Different Use Year Add On?

[disneylover81]

I’m only 1 year into owning DVC. Is it very confusing to have different UY’s at the same resort? I’m really struggling with what to do. Currently have 175 points with Feb UY at VGF. Thinking about taking advantage of the Add-on incentives with magical beginnings.

DH and I will go to WDW in May 2024 for our anniversary, needing 74 points. We plan to go to Aulani next year for maybe 5 nights in Sept or Oct. and will need a 2 bedroom for 8 of us in all. Thinking island garden view. So we will need 245 points. This may be a one time only trip or may not be so I don’t want to factor my whole decision into this specific Aulani trip.

Which would be best? I hope I make sense with my question. This is all new and complicated to me. My options for adding on is to keep the Feb UY that I have now for simplicity of only having 1 UY and 1 membership number and sell the 2023 points back. So in feb 2024 I’d have 325 points. Or I can choose an Aug use year for the add on contract and sell back the 2022 points. Then in Aug 2023 I’d have 150 points, which I might have to bank and then we could use them along with the Aug 2024 points for Aulani. But then I’d be dealing with 2 UY’s and 2 membership numbers, which might be okay since for our future trips, we plan on going in May and sometime in the fall/early winter. And that could work well with a Feb and an Aug UY. I’m just not sure how complicated and hard it is to keep up with having to transfer points between contracts. I just don’t want to make the wrong decision since there’s no going back once I do this. Then also, what if on the second contract I add my grown son on there so he can be a blue card member or does that complicate things further? Only DH and I are on our current contract. What’s my best move here?

 

[PinkPig]

Since you said this is new and confusing to you, I wouldn’t even think about having 2 use years. It will just make your membership more complicated.

If you’re buying a direct add-on your guide will (most likely) steer you strongly towards keeping your existing use year.

 

[Sandisw]

Two UY's is two different memberships so you can't use the points together for a single trip, even if the same resort, without transferring them.

And, once transferred, points don't work online during the home resort booking period so you are most likely looking at having to call to use them...though, you have to call to transfer anyway...but, it can make a difference at 11 months if you are trying for hard to get rooms.

There are rules to using transferred points as they still retain all the regular use and banking deadlines. And, once you do transfer, you can't borrow them for trips so you have to be strategic in which points you transfer when. Transferred points are held in a temporary contract and you can't see them except when you go to book so you do have to keep track of what you have done, or call/chat with MS to tell you.

We do have three UYs, but our reason for buying is so we can travel on whichever membership makes sense for that trip to maximize the banking window. We also do split stays which helps and we don't mind booking some nights on one membership and some on the other and ask from them to be noted it is a continuous stay. We find that easier than transferring

We have never had to change rooms, although there is always a slim chance it could happen. If you think having two UY"s would benefit you in the long run because of the times you travel, then it can be a great thing. But, I wouldn't do it for just one trip only to later find out its more of a hassle

 

[disneylover81]

Since you said this is new and confusing to you, I wouldn’t even think about having 2 use years. It will just make your membership more complicated.

If you’re buying a direct add-on your guide will (most likely) steer you strongly towards keeping your existing use year.

Im sure I can figure it out eventually, but since it’s a permanent decision I don’t want to have any regrets.

My guide only mentioned keeping the same use year that I have for the add-on so it was later on that I realized I could have a second one if I wanted to.

 

[disneylover81]

Two UY's is two different memberships so you can't use the points together for a single trip, even if the same resort, without transferring them.

And, once transferred, points don't work online during the home resort booking period so you are most likely looking at having to call to use them...though, you have to call to transfer anyway...but, it can make a difference at 11 months if you are trying for hard to get rooms.

There are rules to using transferred points as they still retain all the regular use and banking deadlines. And, once you do transfer, you can't borrow them for trips so you have to be strategic in which points you transfer when. Transferred points are held in a temporary contract and you can't see them except when you go to book so you do have to keep track of what you have done, or call/chat with MS to tell you.

We do have three UYs, but our reason for buying is so we can travel on whichever membership makes sense for that trip to maximize the banking window. We also do split stays which helps and we don't mind booking some nights on one membership and some on the other and ask from them to be noted it is a continuous stay. We find that easier than transferring

We have never had to change rooms, although there is always a slim chance it could happen. If you think having two UY"s would benefit you in the long run because of the times you travel, then it can be a great thing. But, I wouldn't do it for just one trip only to later find out its more of a hassle

I don’t mind having a Feb UY only. And really, the biggest reason that even has me considering changing to a different one is that I can sell back the 2022 points if I make the new contract august UY, because I probably wouldn’t use those points anyways. So I don’t feel like I’m losing any points and I like the idea of having 300 points ready to go for our Aulani trip. Plus not having to pay the $700 dues for 2023 if I keep the Feb UY for the new contract is a plus. I know $700 is a drop in the bucket at this point, but it’s still $700 I could save.

