DVC T &C Personal Use - Only Thread to Discuss.

[VGCgroupie]

Not diving back into the thread for debate so if someone feels the need to combat me Im not responding unless Im told to apologize for my words. But wanted to respond RE: the not allowing name changes potentially written in the contract.

I have been accused of being anti rental and the rental police in this thread. To be clear I am 100% anti commercial renting. Period. Spec rentals do happen to be what leads the way in commercial renting, whether some choose to believe that or not. I am onboard with Disney doing what it needs to do to eliminate commercial renting.

I am not onboard with not allowing name changes for reservations for average personal use owners. If they choose to go this route, I sadly will sell all my contracts unless the rules for banking are changed. I bought DVC partly due to its flexibility (renting) when needed. I never rented prior to becoming an owner because I do not like not having a flexible cancellation policy. If I cant make my trip 60-90 days out and I cant make another reservation for whatever reason I can rent that reservation without losing points (money). At 60-90 days I would be past my banking deadline and would lose those points. I am not in DVC to lose points. If the rules change that makes it so that is more likely to happen I would rather not be a member. The insurance coverage option isn't enough to get me to remain a member.

My stance after alllllll of this is still exactly the same, I trust DVC is not out to get us normal DVC owners and wont be doing anything that will have bad consequences for us that aren't in it as a money making endeavor.

 

[cruisehopeful]

I skim and don't actually read a lot. It seems like people are having trouble changing the lead guest name? My question is does it matter if the overall number of people on the reservation is within the max allowed? For example, I am the lead and my daughter and her husband are on the reservation. I get sick and can't go. Afaik, my daughter and her husband can just go without me and I don't need to remove my name. Correct? I think people are freaking out the name change because they are commercially renting?

 

[DougEMG]

Aarh thanks

It’s a possibility that is how it works.

With that said, I will continue to use and rent my points as I see fit. If DVC has a problem with that they are more than welcome to me, and Ill adjust.

For now I don’t know if I should adjust at all and if I should what I should adjust to. According to what @Sandisw wrote owners are entitled to an explanation.

Same here. While this thread has been interesting to read and it did highlight to me just how bad the spec renting has gotten, it really just goes around and around in circles with us having no idea on what DVC may or may not do. So, I am just going to do what I have been doing and see what if anything happens.

What I am much more concerned about is when DVC gets around to loading my new VDH contract so I can book my DL trip for next April!

 

[mkatsy]

I skim and don't actually read a lot. It seems like people are having trouble changing the lead guest name? My question is does it matter if the overall number of people on the reservation is within the max allowed? For example, I am the lead and my daughter and her husband are on the reservation. I get sick and can't go. Afaik, my daughter and her husband can just go without me and I don't need to remove my name. Correct? I think people are freaking out the name change because they are commercially renting?

The exact names on the room become important for extra magic hours, day of arrival water park benefits, and in theory wristbands at pools BUT it has been my experience that as the lead guest they just hand me all the wristbands.

 

[VGCgroupie]

I skim and don't actually read a lot. It seems like people are having trouble changing the lead guest name? My question is does it matter if the overall number of people on the reservation is within the max allowed? For example, I am the lead and my daughter and her husband are on the reservation. I get sick and can't go. Afaik, my daughter and her husband can just go without me and I don't need to remove my name. Correct? I think people are freaking out the name change because they are commercially renting?

I have seen 1 report of someone not being able to change the name. I have seen many reports of people changing names so it's clear not even MS knows what the heck is happening.

I believe you can leave your name since they can check in on the app, but I would still try to change it if you can

 

[DougEMG]

There’s literally an attorney in this thread, who broke it down extensively.

As for the false theory that it doesn’t apply to timeshare condos . It’s funny how it did apply when it came to the structural assessment laws for condos that were passed, and Disney had to do structural assessments of all of our timeshares.

I just got a bunch of letters from DVC yesterday informing me that all the structural assessments had been done.

 

[disneylandtour]

Not diving back into the thread for debate so if someone feels the need to combat me Im not responding unless Im told to apologize for my words. But wanted to respond RE: the not allowing name changes potentially written in the contract.

