Poly Tower Speculation

[Genie+]

The question is, did restrictions hurt sales at Rivera? There are only two possible answers: yes or no. To answer that question we have to ask a different question, is there anyone that did not buy because of the restrictions? That is an easy answer - of course. So, restrictions (without question) hurt sales at Rivera.

In a weird way Riviera restrictions made me more inclined to buy DVC direct. I did not like the idea of restrictions’ impact on value if we ever decided to sell. Restrictions also made direct more attractive since we prefer not to be locked out of new resorts over the decades.

Maybe less weird and more intended. This gap between resale and direct will keep growing bigger.

VGF direct seemed a last opportunity for us to avoid both the buying and selling aspects of restrictions. I would’ve bought resale if only RIV was offered (due to restrictions). But… A few years from now when the newest 5 resorts are restricted and more in development? Not sure what our decision would be.

 

[Genie+]

TikiMan (from the now defunct ***********.com) predicted the following back when Poly1 was being built:

"WL – room conversions & new cabins
YC – room conversions
CBR - new buildings and a new waterway connecting it to Epcot by boat
FW
PVB (phase 2)"

He had some great inside info and pretty much nailed it with the exception of VGF2 replacing YC (still got the room conversion correct) and the Epcot waterway.

YC to be announced as soon as RIV is near sold

 

[Sandisw]

I think everyone is being far too analytical about the question of restrictions. We are answering with our heart and not our heads (a completely normal thing to do on a subject we are passionate about. I will fight to the death (OK, not really) that Wilderness Lodge is the best Disney resort). The question is, did restrictions hurt sales at Rivera? There are only two possible answers: yes or no. To answer that question we have to ask a different question, is there anyone that did not buy because of the restrictions? That is an easy answer - of course. So, restrictions (without question) hurt sales at Rivera. The main question everyone has been debating is actually the rate at which sales were affected and if Disney finds that rate acceptable. That is the point where Disney seems a bit neurotic. Thus all of our arguing about restrictions. They added another resort with restrictions - but also added a "new" DVC without them. What will they do at Poly 2? I really don't have a clue. I am completely in the middle. I could see them going either way. As a Poly owner I am not even sure what I want them to do. I am happy with the Poly I bought - do I want them adding a lot more competition for my rooms? I am not sure. Hmmm....but I could stay in a shiny new tower.

Well, to be fair, anything that causes people to shy away from buying a resort can be said hurt sales.

Are their people out there who did not add on more VGF points because of the resort studios? The answer is yes.

Are there people who bought direct instead of resale because of restrictions? The answer is yes.

So, in that respect restrictions worked and increased sales for DVD.

I don’t think there is anyone who doesn’t know that people have chosen not to by a restricted resort and that some sales were lost.

The bigger question is really whether the number of sales lost because of them exceeded the number of sales gained because of them?

Sales, since VGF went on sale, and those two are selling at the same time have pretty comparable numbers.

It’s why I think restrictions for Poly tower, if they decide to make its own resort, won’t matter. It hasn’t for VDH.

And if DVD wants them to continue they have plenty of dats to support that restrictions in the long term will help, not hurt their goal of selling new properties.

If Poly tower is made part of PVB it will be because they have decided that selling it that way is what will get them higher sales.

We already know there are people here, myself included thst won’t even consider buying if it’s part of PVB..

No matter what the decision is it will impact sales. It is whether it’s impact is meaningful enough to be seen as a mistake.

So far, I think DVD has shown they are okay with the decisions made at this point.

We know that because they haven’t reversed them..and it was obviously something that had been thought about a head of time which is why they gave themselves the power to remove them.

 

[ehh]

I am not sure they can do that either. The way units are declared, it would change the make up of those in the legal filings.

They can legally add more phases to the resort which is what happened with BPK and what this would be if added to PVB.

I think that attempting to change the make up of the long houses would create an issue.

But are the rooms you are seeing gone within the 11 month window? Maybe there are just owners? Or simple something that will correct itself.

The rooms are unavailable at 11m + 7d, before the owners can book them at 8am. I've tried to modify a 7-night reservation to an 8-night reservation during the midnight-8am time window and the site doesn't let me, so it's not owners.

Even if it were bookable by owners (which it's not), the rooms are gone when the rooms are first shown on the website right at midnight, before anyone would be able to complete a reservation/modification (not that anyone is extending reservations at that time), with no other change in inventory until 8am or later.

