Help me decide on DVC purchase

WendyinNC

DIS Veteran
Joined
Jul 4, 2003
Messages
538
I have a family of 6 and live in North Carolina. I plan (always subject to change) to visit HH during Easter Break every other year and WDW during Summer Break every other year. My thought is that I should purchase points at HH since it may be more difficult to get Easter week at HH than Summer at WDW. However, when I go to WDW I really want to stay at either BCV, BWV or WLV. I would also like to try AKV once and would love it if CRV was built.

(1) Where should I purchase - HH, BWV, or wait for AKV or CRV? I'm not in a hurray since my youngest is only 10 months old.

(2) I'm assuming resale is the way to go if I want HH or BWV. Correct?

(3) What would be a good use year?

(4) I'm assuming 150 points would be a good amount if I only stay Sun-Thurs. Correct?

My hesitation on purchsing at WDW is that my vacations there are subject to the price of airfare (I really don't want to drive). I don't mind paying the current rates, but if they go up alot I won't want to go.
 
Based on what your saying i would think you need to split the contracts up like 75 at hh and 75 wherever else you want to stay b/c the times you want to go will be very busy. And when i say busy i mean you will need the 11 month booking window to make sure you get your reservation.Otherwise you will be dealing with waitlist.
Just my opinion but i would buy resale at hh for 75 points and thenwhen your in the system i would add on through disney
 
WendyinNC said:
I have a family of 6 and live in North Carolina. I plan (always subject to change) to visit HH during Easter Break every other year and WDW during Summer Break every other year. My thought is that I should purchase points at HH since it may be more difficult to get Easter week at HH than Summer at WDW. However, when I go to WDW I really want to stay at either BCV, BWV or WLV. I would also like to try AKV once and would love it if CRV was built.

(1) Where should I purchase - HH, BWV, or wait for AKV or CRV? I'm not in a hurray since my youngest is only 10 months old.

(2) I'm assuming resale is the way to go if I want HH or BWV. Correct?

(3) What would be a good use year?

(4) I'm assuming 150 points would be a good amount if I only stay Sun-Thurs. Correct?

My hesitation on purchsing at WDW is that my vacations there are subject to the price of airfare (I really don't want to drive). I don't mind paying the current rates, but if they go up alot I won't want to go.

It sounds to me like you are thinking things through very well for your family's situation. My answers to your questions would be:

1. If you know where you want to stay, especially during high demand periods, AND your family's schedule allows you to book more than seven months in advance, then you should buy at at those resorts. If you know you will want to split your time (i.e. one trip to HH, next trip to BWV) then buying two smaller contracts and using banking and borrowing would, IMO, be the best way to go.

2. It depends. Once you decide how many points you need, and at which home resort/s, you can evaluate whether buying resale or direct makes more sense. If you want to buy fewer than 150 points, resale will be your only option.

3. I don't know. I honestly don't think it matters that much, unless you frequently have to cancel reservations at the last minute. Our use years have never made any difference to us. (We have 2 contracts with 2 use years, and previously had another contract with yet another UY.) Others will surely disagree here...YMMV!

4. If you bought a 75 point contract at both HH and BWV, you would have enough points for a S-TH stay in a 2-br at one or the other every year. (Did I say that right? Did it make sense?)

The only other piece of advice I can offer as a mom in a big family is that we find the size of the 2-br units at OKW (and VB and HH are about the same) to be extremely valuable. (Most of our points are at SSR, and while we've never had trouble booking a 2-br at OKW, we wish we had points there so we could get a GV!) The location of BWV and BCV is tempting, but in the end it isn't worth it to us to be squashed into the smaller rooms. Of course everyone's priorities are different, and as long as you know what those are, you should be able to make a decision you will be happy with.

Good luck with your decision!
 
MILLZ said:
b/c the times you want to go will be very busy.

Just to add...

Summer is not a high demand DVC time at all. It is for WDW in general. But not for DVC.

Now as more and more younger DVCers sign up well that might change somewhat. However, at this time it is not high demand.

Of all the times of the year you might have the best chance to get WDW DVC resorts, including the ones you listed, during the summer at 7 months. I got BCV, in July, no problem at 5 months out this year.

Who knows what the increase in members might produce. But now it is not a big deal.
 

Knowing what I know now (Bought at BWV 3 plus years ago) Here’s how I would answer the questions if I were in your shoes

(1) Where should I purchase - HH, BWV, or wait for AKV or CRV? I'm not in a hurray since my youngest is only 10 months old.
I would lean toward buying all the points at HHI, but like the idea of splitting into two contracts one at HHI and one at BWV. Owning at BWV would give you the 11 month advantage for Std points.

