DVC Newbie Advice re SSR and points

[Apixarfan]

I am really close to pulling the trigger on a Disney Direct purchase. I'd appreciate some advice.

First some background: My wife and I are in our later 40's and have kids that will soon be 13 year old girl and 15 year old boy. We live in MN. At some point or another I've stayed at about 2/3 of the Deluxe resorts as a regular hotel stay at some point or another and been to WDW theme parks probably 25 times. My wife is somewhat newer to Disney having stayed mostly at Value resorts or offsite house rentals with the exception of one trip where we split a stay between normal hotel stay at Coronado and point rental at a Beach Club studio. Now that she's gotten a taste of Deluxe, and we can afford it, she never wants to do Value again.

Our intent is to primarily use DVC points for stays Jun-Aug through the 2020's because of kids' school schedules and my wife works at a school so she has very limited vacation time during a school year but is off during the summer. We'd likely book trips 11 months apart to use a gold pass twice and then skip every third year to try other places. For whatever reason, my wife is insistent that she strongly prefers a 1BR over a studio (Happy wife, happy life - so I've given up on talking her out of it). For the next decade we'd likely want to rotate and try different DVC resorts most of the time.

I've done a ton of research and it seems like Direct might actually make sense for our situation mostly because of the major difference in cost for four gold passes vs. buying four 6-day base tickets two years in a row. Future-proofing other perks like being able to stay at Riviera and something that could come out 5-10 years from now are nice extras.

Where I need advice is whether Saratoga makes sense for a home resort if we're primarily getting 1BR's during summer months and want to try different resorts. I'm also waffling between 150 pts @ $160 vs. 135 pts @$165 (basically, $115/pt for the extra 15 points). If we stick with the plan to skip Disney every 3rd year or so, it looked like 135 would be enough most of the time.

Side note: if our first trip is intended to be Aulani next June (saved up from having no big vacations last year or this year), does it even make sense to purchase DVC at all now vs. waiting until Oct or Nov?

 

[Traveling on cc points]

Do you plan on staying for a week on each trip? If the answer is yes, 135 is not nearly enough points to stay in a 1 bedroom twice every 3 years. You would have 202 points to work with if you took every 3rd year off and 225 points is you go with the 150 points.

1 bedrooms are usually attainable at 7 months but a standard view (lowest point amount) are definitely more scares. If you plan on using your points at resorts other than your home resort, I would definitely use the higher priced views to calculate what you will need.

 

[MICKIMINI]

Welcome! First bit of advice: Your wife is RIGHT! Go for the 1 BR with w/d and full kitchen as it is totally worth it IMO.

Secondly, buy more points than you need (now) or plan to do an add on. It just works that way, trust me!

Thirdly, you can buy 125 direct and get whatever benefits are available and add on a resale for much less. It may shorten your stays at RIV, but that's about it for now. It will stretch your budget so you get more points (you will use them LOL). Personally, I'd consider just buying a resale now and see what benefits do or don't reappear.

Good luck!

 

[princesscinderella]

I would aim for 200 points which qualifies you for the larger direct incentive. You will quickly find out you want more points if your plan is to stay in a one bedroom. There’s a big difference in point costs at each resort for one bedrooms, okw is one of the lowest and VGF & RIV have the highest. If it’s your plan to try to exchange into these resorts at the 7 mo mark be prepared to have to book the highest point category because the standard views are usually snapped up by owners at the 11 month mark to make their points stretch further.

 

[Sandisw]

I would definitely go with the 160. I do think you will have pretty good luck with 1 bedrooms at 7 months...but, starting with the 2022 points charts, summer nights are going to be less so it will impact the ease at some of the near park resorts,

As long as you are flexible, and are okay staying at whatever is available, as well as dates within your time frame, it might be good.

 

[eandt]

I am really close to pulling the trigger on a Disney Direct purchase. I'd appreciate some advice.

