Approach for Add-On?

[Lumee23]

My hubby and I are trying to decide on an add-on strategy and I keep waffling on the best approach. We currently have direct points at Riviera with a September use year. At the time I didn't realize it was one of the rarest use years out there, which has made considering resale complicated. We are looking to add-on about 75-100 points, which also seems to be a problem due to the lower point amount.

Originally we were looking at doing the Poly towers direct because we love the Poly but would prefer the bedroom type variety and I personally think it will be its own association; however, the lower resale pricing right now is very attractive, especially since we could buy now. I am assuming despite the economic outlook that Disney is going to continue with price increases on direct making Poly tower over the current 217 price by the time it is on sale. To add to it all we would also like to add on a small CA contract down the line but we don't have the money lined up to do both purchases right now.

I see a lot of great deals at the resorts we are interested in (BLT and Poly) posted in the ROFR thread and my various DVC social media groups but I am not seeing anything near that in the current listings for our use year. There seem to be some better deals in other use years but I am aware of the challenges with having multiple use years and not sure I want to deal with that long term. We considered other resorts but the 2042 resorts are out for us due to length of time left and since we are looking at a smaller size contract I would rather pay the extra few thousand dollars and not have to worry about availability at 7 month window. My husband is more on the fence about that and wants to consider sleep around points. He is somewhat interested in a possible Aulani purchase since those prices are very low with a long term on the contract still but I am concerned about the dues and not having any 11 mo WDW availability.

So I guess I am just wondering what others would do in our situation? Offer lower on resale listings in our use year and hope we get a bite? Grab a contract with an alternative use year? Pick up sleep around points for some minor savings? Or since our contract amount is small not even bother with resale despite the potential deals and just do our direct VDH CA purchase once it is available or wait it out for Poly tower?

 

[Sandisw]

Because we love RIV, having points resale that couldn’t be used there was not ideal and we sold that contract only a year later.

Keep that in mind. In terms of the rest, smaller contracts are harder to find and listing prices tend to be less negotiable because owners seem to be willing to hold off.

If owning Poly and being locked out of the towers would be disappointing then I would not buy resale there until you know what is happening.

Remember, a different UY is a different membership so you can’t use points all together for a single trip without transfers. It’s important to understand how that all works before taking that approach.

 

[Duckbug.Ducktales]

You could buy Poly now, enjoy it for a trip or two, and decide later if you want to buy the new tower and sell your add on, or keep it.

 

[Cfabar1]

If you know you want to own in California too, I’d buy VDH direct to ensure you’ll be able to use some points there. I think inventory is going to stay very tight in California for a while. I think resale value is going to hold up very nicely for those contracts.

then in a year or two you’ll know more about Poly and the best way to use your points moving forward.

 

[intamin]

My hubby and I are trying to decide on an add-on strategy and I keep waffling on the best approach. We currently have direct points at Riviera with a September use year. At the time I didn't realize it was one of the rarest use years out there, which has made considering resale complicated. We are looking to add-on about 75-100 points, which also seems to be a problem due to the lower point amount.

Originally we were looking at doing the Poly towers direct because we love the Poly but would prefer the bedroom type variety and I personally think it will be its own association; however, the lower resale pricing right now is very attractive, especially since we could buy now. I am assuming despite the economic outlook that Disney is going to continue with price increases on direct making Poly tower over the current 217 price by the time it is on sale. To add to it all we would also like to add on a small CA contract down the line but we don't have the money lined up to do both purchases right now.

I see a lot of great deals at the resorts we are interested in (BLT and Poly) posted in the ROFR thread and my various DVC social media groups but I am not seeing anything near that in the current listings for our use year. There seem to be some better deals in other use years but I am aware of the challenges with having multiple use years and not sure I want to deal with that long term. We considered other resorts but the 2042 resorts are out for us due to length of time left and since we are looking at a smaller size contract I would rather pay the extra few thousand dollars and not have to worry about availability at 7 month window. My husband is more on the fence about that and wants to consider sleep around points. He is somewhat interested in a possible Aulani purchase since those prices are very low with a long term on the contract still but I am concerned about the dues and not having any 11 mo WDW availability.

