Help!!! DVC Basic questions

[Mousemommy1]

Hi All ~ we have been throwing around the idea of buying for a few years, and I just have a few questions. How long does the purchase usually take? (we plan on buying direct thru Disney). How much is the interest rate for financing (we have top tier credit)? How good is availability usually at resorts other than your home resort, like if we want to try other resorts? We plan on getting 160 pts. Is that pretty sufficient for once a year for a week or a little longer? Thanks!!!

 

[Deb & Bill]

Hi All ~ we have been throwing around the idea of buying for a few years, and I just have a few questions. How long does the purchase usually take? (we plan on buying direct thru Disney). How much is the interest rate for financing (we have top tier credit)? How good is availability usually at resorts other than your home resort, like if we want to try other resorts? We plan on getting 160 pts. Is that pretty sufficient for once a year for a week or a little longer? Thanks!!!

Why are you fixed on buying direct from Disney? You can purchase points on the resale market for a lot less.

 

[Mousemommy1]

Why are you fixed on buying direct from Disney? You can purchase points on the resale market for a lot less.

Disney has a pretty decent deal on points right now...and I have looked at resale sites and realize I could get the points for a lot cheaper, but I read a lot about speculations on restrictions to contracts from outside sellers...

 

[disneynutz]

If you really want to buy direct, you should contact them and find out what the terms of purchase are. They will be raising the prices again and are currently offering a small incentive if you buy AKV now.

Remember information is power!

Bill

 

[Missyrose]

Hi All ~ we have been throwing around the idea of buying for a few years, and I just have a few questions. How long does the purchase usually take? (we plan on buying direct thru Disney). How much is the interest rate for financing (we have top tier credit)? How good is availability usually at resorts other than your home resort, like if we want to try other resorts? We plan on getting 160 pts. Is that pretty sufficient for once a year for a week or a little longer? Thanks!!!

There also isn't as much in options when it comes to resort changing (yes, I'm on these boards too!). You book your home resort 11 months out and change at 7 months if you want a resort other than your home resort. The closer you get to your dates, the less options you will have.

I would do a great deal of research on these boards to determine whether buying direct is really the way to go for your family. The restrictions Disney has put on resale contracts are for options that don't hold much value for your points (especially if your point total is in the 100-200 range). Like PP said, you could buy AKV points from Disney for $125 per point, or buy resale and pay $55-$60 per point (and maybe not even have to finance the deal).

There are many things to keep in mind about the differences between staying in a resort room and DVC villa. Information is your friend. Spend the next few weeks really learning all the ins and outs of DVC ownership and see where you stand once you have more info.

Good luck.

 

[ELMC]

Disney has a pretty decent deal on points right now...and I have looked at resale sites and realize I could get the points for a lot cheaper, but I read a lot about speculations on restrictions to contracts from outside sellers...

I would like to echo the opinions expressed already by saying that you should do a LOT more research before making a purchase. I would also like to add two points:

First, what you mentioned above is just what you said, speculation. Furthermore, it is a parroting of the fear tactics used by DVC sales people to sway people away from a good financial value (resale) by making it seem that they are getting a better product by buying direct. General consensus is that whether direct or resale, you will be treated the same when booking at a DVC resort.

Second, please read up on the threads with regards to financing vs. purchasing outright. I don't know about your personal situation and I am NOT trying to be mean or condescending, but the prevailing theory in the financial and timeshare communities is that financing a timeshare is a very poor decision. Timeshares are a luxury purchase and if you don't have the cash on hand, then perhaps you should delay gratification and hold off on purchasing.

Have fun doing the research and keep asking questions. Good luck!

 

[ToddyLu]

We made the decision to purchase direct in 2009 and have no regreats. We got a 10.75% interest rate (their standard rate is around 14% I think). Our points were $93 dollars with incentives at the time and we purchase 210 points at AKV. Our monthly mortgage is $237 and out monthly MFs are $80. We have used our membership up and have enjoyed every point.

So far we have used 7 studio villas at Kidani since our purchase for 7-9 nights each trip. We have stayed in SV, standard and this trip in Oct we will stay in Value Studios at AKV.

Sometimes it bothers me when the prevailing attitude is not to finance a luxury purchase. It is up to you and your situation. It was OK for us and we have loved being members. I believe we have gotten what we paid for...

Would we buy direct again? Nope, resale...but we know we will only travel to DVC resorts and of course we did not know about resales when we purchased. We still have no regreats about our loan.

The loan is not placed on your credit report and there is no penalty for paying it off early.

