Convincing the DW

[erikthewise]

I know what you mean by "breakeven point", and I have a spreadsheet I can send you that addresses that point. Just email or pm me.

My spreadsheet says you pay off your membership within 10-15 years depending on certain parameters. That's in comparison with discounted deluxe resort expenses or renting points, which are roughly the same cost.

After your first stay, you will know you did the right thing, and the spreadsheet won't matter any more. But you need to get to that point first.

 

[CaptainMidnight]

My suggestion is to rent points from the Rent/Trade board for your next vacation accomodation at either Wilderness Lodge Villas or Beach Club Villas and let the accomodations do the selling for you. Try it out to see if you like it before you buy.

 

[Always Grumpy]

Thanks everyone. I will keep you posted.

Always Grumpy

 

[Dancind]

When you figure your costs for your DW, make sure to incorporate the savings of eating at least one meal per day in the room. And make sure to mention that you would be more than happy to do the cooking! Diana

 

[Sharper]

Originally posted by erikthewise
My spreadsheet says you pay off your membership within 10-15 years depending on certain parameters. That's in comparison with discounted deluxe resort expenses or renting points, which are roughly the same cost.

Whoa, that will probably scare off his DW! Not trying to be critical, but I feel sure that it won't take us 15 years to break even. Perhaps if you compared it to getting great discounts on rooms (which is not a given) and financing at a high rate of interest (which I can't tolerate), staying mostly weekend or other more expensive DVC nights or whatever, but if I honestly felt it would take 15 years to break even I just don't know that we would have purchased. There are entirely too many factors and variations to try to calculate, and perhaps my situation is different, but I just wanted to note that it is possible to break even before your projected time, hopefully before it got someone upset and they either decided not to buy or began regretting their purchase.

 

[erikthewise]

If you want to feel good, you can compare joining DVC against paying cash rack rates to stay in the same rooms. Then it only takes 6-7 years to break even, by which I mean you've saved the cost of your initial purchase plus interest, i.e. paid off the loan through savings in room costs.

However I think that's unrealistic. It makes more sense to compare against renting points, or against paying for what you would otherwise pay for accommodations (in our case, discounted deluxe resorts). That does take about 11-12 years in my personal case, at the price we paid and the interest rate we currently have.

Of course there are many ways to do the accounting, some kind of flaky and some no doubt more expert than my own.

 

[OKWKirt]

Always Grumpy, and all, sorry if this is a little long but I'm pasting below my records. Some may enjoy it. When we take our normal 7-9 day trip in June I will be at a -$435 and if we go in October I will be in the black. That makes it 6 years payoff after my initial purchase and includes the add on in 1999. I didn't include interest my money could have made because it wasn't going towards investing anyway. I see I didn't include the interest on financing through Disney which was $660 for the add on and I'm not sure about the initial purchase because I paid it off in one year and don't have those records with me. So you could say it may have added part of one more year. I used rack rates that I would have paid staying in these wonderful accomodations.

Like I said in a previous reply, before I joined I used two comparisons for payoff. One using rack DVC rates and one using moderate resort rates (where we used to stay). During that process I calculated 5 years payoff using rack DVC ratres and 8 years using moderate rates. As you can see I wasn't far off. Without the add-on purchase I would have met my 5 year calculation. Now look at how many years I will have with only the maintenance fees.

Date Action $+/- Balance
7/97 Purchase 220 pts - 12,500 -12,500
10/97 OKW 4 nights studio +896 -11,604
97 Maint fees - 324 - 11,928

5/98 OKW 10 nights studio +2,530 -9,398
11/98 Big Cedar Lodge +667 -8,731
98 Maint fees -637 -9,368

5/99 OKW 9 nights 2 bdrm +4,320 -5,048
99 Maint fees -687 -5,735
12/99 Purchase 100 pts -6,000 -11,735

4/00 Big Cedar Lodge +1,200 -10,535
6/00 OKW 9 nights 1 bdrm +3,015 -7,520
00 Maint fees -1,004 -8,524
12/00 Wilderness Lodge +685 -7,839

6/01 VB 2 nights Inn room +450 -7,389
6/01 OKW 8 nights 1 bdrm +2,555 -4,834
01 Maint fees -976 -5,810
10/01 OKW 4 nights 2 bdrm +2,100 3,710

02 Maint fees -1,020 4,730
6/02 OKW 3 nights 1 bdrm +1,125 3,605
10/02 OKW 3 nights 2 bdrm +1,635 1,970

 

[OKWKirt]

I just noticed my records came through without the spacing I had. It is supposed to be four columns: Date, action recorded, a $+ or $-, and the balance. Hope this helps if it looks confusing.