I check many resorts every night between midnight and 8am to monitor for refurbs, but Poly hasn't been one of them because it was last refurbed in 2021 (or maybe 2020? I forget). But once I saw the Poly disruption, I then did a non-scientific 'lookback' to see when the inventory disruption might have started. As you mentioned, owners could have booked and contributed to reduced inventory so the lookback is very fuzzy. Despite that, it's very likely the inventory disruption is on the order of at least days and even likely over 2 weeks so far. Theoretically it could have been going on even longer than that, depending on how they initiated the inventory disruption (I have seen other refurb-likely resorts do weird things).

 

[Sandisw]

The rooms are unavailable at 11m + 7d, before the owners can book them at 8am. I've tried to modify a 7-night reservation to an 8-night reservation during the midnight-8am time window and the site doesn't let me, so it's not owners.

Even if it were bookable by owners (which it's not), the rooms are gone when the rooms are first shown on the website right at midnight, before anyone would be able to complete a reservation/modification (not that anyone is extending reservations at that time), with no other change in inventory until 8am or later.

I check many resorts every night between midnight and 8am to monitor for refurbs, but Poly hasn't been one of them because it was last refurbed in 2021 (or maybe 2020? I forget). But once I saw the Poly disruption, I then did a non-scientific 'lookback' to see when the inventory disruption might have started. As you mentioned, owners could have booked and contributed to reduced inventory so the lookback is very fuzzy. Despite that, it's very likely the inventory disruption is on the order of at least days and even likely over 2 weeks so far. Theoretically it could have been going on even longer than that, depending on how they initiated the inventory disruption (I have seen other refurb-likely resorts do weird things).

You can’t add day 8 to an 11 month booking until 8 am the next day so not sure it matters since they can’t be booked and don’t need to show availability until 8 am.

I have never seen anything beyond 7 days until 8 am at my resorts.

So, I am not sure I am understanding, especially if you are saying they are back by 8 am?

 

[0FF TO NEVERLAND]

TikiMan (from the now defunct ***********.com) predicted the following back when Poly1 was being built:

"WL – room conversions & new cabins
YC – room conversions
CBR - new buildings and a new waterway connecting it to Epcot by boat
FW
PVB (phase 2)"

He had some great inside info and pretty much nailed it with the exception of VGF2 replacing YC (still got the room conversion correct) and the Epcot waterway.

I wish the YC had DVC rooms.. lol

 

[tidefan]

We already know there are people here, myself included thst won’t even consider buying if it’s part of PVB..

To counterpoint, there are people here as well, myself included, that won't even consider buying unless it IS part of the existing association (and even then, it would be a hard sell if point inflation is too bad)...

 

[tidefan]

Thank you.

Follow-up question: can they swap the location of rooms?

Example, take 70 Deluxe Studios and convert them to Resort Studios and build 70 Deluxe Studios (e.g., as part of 2BRLOs) in the new Tower?

Reason I ask: last night I noticed a major inventory disruption at the Poly Studios in summer 2024. Over 20% of the many SV Studios and over 10% of LV Studios are not bookable for an extended period of time. It's too soon for a scheduled refurb (last refurb was 2021) and the offline volumes are too high for cash bookings (if they want to rent any at other times of the year, at least), so I'm at a bit of a loss.

To get back just to PVB2 speculation... I think that they had a huge missed opportunity at VGF by not having dedicated King Bed studios. What I would find interesting is if they created King studios, perhaps here, though the building photos don't seem to lend themselves to it, but who knows...

 

[0FF TO NEVERLAND]

To get back just to PVB2 speculation... I think that they had a huge missed opportunity at VGF by not having dedicated King Bed studios. What I would find interesting is if they created King studios, perhaps here, though the building photos don't seem to lend themselves to it, but who knows...

Agreed. I stayed at the resort studios and wouldn't do it again because of the two beds in the room ( along with the thinnest walls known to man keeping me up all night ) Just isn't DVC to me without one bed and a couch for a studio.

 

[ehh]

You can’t add day 8 to an 11 month booking until 8 am the next day so not sure it matters since they can’t be booked and don’t need to show availability until 8 am.

I have never seen anything beyond 7 days until 8 am at my resorts.

So, I am not sure I am understanding, especially if you are saying they are back by 8 am?

Correct that you can't add day 8 to an 11m booking until 8am, that's also what I was trying to say, but maybe poorly.

But if you check the inventory between midnight and 8am, you can see what will be available to book at 8am. That inventory is significantly reduced at Poly Studios, a reduction amount typically indicative of a refurb. The inventory does not recover at 8am (or at all, so far), it's stayed unavailable as if there's a refurbishment.

