Maintenance fees

[TwistGrl101]

My husband and I are having a hard time justifying the purchase of DVC when we calculate that we will spend upwards of $20,000 in maintenance fees alone. Am I not getting something here? Thanks!!

 

[chalee94]

how much will you be paying in disney resort costs over that period of time? if you are a disney nut who is determined to stay onsite at disney deluxe resorts, you will surpass $20,000 over 30 years quite early on in your calculations.

while $20,000 sounds like a big number, if it is spread over decades, it's not nearly as formidable. i would also ask if you are comparing buy-in costs for a studio to a disney hotel room - if you are comparing paying maintenance fees for a 1BR/2BR villa but comparing those costs to a hotel room, that's apples and oranges.

but it is entirely possible that DVC is not right for you and that is ok.

 

[disneynutz]

My husband and I are having a hard time justifying the purchase of DVC when we calculate that we will spend upwards of $20,000 in maintenance fees alone. Am I not getting something here? Thanks!!

Where are you getting the $20,000 number, how many points at which resort?

Bill

 

[Lynne M]

It sounds like a big number, that's true. But the way to look at it is to add both the purchase price and maintenance fees together, and compare that cost over the life of the contract to the cost of the room type you'd normally be staying in over the same period of time. If you typically stay in values, say, it's going to be more costly to do DVC. But you might say, hey, the rooms are bigger and nicer, many of the resorts are real close to a theme park...it's worth the extra money. Or you might say, nope, the rooms we're getting now are good, no need to spend that much more. But you really need to look at the total to see if it's worth it to you, not individual pieces of it.

I know it's vacation accommodations, not a home, but here's a sort of comparison. When I was looking at condos, and was quoted a monthly condo fee in the hundreds of dollars, my first thought was YIKES! No way! But then I added that to the mortgage and property taxes and compared that total monthly figure to what I was currently paying to rent my apartment. It was only a little bit more, and I was getting a much larger place, in a building with more services.

Besides, if you take any of your monthly expenses and multiply them out over 40 years, you'll get a really scary number. For example, my cable bill is $100/month. Over 40 years, that's $48,000.

 

[disneynutz]

I get a higher number. Using AKV, 160 points with a 4% increase for 30 years is $56,000.

This year the increase at AKV was 5.28%.

Bill

 

[cedricandsophie]

We have over 1400 points at seven resortspoints done purchased direct others via resale. Spent over $5000 in total. Maintenance is about $1000 a year.

 

[DisneyDenis]

My husband and I are having a hard time justifying the purchase of DVC when we calculate that we will spend upwards of $20,000 in maintenance fees alone. Am I not getting something here? Thanks!!

You are not seeing the very big picture. I will give you the summary: the maintenance fees plus other costs are way lower than a deluxe disney room now and at any time in the future.

My last trip to AKV Jambo House cost (2 studios for 5 nights each at spring break time 2013) cost me in (2 years) membership fees, (2 years) depreciation, and some extra points: $1773.

The cost of the exact same rooms at Jambo House at the exact same time with tax: $6559. Disney did not offer any discounts on this room category (Savannah View) at the time. That's a $4786 difference which does not include about a $200 savings in DVC member discounts while there !!! So I saved almost $5000 on one trip !!!

I paid $6450 which includes closing costs for my BWV points that were used for that trip.

I have NOT included the time value of money for my DVC trip cost because you would also have to include TMV for many, many years on the cash cost of that one trip as well.

Even if my party stayed at 2 standard view rooms with a 30% discount, I still would have saved about $3000 vs. the membership fees (plus other cists) on that one trip.

This year I rented a lot of my BWV points at $6 more than membership fees. I made over $ 900 profit vs mfs.

 

[cedricandsophie]

We have over 1400 points at seven resorts some purchased direct others at resale. Maintenance is about $10000 a year. We are emotional buyers and don't do a lot of financial analysis. We love disney resorts and go 2 or 3 times a year to Orlando plus vero beach once or twice and aulani at least once. I figured during the last 18 month period we used over 60 days some at aulani two bedroom valued at about 1500 to 2000 a day, others at 3 bedroom ocean front villa at vero beach which runs about 800 a night, and so on. Figured the value of all these rooms was at least 35000 to 40000. Would we book these kinds of rooms otherwise? Maybe not. But for us it's enjoying what we have for as long as we can. So we don't worry about analyzing whether or not we made right decisions but more how to use them effectively. Our financial planner has always said never treat a timeshare as an investment but rather has a pleasure that you enjoy.

 

[DisneyDenis]

We have over 1400 points at seven resortspoints done purchased direct others via resale. Spent over $5000 in total. Maintenance is about $1000 a year.

Sorry. posted this before seeing your next post.

 

[Minniesgal]

My husband and I are having a hard time justifying the purchase of DVC when we calculate that we will spend upwards of $20,000 in maintenance fees alone. Am I not getting something here? Thanks!!

But the annual cost in maintenance fees is way less than the room rate you would pay.

