I don't mind the room being a little smaller, I'd rather save the points and keep the laundry and kitchen.

 

[Genie+]

We purchased DVC totally with studios in mind. We rented studios many times in the 5 years prior, and booked them the first several years we owned DVC. The value is/was really strong there. By comparison 1BRs did not seem anywhere near as good of a value when comparing against rack rates or considering occupancy.

Guess what I have booked this year?

5 nights in VGF 1BR

5 nights in VGC 1BR

A few things changed our mind:

Visiting repeatedly at deluxe resorts changed us from being park commandos.

We started spending more leisure time in our resorts and rooms.

The comfort of our room began to matter more.

We tried a couple trips booking 2 studios for 3-4 people and it felt worth the point cost.

Made an easy jump to 1BR for functionality of kitchen, LR, laundry, and room to spread out.

After we booked those, we started tracking cash discounts and availability. That really surprised me! There’s no way we could do these without DVC.

For VGC it cost us 173 pts. The bulk we used our low dues VGF, 1 BWV point and 24 bogo OTUPs. Including TVM, we paid about $500/nt. I can’t even find a discounted studio for that price, never mind a 1BR. My parking is included. I’ll take any room but we have a shot at theme park view. This situation made me understand why VGC resale is so high $pp.

For VGF not quite as good. Cash availability on 1BR is still pretty tight but nowhere as hard as VGC. They are charging $1,600 for our dates, and the best discounts still leave it over $1k/nt - if you can even find your dates. With DVC it is costing us about $700/nt in April. This was a splurge to include my son who has an expensive Season 6 birthday The great thing about DVC is we can balance this cost out by doing a Jan or early May BW std 1BR next time - for HALF the points! Try booking a suite at Swolphin for $350/nt including tax, resort fee and parking lol. Won’t happen. I’m surprised DVC is still winning for the 1BR category!

 

[cruisehopeful]

Yeah, I think most of us who book a one bedroom aren't necessarily trying to save money/points. When I did parks all day, studios, heck any hotel rooms, were fine. I spend time kicking back in the room now. The one bedroom makes all the difference, even when it's only my husband and myself. He can take a nap and I can be really loud in the other room. We do still book studios as well, but I often don't mind paying a lot more for the one bedroom.

 

[bookbabe626]

It just occurred to me that studios are what retail would call a Loss Leader. DVC is luring people into a DVC purchase with the value of the studios in hopes that those purchasers will upgrade to bigger villas as time passes, and thus buy more points in the future. I am sure DVC knows that studios are a great deal, and it’s intentional.