Free Cruise, Good Deal?

[Stevegriswold]

Is this a good deal?

EXISTING MEMBER ADD-ON
100 - 119 points: 3-night Disney Cruise Line voyage
120 - 199 points: 4-night Disney Cruise line voyage
200+ points: 7-night Disney Cruise Line voyage

Say I add on 100 AKV points at Disney's price.
Does this come out to less than me just booking a 3 night cruise for any date I want in 2009 with the free kids promo?

From checking the ROFR board here I see that I can get AKV points via resale and work it into the deal that the seller pays closing costs. So I can get AKV for about $85 I see one that passed at $81.50 but would think $85 a point would pass from looking at the boards,

So my cost to buy 100 AKV points resale is $8,500 ($85 a pt X 100 pts)

What do AKV points cost direct from Disney? $108? If that is the right cost that would be $10,800.

So $10,800 and free cruise
VS $ 8,500 and buy your own cruise

So that is $2,000 cash diff. that I could use to buy a three day cruise on teh kids free promo. I would think I could easily get a three day Disney cruise for two adults and one free kid for a lot less than $2k.

Does this sound right?

Thanks

 

[CarolA]

I agree with your logic.

IMHO the "incentive" should NEVER really be considered when buying. That's a ONE time deal that you may actually cost you money. IF I am buying either way the incentive is good, but to pay more for an incentive means you just "capatilzed" the cost into your membership. Nothings really "Free" with Disney. What they are really saying is "due to the bad economy we can't fill these boats or sell these timeshares.... let's bundle the two together rather then lowering prices on either one" In other words they don't lower the price on the timeshare or "fire sale" the cruise....

 

[TexasGator]

Does anyone know the dates that are available for the "free" promotional cruises?

 

[Modog814]

We just added on 100 points at AKV and got the free cruise.

I have the actual dates at home, but it was basically the 1st thursday in sept (or last thursday in august) through the 2nd week in Feb, not including the week in between christmas and new years. Thanksgiving week was included but I think it set sail on sunday and not thursday (thanksgiving day). There were a few other odd weeks that were left out.

Note we also got a $6.25 (or $6.75 I forget which one) point deduction off the $112 list price, so it was 105.75 per point.

The cruise was a category 8 or 9, and you could upgrade to a verandah for $80 extra per person. Tax and Gratuities were included, only had to pay for alcohol and off ship excursions.

Our plan was to buy 50 points now and another 50 or so in a couple years, but with this offer thought it was a good enough deal to just get the 100 points now.

It may have been a little cheaper to go re-sale and buy a cruise ourselves, but that would have required time and effort which we don't particularly have an abundance of at this time. Plus it was nice waking up the next day and having the points in our account already to be used.

 

[TexasGator]

Thanks for the info. It seems like most dates are available outside of summer and major holidays.

 

[ACDSNY]

It worked out well for us since I already had 3 cabins booked for Nov. It will be interesting to see if I have to cancel and rebook next month or if they'll apply the voucher to my existing reservation.

 

[janni518]

Was looking at this and am wondering how long it is good for. Did I just miss it in the teensy print?

 

[ACDSNY]

Was looking at this and am wondering how long it is good for. Did I just miss it in the teensy print?

Someone posted the dates on this thread.

 

[janni518]

Someone posted the dates on this thread.

Thanks, but I was wondering how long the promotion was good for.

 

[tjkraz]

Thanks, but I was wondering how long the promotion was good for.

The promotion is only a week or two old. Normally DVC runs these things for a couple of months and ending dates aren't known until close to the end. So the answer to your question is...nobody knows.

If course, all of the DCL voyages are "subject to availability" so if you're considering the promotion and don't have a lot of flexibility in your schedule, you may not want to wait too long.

 

[lah3hh]

This little incentive is what made up our final decision about buying additional points as a founding member for the VGC. Once we heard about the cruise offer we bought quickly. The incentive even swayed how much we bought because originally we were thinking of only 60 point add on...then changed to 100...and ultimately bought 125.

Now we have a 4 day free cruise coming our way....I am very pleased!!!!