I have been accused of being anti rental and the rental police in this thread. To be clear I am 100% anti commercial renting. Period. Spec rentals do happen to be what leads the way in commercial renting, whether some choose to believe that or not. I am onboard with Disney doing what it needs to do to eliminate commercial renting.

I am not onboard with not allowing name changes for reservations for average personal use owners. If they choose to go this route, I sadly will sell all my contracts unless the rules for banking are changed. I bought DVC partly due to its flexibility (renting) when needed. I never rented prior to becoming an owner because I do not like not having a flexible cancellation policy. If I cant make my trip 60-90 days out and I cant make another reservation for whatever reason I can rent that reservation without losing points (money). At 60-90 days I would be past my banking deadline and would lose those points. I am not in DVC to lose points. If the rules change that makes it so that is more likely to happen I would rather not be a member. The insurance coverage option isn't enough to get me to remain a member.

My stance after alllllll of this is still exactly the same, I trust DVC is not out to get us normal DVC owners and wont be doing anything that will have bad consequences for us that aren't in it as a money making endeavor.

I completely get it and mostly agree.

What I think would be helpful for everyone here would be to set up a thread where, for those who rent, they can post thier experiences going forward. So this, as I see it, is the underlying problem: DVD created an intentionally vague policy. To figure out what it means will require a set of examples. And from that we can see how this vague policy is developed into terms of practice. And that's all that really matters here, at least for most of the people posting, what does it mean in practice for those members who mostly visit the resorts themselves but may have a need to rent from time to time.

 

[keishashadow]

While this thread has been interesting to read and it did highlight to me just how bad the spec renting has gotten, it really just goes around and around in circles with us having no idea on what DVC may or may not do. So, I am just going to do what I have been doing and see what if anything happens.

If only Disney would actually manage to be crystal clear when they decide to put a policy like this into place and state it clearly & prominently where members can read.

To figure out what it means will require a set of examples. And from that we can see how this vague policy is developed into terms of practice. And that's all that really matters here, at least for most of the people posting, what does it mean in practice for those members who mostly visit the resorts themselves but may have a need to rent from time to time.

If only Disney would enforce, evenly across the board, whatever policy is put in place.

They need to state whether a member either can or cannot book a prime rental/time, (that might morph into a spec one) via transferring to another person down the road.

‘Renting points’ (whether to another member or a non-DVC guest) is a different animal IMO. Would think that should be disallowed until the 7 month mark. I’m sure would be quite unpopular with those who do rent every year.

Taking a prime rental/time out of play @ 11 months, or sooner possibly via walking, then selling the reservation, just doesn’t seem fair to the DVC membership as a whole.

If anything, why not consider limiting the transfer of confirmed reservations to a shorter window prior to arrival, say 2 - 3 months?

 

[Sandisw]

Nothing about that means that you aren't allowed to rent. You can still make a reservation and put renters names one it. You just aren't guaranteed to be allowed to change a lead guest name to a renters name after the reservation has already been made, according to the rules.

They clearly differentiate between guests not paying for the stay and guest who are paying for the stay aka renters. And they state that different approvals may/may not needed for the different groups. So IMO there's already enough there to cut down on it if someone is trying to change the lead guest again on their 10th AKV value studio reservation of the year

What I meant is that there is not current language that distinguishes that a renter and a guest are different when it comes to being on a reservation.

So, if DVC wants to have different rules for renters vs guests when it comes to lead changes? I do not know that they can.

But, if they decide they can, then they have to make that an actual rule in the HRR because they have to make rules related to renting to rise to the level of commercial enterprise.

Because the contract requires that any rules for making and changing must be there.

 

[Sandisw]

I have seen 1 report of someone not being able to change the name. I have seen many reports of people changing names so it's clear not even MS knows what the heck is happening.

I believe you can leave your name since they can check in on the app, but I would still try to change it if you can

I’ve seen reports that someone was told they might not be allowed but then it did happen

I’ve made three.

 

[Sandisw]

I have no idea whether DVC would bother to do this or not, but it would be done by AI. In theory, it (AI) could constantly crawl around the data related to frequent bookers or flagged accounts looking for, well, anything it wanted. One human could monitor the whole thing and evaluate the results to decide whether further action was warranted.

