Best UY for us

[yekcoh_99]

We would like your opinion's on what the best UY date would be for us. We're also not understanding the points system 100% yet. We're planning on buying 150 points at BCV and may have years where we'll want to take advantage of borrowing points in order to get larger rooms and have family. We would want to take advantage of the 11 month booking and would want to book for Feb vacation. Would we need to have a March UY in order to take advantage of booking all the rooms/dates we want for Feb? Thank you for taking the time to answer us.

 

[Inkmahm]

We would like your opinion's on what the best UY date would be for us. We're also not understanding the points system 100% yet. We're planning on buying 150 points at BCV and may have years where we'll want to take advantage of borrowing points in order to get larger rooms and have family. We would want to take advantage of the 11 month booking and would want to book for Feb vacation. Would we need to have a March UY in order to take advantage of booking all the rooms/dates we want for Feb? Thank you for taking the time to answer us.

Definitely not. A March UY would mean you are always taking vacation in your 11th month and you need to bank by the end of your 8th month. I'd say December UY would be great for you.

 

[Sandisw]

Your UY is simply the time that your points become "active". It in no way affects when you book. Regardless of your UY, you can always book 11 months out for vacations--in your case, you will always be able to book in March for Feb vacations.

Typically, having a UY that falls right before you travel can be a good thing as it allows flexibility in what you can do with the points if you have to borrow points for the trip, or change/cancel your trip (at least 31 days out--if you cancel/change the trip with less than that, something different happens to the points).

You can "bank" your points within the first 8 months of your UY. So for Feb vacations, you would want a UY that happens in the fall. Dec UY would be the best (gives you until July 31st to bank), but Aug/Sept/Oct would also work out.

When you call to book a reservation, MS looks to see what points you will have available at the time you travel (not when you book). To pay for a trip, you can use "banked" points from the previous UY, current UY points, and borrowed UY points.

For example, say you had a Dec UY for 150 points. You want to travel in Feb, 2011 and use 400 points.

Since this trip would fall in your Dec 2010 UY (which runs from Dec 1, 2010 - Nov 30, 2011), you could pay for it by "banking" the 150 points from Dec UY 09 into Dec UY 2010, 150 2010 UY points, and then borrowing from 100 points from your Dec 2011 UY.

 

[DisneyWalker44]

Don't overthink use year. Folks here are real helpful and will give you complicated scenarios where one use year is better than the other. But those scenarios are rare. And the use year that seems good for one trip ends up being lousy for another.

If you know you are only going to be traveling in February for the 35 years you'll own DVC, then it's worth going after an ideal use year. Otherwise, I'd just say avoid March and April and don't worry about it. Find the best contract you can. Whatever use year it has, that's the best use year for you.

 

[yekcoh_99]

Thanks that was great.

 

[toniosmom]

I have a December UY. I like it because I know by July 31st (my banking deadline) whether or not I will be traveling by December 1st of that year. I think most of my trips will be in the Spring when I've about had it with winter and am ready for some Floriday sunshine.

But that's how it works for ME. The previous poster is right -- don't make too much out the UY. The only time I concerned myself with UY is when I was adding on additional points. I wanted to make sure I had the same use year. I didn't want to have to deal with which contract needed to be banked by when. I can bank them all at once.

Whatever you do, there is one thing for certain. You will enjoy your membership!!!

 

[DebbieB]

Points don't "deposit" when the use year starts, they are already there. I have an April use year. If I look at my account online, I have points showing for April 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 use years. When you make a reservation, they look at which use year the date of stay falls into and use the appropriate points.

 

[Disney MAINEiac]

we tend to travel in Feb and have a Feb UY. this allows us the most time possible to rebook should we need to cancel a trip in Feb for some reason.

 

[Inkmahm]

we tend to travel in Feb and have a Feb UY. this allows us the most time possible to rebook should we need to cancel a trip in Feb for some reason.

We have October as our UY. We travel in October, December and March to WDW. My banking deadline of May 31 is perfect for us as I will never travel to WDW during June, July, August or September. It is way too hot for me during those months. I will always know by the end of May if I need to bank points or not.

 

[snowhyte]

We have October as our UY. We travel in October, December and March to WDW. My banking deadline of May 31 is perfect for us as I will never travel to WDW during June, July, August or September. It is way too hot for me during those months. I will always know by the end of May if I need to bank points or not.

I am looking at buying resale and thought October would work best. My travel months are basically the same as yours, so good to know I have this figured out right!

 

[yekcoh_99]

Thanks! We just had our offer accepted for a BCV resale and will be on pins and needles until closing. We ended up going with a resale with a Feb UY after reading the various responses and speaking with our agent. Thanks again for everyone's help. We are anxious to say we're DVC Owners!!!

 

[Disney MAINEiac]

Thanks! We just had our offer accepted for a BCV resale and will be on pins and needles until closing. We ended up going with a resale with a Feb UY after reading the various responses and speaking with our agent. Thanks again for everyone's help. We are anxious to say we're DVC Owners!!!

sending your way. BTW BCV is wonderful, best of luck