Curious. What is your home resort, how many points, and why....

[Checkers]

450 pts., 300 @OKW and 150 @BWVs. We love both resorts and are loving taking our DD, SIL & 3 DGC with us as well as extended family. That's what it's all about!

 

[VanessainWonderland]

People that have different points at different places....why?

Can you combine these points and have one huge Cruise or anything else? Or would they be separate vacations? Like the 30 points at BWV....What can be done with those?

I guess combine to other points? Does it just give you another option to book 11 months out?

 

[Tink-n-Belle]

180 at BW-- Just love the theming and location to Ecpot and DHS

160 at BLT- for the location and the monorail access

We used to stay where SSR is today, and the bus rides are really long!!! especially to the MK so I wanted to be close to the parks. And now I am super close to 3 parks and can walk to any park anytime I want. I especially love it at closing, its just convenient to be home after the fireworks within 15 minutes vs. battling the crowds and waiting for buses and then dropping off at 5 different stops before ours. IMHO, the buses are really a great feature, but it waste at least an hour of our time between, waiting and riding so it was important for me to be close to the parks.

I haven't stayed at the BLT (I will arrive there 4 months from tomorrow!!!) So I can't comment on the theming, but we have stayed at the Contemporary and being on a monorail line is just so super cool!!! I have always had a fascination for the monorail.

 

[Cinderella1122]

Like a couple of the previous posters I own a small contract that I got from re-sale. I choose AKV because to me it meant accomplishment. When I was younger, my parents had to save for years to take us to Disney. I always wanted to stay at the AKL, but i knew my parents could never afford it. While in college, I started putting aside money to be able to go to Disney and stay at AKL. I finally made that dream happen and I fell in love. After that I knew I couldn't stay any place else. Right after graduation, I got my first full-time job and while my friends got new cars and houses, I purchased a DVC membership at AKV. Last summer, I treated my parents and my siblings to a stay at AKV.

 

[nunzia]

People that have different points at different places....why?

Can you combine these points and have one huge Cruise or anything else? Or would they be separate vacations? Like the 30 points at BWV....What can be done with those?

I guess combine to other points? Does it just give you another option to book 11 months out?

You can combine the points for something like a cruise or at 7 months for any resort. However, if you only have 30 BWV points you can only book those 30 (or 90 if you are using 3 years worth of points) at 11 months even if you have hundreds of points elsewhere. Only that resort's points may be used at 11 months. At 7 months, it all becomes fair game. So, owners have a 4 month booking window priority over non owners for that resort.

 

[VanessainWonderland]

Cinderella, that's an awesome story.

My mom struggles to even get us to Disney when we were kids, but she did it for us all the time. I want my daughter to have everything I didn't (which isn't much , really)

This year I had my mom over at the AKL as well with my daughter. It was awesome to watch them both have fun. Thanks for the input.

 

[Tara]

We own 280 points at BLT.

Why DVC - we go at least 1x per year and have gotten past the "gotta see, gotta do, gotta dine" rush. Even our almost 8yo son is a laid back Disney traveler now! Previously I was all "I don't want a kitchen in my room! I don't want to cook on vacation!" But now I'm all "I don't want to do laundry when I get home" and "I don't want to spend all my time making ADRs or in crowded restaurants." We love the space of our villas and the ability to grab a quick meal. I usually do tacos and spaghetti the first night so we have that to choose from during the week, plus breakfast and sandwich stuff.

Why BLT - it's just our style of resort. The other resorts are great and pretty, but we prefer a more boutique hotel experience and the decor, the location next to MK and the ease of access to some of the restaurants we still enjoy is perfect.

Also, for the record, we initially bought 240 points at AKV but canceled within 10 days. We realized that DVC was right for us but AKV was not and we'd gotten caught up in the moment. We are SO glad we canceled because BLT was announced soon after and we immediately bought in!

 

[wildernessDad]

We own at two home resorts.

VWL - We fell in love with the resort when we stayed at WL. Bought in there when Disney was selling SSR. Didn't go for SSR. 300 points currently at VWL after several add-ons.

