Is there a tour and reward to sign up to do?

[DCWarrior]

We are heading to Disney World the first week of September, staying offsite and spending 5 days at the parks. I've read a bit about DVC but want to see and learn a little more. I am wondering if there is a tour to sign up for on one of our off days? Is there some sort of reward that you get for doing the tour? How do you sign up for them?? Just wondering!!!!!

 

[ericstac]

I got a card in the mail the other day to visit and hear about the DVC and I will get a $50.00 Disney Gift card.. It was either 90 minute or 3 hours for the tour.. whatever it was I decided my time was more valuable so I am not doing it..

 

[kbonner]

You can go to an open house. They will walk you though and give you some information. They used to give things like fast passes and purchase incentives for going through the open house. Just stop by one of the million DVC booths around the parks and they will sign you up.

 

[disneynutz]

The "tour" is a well designed selling session and to get a "gift" Disney expects you to sit through the program with your partner who will be buying with you.

Over the years the "gifts" were ice cream and a family photo, fast passes, gift cards of various denominations, and during our return session to ask some additional questions, all we got was lemonade and a cookie.

Bill

 

[chalee94]

I've read a bit about DVC but want to see and learn a little more.

using the search function here on the DIS is your best bet for learning more about DVC. the salespeople on the tours are generally honest, but are motivated to encourage you to buy directly from them (and have been known to shade the truth a bit from time to time.)

Is there some sort of reward that you get for doing the tour?

not much of one, no. sometimes small gift cards. more commonly fast passes (and sometimes, as noted, just ice cream and cookies.)

 

[mcorbo]

Gone are the good old days. When I was looking into DVC 10 years ago, they put me up in POFQ for 3 nights and gave me park tickets just for taking the tour!

 

[wench]

I received an offer in the mail to do a "tour" over the phone & get a $40.00 gift card. I'd always wanted to do DVC, but thought it was out of reach for me. I figured I could use the gift card for a the next trip I had planned & it wouldn't hurt to get more information. I realized that DVC was much more affordable than I thought (at least for someone visiting WDW or DL every year) & bought in a week later. The gift card was nice, but the real reward is DVC itself.

Wow, that sounds corny, but it's true for me.

 

[JenandFrank]

I just did the tour a couple weeks ago. They gave us a $50 gift card and 3 fastpass + for each us.

 

[nalajms]

I just got an email for an interactive tour, $25 GC if done by 6/24. I can't imagine that it's tied to my email, since it's also the email listed for my DVC account. If you're interested, let me know

 

[JimMIA]

Anyone taking a DVC tour should understand a couple of basic things:

1. Buying direct from Disney is not the only option. There is a very active resale market that will probably offer you BIG savings. For examples, click on the DVC resale listing link on the Timeshare Store banner at the top of this page.
2. DVC timeshare sales personnel will play up the non-DVC options which broaden the scope of a very limited timeshare system. The vast majority of those options are VERY poor values for your points. The one that many owners actually use -- RCI exchanges -- is also available for resale purchasers.
3. NOTHING is guaranteed with DVC except the opportunity to use your points at your home resort, subject to availability. EVERYthing else can be changed, and changes occur frequently...sometimes with little or no notice.

 

[bakerworld]

During our tour the guide asked what motivated us take the tour and we told her the FP - expected 3 immediate FP/PP and she gave us double the #

 

[freewill]

[*]NOTHING is guaranteed with DVC except the opportunity to use your points at your home resort, subject to availability. EVERYthing else can be changed, and changes occur frequently...sometimes with little or no notice.
[/LIST]

Do you think DVC would ever alter the rules to require that members stay only their home resort, even within WDW? So that SSR owners couldn't stay at BCV, etc?

 

[chalee94]

Do you think DVC would ever alter the rules to require that members stay only their home resort, even within WDW? So that SSR owners couldn't stay at BCV, etc?

this is usually a threat for DVC to use against resale buyers.

i know dean doesn't think it's legally possible. and i doubt it also. but while the mouse is pretty clever...and also his lawyers - if you lock DVC members into their home resorts, that limits the overall appeal of the program (and also annoys the owners of the higher demand resorts - say a VGF owner who wanted to spend one trip at an epcot resort or at AKV to see the animals or a low cost OKW grand villa.) if i cannot trade out, they cannot trade in.

the bigger risk is that more buyers over time buy into their home resort with the intent to book during their home resort window. that will lock out a lot of owners at other resorts.

but you'll probably always have some percentage of owners that wait to book till later and even a small percentage that aren't paying attention and allow their pts to expire unused.

just depends on where the demand is and what percentage of owners are active planners.

