Future of Riveria

[Cfabar1]

I will say this about Riviera ; even with the Resale restrictions at least its a beautiful resort in a good location unlike SSR which is a total bust. That was a huge DVC mistake. Its the largest resort which added millions of points to the system and nobody wants to stay there. Ridiculous mistake. You could add Vero beach to that too.

Disagree about Vero, but otherwise agree.

 

[Dobermanns]

Initially, the restriction kept me away from buying direct (already own at other resorts). But I fell in love with the resort after dining at Topolino and then staying there for a week a few months later. I decided resale was OK, since I would only ever use RIV points at RIV. And I bought DVC because of runDisney, so all my bookings for race must be done at 11-months anyways.

I did consider the possibility of potential difficulty in booking if enough resale owners are locked into RIV, so I bought extra points to allow for larger units.

 

[ziravan]

Initially, the restriction kept me away from buying direct (already own at other resorts). But I fell in love with the resort after dining at Topolino and then staying there for a week a few months later. I decided resale was OK, since I would only ever use RIV points at RIV. And I bought DVC because of runDisney, so all my bookings for race must be done at 11-months anyways.

I did consider the possibility of potential difficulty in booking if enough resale owners are locked into RIV, so I bought extra points to allow for larger units.

And unless DVC does a serious revamp of how they do their point charts, if you have enough points for a 1BR - and you’re booking 11 months out, you should be fine.

We find 5 nights is our perfect trip. By the end of five nights, we’re ready to go home. It’s not like I’m not gonna be back in 6 months…

So we bought enough to book 5 nights in a 1BR in either the Spring or early Fall.

I’m not worried about booking for us; I think we’ll be fine.

Buying a standard studio fixed week was about preserving resale value. As many have posted, the value of having a Fall standard studio pre-booked was likely to be there even without the restrictions: those are gonna be hard to book anyway.

 

[Epcot Forever Forever]

There are (at least) two reasons why I think the doomsday scenario doesn't happen.

First, it's just not the case that everyone can plan at 11 months. Some people can, sure. But, not everyone can or will. Riviera has a decent room mix. There are 210 studios in total between dedicated and lockoff, with about 280 larger rooms. If you absolutely need a Tower Studio (or a Standard View) then maybe things are hard much of the time. And yes, it's inconceivable to most of us that someone would not be online right at 8AM, 11 months to the day before a vacation that we might or might not take. But most people just don't think about this the way the average DISer does.

Second, I suspect it will take a while for even an appreciable minority of the resort to be in the hands of resale buyers. We see things like "people hold contracts for ten years" but as I understand it, that's only the people who are selling. Lots of people don't. I have yet to see anyone do the work to really figure this out*, and it would be hard to use other systems as an estimator because the economics are different for most of them.

----
*: I'm not even 100% sure that the public deeds give enough information to do this, though I think if you had access to all of them you could probably figure it out. But you can't just count the total resales, because some contracts are presumably "resold" more than once.

I believe @wdrl dug through 25-30 years of OC data and figured out a few years ago that the total OKW points ever purchased resale was less than 25% of all the points for the resort. And that doesn’t even account for re-resales which would knock that number down more. So assume ~80% of OKW points are still held direct.

In other words, slow turnover.

 

[DonMacGregor]

DVC rooms are getting smaller because, even though it's practically mandatory to complain about not getting enough out of the rooms (amenities, housekeeping, theming), the trend, on the party of purchasers/owners, seems to a desire to squeeze as many warm bodies into something the size of a closet to save money and use fewer points. Building rooms that are 10 or 15% larger isn't going to demonstrably change the cost of building a new tower/resort or in turn purchasing a DVC contract. We're not talking about trying to fir as many staterooms as possible onto a cruise ship, where space is somewhat finite.

People would rather have a studio that sleeps 7, over a villa that actually has a kitchen. Disney knows how quickly studios are reserved, and conversely how long larger villas take to book.

 

[mz-s]

I personally think Riviera is the perfect DINK resort (Dual Income, No Kids)

Probably why my wife and I own there.

