Buying Resale - Confusion on my part

[Charles Marshall]

New to the forum, and trying to learn as much as I can. Sorry if already been answered, but I cannot find it anywhere. We are looking at purchasing a membership, and are looking at resale vs direct. I am trying to understand more about resale. I understand that you cannot use point on Disney Cruise Line voyages, Adventures by Disney, and non DVC hotels such as the Disneyland Hotel, Disney's Polynesian Resort in Florida and a few others. So, basically you can use them at DVC club hotels at Disney World, but they have to be a DVC hotel. If I bought resale, I could book at Aulani, Boardwalk, Beach Club, etc. Correct? Just a little confused if you can never use them at a Disney resort, or you can use them on a resort that is specifically designated a Vacation Club hotel.
Thanks in advance.

 

[disneynutz]

You can use your resale points at all DVC resorts and for RCI trades. Spend a few weeks reading and learning here, you will be glad you did.

Bill

 

[suebeelin]

Yes. If you buy resale or direct you can book at your home resort at the 11mo mark, any of the dvc hotels at the 7mo mark.

For example, I own at Boardwalk and bay lake. I bought resale for both. I can book 11mo ahead of time (usually important during the times I go to Disney-- December). However, at the 7mo mark, I can try to switch to another dvc hotel, such as poly or animal kingdom.

Some dvc hotels are very tough to get into at the 7mo mark (grand Floridian, beach club, grand Californian), others are tough depending on the time of year (wilderness during Xmas, Boardwalk during food and wine).

Basically your assessment is correct. However, the poly has a dvc section that opened up this year so you CAN use your dvc points there.

The restrictions on resale do not bother most people. These options are not very cost effective anyway.

Sorry, trying to put kids to bed so can't be very detailed...

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

If I bought resale, I could book at Aulani, Boardwalk, Beach Club, etc. Correct? Just a little confused if you can never use them at a Disney resort, or you can use them on a resort that is specifically designated a Vacation Club hotel.
Thanks in advance.

For many of the Deluxe accommodations at WDW there is both a hotel side and the timeshare side. So, the DVC timeshare locations you could stay at include Boardwalk Villas (vs Boardwalk Inn), Beach Club Villas (vs Beach Club), Bay Lake Tower (Vs Contemporary Resort), Polynesian Villas and Bungalows (vs Polynesian Village Resort), Villas at Wilderness Lodge (vs Wilderness Lodge) etc.......

So, with resale you cannot trade in to stay at any of the Disney owned hotels but you can stay at any of the DVC resorts or sections if you prefer to refer to it that way.

DVC resorts are:
Aulani
Villas at Disney's Grand Californian
Villas at Disney's Wilderness Lodge,
Animal Kingdom Villas (both Jambo house and Kidani)
Beach Club Villas
Boardwalk Villas
Saratoga Springs
Old Key West
Bay Lake Tower
Villas at Grand Floridian
Polynesian Villas and Bungalows
Vero Beach
Hilton Head

Plus you can still trade into RCI and Buena Vista Trading Co but really the value of DVC is in staying at DVC resorts.

 

[Charles Marshall]

so.... Sounds like I really need to consider resale.

 

[disneynutz]

so.... Sounds like I really need to consider resale.

If you want to save a few thousand dollars!

Bill

 

[Charles Marshall]

Also good for non-Disney location?

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

Also good for non-Disney location?

As I mentioned above:

"...you can still trade into RCI and Buena Vista Trading Co but really the value of DVC is in staying at DVC resorts."

You could not trade into the Disney Collection nor the Concierge Collection. But DVC points are easily rented and in most cases you can rent and then pay cash for any of these and still have some $$$$'s left over. Best advice is to not buy DVC to trade as there are other less expensive options for that. Many consider that DVC did a lot of owners a favor when they added the restrictions as it removed the possibility of using points on expensive options.

 

[Charles Marshall]

Sorry. Not familiar with the rci terminology, but figured it out .

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

Sorry. Not familiar with the rci terminology, but figured it out .

Disney places both RCI and Buena Vista Trading under the "World Collection" umbrella.

Buena Vista trades into Club Cordial and Intrawest resorts - or at least some of them. I'm not familiar enough with those two timeshares to say if it covers all their resorts but there are currently 5 Club Cordial and 8 Intrawest on the list.

 

[MsTessP]

For the restrictions options mentioned above, many resale owners just take the extra step of renting their points (going rate = $11/pt) and then use that cash for those options. The added bonus is that they usually come out head financially by doing so. Many direct owners are now taking that step as well because it is usually such a good deal.

 

[jerseyduke]

Speaking pragmatically there is really only 1 situation in which buying direct makes much sense, and that is if you specifically want to buy at the Polynesian.
1. The resale market is limited, and it offers very little discount (but it does offer some), but you have to pick from what is available. Buying direct you can pick how many points, and what UY)
2. Buying direct is a lot faster than buying resale.

So for poly, you pay similar amounts, resale somewhat cheaper.

Buying anything other than the Polynesian, resale is a much better value.

While I suggest knowing the difference, however, even if the resale points were totally restricted (no RCI or ANYTHING), as long as you can rent the points out (and are willing to do so), you are covered.

As alluded to, in virtually every case, if you were to get the going rate for point rental, and use that cash to pay for whatever you were going to switch your DVC points to (cruise, adventures by disney, etc) you would come out with change in your pocket!

And even if you lost a little every time you rented your points to switch, it would probably never erode the savings from buying resale.

While your question is totally legit, I think how Use Year affects things is a much more important concept often ignored by new buyers.

 

[Dean]

so.... Sounds like I really need to consider resale.

You lose NOTHING of value buying resale. Just compared price and options for the home resort you judge to be best.

 

[suebeelin]

Unless you have your heart set on the Polynesian long term, resale is the best bet.

Just an FYI - I just posted on tug to find out info about the Atlantis harborside timeshare, as I figure it may be similar to dvc. Someone reached out to me to trade my bay lake for his Atlantis timeshare in the fall 2017 or 2018.

The harborside timeshare also has crazy dues-- I think his 2bd for a week in the fall season runs over $3k/yr. He's ok trading for a 1bd in October, so about $1500 in fees for bay lake.

So, you don't have to go through Rci-- dvc is in demand so you can probably find a private owner to trade!