 

[ELMC]

We made the decision to purchase direct in 2009 and have no regreats. We got a 10.75% interest rate (their standard rate is around 14% I think). Our points were $93 dollars with incentives at the time and we purchase 210 points at AKV. Our monthly mortgage is $237 and out monthly MFs are $80. We have used our membership up and have enjoyed every point.

So far we have used 7 studio villas at Kidani since our purchase for 7-9 nights each trip. We have stayed in SV, standard and this trip in Oct we will stay in Value Studios at AKV.

Sometimes it bothers me when the prevailing attitude is not to finance a luxury purchase. It is up to you and your situation. It was OK for us and we have loved being members. I believe we have gotten what we paid for...

Would we buy direct again? Nope, resale...but we know we will only travel to DVC resorts and of course we did not know about resales when we purchased. We still have no regreats about our loan.

The loan is not placed on your credit report and there is no penalty for paying it off early.

Toddy,

You're not going to like what I'm about to say. I'm going to preface it by saying that I am happy for you that you are enjoying your purchase. I'm not trying to intentionally make you feel bad, but in the interests of the OP who asked the question, I do feel that I need to make one comment.

Given the numbers you provided (thank you for being so candid), over the course of the loan (assuming 10 years) you will pay $11,180 in interest. That pushes your effective purchase price, including interest, to $146 a point. In addition, it would probably cost less money for you to rent DVC points and have the same exact number of visits than it would to pay the interest and maintenance fees alone on those points (this doesn't even include your principal payment).

I understand that there are other factors than money, and you feel like you are getting value or you have some emotional benefit from owning DVC, and I respect that point of view. But from a strictly financial standpoint, taking a loan to purchase DVC is a very poor decision.

 

[GrnMtnMan]

but I read a lot about speculations on restrictions to contracts from outside sellers...

As others have said, some more research is in order.

I always like to remind people what they are buying when buying a timeshare (and DVC is a timeshare): along with 50 or so other people, you are buying a vacation condo. You're obligated to pay whatever it requires to keep that condo in good shape.

But the other side of that is that nobody else among your fellow owners has any greater claim to that condo than you do. And if you decide to sell the rights to your usage of that condo, there is no way for DVC to restrict the subsequent owners usage of that condo.

What they can do is restrict or eliminate sales perks they added to entice *you* to buy. That's what they did last year. Also important to note is that they didn't cut off these perks for secondary buyers....just secondary buyers who purchased a resale after a certain date. The expectation is that if DVC were to add any other new restrictions, they wouldn't change the rules on existing owners, just future resale buyers.

Like others have said, the perks they eliminated were very poor value per point perks....like paying $100 credit for something that you could have purchased for $50 cash.

One of the concerns people have is that DVC might change the 11 and 7 month booking windows for resale buyers. 1) DVC cannot give somebody else greater access to your condo....you'll always have the same booking advantage (minimum of one month, per the original contract) as the original buyer. 2) There's a thought that they could give direct buyers an earlier non-home resort booking window. This is generally thought to be unlikely, as it would effectively remove inventory from DVC resorts. Knowing that they have a disadvantage, resale buyers (who are generally better informed than direct) would book more reservations during their exclusive period, leaving less out there for direct. For this reason, its probably impractical for DVC to create separate non-home resort booking windows for direct and resale buyers.

So the difference comes down to perks that are not guaranteed to be permanently part of your ownership, and uses of your points that are poor value.

Hope this helps your thinking process.

 

[Mousemommy1]

Thanks for the responses!!! I think we will probably just continue digging for discounts every year...I'd rather do that than have a 10.75% interest on anything!! our actual mortgage is only 3.75% so I can't imagine having a higher interest rate for a "vacation home". We don't even have interest on our cars...yikes! I'll get my shovel ready

 

[fmer55]

Thanks for the responses!!! I think we will probably just continue digging for discounts every year...I'd rather do that than have a 10.75% interest on anything!! our actual mortgage is only 3.75% so I can't imagine having a higher interest rate for a "vacation home". We don't even have interest on our cars...yikes! I'll get my shovel ready

just a thought,.......sounds like you are financially sound and if you have your sights set on buying direct you certainly dont have to finance through disney....there could always be the optopn of using a heloc, or home equity loan which you can get for about 3.25 right now......just my two cents

 

[ELMC]

just a thought,.......sounds like you are financially sound and if you have your sights set on buying direct you certainly dont have to finance through disney....there could always be the optopn of using a heloc, or home equity loan which you can get for about 3.25 right now......just my two cents

To add to this great idea, that interest you pay on a home equity loan should be tax deductible (consult your tax professional). This is a good example of leveraging debt, provided that you have another use for the money that could return greater than the interest rate you would be paying.