(2) I'm assuming resale is the way to go if I want HH or BWV. Correct?
I would say yes

(3) What would be a good use year?
Like a previous poster stated, only when cancellations occur does the use year usually matter, however given that you want to go around Sprng Break, a Feb Use year would be my recommendation

(4) I'm assuming 150 points would be a good amount if I only stay Sun-Thurs. Correct?
Note I'm answering this like you'll be taking a trip every year either to HH or WDW.... For HHI 2BR over Spring Breaks 150 is fine, for a 2BR in Magic season (middle of June to Middle of August) 150 will only be okay at OKW. For BCV, VWL, and preferred view BWV, you'll need 200. No one knows what the AKV requirements are yet. As a suggestion, I’d buy as many points over what you think you’ll need as you can afford. Most on the board here wish they had more points. That’s why they call it Add-on-it-is!

Hope this Helps. Good Luck!!
 
You can add on points after you buy a package. How does that work and how much is it?
 
Without a doubt, I would purchase at HH.

We tried to make reservations after becoming members this summer - at about 9 weeks out. I asked for reservation for ANYTIME in July or August. I had no problems getting reservations at WDW -we even had a choice of resorts. Vero had availability.

BUT - HHI was totally booked - except for a random single weekend night.

If you KNOW you will want HH during the summer regularly, buy HH.
 
We are currently purchasing at SSR. We booked for SSR in June and waitlisted to get into 2 BR standard at BWV. By the end of the day our
request had come through. We were thrilled because we had been worried about the 7 month window

HTH
 
Hi, Wendy - fellow NC DVC owner here!!

I bought 165 HH points as my first contract. That gets us a 2BR for five nights (Sunday - Thursday) in July's high season. You might want to think about that as your children get older. Mine are not always available on the same schedule anymore and we can't always count on Spring Break together as a family. I know that will be a ways off for you, but having the flexibility to get the large unit we need in summer gives us greater flexibility, and you'll have teenagers before you know it!!

I added another 165 contract at BCV later, and that's what we use for most of our WDW trips. Both of my contracts are March use years, which work very well for us. I don't remember a Spring Break in February for us, they are always in March or April, so March 1 has been great for our new allotment of points.
I bought HH directly from Disney because I wanted a specific number of points. I bought the BCV contract resale because it matched what I needed at the time. Both ways were easy and painless!!

Good luck with your decision!!!
 
Another fellow NCarolinian here, with 4 kids, too! We purchased 150 BWV points in Dec.1999. At the time, our kids were young, and I *thought* 150 would be plenty of points(Boy, was I wrong on that!) Less than a year later I purchased 50 points at HH so I could spend a night or two every other year on my way to/from Disney World. We usually drive(it's about 9 hours one-way), and I thought a night or two on the beach would be a nice way to break up the drive. Needless to say, I ended up adding another 50 HH points later for the 11-month advantage in the summer. You seem to have a good idea of how you would use your points(something I did not even think about when purchasing), so the purchase itself should be easy. Resale is definitely the way to go for HH right now. I would suggest purchasing a minimum of 75 points there, to bank/borrow for a trip every other year. The Saturday night stays are a killer there, so you probably won't be spending a lot of Saturday nights there with 150 points! For purchases of less than 150 points, you'll have to go resale, so you may not be able to choose your use-year. Just look for a contract with the right amount of points first. After closing on your HH contract, you can purchase your on-property points from Disney(keeping your same use-year if you purchase less than 150 points),or go the resale route again, but maybe ending up with a different use-year. I have to admit that having the same use-year for my multiple contracts is nice...it makes tracking my points usage easier. An ideal use-year for Spring/Summer stays would probably be Oct./ Nov./Dec./Feb. Any month would be fine, but you will have more flexibility with points that will not expire near the times you wish to use them. I have a Dec. use-year, and that works great for us because my kids are all teens now(18,16,14,13), and we have to vacation during school/college breaks, which means summer and Christmas/New Years. If I had to do all over again, I would have purchased a small contract through resale, then added on through Disney as I needed to, paying cash each time. It is getting increasingly harder to book BCV/BWV/WLV stays during popular times without the 11-month advantage. If you can be flexible with your summer dates and resort choices, where you purchase your points won't be a problem. But if you only want to stay at one of those three resorts, you should purchase points at one of them. We spend a lot of time at OKW, even though we do not own there, because my husband loves the bigger rooms and the general "feel" of the resort. My kids love the location of the BWV(not neccessarily the resort itself), so having points there is nice for Christmas/New Year stays when the 11-month booking window is needed. Good luck with whatever you decide to do!

I just wanted to add that the drive from Greensboro to Disney is not bad at all! We live just 35 minutes south of you, and we have made the drive in as little as 8 hours(DH, the professional driver, drove all the way, from midnight to 8 AM, and we stopped only once)to 10 hours(our last trip, the day after Christmas). Traffic is generally not bad, except during bike week/race week near Daytona, and holidays. If you plan on driving to HH, you are halfway to WDW from there! You will find it easier to maximize your points if you drive...you are not at the mercy of the airline schedule when booking your arrival/departure days(it will be easier to stay Sun.-Thur.nights).
 











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