As to the 20 reservation rule, I made a copy when it was published back in early 2008 but I do not know where it can be found now. Here is what I have:
Commercial Use Policy. The Disney Vacation Club (
DVC) Public Offering Statement makes it clear that DVC memberships are intended for personal vacation use. The Declaration of Condominium and the Membership Agreement for the Resort expressly limits the use of Ownership Interests to personal use and prohibits use for "commercial purposes," - a pattern of rental activity or other occupancy by an Owner that the Board of the Association, in its reasonable discretion, could conclude constitutes a commercial enterprise or activity.
DVC Members may make as many reservations as they desire. However, if, in any 12-month period, a DVC Member desires to make more than 20 reservations, the DVC Member shall be required to establish, to the satisfaction of the Board, that all of the reservations made by the DVC Member in such 12-month period are for the use of accommodations by the DVC Member, the DVC Members family and/or the DVC Members friends (collectively, Personal Use), and not for commercial purposes. If, in any 12-month period in which a DVC Member attempts to make more than 20 reservations but is unable to establish, to the satisfaction of the Board, that all such reservations are for Personal Use and not for commercial purposes, all reservations in excess of the first 20 reservations shall be presumed to be the use of Vacation Accommodations for commercial purposes in violation of the Declaration and the Membership Agreement (the Multiple Reservation Rule).
Enforcement of this policy will be the responsibility of DVC Member Services as follows. For each reservation made by a DVC Member, Member Services shall determine, before confirming the reservation, the number of reservations made by such DVC Member which are occurring or have occurred in any rolling twelve-month period in which the reservation then being made will occur. If, as a result of Member Services review of the DVC Members reservation history, the reservation the DVC Member is then attempting to make violates the Multiple Reservation Rule and the DVC Member has not established, or cannot then establish that all of the DVC Members reservations, including the reservation then being made by the DVC Member, are for Personal Use, DVC Member Services will not honor or confirm the reservation and the DVC Member shall be advised that the reservation violates the Multiple Reservation Rule and the prohibition on use of Vacation Homes for commercial purposes. For reservations canceled for violating this policy, the cancellation shall be deemed to be a cancellation by the DVC Member and the provisions of the Home Resort Rules and Regulations relating to cancellations (including, without limitation, Sections 5(d), 13 and 14) shall apply.
End quotation.
That was issued after serious issues concerning professional renters had developed along with the development of the internet, which made it easy to rent. Professional renters were getting control of a lot of points and doing what some of us called "predatory" reservations. Any single DVC owner could own no more than 5,000 points total, but put a few people together in a side business and you could easily double or tripple that total. Moreover, there were two rules that allowed such businesses to capture a lot more points for rental without owning them. At the time, you could do unlimited transfers of points in one direction, either in or out but not both, during a use year. The professional renters were getting a lot of transfers into their accounts. Also, you could be named as an associate member who could do reservations on anyone's DVC account and the professional renters were arranging that with numerous members.
With all the points they had control of, what the professional renters started doing heavily was not just ordinary rentals, but, at 11 months out, they were also making large numbers of reservations for highly desired DVC times, like Christmas and Thanksgiving, in highly desired rooms. They would then advertise to rent the reservations that had already been made.The result is that they were creating 11 month issues for members, particularly at a time when such issues otherwise did not exist. The complaints were constant and loud. DVC decided that the way to put an end to the problem was to change the rules to make it more difficult for professional renters to operate. One of the steps it took was the adoption of the above 20 reservation rule (and some of the professional renters received notices under that rule). It also changed the transfer rule to allow only one transfer in or out of an account per use year (which had actually been the original rule in the 1990s). Also, it issued a rule prohibiting any member from being an associate member on more than 4 accounts.
The net effect was not to completely eliminate professional renters but the problem that existed was alleviated. It also led to the development of the current rental broker businesses, under which the brokers avoid any issue of renting points they own as members for commercial purposes because they are acting as a service that hooks up members who want to rent with people who want to rent through them. I doubt the well-known brokers that are often mentioned on this site are ones actively trying to buy points in resale to rent that way because they want to avoid DVC coming after them for improperly using their points for commercial purposes.
Bill