But as you mentioned this could be good for us to have 2 UY’s given the times of year we plan to travel and just keep them separated all the time for the times of year we travel and hopefully not need to transfer points between them.

Do you feel like it’s a hassle sometimes having all the different UY’s or ever regret doing it that way? Do you ever have extra and rent your points?

If you were me, would you put your 25 year old on the second contract instead of DH so that he could get the blue card for himself? He has a 3 year old, so I’m sure Disney will be in there future travels for many years to come. But as of now, they only go to WDW if I do. But of course one day, hopefully in many many years, they’ll have to go without me. Of course adding him is only a good idea if he’s willing to take over the dues and such when I’m no longer around to do it.

 

[Sandisw]

I don’t mind having a Feb UY only. And really, the biggest reason that even has me considering changing to a different one is that I can sell back the 2022 points if I make the new contract august UY, because I probably wouldn’t use those points anyways. So I don’t feel like I’m losing any points and I like the idea of having 300 points ready to go for our Aulani trip. Plus not having to pay the $700 dues for 2023 if I keep the Feb UY for the new contract is a plus. I know $700 is a drop in the bucket at this point, but it’s still $700 I could save.

But as you mentioned this could be good for us to have 2 UY’s given the times of year we plan to travel and just keep them separated all the time for the times of year we travel and hopefully not need to transfer points between them.

Do you feel like it’s a hassle sometimes having all the different UY’s or ever regret doing it that way? Do you ever have extra and rent your points?

If you were me, would you put your 25 year old on the second contract instead of DH so that he could get the blue card for himself? He has a 3 year old, so I’m sure Disney will be in there future travels for many years to come. But as of now, they only go to WDW if I do. But of course one day, hopefully in many many years, they’ll have to go without me. Of course adding him is only a good idea if he’s willing to take over the dues and such when I’m no longer around to do it.

No matter the UY chosen, the 2023 dues would be the same as you pay based on date of purchase.

I don’t mind because I use each one as it’s own and don’t care if I have to borrow on one even if I could transfer and use points for the other.

We do not rent points out but we travel a lot now and I always gift nights throughout the year to family and friends.

So, it works!! We did add our adult kids in 2019 for benefits and hapoy we did. We were comfortable with all the what ifs..we pay for it all so it’s not a concern.

But, if you do add him, even if it is a Feb UY, it will be a new membership since owners are different. Keep that in mind.

 

[CarolynFH]

If you were me, would you put your 25 year old on the second contract instead of DH so that he could get the blue card for himself?

That would create a new membership because of being titled differently from your first contract. So you'd be looking at the same complications Sandi explained above regarding having different UY.

Based on your posts about how you want to use your points (to visit AUL, etc.) I'd recommend you stay with the same UY, especially since it will be the same resort. And the same owners on the title. That way both contracts will be in the same membership, and using the points together will be seamless. We have two contracts for the same resort, and until the advent of online booking and having to specify which contract to use when booking a reservation, I tended to forget that fact because it all worked as if we had just the one set of points.

 

[disneylover81]

No matter the UY chosen, the 2023 dues would be the same as you pay based on date of purchase.

I don’t mind because I use each one as it’s own and don’t care if I have to borrow on one even if I could transfer and use points for the other.

We do not rent points out but we travel a lot now and I always gift nights throughout the year to family and friends.

So, it works!! We did add our adult kids in 2019 for benefits and hapoy we did. We were comfortable with all the what ifs..we pay for it all so it’s not a concern.

But, if you do add him, even if it is a Feb UY, it will be a new membership since owners are different. Keep that in mind.

I’m sure I’m overthinking this whole thing as I tend to do. I just like to be well informed before I spend a lot of money.

I see what you mean about the dues. In reality, the longer I wait to purchase, the less dues owed though for 2023. But we don’t know for certain how long these incentives will last either from what my guide said. I’m not in a rush for the new contract, but I do have the FOMO and this great price ending before I pull the trigger. I’m just trying to watch my spending closely at the moment… I went on 2 WDW trips in May, bought 2 AP’s and had to pay for a July cruise so there’s been lots of spending recently. But on the other hand, DH says I will give Disney my every last dollar and he’s probably right.

I’m sure he would have no problem being on the contract and if I do add him, like you said the UY won’t matter because it’ll be a different membership either way.

 

[disneylover81]

That would create a new membership because of being titled differently from your first contract. So you'd be looking at the same complications Sandi explained above regarding having different UY.