So I guess I am just wondering what others would do in our situation? Offer lower on resale listings in our use year and hope we get a bite? Grab a contract with an alternative use year? Pick up sleep around points for some minor savings? Or since our contract amount is small not even bother with resale despite the potential deals and just do our direct VDH CA purchase once it is available or wait it out for Poly tower?

So I’m in a similar position. I have RIV in an April UY and it’s one of the rarest UY for newer resorts and in general it’s terrible to add on from.

If you’re going to purchase resale, I’d recommend either add into the same UY which in general is recommended, or pick a UY 5-7 months (Feb-April) off from your current UY so you can plan to have coverage for the months of the year your Sept UY is not ideal (summer).

I own an April UY and added on resale in March. The only reason I did this was because I REALLY wanted an Aulani contract with subsidized dues for SAP, but otherwise I wouldn’t have.

Now that I own two separate UY, I have 2 resales in my March UY and my direct RIV contract is currently on its own. I plan to keep the direct points in my April UY and my resales in my March so I don’t have to worry about figuring out which points are good at RIV/VDH/poly2(?).

So if poly2 ends up being a different association, I’ll add it to my direct UY. If it’s the same I’ll likely buy resale poly and add it to March and then with the savings buy some more direct RIV to add to April or consider some VDH.

I know our situations are somewhat different but I think this gives you an idea of how I personally would approach yours?

 

[Great3]

As Intamin said, I personally would add resale in any UY that is a "good" deal if you are going to buy resale, and not worry about matching UY. If you are going direct, then yeah, get the same UY.

As Sandisw said, you need to know that a different UY means another DVC membership. To me, it's not that difficult, and doesn't personally bother me to keep track of, however, it does create headaches for others to keep track of different UY, so keep that in mind and decide if different UY is okay for you. That's the reasoning while I would buy a different UY with a better price, and that are more readily available.

If you want CA, then pretty much you going to need to buy direct. And I wouldn't buy Aulani to use as SAP, unless you actually plan to use at Aulani at least once every 3 years.

Great3

 

[RoseGold]

These are all completely different strategies. SAP already are useless at RIV, and will likely be useless at DL and also at Poly tower. If that's what you want, then buying SAP doesn't make sense. If you're buying direct, I doubt 100 points will get you far on the DL/Poly2 charts, especially with 1BR. I don't really understand what you are trying to book. 100 points isn't enough to book 1BRs, if you're booking studios, then just buy Poly1?

If you are in the market for SAP, who cares if your UY matches. You can't use them with RIV anyway. And there's plenty of SAP in any UY right now, if you really want to match it up. There are a lot of brokers and a lot of contracts out there.

I wouldn't buy Aulani at all for many reasons, as has been beaten to death in other threads. I think both BLT and Poly are excellent SAP choices right now.

I wouldn't call SAP "minor savings" at all. It is a massive price premium to buy direct. You have to decide if that is worth it to you.

 

[Lumee23]

Thank you everyone for your thoughts! I had a few follow-up questions.

I know it is impossible to really know but is the general consensus that VDH is going to sell out pretty fast? I haven't really looked into the number of rooms/size of the resort compared to other recent new resorts but it seems like apples to oranges anyway since this is the only CA resort aside from the very tiny/expensive VGC. If we buy resale now we will probably need another 1.5-2 yrs to save up the funds to buy VDH and I am a bit worried it will be sold out by then.

If you want CA, then pretty much you going to need to buy direct. And I wouldn't buy Aulani to use as SAP, unless you actually plan to use at Aulani at least once every 3 years.

Is there another reason I am not thinking of besides not having an 11th month window at WDW? We are going to Aulani in 2025 and while we will definitely go again I doubt it would be every three years due to the cost and flight duration to Hawaii from the east coast. My spreadsheet calcs shows that Aulani has the best value in terms of how many points we can buy for X dollars and what that translates into for total points for the life of the loan but the high dues give me pause more than the 11 month window issue.