First some background: My wife and I are in our later 40's and have kids that will soon be 13 year old girl and 15 year old boy. We live in MN. At some point or another I've stayed at about 2/3 of the Deluxe resorts as a regular hotel stay at some point or another and been to WDW theme parks probably 25 times. My wife is somewhat newer to Disney having stayed mostly at Value resorts or offsite house rentals with the exception of one trip where we split a stay between normal hotel stay at Coronado and point rental at a Beach Club studio. Now that she's gotten a taste of Deluxe, and we can afford it, she never wants to do Value again.

Our intent is to primarily use DVC points for stays Jun-Aug through the 2020's because of kids' school schedules and my wife works at a school so she has very limited vacation time during a school year but is off during the summer. We'd likely book trips 11 months apart to use a gold pass twice and then skip every third year to try other places. For whatever reason, my wife is insistent that she strongly prefers a 1BR over a studio (Happy wife, happy life - so I've given up on talking her out of it). For the next decade we'd likely want to rotate and try different DVC resorts most of the time.

I've done a ton of research and it seems like Direct might actually make sense for our situation mostly because of the major difference in cost for four gold passes vs. buying four 6-day base tickets two years in a row. Future-proofing other perks like being able to stay at Riviera and something that could come out 5-10 years from now are nice extras.

Where I need advice is whether Saratoga makes sense for a home resort if we're primarily getting 1BR's during summer months and want to try different resorts. I'm also waffling between 150 pts @ $160 vs. 135 pts @$165 (basically, $115/pt for the extra 15 points). If we stick with the plan to skip Disney every 3rd year or so, it looked like 135 would be enough most of the time.

Side note: if our first trip is intended to be Aulani next June (saved up from having no big vacations last year or this year), does it even make sense to purchase DVC at all now vs. waiting until Oct or Nov?

Your situation sounds a lot like ours except we are a bit older as are our kids. We are very close to buying direct (most likely the minimum but may go the extra 25 points to get the discount). At one point we were leaning more toward resale but after a few offers that were rejected and reading here about the waiting, the rofr, the issues with agents and title companies we are soured a bit on that at least for our first contract.

What has held us and our cash back from buying direct already is the suspension (or elimination?) of the AP discount and the restriction on borrowing that is currently in place. Until those things come back we will probably just stand tight on the direct purchase and keep and eye on the resale sites in case we see a contract we cant resist.

 

[EIU110]

I would encourage you to look at BLT or AKV. They both have 2 full bathrooms in the 1 bedroom units. So nice for the kids to have their own bathroom, especially as they grow and are no longer 13 and 15. It is making things nice for us right now as my 19 year old daughter is bringing a friend on the next trip. No sharing a bathroom

 

[RoseGold]

You don't need two APs in your example. You need one and a 5 day ticket for three years. You need to know the math on your situation. August (AP)- June (AP) - 5 day pass.

I doubt the math works on that discount, assuming the discount returns or won't be blacked out or weekday only or not applicable to your limited travel dates. Who knows what APs will look like. This is a big risk.

For a direct buy, I would wait until the APs return to make sure you are right. This is a gamble for something that is very clearly not promised, and does not currently exist. And there is no explicit promise to get to stay at whatever the resort in 10 years is anyway.

Resale DVC is a much less commitment scenario. As you are going into a lot of change soon in your life, maybe that is appealing. Buying cheap SSR points to scoop up whatever 1BR works, and if you change your mind, you sell. I booked a 1BR Beach Club this summer on resale SSR points, and I'm thrilled!

 

[skippytx]

Right now I'm not comfortable recommending people buy direct for the Gold AP pass discount. It's changed a lot in even just the last 4 years since I bought into DVC. Now I got in when the blue card min was 25 points. That was a no brainer, and we wanted the points anyway. It was like 1K or so difference between direct and resale at BLT for a 25 point contract, if you could find a resale 25 point contract. In less than 4 years the direct point minimum has gone from 25, to 75, to 100, and now what, 125 points? I think we paid 191 a point for a 25 point direct BLT contract.

