If you had a do-over would you pick the same UY?

[disneyfam27]

If you had the option to choose your UY again, would you change it for keep the same one? Based on my kids school schedule vacation schedule I figured that Feb UY would be the best. But I was having a hard time finding the right resale with a Feb UY so I ended up buying a really nice contract with a Dec UY. This gives me the option of doing vacation in Feb or April or when they get out of school in June and my points don't have to be banked until July 31. I always factored in vacations thinking about their schedules only. But last year I took a last minute trip for Labor day weekend and had to borrow points after I previously banked. Not really a big deal, so I didn't think much about it. But then lately, I have been reading posts about picking the right UY and it made me think about my future vacation plans (like in Nov for F&W and is also my birthday month). So being the number cruncher that I am I created a list of all the UY and their banking deadlines. Then I added the 2 months that I would most likely take a vacation in the near future (kids are 15 and 13 so I need to keep the school schedule for at least another 5 years) and the two months I would like to vacation if I did not factor in the kids schedule. From that info I was able to determine if a vaction months would be within my banking deadline or not based on chaning my UY. I sorted based on order of which months I would most likely vacation (April being #1 as I my kids are still living at home) and this is what I came up with

UY Bank April Nov Feb Sept
Oct 31-May In In In Out
Apr 30-Nov In In Out In
Sept 30-Apr In Out In In
Feb 30-Sep In Out In In
Dec 31-Jul In Out In Out
Mar 31-Oct In Out Out In
Aug 31-Mar Out In In In
Jun 31-Jan Out In Out In

Based on this data if I factored in all 4 vacation months, October is my best choice of UY followed by April. As a matter of fact Dec is #5 on the list So far it has not become a problem since I still primarily vacation in april and I haven't had to cancel any vacations after my banking deadline. But its still something to consider.

 

[twinmom108]

December is my use year & since we like to travel in the Fall it's about the worst UY we could of gotten.

 

[fitzpat]

Why with a desire to travel in the fall, would December be the worst UY? My use year is Feb and I think that is good for me. We are DINKs so going off the school schedule is best for us (which is the fall). So Feb to get Sept or October is the way to go or should I have tried for a different UY?

 

[xipetotec]

If you had the option to choose your UY again, would you change it for keep the same one? Based on my kids school schedule vacation schedule I figured that Feb UY would be the best. But I was having a hard time finding the right resale with a Feb UY so I ended up buying a really nice contract with a Dec UY. This gives me the option of doing vacation in Feb or April or when they get out of school in June and my points don't have to be banked until July 31. I always factored in vacations thinking about their schedules only. But last year I took a last minute trip for Labor day weekend and had to borrow points after I previously banked. Not really a big deal, so I didn't think much about it. But then lately, I have been reading posts about picking the right UY and it made me think about my future vacation plans (like in Nov for F&W and is also my birthday month). So being the number cruncher that I am I created a list of all the UY and their banking deadlines. Then I added the 2 months that I would most likely take a vacation in the near future (kids are 15 and 13 so I need to keep the school schedule for at least another 5 years) and the two months I would like to vacation if I did not factor in the kids schedule. From that info I was able to determine if a vaction months would be within my banking deadline or not based on chaning my UY. I sorted based on order of which months I would most likely vacation (April being #1 as I my kids are still living at home) and this is what I came up with

UY Bank April Nov Feb Sept
Oct 31-May In In In Out
Apr 30-Nov In In Out In
Sept 30-Apr In Out In In
Feb 30-Sep In Out In In
Dec 31-Jul In Out In Out
Mar 31-Oct In Out Out In
Aug 31-Mar Out In In In
Jun 31-Jan Out In Out In

Based on this data if I factored in all 4 vacation months, October is my best choice of UY followed by April. As a matter of fact Dec is #5 on the list So far it has not become a problem since I still primarily vacation in april and I haven't had to cancel any vacations after my banking deadline. But its still something to consider.

Not only do we like our UY, but we've added on through resales and always make sure it's the same UY. Granted, the latter statement is just more convenient, but we tend to travel in Feb/March with an April UY. This works out perfectly for us as we also tend to bank and borrow to bring large groups.

 

[fitzpat]

 

[ToddyLu]

Same for us, we have a DEC UY but we always travel Oct-Dec. It is only a problem if you cancel a trip. If we book an Oct trip, then canel it we could possibly only have several weeks to re-book and use the points because they will go into a "holding account", cannot be banked and have to be used by the end of our UY which is Nov 31. Talk about a time crunch. But this UY is also great because DH schedules his vacations a year in advance with the Fire Dept. They do this in Dec. So if we were going the following fall it gives me the most time to use my 11 month booking knowing for sure what days he will get as first or second pick. That way I rarely cancel a vacation and all is good.

 

[disneynutz]

One of the hazards with buying a contract that you may have it for 10, 20, 30, 40, or 50 years is that things change. The best that you can do is make your UY choice based on what you think will happen in the future.

Schools change, jobs change, kids grow up, family gets tired of Disney every year etc.

Bill

 

[ospopo5]

I struggled with the UY when we bought and am not regretting the time. Locally we purchased at a low buy in so we can adjust when we add on points in the future.