 

[JimMIA]

Do you think DVC would ever alter the rules to require that members stay only their home resort, even within WDW? So that SSR owners couldn't stay at BCV, etc?

No, I don't think they will...but it is possible.

As I understand it, the only way they could do that would be to remove your home resort from the "Club." The primary benefit of the "Club" structure is that points are interchangeable between member resorts, subject to the home resort booking preference period. The ability to use your points at all other DVC resorts is probably the biggest key benefit of the program. If Disney eliminated that, IMHO they would have an unsaleable product.

But...could they do it? Yes, they could. The situation where I think it is most likely would be if a resort were heavily damaged by a hurricane, fire, or whatever and DVC decided to just close it rather than rebuild.

The main point, however, is not non-home resort use or any other one particular aspect of ownership. The point is -- you need to understand what is "guaranteed" and what is not. And in truth, darn little is guaranteed.

(Very little being guaranteed is not unique to DVC, BTW -- it is true in most timeshare systems. And timeshare salesmen -- ANYbody's -- will present their product in the most favorable light and minimize any downsides. A salesman doesn't have to LIE to deceive a naive prospect, and there is probably no personal business transaction where it is more important to be an informed consumer than buying a timeshare.)

 

[freewill]

No, I don't think they will...but it is possible.

As I understand it, the only way they could do that would be to remove your home resort from the "Club." The primary benefit of the "Club" structure is that points are interchangeable between member resorts, subject to the home resort booking preference period. The ability to use your points at all other DVC resorts is probably the biggest key benefit of the program. If Disney eliminated that, IMHO they would have an unsaleable product.

But...could they do it? Yes, they could. The situation where I think it is most likely would be if a resort were heavily damaged by a hurricane, fire, or whatever and DVC decided to just close it rather than rebuild.

The main point, however, is not non-home resort use or any other one particular aspect of ownership. The point is -- you need to understand what is "guaranteed" and what is not. And in truth, darn little is guaranteed.

(Very little being guaranteed is not unique to DVC, BTW -- it is true in most timeshare systems. And timeshare salesmen -- ANYbody's -- will present their product in the most favorable light and minimize any downsides. A salesman doesn't have to LIE to deceive a naive prospect, and there is probably no personal business transaction where it is more important to be an informed consumer than buying a timeshare.)

Thanks -- and thanks to Charles -- and with my apologies if I pulled this thread off-topic with my question. I agree the main point is to understand what's guaranteed and what's not when it comes to buying in, but pulling a WDW resort out of the "Club" would indeed render the DVC product incredibly tarnished and I can't imagine that happening outside of economically apocalyptic circumstances.

Then again, I just noticed that the promotional materials from DVC include this statement on the inside back cover: "[AKL] Purchasers should not rely on the continued existence of, and access to, existing Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge amenities, such as savannas, restaurants and recreational facilities that are not part of Membership." Boy, that would be a buzzkill!

 

[disneynutz]

Thanks -- and thanks to Charles -- and with my apologies if I pulled this thread off-topic with my question. I agree the main point is to understand what's guaranteed and what's not when it comes to buying in, but pulling a WDW resort out of the "Club" would indeed render the DVC product incredibly tarnished and I can't imagine that happening outside of economically apocalyptic circumstances.

Then again, I just noticed that the promotional materials from DVC include this statement on the inside back cover: "[AKL] Purchasers should not rely on the continued existence of, and access to, existing Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge amenities, such as savannas, restaurants and recreational facilities that are not part of Membership." Boy, that would be a buzzkill!

When DVD sold BLT they touted TOWL and the low dues. Turned out that TOWL was not owned by the BLT owners but by Disney. Later they deeded the TOWL to the owners and made them responsible for everything, utilities, insurance, cleaning, everything. Then they leased back the lounge area and kept all of the income. DVC members staying at BLT didn't generate enough in sales so they opened up access to any member staying anywhere.

When active sales ended the dues have increased by over 6% yearly for the last couple of years.

My point is that Disney has and can do what ever benefits Disney.

Bill

 

[chalee94]

pulling a WDW resort out of the "Club" would indeed render the DVC product incredibly tarnished and I can't imagine that happening outside of economically apocalyptic circumstances.

sure.

pulling VB out of the club, OTOH...

not a sure thing, but not nearly as hard to imagine.

Then again, I just noticed that the promotional materials from DVC include this statement on the inside back cover: "[AKL] Purchasers should not rely on the continued existence of, and access to, existing Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge amenities, such as savannas, restaurants and recreational facilities that are not part of Membership." Boy, that would be a buzzkill!

mostly legal-ese. but certainly things can change a lot in 50 years.