Benefits of a guaranteed week?

mickey10171

Earning My Ears
Joined
Apr 28, 2021
my husband and i were about to make the plunge into RIV direct. however I've been noticing this week that alot of people are recommending guaranteed weeks if buying direct from RIV, but im not really sure i understand what the benefit is to a guaranteed week? Sorry to repeat, TIA!
 
If you want to use your points at RIV during a busy time and typically do a 7 night stay, the guaranteed week can be a great benefit as you don’t have to worry about fighting with other owners for the room.

You do pay a 10% premium for it, but that is based on the initial chart so with some recent changes, it may not be that different.

If you cancel it, you get the points to use as normal.

I considered it but we never do a 7 night stay at the same place so I just bought my RIV points as always.
 
? For those that picked up a fix week, and now the points for the same stay went down, do they get a refund. Do the dues go down or are they just stuck with the higher cost for the stay + dues?
 
? For those that picked up a fix week, and now the points for the same stay went down, do they get a refund. Do the dues go down or are they just stuck with the higher cost for the stay + dues?
You do not get a refund same as you are not expected to have to buy more points if the charts went up. It is the risk you take.
 


? For those that picked up a fix week, and now the points for the same stay went down, do they get a refund. Do the dues go down or are they just stuck with the higher cost for the stay + dues?

You could cancel your fixed week and book it back for cheaper. You're never stuck with the fixed week. If you canceled and rebooked even that first year, you'd save 10%. That's the whole point, you paid 10% for the priority, which you don't have to use.

Dues are just based on how many points you used. The FW costs for that stay on the original chart + 10%. For VGF, some weeks already cost much more.

The question I never got answered was what chart it was based on for sold out resorts. They are selling FWs now for Poly and VGF, but it's not clear to me how they are priced.
 
Can you explain restrictions for rental?
I know a 7 night stay that begins on a Sunday is not allowed to be rented ? Is that correct? Any other issues to be aware of ? Thanks
 
You could cancel your fixed week and book it back for cheaper. You're never stuck with the fixed week. If you canceled and rebooked even that first year, you'd save 10%. That's the whole point, you paid 10% for the priority, which you don't have to use.

Dues are just based on how many points you used. The FW costs for that stay on the original chart + 10%. For VGF, some weeks already cost much more.

The question I never got answered was what chart it was based on for sold out resorts. They are selling FWs now for Poly and VGF, but it's not clear to me how they are priced.
My understanding is that it is based upon the current point charts. If people are buying fixed weeks for a popular time period there is no guarantee when they cancel the room will still be there when they try and rebook.
 


Can you explain restrictions for rental?
I know a 7 night stay that begins on a Sunday is not allowed to be rented ? Is that correct? Any other issues to be aware of ? Thanks

To clarify:

While fixed weeks (Sunday to Sunday) are not allowed to be rented here on the DISboard's Rent/Trade Board, brokers and other websites may allow it. So if you really want a fixed week, there are rental options available.
 
The 10% premium for fixed weeks is based on the cost of the week the year the resort opened. So changes in point charts will affect the cost of the week you purchase. FWs are especially beneficial if you are looking for a week during Fall Frenzy or Spring Break.

For example, I purchased FWs at CCV in Studios for week 44 (special runDisney Food & Wine week), week 47 (Thanksgiving most years) and week 48 (first week of holiday season). Each of these weeks cost 118 points to purchase, which was a 10% premium when CCV opened (as those weeks cost 107 points then). In 2022, those same weeks cost 115, 126, and 121 respectively. If I were to use all 3 in 2022, I would "save" 8 points (and only pay a premium of 3 points instead of 11 points on my week 44). If I cancel, however, I only get back the points the FW cost me (118).

The CCV RunDisney events, btw, correspond with the runDisney races, and give special benefits for those races, such as advanced registration. Additionally, they are the ONLY FW that can move its check-in date, which is one reason we got it.

I was tempted to buy Week 48 at RIV, which would have cost 120 points for a Standard Studio to buy the FW, but is 116 to book (so the premium is only 4 points) or Week 52 at RIV, which is 196 points to buy but 209 points to book in 2022.

I highly recommend this thread from a while back on the benefits of FWs:
https://www.disboards.com/threads/all-about-fixed-weeks-riv-ccv-aul-vgf-poly-charts.3806985/
 
If you can find a fixed week that's fairly close to the number of points you want, there's really no downside to getting the fixed week. You're not paying a premium per point, you're paying a premium on the number of points needed to book that week before the 11 month window opens.