I know Disney's IT is the butt of many jokes, but I've got to assume Disney is following the same path as airports, professional sports arenas, etc, and adopting facial recognition technology to streamline the park experience even further. (I don't need to scan anything when I enter my local MLB stadium. It knows who I am and whether I have a ticket.) That info, combined with DVC bots monitoring reservations (and reservation holders), would give DVC all the info they need, assuming they have some policy/goal in mind re:rentals.

Again, why? That is not the standard they are required to meet when deciding if an owner is renting outside the personal use rules for rentals.

That was my point…DVC doesn’t need to make this hard when they have everything they need.

They don’t need to prove something to that degree. They need to look for patterns an owner is doing and decide it looks like the purpose is commercial.

So, DVC has no need to make it complicated.

 

[disneylandtour]

What I meant is that there is not current language that distinguishes that a renter and a guest are different when it comes to being on a reservation.

So, if DVC wants to have different rules for renters vs guests when it comes to lead changes? I do not know that they can.

But, if they decide they can, then they have to make that an actual rule in the HRR because they have to make rules related to renting to rise to the level of commercial enterprise.

Because the contract requires that any rules for making and changing must be there.

I really think this is going to be a "wait and see" situation. The wording seems specifically designed to scare people who are renting a lot, which is probably a good thing. But I think the crack down is mostly going to be for very high level commercial renters.

There's another part of the calculus here - the level of ill will and bad publicity Disney will receive (on social media) from casual rentees whose reservations were cancelled by Disney. On this board, we will all know how to parse this out and what it means. But on social media, it's all going to sound like "Disney cancelled our reservation at the last minute, leaving us stranded, and they didn't give us any other reasonable alternatives." And if this is done in very large numbers, I think the optics are going to be pretty bad. So DVD has a difficult road to walk.

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

They are not those kind of privileges. They are membership extras and things given as a DVC owner.

Those elements you mention above are not DVC…they are benefits of staying at WDW resort which all DVC villas are classics to be…

The contract doesn’t allow for this…even for a renter.

Is there somewhere that formally defines a DVC timeshare unit as always being entitled to all privileges of deluxe resorts, no matter who is staying in it? What specific part is the contract would disallow it?

The restriction in our POS against renting is that you can’t do it to the level that the board can reasonably determine you are a commercial enterprise or doing it for a commercial purpose [snip]

ETA: We can also go back to the offical statements made at the December meetings by the board…and what they said they want to target as best they can…large point owners renting thousands to make money.

I think all of us would be happy to see Disney follow through on targeting large point owners renting 1000+ points per year to make money. Hopefully it is where they will start and determine they don’t need to advance beyond that—but I also think they need to separately address spec renting and bots to allow owners (especially at the highest profitability resorts) to actually get the benefit of booking in their home resort windows with a fair chance of getting a room… there are dozens if not hundreds of “midsize” spec renters engaging in both of those practices who will pick up a lot of the availability slack if only the worst offenders are stopped.

I don’t think Disney would “ Spy” on their guests .
Is that what you are describing ?

Go ahead and make a privacy rights request if you doubt it— your magic band and MDE apps have been “spying” on you for years. Disney knows where you’ve been and whom you’ve been with for a decade.

Strong statement here….There is absolutely no way that DVC is going to spend their money to scan park photos and the like to determine this.

They don’t need to— they already have easily searchable records that can be done in an automated fashion because guests/renters are going to link with MDE. Photos aren’t necessary- they can just compare geolocation history.

Everything they need to make a reasonable determination that an owners membership,,,or all memberships an owner is tied to if legally allowed to do that…is already at their finger tips.

Reservations in the names of others can be monitored and they can decide if it’s high enough to be at issue.

I agree with this. If I was Disney, I would just assume someone with a constantly changing roster of guests was renting— and give them the opportunity to tell me which of them were actually friends and family— if they tried to claim most/all were friends and family I’d probably do a quick cross reference of MDE/MB geolocations before deciding whether or not to enforce commercial renting violations.

Nope never … have you been to epic universe yet? The lockers open when you stand in front of a camera, it literally knows who you are. Annual passholders don’t use passes at Universal anymore, we use facial recognition software at the gate. Your magic band triggers sensors as you move throughout the park and it’s capturing data about your habits and preferences.