 

[VrBchJ]

I always travel Oct., Dec. and April so my Oct. UY is perfect. When I purchased my initial resale contract I waited until an Oct. BWV contract came up because I knew that was the home resort and UY I wanted.

 

[DVCBELLE]

We have an October UY and it works just fine for us. To be honest - I am not sure how a UY would affect us. I have never understood agonizing over use years. With proper planning it isn't a big deal to me.

 

[Buckeye Fan]

Just sold two contracts because of it. It became an issue with banking, as it would force us to travel June or July since any banked points expired at the end of July. If you travel often, it's not as big of a deal, but it isn't always a reality for us. Plus, no matter what, if you resort hop and change the size of your accommodations like we do, we always have an odd number of points remaining that we bank.

When we repurchased, we went with a Dec UY because that was the UY for our other 2 contracts. With DH being a teacher, if I was buying for the first time and was fully educated, I would choose February or March UY (if March is a valid UY - can't remember). But, Dec is SOOO much better than Aug for us!

 

[disneyofcourse]

I just ended up closing on a Feb use year contract. I was so confused by which use year would be best for traveling in either December, Jan, Feb, April, May and October. I'm planning on 3 trips a year with such a mix of Fall, Spring, and Winter dates that I gave up trying to figure out which UY is best.

 

[n2mm]

We are April UY and it fits us perfectly. We travel in May, August, Oct, Jan. The only trip that gets a little iffy is the January trip. We bank the end of November. We generally only have 1 trip (Jan) that occurs after banking and before the new points are released. I always have a couple hundred points to bank, so if we want to throw another trip in we could still borrow the next year's points. We have only been members for nearly 6 years and so far we've had no problem with an April UY, other than trying to find another contract to buy that is a good fit for us. I am working on putting my 2012 vacation schedule together right now!

 

[parlay]

We have an August use year, and probably would have preferred a March (because of the kids schedules) BUT we've been traveling late August and right now its working out really well. I'm sure things will change in terms of when we will vacation in the future, so we'll stick with August.

 

[mom of princessx2]

We have an Oct UY and find it works best for us. We prefer to travel in Oct, Dec, spring break or early June.

Is there a break down somewhere that shows the percentage of contrats released in each UY? When I was looking at resales it always seems that Oct is harder to find.

 

[Sandisw]

We have a June UY now and it works out great for us. We didn't start out that way. I started out with Oct UY because I really didn't understand what it was all about.

We travel in the summer now (because I am a teacher) but plan to travel in the fall and/or early Winter when we retire so having a June UY puts most of my travel during the first 8 months, allowing me to bank points if I ever have to cancel or change.

The only time of year that would be vulnerable is the Spring, which right now, is the least likely time of year for me to go.

 

[JWG]

We have August, but that's what we got in 1999 when the purchase was made. Not ideal, but in the future I think it will be as our prefered travel times are Sept - Feb. It's just because we have a daughter about to enter school that August is problematic.

If we can survive the next 18 years we'll be fine .
That's less than half the length of our BLT contract .

 

[Kidanifan08]

We have an October UY and it works just fine for us. To be honest - I am not sure how a UY would affect us. I have never understood agonizing over use years. With proper planning it isn't a big deal to me.

I agree with this posting totally. I have yet to figure out how use year makes a difference. For us, a trip to Disney is a big deal and it is non-negotiable. This may change, but over the course of 50 years of ownership, all kinds of situations will change and we will either have to have creative planning or bank. We have a December UY and it confuses the heck out of me, but we are getting used to it.

 

[Buckeye Fan]

I agree with this posting totally. I have yet to figure out how use year makes a difference.

This is very specific to us, but just an example of where it was a MAJOR pain. DH is a teacher and the kids are in school, which significantly limits when we can vacation and will for many, many years to come (until DH retires). We have had years where we can go down multiple times (UY becomes much less important the more you travel, because you have more chances to use banked points before they expire), and others where we can only make the summer trip. This year happened to be one of those years where we had 215 banked points. We really wanted to go to Disney in Aug, but couldn't because our points had to be used by the end of July. Otherwise, we would lose them. I REFUSE to lose points, so we worked it out. Fortunately, we have that flexibility, but I don't want to have to adjust when I travel based on when banked points will expire.

Now, same exact scenario using a Dec UY. If I have 215 banked points, I can travel anytime in June, July or Aug with a Dec UY without giving it a second thought. I know this sounds extremely trivial, but it's changed our travel plans 3 out of 4 years that we've had the points.

My situation does not reflect the majority, but I post about it because of the teachers and once a year travelers it may impact. The other situation that became less than ideal with an Aug UY and summer travel was our risk of losing points if we cancelled the vacation. In the 20 years we've been married, we've NEVER cancelled a vacation, so I honestly didn't give it a second thought when I made a reservation. But, had we cancelled at the last minute, there was not time to re-book. Just another point of view to consider!

 

[ORD2KOA]

We had June (passed ROFR waiting for closing now) at OKW, but chose December for our new contract (waiting for ROFR).

June was a nightmare for us because my d/h can't get approval for current year vacations until after February 1st.