So say you're looking to buy 200 points. If there's a fixed week that's 178 points per the chart, that week would cost 10% more as a fixed week or 196 points. If you're OK with purchasing 196 vs 200, it's not costing you anything to have the option of the fixed week. It doesn't matter if you cancel the fixed reservation every single year. You'd get the 196 points to use as you please. If you can find a popular week that fits your point needs, that makes it even better from both the potential to actually using it or renting it.
 
If you can find a fixed week that's fairly close to the number of points you want, there's really no downside to getting the fixed week.
There is for us. We like to schedule our "annual" trips 50 - 51 weeks apart so that we can use the same annual pass for two "annual" vacations. A fixed week makes that unworkable.
 
Sorry if I missed it, but isn’t it true that fixed weeks aren’t eligible for incentives?
 
There is for us. We like to schedule our "annual" trips 50 - 51 weeks apart so that we can use the same annual pass for two "annual" vacations. A fixed week makes that unworkable.

So, you just cancel it, and don't use it that year or ever. There's no downside to just cashing out the points. I never plan to use mine, I just got it for resale.

If you're buying direct points anyway, and there's a FW that would work with your point count, I don't see why you wouldn't do it.
 
If you want a standard room during any of the fall/winter holidays, purchase a fixed week. Best DVC purchase I’ve made. I own week 49 at CCV. We have used it every year ( except last year due to Covid) and will stay again this December. I really like the Sun to Sun reservation week.
 
If you want a standard room during any of the fall/winter holidays, purchase a fixed week. Best DVC purchase I’ve made. I own week 49 at CCV. We have used it every year ( except last year due to Covid) and will stay again this December. I really like the Sun to Sun reservation week.
I was just thinking the same thing the other day that our fixed week is probably going to end up being our best DVC purchase and I haven’t even used my fixed week yet. We were able to get the incentives so I paid only $176 a point for our RIV fixed week at then end of March. You have 50 years to choose to use it or not but it’s nice to have the convenience to use it and vacation patterns can change so much over that time. My fixed week (52) right now no longer has a 10% point premium. I think a fixed week is great if you want a studio but if you want a one bedroom or bigger those contracts can become too big to sell because they have so many points in a single contract.
 
We considered it, but didn't really make sense for us. There may be a few years where we stay a week in a studio, but more likely, we are typically going to be staying 4 nights in a 1br combined with something else (e.g., disney cruise, universal, beach trip). For that to work, we really needed something between the cost of a guaranteed week in a studio and the cost of a week in a 1br. If we went with the GW, that would require a lot of banking and borrowing gymnastics. Ultimately, made more sense for us to get the right amount of points we wanted for the kind of stay we wanted.
 
I went ahead with a fixed week. I initially was adding on a few less points. Had broke the payments up over a couple months to ease to pain of paying for it. I tried to make a ressie for a standard view studio a day after the 11 month availability came up and I was shut out. I wait listed and it still has not filled. I know right now is different because of Covid and pent up points. With all the point reallocations the past couple years, current borrowing restrictions and limited standard view availability for Riveria, I thought it best to up the purchase, forget about the bank and borrow method and just go with a fixed week. I was able to make the change because the contract had not closed yet. I got the lower pricing and better discount because I had initiated the process prior to the price increase. Who knows what the future will bring but at least I'm protected if I want to use the assigned week. My kids will hopefully take the contract someday but if not, the fixed week hopefully stands a better chance of selling someday if needed.
 
I went ahead with a fixed week. I initially was adding on a few less points. Had broke the payments up over a couple months to ease to pain of paying for it. I tried to make a ressie for a standard view studio a day after the 11 month availability came up and I was shut out. I wait listed and it still has not filled. I know right now is different because of Covid and pent up points. With all the point reallocations the past couple years, current borrowing restrictions and limited standard view availability for Riveria, I thought it best to up the purchase, forget about the bank and borrow method and just go with a fixed week. I was able to make the change because the contract had not closed yet. I got the lower pricing and better discount because I had initiated the process prior to the price increase. Who knows what the future will bring but at least I'm protected if I want to use the assigned week. My kids will hopefully take the contract someday but if not, the fixed week hopefully stands a better chance of selling someday if needed.
Congrats!!! I think you made a fantastic decision. You wont believe how stress free you will be knowing you will always have that week. And you will have plenty of time to think about cancelling it should you want to just use the points. Great price too!! What fixed week did you get? Standard view?
 
There is lots of benefits the biggest being you have a fall back guarantee of a reservation and possibly that is a benefit if you ever do sell.

Check my signature have a fixed week thread with a bunch of info.

Ask away happy to answer questions.
 

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