Almost all of this (with possible exception of facial recognition) exists at Disney. Your MB and app is keeping tabs on where you go and whom you’ve are with…Disney has more tools than ever to call the bluff of people who are lying about their “friends and family”…but it wouldn’t surprise me if they don’t show their cards until well into a lawsuit.

 

[Tatebeck]

What I meant is that there is not current language that distinguishes that a renter and a guest are different when it comes to being on a reservation.

So, if DVC wants to have different rules for renters vs guests when it comes to lead changes? I do not know that they can.

But, if they decide they can, then they have to make that an actual rule in the HRR because they have to make rules related to renting to rise to the level of commercial enterprise.

Because the contract requires that any rules for making and changing must be there.

Both sections I quoted a few pages ago did differentiate between renters and a non-renting guest actually. A lot of times they lump paying renters and other family/friends in as "guests" but not all of the time.

"DVD’s approval of a rental by an owner is not required after a reservation has been made in the renter’s own name. However, Ownership interests should not be purchased with any expectation that Vacation Homes may be reserved and rented to third parties."

So if you make a reservation specifically for a renter in the renter's name and the reservation is confirmed, you do not need to get approval for that rental. A (Which means that if you make a reservation in your own name, you may need to get permission/approval to rent that reservation at a later date). And it likely won't be cancelled unless you have broken another rule. It specifically leaves out free family/friends and only mentions only renters specifically. And further it says that you should not expect to be able to reserve rooms and then rent them to a third party.

"When a Club Member uses Home Resort Vacation Points to reserve Vacation Homes on behalf of a Guest, and the Club Member does not charge any rental or other fees to the Guest for the reservation, then the Guest may be eligible for all or some of the Club Member privileges and benefits that a Club Member would normally receive during the Club Member’s stay in the reserved Vacation Home. If the Guest is renting, it is the responsibility of the Member to notify Member Services when making the reservation. Member privileges and benefits cannot be extended to Guests who rent Vacation Homes from Club Members"

This also sets different rules for free guest use and renting use. Free guests do not require us to notify member services that they are staying, and may be entitled to some extra privileges and benefits that we get as members. If the reservation is a rental, we are required to notify members services about the details of the rental at the time of the reservation. If you are booking a spec rental in your own name to possibly rent to an unknown renter later, you would be unable to confirm the renter guest details and would not be sure that it was being booked as a rental yet in in order to fulfill this rule.

 

[disneylandtour]

Almost all of this (with possible exception of facial recognition) exists at Disney. Your MB and app is keeping tabs on where you go and whom you’ve are with…Disney has more tools than ever to call the bluff of people who are lying about their “friends and family”…but it wouldn’t surprise me if they don’t show their cards until well into a lawsuit.

About four years ago, Disney experimented with facial recognition systems at Disney World. It didn't go particularly well. So I do think this presently is limited. As far as I know, there hasn't been another large test.

And I can tell you the facial recognition system at Epic is less than stellar in terms of accuracy--typically with false negatives.

No doubt this is all coming in the near future--but presently it's limited in its application at WDW.

RFID magic band tracking is an entirely different matter. Disney definitely knows your habits from that.

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

There's another part of the calculus here - the level of ill will and bad publicity Disney will receive (on social media) from casual rentees whose reservations were cancelled by Disney. On this board, we will all know how to parse this out and what it means. But on social media, it's all going to sound like "Disney cancelled our reservation at the last minute, leaving us stranded, and they didn't give us any other reasonable alternatives." And if this is done in very large numbers, I think the optics are going to be pretty bad. So DVD has a difficult road to walk.

This is a double-edged sword. There are many people (I am not one of them) who thinks this is EXACTLY what Disney wants. I agree Disney wants people to believe there is a real risk to renting from strangers on FB and 3rd party rental brokers but I’m not sure they actually want the family of 12 from Sheboygan suddenly homeless in the Grand Floridian lobby live-streaming their misery.