AKV - Wife originally wanted to stay at AKL on the above faithful vacation, but commented that she could go on a real African safari at those prices. When it became available to purchase as a DVC resort, we were in. 260 points currently at AKV.

We love the decorations at WL and VWL during the holiday season. We've been vacationing with family there the last few years, utilizing a dedicated 2-bedroom. It does eat up the points so we stay here in a studio to build up the points for the 2-bedroom. We also use VWL points for my wife to go to Orlando every year for a conference. We book OKW with the points at the 7-month mark. I'd like to purchase a 50 point OKW resale contract with a March UY. Our April UY is not really conducive to DW's March trip.

 

[quirty30]

I started out with 360 points at BLT, purchased late in June. We love modern, sleek hotels, so BLT was right up our alley and the location made it that much better. We had our first stay there last weekend and overall, I was quite pleased (but agree with some other posts I've seen that the rooms are already showing some wear in tear in just a few short months since it opened.) I had never stayed at a monorail resort and I was thrilled with the convenience of it.

I already added on 100 points at AKV. Prior to purchasing DVC, we had a concierge level stay at BC, and I really liked the idea of weekend concierge level stay at AKV every year or so. AKV also sounds like a nice "destination" resort - somewhere you can stay and enjoy without ever setting foot in a park. Combine that with CL, and I think you have the makings for a very relaxing escape (and a great contrast to BLT.)

 

[VG9493]

Started with 400 at OKW in 1992, added 100 at BCV, and 100 at SSR. Total of 600 point. Still love OKW after all these years.

 

[eporter66]

Home Resort : SSR
Points : 150

Why : We love WDW, and bought into DVC prior to having our daughter (we planned on having a family). We felt DVC offered a great opportunity to have enjoyable family vacations. We originally bought the 150 after reading the boards and decided that once every 2 years would be great (giving us 300 pts with banking).

As you can see below our plan did not really work as we have been going at least once a year if not more. I guess we are surprised at how far our 150 pts have gone. With some creative borrowing we have still gone every year, had a least a 1 bedroom and once a 2 bedroom.

We love all the resorts, so we were not that concerned with where our home resort was. SSR was fairly cheap at the time we bought ($79 per point). We love SSR but have stayed at OKW, BWV, SSR and soon AKV.

Once our DVC is paid off, we might get more points, but honestly the 150 to this point has worked out great.

 

[twinkle49]

We have 2 home resorts AKV and BWV. When we 1st purchased AKV and SSR were available and for some reason we chose AKV. We never took a tour or anything we did everything over the phone, I think the animals appealed to us for some reason lol. Then 2 summers ago we stayed at BWV and fell in love with it and bought a resale contract. Anyway we have 310 points at AKV and 150 points at BWV. We try to go 2-3 times a year, usually spring break weak since my mom and I both work in the school district and we go again for 2 weeks in the summer and last year and this year we're also going in the Fall!

 

[bobbiwoz]

We are DGP. DGC live in MA, we live in OH, and we have other family in NJ and PA. Coming to FL or Cape May NJ works the best for us for all inclusive family vacations. We have picked our home resorts as ones that have something special that we like and when we book, I like to know what we're going to get 11 months out. We have sometimes changed resorts at 7 months, but for the most part, we own and book where we want to stay. One time we changed because at 11 months out I booked a GV at BWV as part of our 40th anniversary celebration, (the other part was a Beach Cottage at VB) but my heart has always felt the VWL was more like home, so at 7 months out, I went with VWL.

Our resorts:
BWV 250
VWL 200
BCV 190
VB 150 - we like the Beach Cottages a LOT. We also book some other inn rooms for DFriends/family
AKV 140

We have bid on a SSR resale, and if we get it, we'll have 100 SSR. These will be primarily for a treehouse stay, every 2nd or 3rd year. I'm not sure if I could hoard the points, but it would be wonderful to get a GV at SSR once!

Bobbi

PS. We've owned for 6 years and we've accumulated these points a few at a time.

 

[mrsR123]

I picked up a re-sale of an original 230 point OKW contract in 2004. That amount of points is just about right, although 250 would be nice. I really like the size and relaxed feel of OKW, and with three kids, the extra space and low point requirements were perfect for us. We always stay in a 2BR.