No one knows what Gold AP discounts, or even availability is going to look like anytime time soon. When I bought in (July 2017) you could get a Platinum Plus AP for the Price of Gold at 559, then last year before Covid (Feb 2020) the DVC Gold AP price was 719 I think and rumor mill was it would be 799 before the end of the year. People were quick to jump on the "savings" of the 719 dollar dvc gold pass compared to the $1,195 Platinum pass when justifying the cost of buying direct, which of course is a false dichotomy. No one wanted to talk about the 160 dollar price increase on the DVC Gold AP in only 3 years (the plat pass went from 849 to 1195), the overall jump in the cost of tickets, or the overall jump in cost in just visiting WDW over the last 3-5 years.

Look I get it, Blue Card FOMO is a real legit thing a bunch of people around here have. I've seen folks pull off all sorts of mental gymnastics trying to justify spending thousands and thousands of dollars more so they don't feel like a 2nd class or less than member of DVC. That's fine, people can spend their money however they want, it doesn't bother me, but you're doing yourself a disservice if you're trying to massage the numbers with supposed savings and discounts to justify spending the money buying direct. If you want to buy direct, go ahead, but don't trick yourself into some scenario where you believe you're saving money, at least not right now. When AP's go back on sale, and ticket pricing is adjusted, we'll have a much better picture of any potential savings.

 

[eandt]

You don't need two APs in your example. You need one and a 5 day ticket for three years. You need to know the math on your situation. August (AP)- June (AP) - 5 day pass.

I doubt the math works on that discount, assuming the discount returns or won't be blacked out or weekday only or not applicable to your limited travel dates. Who knows what APs will look like. This is a big risk.

For a direct buy, I would wait until the APs return to make sure you are right. This is a gamble for something that is very clearly not promised, and does not currently exist. And there is no explicit promise to get to stay at whatever the resort in 10 years is anyway.

Resale DVC is a much less commitment scenario. As you are going into a lot of change soon in your life, maybe that is appealing. Buying cheap SSR points to scoop up whatever 1BR works, and if you change your mind, you sell. I booked a 1BR Beach Club this summer on resale SSR points, and I'm thrilled!

I am not sure that this is true as I believe it is explicitly promised that direct points can be used at "any of the Disney Vacation Club Resorts'

 

[RoseGold]

I am not sure that this is true as I believe it is explicitly promised that direct points can be used at "any of the Disney Vacation Club Resorts'

It can't promise something that doesn't exist. There's no reason the next resort couldn't be DVC+.

And even the existing DVC rules allow non-home resort surcharges.

RIV made it very clear that DVC is willing to change even the most basic of rules.

 

[eandt]

Right now I'm not comfortable recommending people buy direct for the Gold AP pass discount. It's changed a lot in even just the last 4 years since I bought into DVC. Now I got in when the blue card min was 25 points. That was a no brainer, and we wanted the points anyway. It was like 1K or so difference between direct and resale at BLT for a 25 point contract, if you could find a resale 25 point contract. In less than 4 years the direct point minimum has gone from 25, to 75, to 100, and now what, 125 points? I think we paid 191 a point for a 25 point direct BLT contract.

No one knows what Gold AP discounts, or even availability is going to look like anytime time soon. When I bought in (July 2017) you could get a Platinum Plus AP for the Price of Gold at 559, then last year before Covid (Feb 2020) the DVC Gold AP price was 719 I think and rumor mill was it would be 799 before the end of the year. People were quick to jump on the "savings" of the 719 dollar dvc gold pass compared to the $1,195 Platinum pass when justifying the cost of buying direct, which of course is a false dichotomy. No one wanted to talk about the 160 dollar price increase on the DVC Gold AP in only 3 years (the plat pass went from 849 to 1195), the overall jump in the cost of tickets, or the overall jump in cost in just visiting WDW over the last 3-5 years.

Look I get it, Blue Card FOMO is a real legit thing a bunch of people around here have. I've seen folks pull off all sorts of mental gymnastics trying to justify spending thousands and thousands of dollars more so they don't feel like a 2nd class or less than member of DVC. That's fine, people can spend their money however they want, it doesn't bother me, but you're doing yourself a disservice if you're trying to massage the numbers with supposed savings and discounts to justify spending the money buying direct. If you want to buy direct, go ahead, but don't trick yourself into some scenario where you believe you're saving money, at least not right now. When AP's go back on sale, and ticket pricing is adjusted, we'll have a much better picture of any potential savings.

