How much do you charge?

[dairyqueenmom]

We're going to SSR in November for a no kids vacation - and have asked another couple to join us. We have reserved a 2 bedroom to give us all enough space and privacy. Has anyone done something similar and how much did you charge them for accommodations?

Our friends are wonderful and they have made it clear that they want to pay their fare share. I'm not sure what's fare.

I totally agree with several of the comments posted on this topic. I am not loaded, I highly value my points. I am a self admitted points miser. If I planned a trip with another couple and booked rooms for us like you are doing I would also charge them for the room. They were planning on going, they were planning on paying. You just did the favor of booking the accommodation. I think the $10 per point is very fair. They could never get those accommodation for any cheaper and have the convenience of being close to your room.

I pay a lot of money to be in DVC, I can't afford to pay for others vacations.

Now with that said, I am taking my sister for my 40th birthday and we are sharing a studio and I am not charging her anything for the room. Nor will I accept any money for the accommodations. Now if she offers to pay for a meal or a something else, great but I don't expect it. This is my birthday present to myself and I wanted to share it with my sister.

 

[dblr]

We took friends and stayed in a 2bdr @ SSR and they said they would book the airfare as he has a travel agent he uses all the time. So when he got everything booked we asked him how much the flight cost, he said seeing we provided the resort they paid for the airfare, they fly alot so he might have even used his miles they earned but either way I felt that was a pretty good deal on both ends.

 

[DVC Grammy]

The only friends that I invite are those close enough to be considered "family", and other than their occasionally picking up the tab at mealtimes, that's their only contribution.
It wouldn't occur to me to invite anyone not that close.

 

[wayno]

I just sent out an offer to my group of friends and their families. In the past we've rented a giant Oceanfront house in the outer banks of North Carolina for a week, but with all of our growing families, we've grown even too large for that. But I offered to rent a grand villa with my best friend (the two of us bought our points together - 1 contract ) for our two families and a giant gathering room. Then for all of my friends' families we're asking them to come down and we would charge them our maintenance fees for whatever accomodations they want to use, $5/point at BWV. Now if they all want to come down in a 1bdrm for 2 weeks, we won't have near enough points, but banking and borrowing hopefully we'll have enough to get our whole group together for a week. I think it would be fantastic!

-Wayne

 

[Coach81]

We occasionally have my brother in law to come with us. Here is what we do, we charge him for a little gas ($75.00 or so), and we charge him about the cost of a one bedroom value resort (which is about $125.00 or so), and he pays for his tickets & food.

Good luck with your decision.

 

[jamstew]

This is how I would work it also. I would go to the Rent/Trade Board and just see what the going rate is. I noticed a few months ago that the price had gone up some. I would for sure charge the going rate. You could take another vacation with the difference or rent the additional points yourself. You will still save them considerable money over CRO. I do pay for the room for my married children, that is it. I would not give my points away. In my view everyone should pay for their own food.
We do have a Traditional Fixed week Timeshare in Tn. If I ask someone to come up to stay a few days of our week, I do not charge them for the room. This Timeshare did not cost me what DVC did. My maintenance fees are 1/4 of DVC. I feel I can do it with this one.
If I was traveling to Disney, I would sure expect some expenses.

 

[SamSam]

We have taken friends before, with me booking each of the couples a studio. They paid $5.00 a point, which they were thrilled with. Everybody's different, but I don't have a problem with charging enough to cover my maintenance fees. My family and friends consider it a win/win situation. We all have a great time together and they get wonderful accomodations at a cost that they could never get any other way.

 

[DVCJones]

We have done something a little different...

We have only enough points to take our family of 4 in a studio for a week during peak season for a week. Sometimes we have a few points left over to get a 1br.

Since we don't have enough points to treat family and friends, we usually secure a point transfer from another member. Our family/friends pay the going rate for the transfer. ($10 a point) for the difference of upgrading to a bigger unit. It is still a huge savings for them and it is less risky then renting from a stranger because the transferred points are in my control.

So far, everyone has been really happy with this. Although...I do dream of the day I can add on and treat my family/friends.

 

[kerickson]

Before purchasing DVC, we shared a hotel room with some friends at the Grand Californian on their points for 2 nights. We paid $100 which was < $5/point. We also picked up a dinner, but got to take advantage of their DVC discount for a few meal. This was a steal for us and our first time staying at the Grand (never wanted to shell out the bucks on a per trip basis).

We had so much fun and loved the resort so much that we purchased DVC (SSR) when we got back and plan to add on VGC in a few weeks!

Best $100 we ever spent!

 

[jlewisinsyr]

No charge for family or friends for the room.

 

[Chellymouse]

It sounds like most of us are in agreement. My BFF and I went this past August and she paid for her tickets, air and meals, but she wound up paying for alot of our....partaking of adult beverages.. We invited our neighbors to join us for our 8/09 trip as they would not have afforded a trip to WDW otherwise and we did not ask for anything other than they pay for their tickets, meals and air fare. They are also going to pay for their groceries. We know that they will pick up drinks and what-not, but we don't expect it. We also are in the early stages of planning a large family trip in 6/10 with DH's side and we are not asking them for anything either. DH and I have enjoyed the last 9 years of going to WDW and we are excited to finally have the means to "share the magic" with our friends and families.

 

[jpeka65844]

We also do not charge family or friends. When we took family in June, they insisted they give us something and we said "Give us whatever you want." It drove my husband's aunt crazy. She even called TA's trying to get a fix on what the room would cost if they paid OOP.

