Aulani Prices in Resale Huge Drop.....Why?

[NickBCV]

I am trying to pick up points at a value for an April use year and I am seeing Aulani points in the $88-$90 range. This is unreal given what Disney was selling these for just last year. Why the crater in pricing?

Is buying in to Aulani a bad move at these prices...will these continue to crash and we will be stuck if we want to sell in say 5 years?

 

[supersnoop]

The resale price has been pretty steady for the past few years. Disney has continued to raise direct prices, but resale for Aulani hasn’t moved much. On-site resorts tend to draw more demand.

 

[NickBCV]

I may be confusing what Disney was selling for with resale prices. I guess Aulani is the new Hilton Head or Vero Beach....low resale cost but high annual dues.

 

[ziravan]

1. It's an expensive place to get to for many.

For example, from Texas I can fly to MCO many times for under $250. To fly to Aulani is something like $1250 pp.

2. Anybody familiar with resale is probably also familiar with the increasing difficulty booking at 7 months.

Buying Aulani to get home resort there while planning to use 7 month window sometimes as WDW isn't as workable as it used to be.

3. The people on the West Coast that might be more interested in going to Aulani are many times better off making the much more difficult to book VGC their home resort and booking Aulani at 7 months.

 

[sndral]

There are lots of time shares in Hawaii, so there's a lot of competition.
Oahu, while nice, is not the first choice of islands to visit for many repeat visitors and the most likely buyers are west coast people and most of us have visited Hawaii at least a few times. In my own case, I'll only spend time on Oahu if I'm going w/ someone who's not been so they can have exposure to Waikiki before we head to Maui, Kauai or the big island and Aulani is a long way from Waikiki.
That said, my brother stayed at Aulani a year and a half ago and really liked it, so I may give it a try.

 

[CaliAdventurer]

Aulani is amazing. We are on the west coast so we have both coasts but the other post isn’t true. From Seattle it costs us $500 pp to get to WDW but 900-1500 to get to Hawaii. Oahu is the best island and underrated. Has it all. Natural beauty, wave beaches, and city and shopping.

It is increasingly difficult to get 7mos and the value vs rack is better than WDW by far. If you want hotel rooms, or Xmas week, you must own. Though the price is low resale, it is a point intensive resort so you need more points in the first place. If you want an ocean view prepare to pay. If you want 7 mos at high demand times including summer, be prepared to accept Oceanview or pool at minimum.

 

[ELMC]

Aulani falls into the same category as HH and VB. The other DVC resorts are timeshares located at Walt Disney World (or Disneyland). Aulani, VB and HH are just timeshares. The Disney name may add a slight bump, but not nearly the bump that the Disney parks add.

 

[crisi]

Hawaii is expensive to get to, it is an overbuilt timeshare market, and Oahu is not everyone's favorite island. Its like buying DVC on site, but you are restricted to the park closest to your home resort. For some people VAKL will be their choice, but more people are going to be looking to the MK or Epcot resorts.

Hawaii has lots of nice timeshares as well.

 

[sndral]

Aulani is amazing. ..From Seattle it costs us $500 pp to get to WDW but 900-1500 to get to Hawaii...

Your Seattle/MCO flights are in line w/ our west coast flights although I've noticed that my son's LAX/MCO flights tend to cost about $100 less than my SFO/MCO flights - his are usually around $400 round trip and mine closer to $500 (non stops early Dec usually.)
But SFO/HNL are usually around $400 - significantly less than what you have from Seattle, yikes, Seattle's Hawaii numbers are what I'd expect to pay to get to regional Europian airports or Australia

 

[ScubaCat]

On-site resorts tend to draw more demand.

The Disney name may add a slight bump, but not nearly the bump that the Disney parks add.

+1 to this sentiment. The Disney name means very little, IMHO, unless you're near one of the theme parks.

 

[CaliAdventurer]

Last December we paid 900 some odd and this year I was dismayed that we had to pay 1400 and that was maybe 5 mos before and the planes were already filling up for the outbound flight with hardly 4 seats together anywhere. We could have paid a little less if we were willing to connect in LA but that’s crazy. Funnily, the cheapest option, $750 I think- was to fly hours to Anchorage and THEN to HNL! I guess that’s good mileage : )

Last April, I think we paid between 7-800 maybe but hardly ever any good deals. I think Seattleites love some Hawaii vacation out of the rain!