I am in the same mindset as OP but I am not trying to "trick" myself into thinking I would be saving money by buying direct vs resale as obviously that is probably never going to be the case unless Disney offers some future benefits not factored in to the present or recent past.

What I am trying to do is get the "true" picture on how close the 2 prices really are as it's simply not $X pp direct vs $Y resale. There is more to it than that, what is the $ amount savings on things like AP discounts, closing costs, "Free points" which are things that you can actually see as well a value on the convenience, trust, timliness, and stress free transaction of getting exactly the contract that you want that a direct sale, by all accounts here, brings. After more than 25 Disney trips including 2 on rented points We are basically at the threshold of giving Disney our cash but we probably will wait to see if/when some of the benefits return before we do. Once we get the first contract under our belts and wish to add on then resale would most definitely be the way we would go.

 

[eandt]

It can't promise something that doesn't exist. There's no reason the next resort couldn't be DVC+.

And even the existing DVC rules allow non-home resort surcharges.

RIV made it very clear that DVC is willing to change even the most basic of rules.

Perhaps but unless they change the name of any future resort to something other than Disney Vacation Club then they will have a fight on their hands.

 

[Apixarfan]

Right now I'm not comfortable recommending people buy direct for the Gold AP pass discount. It's changed a lot in even just the last 4 years since I bought into DVC. Now I got in when the blue card min was 25 points. That was a no brainer, and we wanted the points anyway. It was like 1K or so difference between direct and resale at BLT for a 25 point contract, if you could find a resale 25 point contract. In less than 4 years the direct point minimum has gone from 25, to 75, to 100, and now what, 125 points? I think we paid 191 a point for a 25 point direct BLT contract.

No one knows what Gold AP discounts, or even availability is going to look like anytime time soon. When I bought in (July 2017) you could get a Platinum Plus AP for the Price of Gold at 559, then last year before Covid (Feb 2020) the DVC Gold AP price was 719 I think and rumor mill was it would be 799 before the end of the year. People were quick to jump on the "savings" of the 719 dollar dvc gold pass compared to the $1,195 Platinum pass when justifying the cost of buying direct, which of course is a false dichotomy. No one wanted to talk about the 160 dollar price increase on the DVC Gold AP in only 3 years (the plat pass went from 849 to 1195), the overall jump in the cost of tickets, or the overall jump in cost in just visiting WDW over the last 3-5 years.

Look I get it, Blue Card FOMO is a real legit thing a bunch of people around here have. I've seen folks pull off all sorts of mental gymnastics trying to justify spending thousands and thousands of dollars more so they don't feel like a 2nd class or less than member of DVC. That's fine, people can spend their money however they want, it doesn't bother me, but you're doing yourself a disservice if you're trying to massage the numbers with supposed savings and discounts to justify spending the money buying direct. If you want to buy direct, go ahead, but don't trick yourself into some scenario where you believe you're saving money, at least not right now. When AP's go back on sale, and ticket pricing is adjusted, we'll have a much better picture of any potential savings.

I definitely see what you're saying but the main thing I'd respond with is that you have to compare the cost of gold in 2017 vs. 2 year's worth of 6-day base tickets over 2017 and 2018 (assuming you went once per year 11.5 months apart) - not against a gold pass in 2020. Both types of passes have probably gone up a lot at the same time.

 

[RoseGold]

Perhaps but unless they change the name of any future resort to something other than Disney Vacation Club then they will have a fight on their hands.

Even current DVC rules would allow different charts for non-home points. No reason VGF couldn't charge 20% extra in 2023 for that. So, sure, maybe it works. Have fun paying that.

Everyone acts like DVC has to be this 1:1 transfer on whatever they build in the future, and it's just not true.

 

[eandt]

Oh ok, you convinced me its a bait and switch scheme disney is running here ...... now I'm not buying

 

[skippytx]

I definitely see what you're saying but the main thing I'd respond with is that you have to compare the cost of gold in 2017 vs. 2 year's worth of 6-day base tickets over 2017 and 2018 (assuming you went once per year 11.5 months apart) - not against a gold pass in 2020. Both types of passes have probably gone up a lot at the same time.