We can do without the kitchen most trips - and so a studio is A-OK for us (saves us points too!). Just wish they could have put that amazing soaking/bubbling tub in the studios!

 

[mz-s]

DVC rooms are getting smaller because, even though it's practically mandatory to complain about not getting enough out of the rooms (amenities, housekeeping, theming), the trend, on the party of purchasers/owners, seems to a desire to squeeze as many warm bodies into something the size of a closet to save money and use fewer points. Building rooms that are 10 or 15% larger isn't going to demonstrably change the cost of building a new tower/resort or in turn purchasing a DVC contract. We're not talking about trying to fir as many staterooms as possible onto a cruise ship, where space is somewhat finite.

People would rather have a studio that sleeps 7, over a villa that actually has a kitchen. Disney knows how quickly studios are reserved, and conversely how long larger villas take to book.

Isn't it great that we have a choice, it's not either or. Well you have a choice as long as you don't buy resale Riviera points, anyway.

 

[DonMacGregor]

Isn't it great that we have a choice, it's not either or. Well you have a choice as long as you don't buy resale Riviera points, anyway.

I have no problem with DVC building smaller rooms if that's what the majority of guests are suggesting that's what they want. I have a problem with one group saying "give us more studios", while another group complains that Disney is building smaller rooms for some nefarious reason.

 

[mz-s]

I have no problem with DVC building smaller rooms if that's what the majority of guests are suggesting that's what they want. I have a problem with one group saying "give us more studios", while another group complains that Disney is building smaller rooms for some nefarious reason.

Oh that's everything though. You can please some of the people, some of the time.

 

[EYL]

If you buy, ask for a guaranteed (aka fixed week or DVC now calls them “favorite” weeks) contract.

We bought a week 44 guaranteed 153 pt week 44 standard studio contract plus a 50 pt contract because we wanted enough points to book 5 nights in a standard 1Br each year.

We never plan to use the guaranteed week, but if we sell, a guaranteed booking each year for a resale buyer plus a small point contract will both sell well.

Our entire reason for buying a fixed week plus small point contract was to hedge our ability to resale - which we never intend to do.

We think it’s a great hedge strategy and did the same with Poly (week 44 Lake View studio).

10 yrs from now, if it gets hard to book standard studios at 11 months because all the resale Riviera owners are trying to do the same thing, our resale buyer - if we ever resale - will have a distinct advantage, and that will add value to the contract we hope.

In the meantime, we shouldn’t have a problem at 11 months booking a 1Br and if that ever becomes a problem, WE have a fixed week as a backup and just like with Poly, we can make a studio work.

(Both of our contracts are week 44 because over time we believe the first full week of Nov will increase in value. Our 168 pt Poly contract already costs 185 to book now. Both our fixed weeks are week 44 but we’d move 1 (annual trip) to spring if booking got hard - depending on which one was easier to move to spring. Our purpose was one Spring and one Fall trip each year anyway (with a few AKV resale SAP in between).

We thought similarly and bought a Standard Studio Week 43 at 130 points before they revised the Guaranteed Week point charts. While we have no plans to use the Guaranteed Week just yet, we figured that week of/before Halloween would be a week that we would like to go for the Halloween parties and for Food & Wine. We have no plans to sell, but we hope that it would be a good exit strategy in the event that we have to. The week itself is worth 139 points now, and if it stays that way, it would be a savings for anyone okay with it.

 

[AnnaKristoff2013]

and nobody wants to stay there.

Hard disagree.

 

[AnnaKristoff2013]

But you don't get AKV value you can still get standard which is still competitive priced. Or BLT lake or BWV garden. The difference with Riviera is that there is no plan B at 7 months, not even SSR preferred.
Would you buy a resort where every room is as difficult to book as AKV value?
Again, I'm not saying it'll happen. But it could.

The thing to remember is that Disney benefits immensely when owners can’t use their points. They have an incentive to make it as difficult as possible for owners to use them to create breakage. Disney only contributes breakage income to a certain percentage of resort operations (I forget what that is, someone feel free to jump in), and everything over that percentage they get to keep for themselves.

