Most Economical Resort - Beyond Year 1

[intamin]

CCV is great unless you need 3 sleeping surfaces. That was the deal killer for me! I would always be in a 2BR. I can do a studio at some other locations.

Yeah even if you only have 4, it really is nice having that extra pull down under the TV. We had 4 adults in a studio at RIV earlier this month and had no problems with the extra shower and added sleeping space. My SIL actually prefers sleeping on the smaller pulldown and it gave our other friend her own space which was really nice for her.

 

[jolynne28]

This is a great thread, thank you!
Does anyone have thoughts on where the sweet spot might end up being to purchase BWV/BCV, or should we expect a fairly standard deviation in ppt from here on out?

 

[ray3127]

A few years ago I created a thread called 'Common Size Points Charts' where I calculated the points needed for an average week at all the different resorts and room categories.

I also alluded to a "time value" of points at the time (not in that post, but others), because it always irked me to value points I'm going to use in 2060 the same as points in going to use next year. Those points should be discounted ... I teach finance at a local university

Less than a year after I posted those charts, Disney went from 5 DVC seasons to 7. And by now there are new resorts. Over the years I've thought about updating my work, and incorporating the TVM math as well.

So I'm just here to say thank you, because I don't have to think about updating my stuff anymore. This is excellent!

 

[CastAStone]

Points Charts Matter - July 2024
(I'll also mirror this above in post 4)

So lots of information above about most economical points, but when it comes down to it you gotta end up using those points. Statisically, it's likely you'll use them at your Home Resort.

So let's combine the most economical points calculations with the points charts and figure out what the most economical resort is (when you stay at your Home Resort).

First, a bit of methodology discussion:

• I use an average week calculation that:
  • Counts 5x the average weekday in the 2024 points chart
  • Counts 2x the average weekend day in the 2024 points chart
  • At most resorts this ends up producing weeks a little above Season 4 numbers, though some room-resort combos can encroach on Season 5 territory.
• For each of the major categories, I do both a 'Cheapest room' calculation for the value-seekers, and an 'Average room' calculation to better represent the entire resort.
  • Average room is weighted based on max inventory, so if a category has 100 of one room view and 10 of another, it's a properly weighted average of the 110 rooms.
• I didn't do the Tower/Duo Studios, or Inn/Hotel Room rooms. Maybe when PVB has Duos?
• Cabungahouses are:
  • Cabins (the real ones)
  • Bungalows
  • Treehouses
  • Beach Houses
• I've sorted them by average Studio price, with CFW getting a custom sort based on its ranking within the 1BR.
  • This is pretty good sorting for 1BR+, but some are slightly out of place.
• I've done 'cost'/yr, as I feel it's more approachable, but definitely open to feedback!

You might need to click/tap on these to view them...

Years 1-5:

Years 1-10:

Years 1-17:

SSR Cabungahouse FTW

 

[CastAStone]

Points Charts Matter - July 2024
(I'll also mirror this above in post 4)

So lots of information above about most economical points, but when it comes down to it you gotta end up using those points. Statisically, it's likely you'll use them at your Home Resort.

So let's combine the most economical points calculations with the points charts and figure out what the most economical resort is (when you stay at your Home Resort).

First, a bit of methodology discussion:

• I use an average week calculation that:
  • Counts 5x the average weekday in the 2024 points chart
  • Counts 2x the average weekend day in the 2024 points chart
  • At most resorts this ends up producing weeks a little above Season 4 numbers, though some room-resort combos can encroach on Season 5 territory.
• For each of the major categories, I do both a 'Cheapest room' calculation for the value-seekers, and an 'Average room' calculation to better represent the entire resort.
  • Average room is weighted based on max inventory, so if a category has 100 of one room view and 10 of another, it's a properly weighted average of the 110 rooms.
• I didn't do the Tower/Duo Studios, or Inn/Hotel Room rooms. Maybe when PVB has Duos?
• Cabungahouses are:
  • Cabins (the real ones)
  • Bungalows
  • Treehouses
  • Beach Houses
• I've sorted them by average Studio price, with CFW getting a custom sort based on its ranking within the 1BR.
  • This is pretty good sorting for 1BR+, but some are slightly out of place.
• I've done 'cost'/yr, as I feel it's more approachable, but definitely open to feedback!

