Maintenance Fees Increase?

[Terry S]

Well I guess I should pay much better attention to this. I just got my monthy maintenance fee withdrawl from my checking account and it is $170.67 more this month? That seems like a pretty steep increase. I just tried calling Membership Account to verify but they are at lunch.

 

[Chuck S]

Depending upon your resort, most property taxes were underestimated for 2005, so the first payment will be more than the rest for the remainder of the year. But, yes, call Mem Accounting for your exact amounts.

 

[TammyAlphabet]

Mine was too, but it is going down the rest of the year. Member Accounting can confirm this.

 

[Caskbill]

Do you have your year-end statement? At the bottom it tells what the January withdrawl will be, and what the monthly withdrawls will be for the rest of the year.

January is the make-up month for underwitholdings for last year.

If you don't have your year-end statement, you can check on-line.

Go to the DVC member's site, log in, and select MY DVC.
Then select Annual Dues
Then where it says Statement Year 2006, click View and Print Statement
Go down to where it says Monthly Direct Debit Date

There you'll see your January Debit, your Feb-Nov Debits, and your Dec 2006 debit.

As you'll see, January is your make up month, Feb-Nov are your regular debits, and Dec will be the same or a little lower (by 11 cents or less) due to the rounding up of each month's payment to the nearest penny.

 

[mitros]

OKW dues increase was a real kick in the teeth this year. I guess that since it is the oldest resort, it now has the dubious distinction of being more expensive to run as it ages, {more things needing to be replaced} and would suspect that all the other resorts will follow suite as they age beyond a certain number of years.

 

[The Prophet]

I understand that January's payment is your monthly payment plus the difference in the 2005 taxes.

What confuses me is why hasn't the estimated 2006 taxes come close to the 2005 taxes so this situation will not be repeated next year

The Prophet

 

[Doctor P]

OKW dues increase was a real kick in the teeth this year. I guess that since it is the oldest resort, it now has the dubious distinction of being more expensive to run as it ages, {more things needing to be replaced} and would suspect that all the other resorts will follow suite as they age beyond a certain number of years.

Have to disagree. OKW still has some of the lowest dues. It's property taxes were very much underestimated last year (perhaps due to the addition of the slide in addition to what appears to be hurricane related higher tax bills for all the resorts) and the resort added a slide which requires more maintenance and staffing. IMHO, it has nothing to do with the age of the resort and most age-related issues are things that there are contingency funds built up to address.

 

[Doctor P]

I understand that January's payment is your monthly payment plus the difference in the 2005 taxes.

What confuses me is why hasn't the estimated 2006 taxes come close to the 2005 taxes so this situation will not be repeated next year

The Prophet

My suspicion is that the tax levies of the local governments were driven up for the 2005 tax bills by leftover "one time" costs due to four hurricanes hitting the area in late 2004. We could check it, but I will bet that only a small portion of the increase was due to change in assessments. Thus, one would expect tax bills to be reduced in 2006 over the 2005 figures if this were true.

 

[Terry S]

Well I did call Membership Accounting and the women told me that January would be more due to this one time make up for 2005 but February would go down to normal. I asked her what that would be and she told me to go find my statement. She never even asked my membership number or offered to look it up for me. I told her I couldn't find my statement and she said I better go look for it.

Thanks to Caskbill who was much more help than she was. Luckily my monthly debit for maint will only go up around $20 come February. Thanks all!

 

[DiznEeyore]

Well I did call Membership Accounting and the women told me that January would be more due to this one time make up for 2005 but February would go down to normal. I asked her what that would be and she told me to go find my statement. She never even asked my membership number or offered to look it up for me. I told her I couldn't find my statement and she said I better go look for it.

 

[erikthewise]

This is not a big deal for me, but "underestimating real estate taxes" sure feels like a stealth rate hike, as it is (I believe) not reflected in the published annual dues rate for either the previous year or the current year.

 

[mitros]

Have to disagree. OKW still has some of the lowest dues. It's property taxes were very much underestimated last year (perhaps due to the addition of the slide in addition to what appears to be hurricane related higher tax bills for all the resorts) and the resort added a slide which requires more maintenance and staffing. IMHO, it has nothing to do with the age of the resort and most age-related issues are things that there are contingency funds built up to address.

OK, did we get to vote on this slide, as to whether we wanted it or not, and did they say that this was going to impact our dues when it was put in?
We rarely, if ever use the pools at at OKW, and certainly would have voted nay if we knew our dues were going to go up more then $12 a month. Are you sure about OKW having one of the lowest dues? I can't put my hands on the thread that someone posted in December that showed all of the charts, and I seem to recall a lot of people being shocked by the percent of increase at OKW. I'm going see if I can search for that chart and get back to you on this subject.

 

[Doctor P]

Other than the subsidized dues at VB and the still subsidized dues (for a different reason) at SSR, OKW dues for 2006 are the still the lowest of any DVC resort.

 

[Simba's Mom]

OK, did we get to vote on this slide, as to whether we wanted it or not, and did they say that this was going to impact our dues when it was put in?
We rarely, if ever use the pools at at OKW, and certainly would have voted nay if we knew our dues were going to go up more then $12 a month. Are you sure about OKW having one of the lowest dues? I can't put my hands on the thread that someone posted in December that showed all of the charts, and I seem to recall a lot of people being shocked by the percent of increase at OKW. I'm going see if I can search for that chart and get back to you on this subject.

At the OKW annual meeting, I was really surprised that no one mentioned the slide as a reason for the big increase in dues at OKW. Boy, was I disappointed-I was all set for a BIG discussion about that! They said dues went up mostly due to a big insurance rate jump (thanks to the hurricane season), workmen's compensation issues, and maintenance (air conditioning, roadways, painting, etc.). Gee, and I was hoping someone would open the can of worms of the slide issue.

 

[OKW Lover]

OK, did we get to vote on this slide, as to whether we wanted it or not, and did they say that this was going to impact our dues when it was put in?

Interestingly, the OKW owners did get to vote on this several years ago and the response was a solid NO (although there was a fair number voting for it). But the vote was only advisory in nature and is not binding on DVC management. When you bought into DVC you gave Disney Vacation Development the power to cast the official votes on behalf of the owners.