 

[Sandisw]

I just deleted a whole bunch of posts that really did not have anything to do with the topic thread and or DVc for that matter.

Feel free to have that conversation in a different forum not related to DVC but for let’s stay to RIV and it’s future.

 

[Sunnyore]

I will say this about Riviera ; even with the Resale restrictions at least its a beautiful resort in a good location unlike SSR which is a total bust. That was a huge DVC mistake. Its the largest resort which added millions of points to the system and nobody wants to stay there. Ridiculous mistake. You could add Vero beach to that too.

I love SSR and love staying there especially when I want access to Disney Springs. When I stay there I would plan on driving to the parks but at least at night I can walk over to DS and not worry about trying to find parking space. While I do agree Riviera is a nice resort, it is not my favorite to stay at because I don't feel I can depend on the skyliner. When its working its great but I've been stranded one too many times. Wish they have a more reliable form of transportation in place.

 

[arich35]

Would love to buy resale at Riviera but the restrictions would be really tough to deal with.

 

[badeacon]

I love SSR and love staying there especially when I want access to Disney Springs. When I stay there I would plan on driving to the parks but at least at night I can walk over to DS and not worry about trying to find parking space. While I do agree Riviera is a nice resort, it is not my favorite to stay at because I don't feel I can depend on the skyliner. When its working its great but I've been stranded one too many times. Wish they have a more reliable form of transportation in place.

I agree about reliability of Skyliner. I have been there multiple times when Skyliner was down for wind or lightening in area. Have walked out towards BCV(where staying) at IG with CM telling people to walk back to front for bus to Riveria because Skyliner is down .
Also even when working, very long lines at close of parks on Skyliner.

 

[Sandisw]

I agree about reliability of Skyliner. I have been there multiple times when Skyliner was down for wind or lightening in area. Have walked out towards BCV(where staying) at IG with CM telling people to walk back to front for bus to Riveria because Skyliner is down .
Also even when working, very long lines at close of parks on Skyliner.

I have been in those long Skyliner lines but they move pretty fast. I have waited longer at close for buses back to resorts Last time we did it we were near the bridge and was on the Skyliner back to RIV in less than 15 minutes.

We have been fortunate because in all our times ar RIV Skyliner was down only once mid afternoon….but they had buses coming every 10 minutes so it wasn’t too bad at all.

 

[Yankee626]

I love SSR and love staying there especially when I want access to Disney Springs. When I stay there I would plan on driving to the parks but at least at night I can walk over to DS and not worry about trying to find parking space. While I do agree Riviera is a nice resort, it is not my favorite to stay at because I don't feel I can depend on the skyliner. When its working its great but I've been stranded one too many times. Wish they have a more reliable form of transportation in place.

I should change the nobody wants to stay there to hardly anyone. Its the resort of last resorts. Most people buy there because its cheap sleep around points . That clogs the system with millions of points at the 7 month mark. Riviera does not. People buy to stay there.

 

[tom1944]

I should change the nobody wants to stay there to hardly anyone. Its the resort of last resorts. Most people buy there because its cheap sleep around points . That clogs the system with millions of points at the 7 month mark. Riviera does not. People buy to stay there.

For those of us who know we are unlikely to book at 11 months but we still want to own DVC it only makes sense.

My early research I read a lot of "if you do not plan to book at 11-month DVC may not be for you" but I still wanted to own.

I would have purchased at BLT but was unable to find a contract where the premium to own there in comparison to owning at SSR made sense.

I also realized that we will mostly book 1 bedroom so availability may be okay for us.

 

[Yankee626]

For those of us who know we are unlikely to book at 11 months but we still want to own DVC it only makes sense.

My early research I read a lot of "if you do not plan to book at 11-month DVC may not be for you" but I still wanted to own.

I would have purchased at BLT but was unable to find a contract where the premium to own there in comparison to owning at SSR made sense.

I also realized that we will mostly book 1 bedroom so availability may be okay for us.

Thats fine. I just wish it was a resort that others would want to stay in. Its always available because few want to stay there.