Based on your posts about how you want to use your points (to visit AUL, etc.) I'd recommend you stay with the same UY, especially since it will be the same resort. And the same owners on the title. That way both contracts will be in the same membership, and using the points together will be seamless. We have two contracts for the same resort, and until the advent of online booking and having to specify which contract to use when booking a reservation, I tended to forget that fact because it all worked as if we had just the one set of points.

You are probably right that I just need to keep it simple, especially since I’m still new to DVC. As we get older, hopefully we can be like Sandi and travel more and more and invite family and friends to come along with us. That’s the goal !

I’m 41 and I know I’ll be long gone before my membership expires and it’s something I want to leave for my 2 kids, so I gotta figure out how to do that if only DH and I are named on the contracts. But that’s something for another day I suppose.

 

[CarolynFH]

it’s something I want to leave for my 2 kids, so I gotta figure out how to do that if only DH and I are named on the contracts. But that’s something for another day I suppose.

After you buy this 2nd contract and get accustomed to using your DVC membership, there will be plenty of time to consider how to pass it down to your kids. Don't even worry about that now - just keep reading here on DISboards and you'll see many discussions about the pros and cons of adding adult kids to the contracts, creating a trust to hold the contracts, etc. There's a great deal to consider and no need to rush into anything right now. Learn to use your membership, then learn about passing it on.

 

[disneylover81]

After you buy this 2nd contract and get accustomed to using your DVC membership, there will be plenty of time to consider how to pass it down to your kids. Don't even worry about that now - just keep reading here on DISboards and you'll see many discussions about the pros and cons of adding adult kids to the contracts, creating a trust to hold the contracts, etc. There's a great deal to consider and no need to rush into anything right now. Learn to use your membership, then learn about passing it on.

You are right! My other child is only 17 so she doesn’t even have a clue about real life yet. Thanks for talking all this out with me. Everyone on the DIS is always so helpful.

 

[Straulin]

We are similar to OP in that we bought our first contract last year. We did add on with a 2nd use year but at a different resort.

I wouldn’t want to add-on to the same resort with a different use year for all the complications others have mentioned. Have you considered adding on RIV?

We had BCV and added VGF so we have both Epcot and MK resorts. We plan to use the memberships separately so the issues with two memberships should be minimal.

 

[disneylover81]

We are similar to OP in that we bought our first contract last year. We did add on with a 2nd use year but at a different resort.

I wouldn’t want to add-on to the same resort with a different use year for all the complications others have mentioned. Have you considered adding on RIV?

We had BCV and added VGF so we have both Epcot and MK resorts. We plan to use the memberships separately so the issues with two memberships should be minimal.

I mentioned adding on to my contract to my son today and he wants to split the cost with me so he can have his own blue card and get AP’s and dining discounts. He said as long as he can use his 75 points however he wants and if I will babysit his son some weekends when they want an adult only trip. So I guess we will be adding a second UY since he wants to travel more in the fall than the spring/summer.

I haven’t considered RIV because it’s not my favorite resort. Plus we really aren’t Epcot people. I’m a MK person all the way. Some trips we don’t even go to Epcot at all. I wish we had other resort options for this offer besides those two and Aulani. I will have him look at RIV and see if he likes it better than VGF since this is half his contract. To me, it really doesn’t matter where we buy, but if ever we wanted to sell (which I highly doubt we will), RIV may not hold its resale value as well at VGF. And I know the annual dues are higher there too.

 

[CarolynFH]

I mentioned adding on to my contract to my son today and he wants to split the cost with me so he can have his own blue card and get AP’s and dining discounts. He said as long as he can use his 75 points however he wants and if I will babysit his son some weekends when they want an adult only trip. So I guess we will be adding a second UY since he wants to travel more in the fall than the spring/summer.

I haven’t considered RIV because it’s not my favorite resort. Plus we really aren’t Epcot people. I’m a MK person all the way. Some trips we don’t even go to Epcot at all. I wish we had other resort options for this offer besides those two and Aulani. I will have him look at RIV and see if he likes it better than VGF since this is half his contract. To me, it really doesn’t matter where we buy, but if ever we wanted to sell (which I highly doubt we will), RIV may not hold its resale value as well at VGF. And I know the annual dues are higher there too.

Sounds like a good plan. It will be a second membership for you, so when you log into the member website you'll have a dropdown to choose which membership you're working with at the time. When he logs in, he'll only have the one membership showing.

 

[disneylover81]

Sounds like a good plan. It will be a second membership for you, so when you log into the member website you'll have a dropdown to choose which membership you're working with at the time. When he logs in, he'll only have the one membership showing.

Oh good. That’ll be really nice for him so he can keep up with it easier.

 

[DanCali]

There are also advantages to having 2 use years such as having 2 waitlists per owner account. Not a reason by itself to have separate use years, but something to consider. Also, you would be able to do one point transfer per owner account if you rent points.

