Help on choosing our use year

[FLYNZ4]

The use year has us pretty confused!

Historically, most of our visits have been during the summer... because we would go when the kids were out of school. We would typically buy annual passes... and go in July/August of year 1... and June/July of year 2. This way we would squeeze 2 vacations out of every annual pass... buying new passes every other year. Our typical vacation was 2 weeks long... but sometimes we would go for a longer period.

Now that our kids are older (college age), my wife and I envision just the two of us going at off-peak times with a certain amount of flexibility. However, at some point during owning our DVC... we expect to want to start taking grandkids... assuming having grandkids lies in our future.

Given the above, what would you choose for a use-year? Would you optimize it for off-season travel now when we do not have school age kids... or plan for eventuality of bringing school age grandkids along? Also... my college kids will want to join us for some vacations... although we may have more flexibility (early Jan as an example) than primary school schedules.

/Jim

 

[CarolMN]

Generally speaking, it's best to have a use year that is up to 4 or 5 months ahead of your usual travel times. For summer trips, February - June would work well.

Keep in mind that use year is only the month that your annual allotment of points is renewed. It has nothing to do with when you can call to make a reservation.

Use month determines banking deadlines, so that is why some consider it important. If you are not likley to cancel a trip that is scheduled near the end of your use year, it doesn't matter at all which use year you have.

It doesn't sound like you will be consistently traveling at the same times of the year over the course of your membership. (Most of us don't, LOL). My advice is to just pick a use year that will work for the summer vacations if that is when you think the kids/grandkids will go most often. That's based on my assumption that you two won't cancel your plans when you travel "off season" as frequently as those with children may have to. That could be a bad assumption on my part, though.

Personally, I think most people worry too much about getting the "perfect" use year. Travel habits are prone to change over the course of 50 years and what is perfect now, may not be so perfect later.

Best wishes -

P.S. Keep in mind that "off season" for the WDW parks is often not "off season" for getting DVC reservations.

 

[FLYNZ4]

CarolMN,

Thank you for the insight. I was also thinking about how optimizing for kids vacations would be the best approach.

BTW, it looks like you are a "low carb'er" from your signature. I have lost 64 pounds recently... and am now in the exact center of the "normal range" for someone 6'6"... 188 lbs, down from 252.

I would never have believed that losing weight could be so easy!!! It is pretty amazing!

/Jim

 

[CarolMN]

Originally posted by FLYNZ4
CarolMN,

Thank you for the insight. I was also thinking about how optimizing for kids vacations would be the best approach.

BTW, it looks like you are a "low carb'er" from your signature. I have lost 64 pounds recently... and am now in the exact center of the "normal range" for someone 6'6"... 188 lbs, down from 252.

I would never have believed that losing weight could be so easy!!! It is pretty amazing!

/Jim

Wow! Congratulations and good for you! Bet you look and feel great!

I've only lost 25, but am also within "normal range" now. I look and feel so much better! I'll be a controlled carb'er for the rest of my life - I'm a diabetic and proud to report that this way of eating brought both my lipid and blood sugar levels well into the normal range, even though I elimnated some of my medications. Just don't need 'em anymore. My doctor still can't believe it.

Best wishes and good luck with your DVC puchase decision. Feel free to post any other questions. We DVC'rs love to help.

 

[FLYNZ4]

Originally posted by CarolMN
Wow! Congratulations and good for you! Bet you look and feel great!

I've only lost 25, but am also within "normal range" now. I look and feel so much better! I'll be a controlled carb'er for the rest of my life - I'm a diabetic and proud to report that this way of eating brought both my lipid and blood sugar levels well into the normal range, even though I elimnated some of my medications. Just don't need 'em anymore. My doctor still can't believe it.

Best wishes and good luck with your DVC puchase decision. Feel free to post any other questions. We DVC'rs love to help.

Carol,

I also am a diabetic... and an striving the be the best controlled diabetic on the planet.... but I will be happy if I can maintain being in the top 0.000001%

My last 4 A1C's were 4.0, 4.5, 4.1, and 4.4 Six months ago at dx, I was 9.8

/Jim

 

[FLYNZ4]

I need some immediate help now.

I think we decided to buy at SSR instead of BWV or BCV... mostly because of the exta 12 years (I'm not positive this is the right choice... but oh well)...

In choosing our use year... I was thiniing April or June... for the reasons that CarolMN said before... optimizing for when we will have children schedules to deal with.

I asked Marshal (my disney guy)... what he felt the most desireable use year was for people with kids... he felt 1) February... which is not available... 2) March... which he thought he could get via an exception.

Then April and June are what they have lots of availability of.

I am tentatively chosing March... it still keeps us within the cancellation/banking window of summer vacations... and also opens up the possibility of a cancellation/banking for an Easter or spring break week. I guess the advantage of Feb would be the additiion of presidents week.

On the other hand... I might just be totally confused LOL

I would love some well thought out responses before I pull the trigger.

My wife and I will probably be flexible for the two of us. We will probably want to do some trips with our college age kids over the next couple of years. Someday, we will have grandkids... or our own children will inherit our memberships.

Thanks in advance.

/Jim

 

[bobbiwoz]

We have March, and I like it because even at the end of December, there's still the 25% banking limit. The downside is MLK or Presidents weekend but every time we've traveled to Florida for MLK weekend, before DVC, it's always been "unseasonably cold." I'm starting to think that it is cold in Florida in January.

Bobbi