You might need to click/tap on these to view them...

Years 1-5:

Years 1-10:

Years 1-17:

Also I think this post and specifically the year 1 version of this post deserves its own thread.

Last step is to compare these to average rack rates…

 

[ehh]

Also I think this post and specifically the year 1 version of this post deserves its own thread.

Last step is to compare these to average rack rates…

For Year 1, easy enough for me to update and add that to the monthly threads that discuss resale price blog posts (those happen, right?).

For the points chart-inclusive 'most economical', I could go either way on a new thread vs. living here. More than anything, I want to make some readability improvements, probably break out Studios, 1BR, 2BR, and GV/Cabungahouses into their own tables/images.

...and then there's rack rates comparison for those who want to go deep down the rabbit hole. Trying to figure out the best way to ingest and process the mousesavers.com data, with an eye toward potentially doing date-specific value.

EDIT: looks like touringplans.com has rack rates in a consumable format for this!

 

[ehh]

Okay, more readable versions of the points-chart-inclusive value calculations!

Hopefully these are better for everyone, but especially those on mobile devices. And as each major room category gets its own image, it's now it's sorted for each major room category (at least the average...the 'cheapest room' is just AKV Value).

Years 1-5

Years 1-10 (my favorite time range for this analysis)

Years 1-17

 

[CastAStone]

These posts are a good reminder of why I so badly wanted to get low 80s for a SSR contract with an extra year of points - for 1BRs (which are what we are exclusively staying in for the next several years), the next best alternative (AoA or ASMu family suites) are cheaper than all of these options as presented here.

My math has me beating them both - barely. But in large part because I did get a loaded contract in the low $80s and I’m renting out the extra year of points.

 

[CastAStone]

I also have a similar spreadsheet to @ehh ’s and I have a version where I see what every room in the DVC system “costs” with my SSR points. I think that even with my very conservative assumptions, my VGC 1BR stay in January was like $300/night

 

[Tatebeck]

Thanks for all the hard work! I do think that it's crazy how much a very small change in dues changes can change the outcome so much.

One thing that I think won't quite turn out according to the graphs is some of the dues changes rates. Isn't the reason that Aulani has the subsidized dues because they were artificially starting dues lower than they should have been around that time to increase sales and then increasing them quickly for a few cycles and got in trouble for it? And since then they have been starting them a bit higher at a more realistic rate and having smaller increases?

Because of that I feel like the last few resorts that opened just before Aulani (AKV, BLT, VGC, etc) may have artificially high dues increase rates and look worse in the data. Their actual increase rates may not be as high as they have been historically and that can change a lot over these long projections.

Similarly then the resorts that opened just after Aulani (VGF, Poly, CCV, etc) may have artificially low dues increase percentages due to Disney trying to stay out of trouble and having to offer subsidized dues to early buyers like they did for Aulani. This would make them look better in the data over the long term projection.

 

[CarolynFH]

Isn't the reason that Aulani has the subsidized dues because they were artificially starting dues lower than they should have been around that time to increase sales and then increasing them quickly for a few cycles and got in trouble for it?

Yes, they did start out with artificially low dues, but they didn’t increase them until the state of Hawaii caught them. https://dvcnews.com/dvc-program-men...ntinel-aulani-dues-error-lead-to-lewis-ouster

Since then, new resorts have started with higher dues than earlier resorts and then have had minimal increases until dues estimates “caught up” with actual expenses.

 

[Floridian From Afar]

This thread brings me back to my college years.... where the professor says you can look over all your notes during the test but I still can't figure out the answer.

 

[ehh]

This thread brings me back to my college years.... where the professor says you can look over all your notes during the test but I still can't figure out the answer.

What 'answer' are you looking for and what would help?

 

[AstroBlasters]

Okay, more readable versions of the points-chart-inclusive value calculations!

