Do you pay cash on the weekends??

[dgaston]

Over the holidays we rented a house at Windsor Hills and had a destination Christmas for my CA brother and his family, and ours. Then when Jan 1 came we moved to a Savanna View 2 br for 3 nights. Best of both worlds.

We tend to be frugal with our points, and do the move to value resorts on Friday and Saturday, or when arriving on a late flight, stay at a 3* Priceline hotel near the airport, moving to DVC early next am. I am paying cash for one night in a VWL studio in July. I did get the DVC discount. This is our first time with this strategy.

 

[diznycrazed]

We have actually for the first time booked the week after Christmas. As we are staying in a 2 bed at BCV I have only booked Sun - Thurs nights. I rarely book a weekend night as we like to take several trips a year. We will usually stay at a value resort for a Fri/Sat. I guess it all truly depends on your travel habits. If WDW was my one big annual trip I would book the whole thing on points. We have on occasion paid a cash night during low time, but it bugs me too much to pay the points.

Terry

 

[DVCLiz]

If you are a family of four do you choose to stay in a studio to save points? The holiday time is such a high point time that I just cannot justify using the points to stay in a one bedroom.

I think we will do the studio for now and I will have some points left over to stay in a one bedroom next time!

You know, that's an excellent point. Because while I can't seem to justify spending the points on a weekend night DVC stay, I have NO PROBLEM staying in a 1BR even if it's just my DD14 and me. And when DD19 is with us, I'll book a 2BR without a thought. I have enough points to be able to spend 200 on a 5 day stay, 165 on our normal HH summer vacation, and a handful of others to play with during the year (I own 430 total.)

Funny that I am stingy about the weekends but the opposite about the size of unit. And that's what I love about DVC - you can make your points work for you in so many ways!!!!

 

[wildernessDad]

I use points on weekends as well as weekdays.

 

[realfam]

Were doing DVC in Aug/08. Arriving on the monday, staying at SSR until friday morning, and then moving to POP Century for the fri/sat. Sunday we move on to AKV for 4 days. Pop Century was only $200 for btoh nights, and the points we saved will let us go back for 5 weekdays in Jan Yeh

We figure if were smart with our points, we can travel several times a year wtih DVC.

 

[sajetto]

Since buying into DVC, we only use points for our room when staying at WDW, even when we are there on Fri/Sat nights. The main reason we purchased DVC was so that we wouldn't have to pay cash for our rooms.

This is my response exactly. I don't ever want to deal with paying cash while staying at WDW again. That was our whole point in buying DVC. I like knowing I can stay where I want WHEN I want, without having to worry about it

 

[DISNEY FIX]

This is my response exactly. I don't ever want to deal with paying cash while staying at WDW again. That was our whole point in buying DVC. I like knowing I can stay where I want WHEN I want, without having to worry about it

Amen!

 

[BEASLYBOO]

Granny's right, the perk of living in Florida is designing your vacations more often and without using both Friday and Saturday. We always arrive Sunday and leave Saturday. When we take long week-ends during school time we do Sunday and Monday. It makes my points go further, and I too hate to pay extra, though for this family reunion in June I had to buy some point from a very nice Disboard/DVC user, otherwise I bank/borrow and limit myself how ever hard to the 210 I have.

 

[TifffanyD]

We are new to DVC and haven't stayed yet but are planning our honeymoon for January-ish. I want to stretch our points too so we are planning to take a 3 day cruise that will cover the weekend. I figured we can either pay cash (like $700ish for a studio for 2 nights) or do the cruise (like $1000ish for 3 nights - and includes food!). Seems like a good idea to us - but we haven't booked it yet.

 

[bobbiwoz]

We don't pay cash to DVC on weekends. If we're in DVC, we use points. We have been know to begin a week stay on Saturday at POP! We like Pop, we get to use DDE for breakfast at the cafeteria! The last time we had a room facing the lake...interesting, and nice if you ignore the brown buildings!

Bobbi

 

[BroganMc]

If you are a family of four do you choose to stay in a studio to save points? The holiday time is such a high point time that I just cannot justify using the points to stay in a one bedroom..

I took 3 adults down fore New Year's last year. We managed just fine in a studio at SSR. I did find that during New Year's there was so much to do outside the room that we never really missed the extra space of a 1bedroom. To me, a 1bedroom only becomes more important if you are staying a week and really want that in-room laundry.

I've also paid cash twice before for a weekend night.

1) First time was last May when we stayed in a 1bedroom for 8 days. My dad had a conference over the weekend, so we just paid cash for Fr/Sa and he was comp'ed for part of it. (Made it possible for him to take the car and me not to be stuck at an offsite resort. We met up a lot later in the parks.)
2) We also paid for a Friday night in 2bedroom last October. My sister's family of 4 flew down for the week so we extended it to 6 days for them to have more time. We moved to a studio for 3 days on our Sat check-out. Paying for the Friday night meant we could afford the points to stay 3 extra days.

At the time we had 320 points. Now that we've added on (now at 430 points) we have enough to abandon the cash nights. We'll just downgrade to a studio to trade points for longer stays.

If my family decides to do that big grand gathering next year, I foresee paying for the Friday night for two 2bedrooms. $1200 vs. 110 points means the difference in losing a week's vacation for my dad and I just for one night for the family.

 

[jdvm]

We switch to cash for weekend nights a lot of the time. You effectively double the amount of time that you can stay. But we usually only do it when we can get a Member discount. The cash prices take your breath away sometimes.
John

 

[keishashadow]

we only do studios despite my best intentions i find myself booking Saturday nights, just to get a jump start on the trip...seems to make it easier to get "special requests" as to view, etc. we want also

works for us since we either segue on over to Universal on following Fri & Sat or try to work in a DCL 3 day...it's all good

 

[DisDaydreamer]

Don't do it often, but we have on a few occasions paid for an extra night with cash.

 

[TAKitty]

We are sadly forced to pay cash for Friday night this June. We just don't have enough points to cover it.

 

[DVC-Don]

We bought enough points to cover our vacations without having to pay cash.

 

[drakethib]

We normally dont stay at WDW on Frid and Sat as we try to make the trip a couple times a year and stay Sun-Fri morning.

We did use points at OKW for a Fri-Sat once and decided for us, we would the points for other trips.

I dont think I would pay cash for a DVC resort if we were to stay on a Fri & Sat again, but would get a studio instead or stay at POR

 

[TomD]

We use our points for whenever we are down there. We usually go 1-2 times a year. Arrive on sunday and Leave on sat.


I figure I paid for them so I will use them.

 

[GGOOFY1]

I like to extend out trips and pay cash for the weekends. I will also plan on going to Universal and stay there for the weekend and they transfer to DVC. This year we have a GV at OKW for a week and it wiped out my points for this year and next year!!!! Looks like I'm going to have to borrow for my trip in 09!!!

 

[hsmamato2]

just curious....isn't it wildly expensive to pay cash for,say a 1 bedroom? just wondering,as using already bought points seems like a better plan,than paying like $300 a night?