If you’re going to purchase resale, I’d recommend either add into the same UY which in general is recommended, or pick a UY 5-7 months (Feb-April) off from your current UY so you can plan to have coverage for the months of the year your Sept UY is not ideal (summer).

I own an April UY and added on resale in March. The only reason I did this was because I REALLY wanted an Aulani contract with subsidized dues for SAP, but otherwise I wouldn’t have.

Now that I own two separate UY, I have 2 resales in my March UY and my direct RIV contract is currently on its own. I plan to keep the direct points in my April UY and my resales in my March so I don’t have to worry about figuring out which points are good at RIV/VDH/poly2(?).

So if poly2 ends up being a different association, I’ll add it to my direct UY. If it’s the same I’ll likely buy resale poly and add it to March and then with the savings buy some more direct RIV to add to April or consider some VDH.

This is an interesting idea. We don't generally travel during the summer because it's hard for my hubby to get off work; however it does happen occasionally. Maybe it's worth researching the most common UYs for resale and picking that up as my resale UY and just keep resale and direct separate like you are doing. We really like split stays with some of the time at a monorail resort and then the rest at Riv so having a separate contract wouldn't be the worst thing in most scenarios for us.

That being said I do see that potential issues. For example we are going big for our Aulani trip in 2025 and will need to combine points with our Riv and whatever 2nd contract we get as well as utilize banked or borrowed points. If our 2nd contract is a different UY we would have to call member services and transfer the points from one to the other, correct? And hypothetically if we only transferred over half of the 2025 points for Aulani, but then later decided to take another trip to WDW, we wouldn't be able to transfer over the other half in a separate transaction because its once per UY?

Do those that have separate UYs tend to just transfer it all into one account each year? Or only as needed?

I am thinking we may just open it up to alternative UYs and if something is a good enough deal to make up for the extra headache we will just go for it.

 

[Great3]

For the Aulani question, it's both the higher comparative dues and 11 months booking window concern. Aulani dues will probably have higher rates of inflation than WDW dues but can be somewhat mitigated with a subsidized Aulani contract. I own two of those. But I do visit Oahu every year (with exception being COVID lockdown periods in HI). Currently, with subsidized Aulani contract, it makes it the cheapest SAP points, but I expect that will change eventually, but I think it will take 10+ years to get there.

As for the 11 months booking window, if you are okay with "settling" for SSR as most likely the only WDW resort you can get in on at WDW at 7 months, than that's not a problem. I subscribed to thought of anywhere onsite at WDW is good enough, so it doesn't bother me what resort I stay at, they are actually all nice. I doubt you will be completely shut out of WDW with an Aulani contract, but I just don't recommend it if your purpose it to mainly use at WDW resorts and not Aulani, as plenty of other WDW resorts has lower dues, and lower inflation of dues.

Great3

 

[Lumee23]

These are all completely different strategies. SAP already are useless at RIV, and will likely be useless at DL and also at Poly tower. If that's what you want, then buying SAP doesn't make sense. If you're buying direct, I doubt 100 points will get you far on the DL/Poly2 charts, especially with 1BR. I don't really understand what you are trying to book. 100 points isn't enough to book 1BRs, if you're booking studios, then just buy Poly1?

If you are in the market for SAP, who cares if your UY matches. You can't use them with RIV anyway. And there's plenty of SAP in any UY right now, if you really want to match it up. There are a lot of brokers and a lot of contracts out there.

I wouldn't buy Aulani at all for many reasons, as has been beaten to death in other threads. I think both BLT and Poly are excellent SAP choices right now.

I wouldn't call SAP "minor savings" at all. It is a massive price premium to buy direct. You have to decide if that is worth it to you.