 

[stacy~**]

I am not an owner (yet) but I can show you the reason why we are hoping to purchase a DVC contract. While over the course of the life of ownership the maintenance fees seem high here is the way it breaks down for us:

We just spent 7 nights at Beach Club (Standard room) with a 30+% off pin code. The cost of those 7 nights was $2340 (room only).

For the same time period it would have cost us 120 DVC points (studio). The maintenance fees at BCV for 120 points would have been $695 (I realize this does NOT take into consideration the initial buy in price.).

It can really be an incredible savings over time.

 

[disneynutz]

I am not an owner (yet) but I can show you the reason why we are hoping to purchase a DVC contract. While over the course of the life of ownership the maintenance fees seem high here is the way it breaks down for us:

We just spent 7 nights at Beach Club (Standard room) with a 30+% off pin code. The cost of those 7 nights was $2340 (room only).

For the same time period it would have cost us 120 DVC points (studio). The maintenance fees at BCV for 120 points would have been $695 (I realize this does NOT take into consideration the initial buy in price.).

It can really be an incredible savings over time.

Savings is the only reason to buy into DVC. The dues in the above example will cost around $40,000 dollars over a 30 year period.

The biggest cost is the repeat vacations, travel, food, admission and hard ticket events, and of course the Disney take home extras.

Bill

 

[dankil13]

My husband and I are having a hard time justifying the purchase of DVC when we calculate that we will spend upwards of $20,000 in maintenance fees alone. Am I not getting something here? Thanks!!

I have been looking at resales as we typically rent points from family or friends. We go every other year to Disney and my oldest is 10 and my youngest kids are 2 and 4 so we expect to continue to go for quite awhile. Standard hotel rooms don't really work for us and we love the DVC resorts (we usually stay at OKW for the space). I'm considering purchasing more points than I need and renting the excess and off year we don't go to help cover the annual maintenance costs. Its a larger cash outlay upfront but would basically make my maintenance fees net to zero provided the price to rent points continues to increase in line with maintenance fee increases.

 

[Minniesgal]

Savings is the only reason to buy into DVC. The dues in the above example will cost around $40,000 dollars over a 30 year period. The biggest cost is the repeat vacations, travel, food, admission and hard ticket events, and of course the Disney take home extras. Bill

Yes tub as time goes on (at least for us) you buy fewer tickets, less souvenirs. Food you need no matter where you are and the number of. Must do restaurants goes down. We find we still splurge but our costs have dropped. Next trip for example we are doing East and west coasts and have decided at WDW we will just do the resorts and will only do parks in California.

 

[janischa]

Just taking very rough figures here, but assuming a resale price of 60 for 30 years of membership (i know it's a few years less than 30, but just making numbers easier since resale prices are different as well; and with the longer dated resorts the price per year is different as well), that would have cost you 2 dollars a year. If you add that to 6 dollar maintenance fees, that gives 8 dollars. This multiplied by an average 15 points per night stay, would be 120 dollars per night.

The way I reasonned, that would be more or less the price I'd pay for any hotel room any holiday. It doesn't even take into account being in a prime Disney location.

 

[dmband]

The fees are what has stopped me many times from buying in
(Edit to match exact days and true cost)

I don't see how DVc makes since unless I am missing something here
For example...
ak is $25,600 with 1,030 in fees right now today and expires in 43yrs
I just booked, with discount, at Coronado for 7 nights it would be $1200ish
I understand the mods are not the same as DVC rooms but since we are never in the room it's not a big factor to us
So yes it costs me $200 more but I didn't tie up 25k or $595.35 yr which in turn means I saved $400

Unless disney stops giving discounts out there is no real plus that I can see
Am I missing something here??

 

[disneynutz]

The fees are what has stopped me many times from buying in

I don't see how DVc makes since unless I am missing something here
For example...
ak is $25,600 with 1,030 in fees right now today and expires in 43yrs
I just booked, with discount, at Coronado for for 11 nights at $1700
So yes it costs me $700 more but I didn't tie up 25k or $595.35 a yr
(Which really isn't correct because the 25k isn't enough points to stay 11 nights)

Point being since fees change and will continue to go up, as will normal resort cost too - how do you really save money unless they stop giving discounts out??

I would not say tying up 25k to save $105 is a good investment, again, unless it am missing something

Ps I understand the mods are not the same as DVC rooms but since we are never in the room it's not a big factor to us

Do the numbers and if staying in a Mod works for you and it's less expensive than owning a DVC contract, then do not buy.

Bill

 

[dmband]

Do the numbers and if staying in a Mod works for you and it's less expensive than owning a DVC contract, then do not buy.

Bill

Well yes, but is there something I am missing cost wise where it would save me money?

 

[DougEMG]

Well yes, but is there something I am missing cost wise where it would save me money?

The big savings is when you buy resale. Buying direct means it takes a lot of years before you even come close to breaking even.

 

[Lynne M]

Well yes, but is there something I am missing cost wise where it would save me money?

No, I don't think you are. DVC isn't a discount program; as a timeshare, it's all about the villas. It's a cost-effective way to pre-pay for stays at DVC resorts. If you're happy staying at other resorts, if that works well for your family, and staying in the villas isn't worth the cost of the contract + fees to you, there just isn't any reason to buy.