We're planning on treating friends in 2010 and will probably have the same attitude. If we were to accept any kind of payment, I'd say to split meals or park tickets, something that's on a non-cash-transferring basis.

 

[roadtripper]

In the past, I have made ressies for friends using my points, and charged 10/pt--like most on the DVC Rent/Trade board. Friends are coming with us this year and sharing our 2 BR at no charge--that way, I can have the Master guilt-free . When DSis wanted a 1 BR instead of the studio that I offered (and had the points for) I charged her 10/pt for the difference b/w an OKW 1 BR and Studio--400.00, since I had to pay 400 to transfer the points from another DVC member. Every time we bring family, they surprise us by paying for a wonderful dinner (last year, Jiko) which is a treat for us. Total payback, IMHO.

 

[lsutiggeratwk]

I've also done similar things. We have friends that we like to travel with (which I can't say about family ). We took a trip together last October and got a two bedroom. It was our invite. We didn't even think about asking for money from them. When we went grocery shopping for the week, we split the bill. And we each had brought some goodies from home that we also shared. They covered all of their other expenses.

Next year this same friend is taking her grandson and his support staff for a week. We happen to have enough points to get them a two bedroom. She is going to pay me for those points. And we'll join them (in our own one bedroom) for a few days at the end of their trip.

Works for us!

 

[permavac]

This is a good point. When we started to plan this trip, our friends have every intention of making a cash reservation at SSR in their own name. We started to investigate that option and it became clear that the cost and hassle would be ridiculous. Aside from the money, they would not assure us that we'd be next door to each other. So I went ahead and made the ressie for a 2 bdrm.

From this, it sounds like you are in a different situation than most folks who "invite" family/friends to join them on a trip. I agree with the majority of folks that if I invited people to join me (fat chance with the limited amount of points I own ) then I would cover the room. Now in your situation, it doesn't seem like a question of "if" to charge but "how much" (since they were expecting to pay for a room anyway). Something that I don't think was brought up previously is to make sure that your friends are ONLY considering SSR before you give them your figure. I don't know their financial situation, but they may have been shocked by the cash prices for SSR and if they do a little research, they may run across the Values and think "Hey - that's more like it!". You need to find out what their expectations are. If they definitely don't want to stay anywhere other than where you are staying then the $10 per point (i.e. the going "rate" for point rentals) seems fair. If they have decided to branch out because of cost, there may be some hard feelings if you are charging them more than they would need to spend elsewhere (currently it's like $50 per night at the Values). I understand the arguments that you're not getting the same accommodations as you would at a Deluxe but not everyone understands this so you don't want your friends thinking that you're "making money" off of them. All that said, if I were charging my friends I would only charge maintenance fees for the points (rounded up to the nearest dollar). If it would be a hardship for me to use the points for their room so much so that I needed to rent them at the "going rate" then I wouldn't book the room on points at all and have them book on cash only. Or, as others have mentioned, have points transferred from another member and have your friends pay for them (but again this would only occur after determining where they want to stay and showing them what other accommodations are available at Disney and at what price point). My two cents.

Terri

 

[jamstew]

This is a good point. When we started to plan this trip, our friends have every intention of making a cash reservation at SSR in their own name. We started to investigate that option and it became clear that the cost and hassle would be ridiculous. Aside from the money, they would not assure us that we'd be next door to each other. So I went ahead and made the ressie for a 2 bdrm.

That's more or less the situation I was in when planning a trip with my cousins. We started talking about a trip to Disney before I ever bought DVC, so everyone was obviously going to pay their own way. We figured 5 nights at Poly or BC would be about $3000 for two rooms, or $750 each. After I bought DVC, I calculated that we could do a 2BR for 100 points more than it would have cost me (in points) to stay in a studio by myself. Therefore, charging them $10/point for the extra points came out to $1000 to split between the three of them, or $333 each, less than half what they would have been paying had we done cash in two rooms. They were thrilled!

I bought DVC for myself, my adult children and grandchildren. I don't have enough points to give up 100 of them for extended family, especially when they aren't expecting (and wouldn't accept) me to pay any of their expenses. We're all in the same financial situation and can afford to pay our own way.

 

[Sheribo]

Wow! So many different opinions. Thanks for all the suggestions. DH and I are going to chat about this some more and probably more after that.

 

[Kickapoo Joie Juice]

We're going to SSR in November for a no kids vacation - and have asked another couple to join us. We have reserved a 2 bedroom to give us all enough space and privacy. Has anyone done something similar and how much did you charge them for accommodations?

Our friends are wonderful and they have made it clear that they want to pay their fair share. I'm not sure what's fair.

We've done this, although we actually prefer to rent two separate rooms to give us some "alone time".

But we have shared, and the way we look at it is that the other couple is essentially staying/sleeping in the studio part of the two bedroom, so we charge them the points cost, ie 60 points, of a studio, times the cost per point. You can charge your friends what you feel comfortable with, there .

 

[Kickapoo Joie Juice]

This is a good point. When we started to plan this trip, our friends have every intention of making a cash reservation at SSR in their own name. We started to investigate that option and it became clear that the cost and hassle would be ridiculous. Aside from the money, they would not assure us that we'd be next door to each other. So I went ahead and made the ressie for a 2 bdrm.

We've never been more than a few doors away from our friends/family, and we're usually next door.

 

[Kickapoo Joie Juice]

Clearly I need to hang out with DVCers more.......

Seriously!!!!