We just booked London for End of June for 750! Madness the arbitrary pricing. I do think the airfare will effect our use of DVC points in future. But then again, you don’t need Park tickets and going to Costco and getting food isn’t a big deal so idk, I’d have to add it up. The transfer from HNL is a couple hundred too. Hmmm.

Your Seattle/MCO flights are in line w/ our west coast flights although I've noticed that my son's LAX/MCO flights tend to cost about $100 less than my SFO/MCO flights - his are usually around $400 round trip and mine closer to $500 (non stops early Dec usually.)
But SFO/HNL are usually around $400 - significantly less than what you have from Seattle, yikes, Seattle's Hawaii numbers are what I'd expect to pay to get to regional Europian airports or Australia

 

[TexasChick123]

Your Seattle/MCO flights are in line w/ our west coast flights although I've noticed that my son's LAX/MCO flights tend to cost about $100 less than my SFO/MCO flights - his are usually around $400 round trip and mine closer to $500 (non stops early Dec usually.)
But SFO/HNL are usually around $400 - significantly less than what you have from Seattle, yikes, Seattle's Hawaii numbers are what I'd expect to pay to get to regional Europian airports or Australia

It costs about $400-$450 for us to fly to SFO from Houston. We can get to LAX for $200-$300 consistently. I don't know why SFO is so much more, but it is.

 

[PSUDinsey]

I own at Aulani and I love it in hindsight do I wish I bought at VGC perhaps but I am tryIng to buy a small direct contract there. I was able to buy a subsidized contact which at the time has the lowest MFs of all resorts. Depending on how you travel it could work for you - low buy in long contract low MFs if you find a subsidized contract. I still see some out there and they are only demanding a dollar or two more per point.

 

[disneynutz]

Supply and demand, when demand is low, so are the prices.

Bill

 

[limace]

1400 from Seattle? We are in Oregon-i think once our airfare was $1200 but that was smack over Oregon Christmas break-other than that, $300-$500 nonstop to Maui is much more common.

I am excited to visit Aulani someday but much prefer Maui to Oahu. Not a fan of the huge city, and the island things we like to do-mainly snorkel, but also relatively mellow beaches-we find to be better on Maui.

 

[jamiecarr@dvcstore]

Sharing the opinion of someone who has been selling Aulani resale contracts since they first came on the market, I feel there are a few things causing the prices not to be as high. The first is, the appeal of that particular resort for a home resort is truly for those who live on the West Coast or in Hawaii. As others have said the cost and flight time is prohibitive for those on the East Coast who can fly to WDW within a few hours and for a lot less money. The second thing is, Aulani is a larger resort, with less competition for reservations, so it is easier to find availability under 7 months, not making it as high of a need to own points at that resort.

Unless you have a member that is planning to travel to that resort often, needs a higher demand time of year, specific type villa or view, then most members can find and book availability under 7 months, for the minimal amount of times that they will visit the resort. I have been to Aulani and it is amazing, I would love to go back, but the fact that I booked easily under 7 months for 2 villas, would let me know that for the few more trips I may make there, I do not need to own at Aulani or book over 7 months.

 

[Littlelulu01]

Aulani also costs more to buy and sell. Hawaii tacks on a 5% tax for the seller. Seller has to then apply for refund on the tax if they take a loss. Closing costs for buyer are also higher and the process can take longer.

I wonder why the mf’s increased so much for next year. We own some Aulani. I think their resale prices have remained steady. They are worth half direct pricing today but the direct pricing has increased immensely since they started selling Aulani. It being a non park property and such high mf’s, it’s just not as desirable a home resort to own unless you only want for high demand times.

Oahu appeals to us for this next trip because it’s under 6 hours flight for everyone including kids in Alaska and it’s direct flight for everyone. We visit the islands at least annually and have never paid 1k per person from Seattle. Delta sometimes has less expensive airfare but Alaska airlines visa allows Hawaii for the companion fare and delta Amex doesn’t.

 

[Wakey]

Think yourselves lucky, from U.K. it’s an 18 hour flight and costs about $2k a ticket in the school vacations. One day

 

[hayesdvc]

I can never remember the huge quantity of resale contracts for a DVC resort prior to the resort selling out as Aulani. As this thread discusses, did the people that purchased direct not realize the cost to get to the resort? Really?

 

[OKW Lover]

I see some comments here about the overbuilt timeshare market in Hawaii. Living in Orlando I'd be willing to bet that its just as "overbuilt".