We've been "home" pretty much every other year, and traveled to other great places in between: Hershey/Gettysburg, Yellowstone/Teton, Williamsburg/beach, Washington D.C.

 

[ToddyLu]

Wanted my points for years, finally talked DH into it. He loves photography, no children (didn't really need a monorail resort)and our home is the dark decor similar to AKV...so it was a no-brainer for us. We purchased our 210 points just this past June our first trip will be in 3 weeks. Why 210...when looking at the financing 210 was about the same as 200, so we bought an extra night.

 

[Ms. WDW]

We have two home resorts; Boardwalk Villas with 300 points and SSR with 600 points. We bought the BWV contract back in 1998 when our son was young. Then SSR came along in 2006 for a change of scenery for "Mom and Dad" when DS doesn't want to come. Unfortunately our son, who turned 20 today isn't the Disney Nut. It's me!!!

Well my hustand and I sat down one evening and started to think about our retirement and ran some numbers. We realized that if we added another 300 to SSR, along with the 300 at the BW, when we retire we could spend anywhere from 6-8 weeks in WDW during these cold NY winter months!!! Now, the time spent in WDW all depends on what month we choose, what size room and how much the points go up over the next 5 years!!! But we do have a plan and I'm totally psyched at the though!!!

 

[Tiger926]

SSR 175 and AKV 125 points = 300 total points.

We bought at SSR as that was the only new resort that Disney was selling. We like SSR, and used to spend lots of time at Downtown Disney, but no so much anymore as it's a bit more of a difficult resort to stay at with young children. We much prefer Boardwalk or Beach Club as we spend most of our time in the Epcot area. Our other favourite area is Magic Kingdom, but BLT is too costly for buying points, as well as using points, so despite always dreaming of owing there (we love staying at the Contemporary), this probably won't be happening.

We bought at AKV as we love it there! We all enjoy the resort immensely, but again, with it being farther away, it is difficult to negotiate with the kids for midday naps and such, so we always plan split stays in which we stay at AKV for 3-4 days. We only do AK during this time, as we are right there!

We would love to sell our SSR points, but this is not possible since with CDN exchange, our SSR points cost us $123.50/point. Ouch! So, we cannot buy in at BWV or BCV as we would like. We always do split stays, so we utilize our 11 month windows at both resorts, and then make switches at the 7 month window as we go for 2 weeks each July, and there is always something available for us. If not, then we would be happy at SSR and AKV, it just means we have to adjust our schedules, rent a car, etc.

Tiger

 

[Simba's Mom]

We own at 3 resorts, here's what and why-

1. OKW, 210 points for a 1 BR every year
2. BCV, 100 points for a studio for me to go solo every fall.
3. HHI, 50 points so we can stay for Thanksgiving on points every other year. Actually we go there every year-alternate years on points, alternate years on MC (very inexpensive in November)

Why did we join to begin with? DH and I have different reasons. For me, you say Disney and I want it. Own a piece of Disney? Oh, yeah!
For DH, he got sick of giving back vacation days every year because he was such a workaholic, he didn't take all his vacation. This seemed a way to force him to vacation (and it's worked!). The other reason he "wanted" to join was to stay happily married

 

[edk35]

Like a couple of the previous posters I own a small contract that I got from re-sale. I choose AKV because to me it meant accomplishment. When I was younger, my parents had to save for years to take us to Disney. I always wanted to stay at the AKL, but i knew my parents could never afford it. While in college, I started putting aside money to be able to go to Disney and stay at AKL. I finally made that dream happen and I fell in love. After that I knew I couldn't stay any place else. Right after graduation, I got my first full-time job and while my friends got new cars and houses, I purchased a DVC membership at AKV. Last summer, I treated my parents and my siblings to a stay at AKV.

HOW SWEET!!!!

 

[Gowahoowa]

210 VWL- the only MK DVC resort at the time and we have always loved the Lodge!!
50 BLT (add on)- proximity to MK.

We love our DVC and hope to add on more in the future!