Hopefully these are better for everyone, but especially those on mobile devices. And as each major room category gets its own image, it's now it's sorted for each major room category (at least the average...the 'cheapest room' is just AKV Value).

Years 1-5

Years 1-10 (my favorite time range for this analysis)

Years 1-17

Why is the cheapest and the average points/wk the same for the Disneyland resorts?

 

[ehh]

Why is the cheapest and the average points/wk the same for the Disneyland resorts?

For the 1BR, 2BR, and GV categories, there's only 1 view category at both VDH and VGC. These charts use view categories, not seasons, to differentiate.

VDH does have different pts/wk for chepest and average in the Studios, though.

 

[MartyParty]

Seriously ehh, you've out done yourself! Thanks for bringing a lively conversation to the DVC boards!

You rock!

 

[MartyParty]

I also have a similar spreadsheet to @ehh ’s and I have a version where I see what every room in the DVC system “costs” with my SSR points. I think that even with my very conservative assumptions, my VGC 1BR stay in January was like $300/night

Agree CastAStone. That's the kicker. Using lower cost DVC points with reasonable dues at the higher end DVC resorts. We've had most of our points long enough that the purchase price at buy in doesn't matter.

 

[ehh]

Almost done integrating cash rates to determine an 'Effective Discount' metric.

Who wants to guess the #1 resort for Year 1 across Studios, 1BR, and 2BR? Hint: they're not necessarily the same resort...

 

[intamin]

Almost done integrating cash rates to determine an 'Effective Discount' metric.

Who wants to guess the #1 resort for Year 1 across Studios, 1BR, and 2BR? Hint: they're not necessarily the same resort...

Complete shot in the dark but I'm going to say.. for studios BLT, for 1BR/2BR CCV /shrug. I'm pretty sure it's not RIV from my calculations compared to rack in the past but I haven't done enough research on the others :X

 

[ehh]

Complete shot in the dark but I'm going to say.. for studios BLT, for 1BR/2BR CCV /shrug. I'm pretty sure it's not RIV from my calculations compared to rack in the past but I haven't done enough research on the others :X

Got Studios right! And very close for 1BR/2BR!

For this phase, I'm just looking at year 1, to remove the complexity of forecasting future rack rates. I fully intend to do longer range analyses.

Also of note, I did 'dumb averages' for cash rates, not weighted by room category count (which I did do for points). I actually did a properly weighted average for AKV Studios and it ended up being within $1/night and decided to just drop it overall. Some resorts that have significant imbalances will be slightly misrepresented in the 'Average' categories (PVB and RIV come to mind).

As a reminder, the "Cheapest [room]" category describes an average week of the lowest points room view/location, not the cheapest season. "Average [room]" is an average of all room views/locations in the category, including the cheapest.

Also, I used Touring Plans publicly posted cash rates, which are limited to just WDW resorts.

Studios

1 Bedrooms

* HUGE DISCLAIMER about CFW: this is based on the 2024 cash rates of the old cabins as there is not full year data for the new cabins (nor has Touring Plans posted what 2024 cash rates exist for the new cabins). Complete 2025 cash rates are not available anywhere, including from Disney.

If the new cabins have a 10% bump in cash rate over the course of the year, that puts the discount in the mid/high-20s, above RIV-D 1BR!


2 Bedrooms

** Normal sized disclaimer about AKV: there's no published cash rates for lock-offs, so all of Jambo has no 2BR cash rates posted, which means no Value or Concierge cash rates are factored in. This probably doesn't matter much for the Average, but it means there is no available cash rate for the Cheapest (which is Value 2BR).

This also impacts BWV, which only has 2BRLO and therefore has no rack rates.


3 Bedroom Grand Villas and Cabungahouses

I was not able to find the cash rates for AKV 3BRGV Standard View or BoardWalk 3BRGV.


Next thing up: forecasting cash rates and doing longer term analyses. I'm leaning toward just copying the dues growth factors I used, but happy to hear arguments for other forecasting methods.