Luckily, they have a middle ground option— the sweet spot would be cancelling rentals from some of the more egregious spec renters (fairly easy to identify) about 6 days in advance. Near enough that they are upset to lose their dining reservations and LLMPs and have to choose from last minute hotel inventory, but not actually causing a crisis for the people on vacation. They could even gently explain they’d been preyed upon by a sinister commercial renter but that if they want to hold on to their advance planning bookings, Disney is willing to set them up with a room at:
Poly- $684+tax
GF- $706+ tax
All Star Sports- $166+ tax
BW- $409+ tax
Port Orleans -$226+ tax
Pop Century- $194+ tax

(These are all real rates currently available for a family of 4 from 6/24-6/30)

 

[Mouseforward]

This is a double-edged sword. There are many people (I am not one of them) who thinks this is EXACTLY what Disney wants. I agree Disney wants people to believe there is a real risk to renting from strangers on FB and 3rd party rental brokers but I’m not sure they actually want the family of 12 from Sheboygan suddenly homeless in the Grand Floridian lobby live-streaming their misery.

Luckily, they have a middle ground option— the sweet spot would be cancelling rentals from some of the more egregious spec renters (fairly easy to identify) about 6 days in advance. Near enough that they are upset to lose their dining reservations and LLMPs and have to choose from last minute hotel inventory, but not actually causing a crisis for the people on vacation. They could even gently explain they’d been preyed upon by a sinister commercial renter but that if they want to hold on to their advance planning bookings, Disney is willing to set them up with a room at:
Poly- $684+tax
GF- $706+ tax
All Star Sports- $166+ tax
BW- $409+ tax
Port Orleans -$226+ tax
Pop Century- $194+ tax

(These are all real rates currently available for a family of 4 from 6/24-6/30)

Just booked BC for Labor Day week at the equivalent of $27 ( Inc taxes) a point with the AP - so not an awesome deal but about $200 a night cheaper and equal to renting a Studio from the big websites.

 

[Sandisw]

Both sections I quoted a few pages ago did differentiate between renters and a non-renting guest actually. A lot of times they lump paying renters and other family/friends in as "guests" but not all of the time.

"DVD’s approval of a rental by an owner is not required after a reservation has been made in the renter’s own name. However, Ownership interests should not be purchased with any expectation that Vacation Homes may be reserved and rented to third parties."

So if you make a reservation specifically for a renter in the renter's name and the reservation is confirmed, you do not need to get approval for that rental. A (Which means that if you make a reservation in your own name, you may need to get permission/approval to rent that reservation at a later date). And it likely won't be cancelled unless you have broken another rule. It specifically leaves out free family/friends and only mentions only renters specifically. And further it says that you should not expect to be able to reserve rooms and then rent them to a third party.

"When a Club Member uses Home Resort Vacation Points to reserve Vacation Homes on behalf of a Guest, and the Club Member does not charge any rental or other fees to the Guest for the reservation, then the Guest may be eligible for all or some of the Club Member privileges and benefits that a Club Member would normally receive during the Club Member’s stay in the reserved Vacation Home. If the Guest is renting, it is the responsibility of the Member to notify Member Services when making the reservation. Member privileges and benefits cannot be extended to Guests who rent Vacation Homes from Club Members"

This also sets different rules for free guest use and renting use. Free guests do not require us to notify member services that they are staying, and may be entitled to some extra privileges and benefits that we get as members. If the reservation is a rental, we are required to notify members services about the details of the rental at the time of the reservation. If you are booking a spec rental in your own name to possibly rent to an unknown renter later, you would be unable to confirm the renter guest details and would not be sure that it was being booked as a rental yet in in order to fulfill this rule.

Well, I have talked to DVC at length over the years and you do not need DVDs approval to rent, whether it’s a name change or not.

So, I am taking what they directly told me in reference to that.

Yes, you have to let them know it’s a rental. But the way you reserve is not and never has been different.

Because you are allowed to make for yourself, guests, and renters, I do not believe that DVC can make different rules for cancellations or modifications for owners vs renters.

Why? Because the HRR have to be the same for all owners…FL 721 explains that,,,, and why I do not think they can say you can change a name to a friend or family but not to a renter.

Outside of notifying DVC it’s a rental, and in my discussions with DVC, DVD can’t institute a prior approval rule…

Again, we can agree to disagree here because we know they are not preventing lead guest changes, even for rentals.