We're pretty new to DVC but I find the idea of having 2 use years generally an appealing one. We started with June UY because we travel mostly in summer but I find it rather limiting that I would not be able to cancel between 30-60 days and bank the points for Spring reservations, since we'd miss the banking deadline. So we're looking into adding a December or March use year to give us more flexibility with future bookings. With a March use year, we could use that account for Spring reservations and use the June UY for summer/fall reservations.

 

[NVDISFamily]

I have two UY and I'm a fan of it, but with some big words of caution.

One word of advice is not to split UY until each membership has enough points to "stand on it's own." I got this wisdom from quite a few veterans as I was considering buying in and how I structured my membership. This can mean different things to different people. As you mentioned Aulani and a 2BR, it sounds like to me you would be best to have one membership to pull from at the 7 month window to get those points easily together for whatever you need. Once you get north of a few hundred points, than each membership can have enough to "do their own thing" with banking and borrowing so this becomes a bit less of an issue. I like our DEC/JUNE UY split as we have good coverage for most of the year for potential trips.

 

[disneylover81]

There are also advantages to having 2 use years such as having 2 waitlists per owner account. Not a reason by itself to have separate use years, but something to consider. Also, you would be able to do one point transfer per owner account if you rent points.

We're pretty new to DVC but I find the idea of having 2 use years generally an appealing one. We started with June UY because we travel mostly in summer but I find it rather limiting that I would not be able to cancel between 30-60 days and bank the points for Spring reservations, since we'd miss the banking deadline. So we're looking into adding a December or March use year to give us more flexibility with future bookings. With a March use year, we could use that account for Spring reservations and use the June UY for summer/fall reservations.

Most definitely that will work for your travels. I agree with you and I think it'll work out in our favor in the end also to have 2 UY's. Plus the extra waitlists will be nice for sure. I have 2 now, and wish I could have 2 more for better odds of one coming through. Hopefully we won't have to do a lot of point transfers, which seems to be the biggest issue or hesitation from those I have corresponded with, since it's something that can't be done online myself. I had intended on just having my second contract at VGF, but then someone advised me to maybe do RIV instead for our second one, so now I am thinking about that. I really don't have much interest in RIV, and would rather maybe BCV or BWV, but they of course aren't offering those great incentives as RIV. We could do Aulani, but that doesn't seem practical for us whatsoever either.

 

[DanCali]

Most definitely that will work for your travels. I agree with you and I think it'll work out in our favor in the end also to have 2 UY's. Plus the extra waitlists will be nice for sure. I have 2 now, and wish I could have 2 more for better odds of one coming through. Hopefully we won't have to do a lot of point transfers, which seems to be the biggest issue or hesitation from those I have corresponded with, since it's something that can't be done online myself. I had intended on just having my second contract at VGF, but then someone advised me to maybe do RIV instead for our second one, so now I am thinking about that. I really don't have much interest in RIV, and would rather maybe BCV or BWV, but they of course aren't offering those great incentives as RIV. We could do Aulani, but that doesn't seem practical for us whatsoever either.

We do have quite a bit of experience with Westin/Marriott timeshares (over 15 years) where, similar to DVC, some resale purchases can trade internally and others are restricted and cannot. The resale values have not been kind to the restricted resorts over time and for that reason alone I would not buy RIV direct. I am not a fan of losing 50%+ of what I paid to DVC to buy direct, and buying resale to go to just that one resort is too restrictive, especially at current resale prices.

Perhaps, if Disney is going this route, they will at some point also “requaify” resales if you buy direct which is what Marriott/Westin/Sheraton do. Basically - buy direct and they will take a resale contract and make it as if it was bought direct (can book RIV, etc). Unless they do this, I think these restricted resorts will become harder to sell to informed buyers over time. Even now they are selling more VGF than RIV.

 

[disneylover81]

We do have quite a bit of experience with Westin/Marriott timeshares (over 15 years) where, similar to DVC, some resale purchases can trade internally and others are restricted and cannot. The resale values have not been kind to the restricted resorts over time and for that reason alone I would not buy RIV direct. I am not a fan of losing 50%+ of what I paid to DVC to buy direct, and buying resale to go to just that one resort is too restrictive, especially at current resale prices.

Perhaps, if Disney is going this route, they will at some point also “requaify” resales if you buy direct which is what Marriott/Westin/Sheraton do. Basically - buy direct and they will take a resale contract and make it as if it was bought direct (can book RIV, etc). Unless they do this, I think these restricted resorts will become harder to sell to informed buyers over time. Even now they are selling more VGF than RIV.

I understand your point completely. I’m not fond of the resale restrictions at all. I don’t ever plan to sell any contracts, but you never know what the future holds either. It’s just so much to think about and decide what’s the best move. Plus splitting this with my son, I have to take his input into consideration.