Perhaps that is the reason for the waffling....the strategy isn't exactly defined. Our vacations aren't going to be the same predictable plan every year where we go the same month for the same timeframe in a certain room type at the same resort. As a general rule for anything a week or over we want to do split stays with a monorail resort and Riv but we also want to be able to sprinkle in occasional shorter trips like long weekends in CA or 1-3 night pre-cruise stays at WDW since we also cruise. So while every 3ish years I would say we are banking/borrowing to take a big trip we have smaller trips sprinkled in between. We are a family of 5 but sometimes we will go just the two of us or sometimes bring the grandparents so our room needs aren't even consistent. - So the thought is monorail add-on either as Poly2 or resale to cover our monorail split stays coupled with a very small add-on at VDH to cover the CA aspect.

I think part of it too is there is a difference in strategy between my husband and I. I am concerned about not being able to combine points with Riv to stay there (or VDH or potentially Poly tower); however my husband feels we have enough points at Riv to meet our needs, we plan to buy VDH (which will cover that need) and he is fine with Poly1 using resale. He may have a point since the 7mo window at VDH might be impossible anyway. Overall he wants to maximize number of points but I want to make sure we are able to fully use them in the way we want.

When I was referring to minor savings of SAP I was comparing a AKV/Saratoga/OKW Ext resale versus a Poly/VGF/BLT resale not versus direct. I didn't know the monorails could be considered SAP, sorry, I worded that confusingly. In the case of AKV and OKW the higher dues appear to eat up the initial cost savings over the life of the loan in addition to them being shorter terms than the monorails. So it was more a comment of is it worth saving a couple of thousand on a smaller contract for 30+ years of dealing with a 7month window for a monorail resort. But that was all going based off of the prices that are actual listed in the contract listings I am seeing and not the deals that people seem to be getting in the ROFR thread.

 

[RoseGold]

we plan to buy VDH (which will cover that need) and he is fine with Poly1 using resale. He may have a point since the 7mo window at VDH might be impossible anyway.

You could wait a few months for VDH pricing. It's possible that launch makes even VDH decent SAP choice. I'd argue the existing member initial VGF2 pricing was, at least for a 200-ish point contract.

Risk in doing this is that resale might go back up, so you have to choose your strategy. If you want SAP, then I'd be buying now. You have to decide if waiting is worth the risk. If you want VDH points anyway, then that's your answer.

I'd find the existing members incentives for launch of VGF2, add a bit, and make a choice.

 

[intamin]

Is there another reason I am not thinking of besides not having an 11th month window at WDW? We are going to Aulani in 2025 and while we will definitely go again I doubt it would be every three years due to the cost and flight duration to Hawaii from the east coast. My spreadsheet calcs shows that Aulani has the best value in terms of how many points we can buy for X dollars and what that translates into for total points for the life of the loan but the high dues give me pause more than the 11 month window issue.


This is an interesting idea. We don't generally travel during the summer because it's hard for my hubby to get off work; however it does happen occasionally. Maybe it's worth researching the most common UYs for resale and picking that up as my resale UY and just keep resale and direct separate like you are doing. We really like split stays with some of the time at a monorail resort and then the rest at Riv so having a separate contract wouldn't be the worst thing in most scenarios for us.

That being said I do see that potential issues. For example we are going big for our Aulani trip in 2025 and will need to combine points with our Riv and whatever 2nd contract we get as well as utilize banked or borrowed points. If our 2nd contract is a different UY we would have to call member services and transfer the points from one to the other, correct? And hypothetically if we only transferred over half of the 2025 points for Aulani, but then later decided to take another trip to WDW, we wouldn't be able to transfer over the other half in a separate transaction because its once per UY?

Do those that have separate UYs tend to just transfer it all into one account each year? Or only as needed?

I am thinking we may just open it up to alternative UYs and if something is a good enough deal to make up for the extra headache we will just go for it.

If you're not planning to go to Aulani regularly I wouldn't recommend buying in there. I'm a huge proponent of using Aulani sub for SAP, but I'm a bigger proponent of buying where you want to stay. If you're going to be going to WDW more frequently and don't have enough WDW points as it is I wouldn't recommend AUL.

