Please recommend our use year?!

[Goingtodisneyworld]

Almost there ~ we are ready to make an offer however I have been following the “Just discovered when use year matters” link (Thank you Crobin for the reply) and with your help hope to feel we have done our best to potentially avoid future worries/challenges ~ currently we have always vacationed late Oct. although this will most probably change (when kids start school) to include early Aug. – mid Dec., any opinions/recommendations for best use year would help and be greatly appreciated!! Happy Friday ~ Christine

 

[Cruelladeville]

Get a use year that is slightly before you are normally planning to vacation, especially if you borrow points--and we all do! That way, you have nearly a full year to use the borrowed points if you cancel your ressie. If you vacation in July, for example, you don't want an August use year because you don't have time to use up points before they expire.

 

[KathyR]

For August through Dec trips an August use year would be perfect; because, you could bank all of your points until the end of January if you need to cancel. Plus, you would have until the end of July to make up the cancelled trip if you needed to. June would be a second choice, but not as good of one since you only have until the end of Nov to bank all your points in case of a cancellation. And, you would only have until May 31 to use your points if you needed to.

 

[CK1]

Personally, I'm so impressed with the savvy of those who "shop around" for a use-year! I can't recall our guide ever even throwing up another use-yr option to us (of course, keep in mind I'm also the one who believes her guide is a ...well... dud.)

We formerly vacationed in Oct-Jan timeframe, and bought our pts around that. You are so smart to calculate in the fact that kids surely do change things. 3 kids (2 baseball all-stars, no less) later, we rarely get out any other month than August! Our June use yr fortunately accommodates that fairly nicely ... thank heavens our guide wasn't offering a later month, or we'd now be toast!!

Cindy

 

[timC]

When we bought our BWV points, we were given the choice of February or June. Not sure why they were our only selection....

I didn't think too much about it at the time, except that it was more likely that we'd be doing summer trips (with kids), and when we bought, our kids finished up their year in June. So we have a whole year to figure out how to spend them. Here are the lessons I've learned so far...

Lesson 1: One month prior to your normal vacation season.
If you vacation in the summer, take May or June. That way, you can freely make/change reservations throughout your "season" without any concerns, and have a whole year to do something with the points.

Lesson 2: Things change.
How you vacationed pre-DVC is not likely to be the same, post-DVC. You'll likely vacation more . Also, I'm fully expecting that within the next 10 years our vacation pattern will change again, as the kids leave home... them grandkids will come along, changing our plans yet again.

Lesson 3: The point system is very flexible.
I think about vacation plans, every weekend. You'll discover in most cases, banking and borrowing will give you enough flexibility where any use year will work.

 

[Goingtodisneyworld]

Thank you all sooooo much ~ although we did not have a guide (because of going through resale) I truly feel like we have had one better ~ a whole DVC family of guides to openly answer any & ALL of our questions!!! This is a pretty big purchase for us, yet one we are completely sure of ~ Thank You again, I will keep everyone posted through the sale. Warm Regards ~ Christine

 

[Richyams]

Guides say nothing about use year for two reasons, it really isn't that big of a deal and they are ony selling one at a time. They don't want people to know that one is better than another.

We got lucky. Bought in Nov '92 and got a Sept use year. All our vacation are in Oct, Nov or Dec, just got lucky. We had no idea of the implications of use year. I don't think it has ever come into play. The few cancelations that I have made were all made WAY, WAY in advance of the trip.

If you don't cancel, use year is meaningless.