Justifying an AKV purchase

[benjaminb13]

We are a family of five. We have been seriously thinking about purchasing AKV 150-250 points. it seems like an incredible resort.
Although we are fortunate enough to be able to afford the purchase- It is just so difficult to justify at as we are from California and have Disneyland fairly nearby .
Because of the children, we can only travel during summer or holidays. Flights to Florida are between 2000 to 2500 during prime season.
Add this to the price and the yearly maintenance fees -and this becomes quite an expensive enterprise-
I would really like to hear both sides of the coin as well as suggestions from Disney owners in similar situations before making a decision
thanks

 

[DVC Mike]

Since there is probably going to be a DVC at Disneyland, why not wait and buy into that?

 

[chalee94]

i'm also from NC...but i agree that you may be better off waiting for the GCV. you can still use points at 7 months for the AKV once every few years, but i don't know if it would be worth it for you to buy at AKV...

 

[JimMIA]

Yours is an interesting situation, and I think there are many families on the West Coast who are in the same boat. I have a couple of comments and a link for you.

First, the suggestions of buying at Disneyland are good ideas if you would want to stay there. If you live in Northern California, that may be a good option. Nothing's been announced about a DVC at DL, but I think the speculation is pretty accurate and it will happen sooner rather than later. However, if you live in Southern CA and just make day trips to DL, DVC at DL wouldn't really make much sense to you...if DL was the only place you were going to go.

Generally, we say that DVC makes financial sense if you are going to make a trip of a week or longer, staying at DVC resorts, at least every other year. That's a ballpark estimate -- some people buy smaller contracts and use banking and borrowing to go every third year.

There are other options with DVC -- cruises, Member Getaways, etc -- but I think if you are interested in using those options much, you'd be much better off with some other timeshare. DVC works best at DVC resorts, and as we've seen with recent changes, anything else can change radically overnight and what was once a benefit can cease to be at the stroke of a pen.

If you're going to buy DVC, your decision of home resort will be an important decision. You'll hear people say, "Buy where you want to stay," but I think a better mantra is "Don't buy where you don't want to stay." Also keep in mind that home resort is only important if you can book more than seven months in advance. At seven months, "points is points," and everybody can book everywhere.

The link below will take you to a thread we started more than two years ago, to try to assist people considering buying DVC. Many experienced DVC owners have contributed to the thread, and there are many topics discussed, so it's an interesting thread just to skim through. The thread opens with a discussion of home resort. Read the disclaimers at the top and keep in mind that the thread is two years old, so the numbers, incentives, etc have changed a lot. And, of course, AKV did not exist at that time. Here's the link: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=778634

 

[grizbuzz]

We're from California and recently bought into AKV. While we don't anticipate making a trip to WDW every year, I think we will travel there every other year or so. This year I'm using some of our points for a Disneyland vacation. Plus, we're using some of the developer points for a 4 day cruise in February.

We went ahead with AKV instead of waiting for Grand Californian Villas (if they actually happen) as we were interested in taking advantage of the double developer points incentive, didn't know how long the wait will be for a Disneyland DVC and also, just really like AKV.

I'm planning to be able to take advantage of a California DVC, if it opens, with a 7 month window. Since we are from CA, we have some flexibility as to when we can go to DL. We will have less flexibility as to when we can go to Florida (once my kids start school), so perhaps it's more important to have 11 month window there.

Just our justification for taking the AKV DVC plunge. Don't regret that we did it.

 

[Mtnman44]

You should really only consider a WDW DVC purchase if your vacation habits are going to involve yearly or ever other year trips to WDW anyway, even if you were not a DVC owner.

As such, those expenses are allready going to be there anyway, so they shouldn't enter into the DVC purchase decision...make sense?

 

[benjaminb13]

Im from the North bay
EOY may seem more practical
How many points did you purchase?
Have you found a way to deal with the airfare?
Can this be done through points.

 

[DVC Grammy]

Im from the North bay
EOY may seem more practical
How many points did you purchase?
Have you found a way to deal with the airfare?
Can this be done through points.

I'm not sure where North Bay is in CA, but if you're anywhere near an airport that has SWA, you can take advantage of some of their sale fares and "Dings" (see the Transportation forum on the Disboards). SW frequently offers some of the cheapest fares, and allows you to change flights with no penalty, giving the $ difference in future travel credits (if originally bought as a non-refundable fare).

 

[SamSam]

I know that Southwest has had 'Ding' flights out of Ontario, CA to Orlando for less than $100 one way. I'm not sure of all the cities in CA they fly out of, but if they do have flights from a city near you, it could save you big bucks.

 

[JimMIA]

Im from the North bay
EOY may seem more practical
How many points did you purchase?
Have you found a way to deal with the airfare?
Can this be done through points.

In addition to the SW idea others mentioned, I would certainly check all of the airports in your area. From Miami to the Bay Area, I usually find San Jose has lower fares. I don't know if the same holds true going the other direction. But you have SFO, San Jose, Oakland, and even Sacramento to choose from and I'd check the fares from all of them. You'll have more options from SFO and OAK, just because they are busier airports with many more flights.

You may also be able to get a cheap flight via LAX -- like SFO-LAX-MCO (Orlando), so you have to check all the options.

You'll also have to check the flight schedules. I can usually save money flying into San Jose, but I end up flying into SFO for a little more because it's non-stop with great timing.

But that will depend greatly on the airline you fly. I almost always fly American because more than 50% of the flights out of MIA are AA, they offer great scheduling options, and I've always had great service from them.

 

[alexandone]

We are a family of four, we live in Lakewood,CA (15 mins from Disneyland). We do an annual trip to WDW. We usually stay 12 days +/-1 day. Sun-Thurs on points Fri/Sat cash and Sun-thurs on points. Our accommodations vary between studios and 1-bd. This gives us the best utilization of points. We also buy 10 day park hopper tickets that don't expire. We use 5-days per trip, so our tickets last for two years.

 

[juliebrooks35]

I've also got a family of 5 and stay in the UK. 2 of my children are of school age and as such, we are also stuck with traveling to Florida during school holiday and the flight prices are horrendous.
We love Florida and like to vacation there every 2 years. We've tried various different options for accomodation(All Star, off site hotels, private villa's) but something has always been missing on the room size/location (or both) front.
DVC is just exactly what we have been looking for and as such we bought at AKV in July.
I haven't yet visited and probably won't be able to until 2009 but I already really regret not buying years ago. Yes, I could probably do it cheaper but we don't want to compromise any more, I want my entire stay to be perfect and Disney really takes care of that or at least tries much harder than everyone else. With DVC, we can now stay in resorts I could only ever dream about and that little feeling of exclusiveness is worth every penny

 

[benjaminb13]

DVC/Grammy- Opps sorry about that- North bay is- the wine country -Napa/Sonoma


Jim- I will look deeper into the flights - Im thinking if I can get 1 200 round trip to MCO this becomes-DOABLE

At the most I will only be in Florida eoy-
I currently own at the Hyatt in Key West-(although I usually use this for Western region vacations) and at the new HGVC at Waikoloa Hawaii- its beautiful- but may be more for us parents than children- but I really feel my children will really enjoy the experience AKV- Im thinking I may sell HGVC first-

what do you guys think - would this be a good trade-off?- or should I keep Hawaii