First Riviera ROFR

[Brian Noble]

upper peninsula of Michigan

It's pretty spectacular, as it happens. Thanks, Ohio! (And apologies to what would become Wisconsin.)

That said, they measure snow in feet, not inches, especially in the northern reaches of it. Ask anyone who went to Michigan Tech what it was like. (And no, I did not.)

 

[havoc315]

Offsite guests primarily stay offsite to save money. To get this crowd,

Yes and no.

First off, the proportion of on/offsite is not constant. Disney pretty consistently keeps their hotels over 90% occupancy. Meaning in low season, they aggressively discount, and most guests stay onsite.
Busy season — they don’t even have enough hotel space for every guest. So prices are jacked up, onsite hotels are full, and a greater percentage stay offsite.

So for busy season, if you wanted more onsite guests, then you need to build more hotels.

But what about slow season — why do guests stay offsite despite aggressive discounts. I suggest:

1– a huge chunk of those guests are locals. They go back to their own house, no need for a hotel.
2– a chunk are against the WDW bubble. Maybe they are staying in Orlando for a week, but are only planning 1-2 days at Disney; other days doing other things. Maybe they just want to escape the Disney vibes each night.
3- They may want accommodations not traditionally offered by Disney. They are an extended family of 15 people, renting an entire house where they get their own pool.
4– price related, but not simply going cheap: offsite will almost offer more for the money. Guests not willing to pay a premium for location. Disney value resorts would not want to match a Motel 6– Disney wants to be able to charge a premium for being onsite. So it will almost always be true that an offsite guest can get a deluxe level property for a Disney mid price, a Disney equivalent mod property for value pricing. These guests simply don’t put a premium on location.

I just did a random search for weeknights in mid November — plenty of rooms for $50 to $60 per night. Lots of really nice options for $150 per night.
Disney has no interest in trying to compete with this: if they tried charging $150 per night for Beach Club, then they couldn’t get $500 per night for Yacht Club. (Disney secretly offers some deep discounts on Priceline and Hotwire for this very reason, but you can’t do mass volume of that. The secret would get out if 90% of Grand Floridian guests were paying $229 per night)

So looking at the mix of offsite guests— categories 1&2 are really not convertible.
Guests in category 3 are not really convertible under current models — you can get some of them into a DVC villa but even that doesn’t compete with renting an entire large house.

Category 4– If Disney dropped deluxe pricing to $199 per night, mods to $119 per night and values to $59 per night, that would indeed convert off site guests. But Disney would lose tons of money, as they would be losing the ability to book thousands of rooms at much higher rates. Better to charge 2,000 guests $600 per night than to charge 3,000 guests $149 per night.
It’s because deluxe rooms are so expensive, that thousands of people see value in buying DVC. If you knew you could book Contemporary and Boardwalk for $199 per night, would you pay $40,000 upfront for DVC?

Disney would either need to build value accommodations (which Disney has demonstrated no appetite for), or lower hotel rates across the board (it seems to be the route they're currently going, surprisingly).

Disney could demolish existing resorts, which I don't think they've ever done before. I won't name names, but some resorts in the value and moderate categories seem like they've lived a full life to me.

 

[Flash_Sloth]

Tell that to the people who buy in Marriot's systemt. Or stay at the Ritz-Carlton. Or the Waldorf. None of them are spending less than it costs to buy DVC or stay onsite.

Not everyone is offsite to save money. Some are offsite because the service level is better---and that's a different problem for Disney, but one that is more easily surmounted given the business model.


This is not the first. They also bulldozed one of the Garden Wings to build BLT, and SSR is built on the bones of the old DIsney Institute.

For our most recent trip to Orlando, we did a split stay offsite/onsite. My DW was going to a work conference, and it was extremely close to a hotel in our HGVC timeshare; easy walking distance. We booked HGVC for her con, and booked a couple of nights in DVC after her con was over. Worked out great for us.

Maybe I'm looking way too far ahead, but with DVC setting up to ROFR & flip cheap resale restricted contracts like RIV, it may price out potential customers who can't or won't afford direct. Who knows when or if that will become a problem.

 

[atthebeachclub]

Side note let me know if you ever need a legitimate beach front hotel in Carlsbad I have 2 that I love. Most say beach front and aren't actually beach front. These 2 are on the beach

I’m curious! I spent about half a year in Carlsbad. Great place to vacation. I don’t ever want to live in California again though. Culturally it was not a fit for me (and I’m a west coaster born and raised).

 

[Brian Noble]

may price out potential customers who can't or won't afford direct.

Seeing as how DVC only profits from direct sales, I don’t think they will care. From DVC m’s point of view, people who do not buy points from them are not customers.

 

[Blondientor]

Nice — that link points to the DVC Resale Market blog, which offers a ton of insight on trends, resale prices, and market dynamics. Here's a quick overview of what you'll find:

They recently reported Disney executing its first-ever ROFR (Right of First Refusal) on a Riviera resale contract — a notable signal about demand and Disney’s market involvement.
DVC Resale Market |

You’ll also find their monthly resale average sales price reports—for example, July 2025’s average is $117 per point, slightly down from June’s $118.
DVC Resale Market |
+1

Plus, they regularly analyze which resorts offer the best value, considering factors like annual dues, years left on the deed, and per-point cost.
DVC Resale Market |

If you were looking for something specific from that post, let me know and I’ll dig deeper. But overall, it’s a solid resource for tracking resale pricing trends and making informed DVC decisions.

 

[Cyberc1978]

Nice — that link points to the DVC Resale Market blog, which offers a ton of insight on trends, resale prices, and market dynamics. Here's a quick overview of what you'll find:

Insights might be a stretch. They are a broker, the only insight they have is what prices a contract goes for - and since we can't look over their shoulder they can report whatever they want. No saying they report anything untrue, but if they did, who would know?

They recently reported Disney executing its first-ever ROFR (Right of First Refusal) on a Riviera resale contract — a notable signal about demand and Disney’s market involvement.
DVC Resale Market |

You’ll also find their monthly resale average sales price reports—for example, July 2025’s average is $117 per point, slightly down from June’s $118.
DVC Resale Market |
+1

Plus, they regularly analyze which resorts offer the best value, considering factors like annual dues, years left on the deed, and per-point cost.
DVC Resale Market |


If you were looking for something specific from that post, let me know and I’ll dig deeper. But overall, it’s a solid resource for tracking resale pricing trends and making informed DVC decisions.

Sorry to say but your entire post looks like an advertisement for DVRM


I have to disagree, they are not a solid resource, the Disboards is a solid resource for tracking prices and making informed decisions. Anything a broker reports you need to take with a grain of salt, they have their own agenda for doing so.