And yes, having separate UY does create the hassle of transferring points and it is technically supposed to only be one transfer per year although some cast members will give you some leeway. If you're having to transfer points to make your stays work I wouldn't recommend owning multiple UY. In the end I plan to have around 1k points as my end goal so I know my memberships will able to function independently of one another. But if you're not able to make your big family trips without transfers that'd be another reason to keep things in the same UY. One way people work around this (myself included) is to just book parts of the stay separately, say 3 nights under one membership and then another 2 under the other and then on check in you can ask them to merge the reservations so you don't have to move rooms which typically isn't an issue.

Edit: I'm not sure how you feel about BLT but another resale you could consider over SSR would be BLT. BLT prices have come down drastically, are good until 2060 and the 11 month window actually matters there to book standard view rooms and theme park views at certain times of the year.

 

[Great3]

I think part of it too is there is a difference in strategy between my husband and I. I am concerned about not being able to combine points with Riv to stay there (or VDH or potentially Poly tower); however my husband feels we have enough points at Riv to meet our needs, we plan to buy VDH (which will cover that need) and he is fine with Poly1 using resale. He may have a point since the 7mo window at VDH might be impossible anyway. Overall he wants to maximize number of points but I want to make sure we are able to fully use them in the way we want.

Yes, you both have differing strategies, and until it's ironed out, will cause you to do too much thinking! LOL!!!

The reality is, unless you are buying more RIV points, it doesn't matter what resort you buy direct or resale, you are waiting for the 7 months mark to hopefully get a reservation that requires combining of points. So, whatever resort you buy that is not RIV is going to work exactly the same way as far as combining purposes for use at RIV for longer stays / larger unit(s). I think with wanting to stay at both RIV / VDH often, then those are the only two resorts that makes sense for you, as any other resort will not allow you to able to fully use them in the way that you want (as you worded it). Any other resort will require you to be flexible.

Good luck with whatever you ultimately decide to do.

Great3

 

[linzjane88]

I could have written everything you said down to the awkward September use year! In hindsight December or Feb seems to be where it's at as far as good resale deals. And for those of us who don't cancel trips and travel in a variety of times of year I just don't feel like it has ever mattered to me. Anyways, I have the add on bug too for another 50-125 points and have for some time but can't figure out what to do. We do have a grandfathered blue card resale at SSR but don't know where to add on. We are West Coast and do Aulani maybe 3ish years, DL every year to other year, and WDW every year. I would love some West Coast points but my thoughts are these:

1) I will buy direct if there are no resale restrictions (that's an absolute, positive deal breaker for me) so no Riviera

2) It is tempting but I don't think I want to own at Aulani due to the nature of a beach DVC feeling more variable with dues. Also, how unfriendly to tourism Hawaii in general has become. I don't know what I think would or would not happen in time but I'd rather be tied to a Florida and it's welcoming arms. LOL.

3) I won't buy 2042 resorts--that's just way too soon! (*disclaimer* BWV <$100 maybe )

4) If Poly is the same association then buying resale now seems smart but if they are different then I am not maybe not. We love the Poly studios for an adult trip but the days of vacationing with the family in a studio are long past. It's not really vacation if the teenagers are in the same room as us...

What I think my current plan is to buy direct VDH or Poly if there are no restrictions and I could get the cost down to <190 PP. If neither of those happen then move onto OKW-X/Poly/BLT/VGF resale and go with whichever one I can get the best deal on which probably means the dreaded second use year.

 

[AstroBlasters]

I agree, stop buying AUL subsidized for SAP and leave them for us Aulani owners

Aloha!

 

[wayneham]

trying to decide on an add-on strategy and I keep waffling on the best approach

My wife and I are preparing to buy VDH direct, probably 100 points. We are first time buyers and we expect that we will want to add on via resale.

So this leads me to a question that might show what a newbie I am: assuming I buy 100 points direct (or even 150 so that I have my preferred home resort and even the Blue Card Magic Extra FOMO Benefits), and then I want to add another 100 points via resale, why wouldn't I just buy the cheapest Vero Beach points available in the same UY, points being points?