A 6 day base ticket in 2017 was 390 dollars for an adult, and 405 in 2018. A 2017 DVC gold pass was 559 You would save 236 dollars in this scenario. It's difficult to compare 2020 pricing since they went to dynamic ticket pricing.

In order to realize that "savings" you have to commit to 2 WDW vacation trips of 6 days 11.5 months from each other, which creates the false dichotomy. Would you be scheduling that trip anyway or are you forcing yourself to maximize the value of the AP by taking a 2nd vacation? Do you really even "save" anything considering the overall costs involved with visiting WDW?

Going to WDW 11.5 months after isn't the only choice. Maybe scheduling doesn't work out that year, maybe you want to vacation somewhere else? I mean we can massage the dates and numbers into perfect scenarios, and worst case scenarios all day to prove our points.

Take me for instance. I have 185 Bay Lake points. Small potatoes around here I know, but it makes no sense for me to buy 185 direct BLT points at 245 dollars a point (45K), over resale at 160 a point (29.6K). There's really no way for me to justify spending 15,000 dollars extra for some perks Disney may or may not decide to keep around.

Now l did purchase 25 points direct when that was what you could get away with. The price difference was roughly 1000 dollars at the time (BLT direct was 191 I think), and once you factor in I bought the contract in Jan of 2018 so I got full 2017 points, and 2018 points, and used the DVC discount on over 20 special event tickets, general merch discounts, etc, I have come out WAY ahead. I've probably "saved" over 3,000 bucks so far using my DVC blue card discount. We did purchase AP's one year and got 2 trips of about 15 days total out of them.

I just want people to be realistic and honest with themselves when looking at the price difference of Direct versus Resale. If the price difference is a few thousand dollars, yeah you're probably going to come out ahead paying more for direct than resale, eventually. I'll be 100% honest, I like the perks. I love being able to visit the Epcot lounge, I love having the blue card. I'm so happy I was able to get that blue card when you only need 25 points to qualify, but it's not worth spending 15,000 dollars more to get it today.

 

[Sandisw]

It can't promise something that doesn't exist. There's no reason the next resort couldn't be DVC+.

And even the existing DVC rules allow non-home resort surcharges.

RIV made it very clear that DVC is willing to change even the most basic of rules.

You bring this point up a lot and to be honest, it’s no different for resale either. You are guaranteed your home resort. DVD has done nothing to ever change the way points bought from them will be restricted.

Even the RIV changes have to do with resale not direct points. So, as of today, direct points are good everywhere and there would be no logical sense that DVD will start a new system that restricts the points they sell.

 

[RoseGold]

You bring this point up a lot and to be honest, it’s no different for resale either. You are guaranteed your home resort. DVD has done nothing to ever change the way points bought from them will be restricted.

Well, it is different for resale, like how RIV doesn't take (non-grandfathered) resale points at all. I just think people should know what system they are buying into if they are banking on future resorts. If they don't expect change, they haven't been around DVC long.

 

[Travel60]

I agree with your wife on minimum 1 bedroom and also suggest that in a few years when kids are older you will want 2 bedroom so kids aren't sleeping in main room. I like to get up early, have coffee and watch the news. The kids want to sleep in. After all, it's everyone's vacation. It's just hubby and I now and I insist on 1 bedroom!

I suggest you look at the point charts for each resort for the summer months. And consider whether you will be there 6 nights, 7 or 8. OR would you do something else on the way to Disney or on the way home so that you only need 4-5 nights at DVC. With that info you could figure out how many points you "need".

Right now, borrowing is limited to 50% of points so that might mess up your first set of "2 years then skip" unless you bank the whole first year then go years 2 and 3. Then bank year 4 and so on.

We have been owners since nearly the beginning and, yes, there have been changes and stuff costs more, but we still enjoy our points. Now, we get a 3 BR every few years for kids, grandkids and one MIL we've "adopted". So much fun!