We have never been to Florida, probably would not visit Vero, and don't have a strong preference for any particular WDW resort. So if I'm just going to spend points at VDH and I've got in the door with my initial Direct purchase, can't I just load up on cheap points elsewhere?

 

[intamin]

My wife and I are preparing to buy VDH direct, probably 100 points. We are first time buyers and we expect that we will want to add on via resale.

So this leads me to a question that might show what a newbie I am: assuming I buy 100 points direct (or even 150 so that I have my preferred home resort and even the Blue Card Magic Extra FOMO Benefits), and then I want to add another 100 points via resale, why wouldn't I just buy the cheapest Vero Beach points available in the same UY, points being points?

We have never been to Florida, probably would not visit Vero, and don't have a strong preference for any particular WDW resort. So if I'm just going to spend points at VDH and I've got in the door with my initial Direct purchase, can't I just load up on cheap points elsewhere?

I would not recommend doing this. If you look at the dues of VB or HHI any savings you would have you quickly would lose in the form of maintenance fees AND you’ll also give up your home resort priority as its not even on WDW property. This is often asked by new/prospective owners and it’s not a good idea unless you actually want points to use at those resorts. Your buy in price is cheaper for those resorts but maintenances fees for Vero Beach and Hilton Head are 12.85 and 10.73 per point respectively.

Edit to add more: If you calculate it on a per point basis you actually end up paying more per point than if you had bought literally any other resort and it has a 2042 expiration date. The best way to do what you’re talking about which is essentially what we call sleep around points (SAP) is with resale Saratoga Springs or Copper Creek as the home resort as on a price per point per year basis they’re amongst the best value.

You can calculate how much each point is costing you for any given year by dividing your buy in cost by the amount of years remaining and then adding the maintenance fees for that year.

Let’s say VB costs you 50 dollars per point,

(50/18 years left) + 12.85 = 15.63 per point for 2023.

Now let’s take Saratoga Springs. Lets set it at 120 dollars per point. Realistically you’ll get an SSR contract for 80 to 105 easily so I’m overestimating.

(120/30 years left) + 7.86 = 11.86 per point for 2023.

So in essence, you’re giving up home resort priority while paying 32% more for your points.

Tl;dr do not underestimate dues lol.

 

[Sandisw]

My wife and I are preparing to buy VDH direct, probably 100 points. We are first time buyers and we expect that we will want to add on via resale.

So this leads me to a question that might show what a newbie I am: assuming I buy 100 points direct (or even 150 so that I have my preferred home resort and even the Blue Card Magic Extra FOMO Benefits), and then I want to add another 100 points via resale, why wouldn't I just buy the cheapest Vero Beach points available in the same UY, points being points?

We have never been to Florida, probably would not visit Vero, and don't have a strong preference for any particular WDW resort. So if I'm just going to spend points at VDH and I've got in the door with my initial Direct purchase, can't I just load up on cheap points elsewhere?

Buying points offsite at VB to use ar WDW means never being able to book anything at 11 months.

And, remember, the resale points won’t be good at VDH, RIV and future resorts. Granted your VDH points can’t be used until 7 months ar WDW either, but at least if you own some there, you can get a head start.

And, as already mentioned, the dues ar VB are quite high so the savings is pretty short term.

 

[wayneham]

sleep around points (SAP)

Excellent feedback, thank you. Especially this bit - I've been reading the forums for weeks and SAP was the only acronym I hadn't decoded yet. What I am taking away: SAP is a reasonable strategy, but VB is not a smart choice for that strategy.

 

[wayneham]

VDH points can’t be used until 7 months ar WDW either,

If I don't have a hard preference for WDW resort, does the 7-month window still put me at a big disadvantage trying to book anything at all? It is probably blasphemous to some here, but we kind of don't care which DVC resort we'd stay at for WDW - we don't expect to visit often. Peak seasons notwithstanding, by the time you get to the 7-month window, is availability usually constrained across the board?