To get back just to PVB2 speculation... I think that they had a huge missed opportunity at VGF by not having dedicated King Bed studios. What I would find interesting is if they created King studios, perhaps here, though the building photos don't seem to lend themselves to it, but who knows...

All of my 'what could they do to Poly1' questions are in the context of Poly2.

There is some sort of inventory disruption event happening to Poly1 Studio inventory in early July 2024 (and likely also June 2024). As I see it, there's no good reason to do anything to Poly1 in 2024, unless it's part of the Poly2 plans. Trying to figure out what that could be.

Possibilities:

• The Poly1 inventory disruption could be totally unrelated.
  • Possible, but fairly low probability. It's likely too big to be inventory pulled for cash reservations, and 2024 is too soon for an on-schedule refurbishment.
• It could mean that Poly2 construction needs a bunch of Poly1 rooms to go offline to for barely-related reasons (like noise or construction safety).
  • This seems extremely unlikely considering the physical distance between them.
• It could be an indicator that Poly1 tweaks are happening because of Poly2, essentially as part of the Poly2 plans, which itself might be a very strong indicator they're the same association. It would also hint at what's in the Tower.
  • Based on Sandi was saying about what's written in contracts, this isn't permitted. Which means it's only possible if DVC feels like they could 'get away with it'.

A King Bed Studio would be a fantastic addition, but also sub-optimal for lock-offs. It also kinda fits into my 'swap with Poly1' conspiracy theory: build standard Deluxe Studios as part of 2BRLOs in the Tower, and convert existing Deluxe Studios into a new type of Studio, such as Resort Studios or King Studios or whatever.

 

[KimMcGowan]

• The Poly1 inventory disruption could be totally unrelated.
  • Possible, but fairly low probability. It's likely too big to be inventory pulled for cash reservations, and 2024 is too soon for an on-schedule refurbishment.

Can Disney do that, remove inventory for cash sales? I thought - and I am FAR from an expert - they could only do cash sales from inventory they owned or rooms that hadn’t been booked.

 

[Sandisw]

To counterpoint, there are people here as well, myself included, that won't even consider buying unless it IS part of the existing association (and even then, it would be a hard sell if point inflation is too bad)...

That was sort of the point I was trying to make regarding restrictions and it hurting sales simply because we know people didn’t buy because of them.

Basically, all decisions that DVD makes will cause some people to buy or not buy, and it doesn’t mean it’s impact is meaningful that the decision was a mistake.

The Poly tower decision, will cause some to buy and some to not, which is not really any different than people choosing to buy or not buy RIV/VDH due to those resorts having. restrictions.

 

[Sandisw]

Can Disney do that, remove inventory for cash sales? I thought - and I am FAR from an expert - they could only do cash sales from inventory they owned or rooms that hadn’t been booked.

DVC has the right to anticipate breakage inventory based on trends and can indeed remove them before the 60 day period when it begins.

So, to a certain extent, they can take rooms if they are normally not booked. But, they get to choose which rooms to take when people trade out of DVC for cruises, etc, it doesn’t have to match the owners actual points.

But, DVD can’t take rooms , even using their own points for cash rentals until the 11 month window like the rest of us.

 

[Sandisw]

Correct that you can't add day 8 to an 11m booking until 8am, that's also what I was trying to say, but maybe poorly.

But if you check the inventory between midnight and 8am, you can see what will be available to book at 8am. That inventory is significantly reduced at Poly Studios, a reduction amount typically indicative of a refurb. The inventory does not recover at 8am (or at all, so far), it's stayed unavailable as if there's a refurbishment.


All of my 'what could they do to Poly1' questions are in the context of Poly2.

There is some sort of inventory disruption event happening to Poly1 Studio inventory in early July 2024 (and likely also June 2024). As I see it, there's no good reason to do anything to Poly1 in 2024, unless it's part of the Poly2 plans. Trying to figure out what that could be.

Possibilities:

• The Poly1 inventory disruption could be totally unrelated.
  • Possible, but fairly low probability. It's likely too big to be inventory pulled for cash reservations, and 2024 is too soon for an on-schedule refurbishment.
• It could mean that Poly2 construction needs a bunch of Poly1 rooms to go offline to for barely-related reasons (like noise or construction safety).
  • This seems extremely unlikely considering the physical distance between them.
• It could be an indicator that Poly1 tweaks are happening because of Poly2, essentially as part of the Poly2 plans, which itself might be a very strong indicator they're the same association. It would also hint at what's in the Tower.
  • Based on Sandi was saying about what's written in contracts, this isn't permitted. Which means it's only possible if DVC feels like they could 'get away with it'.

A King Bed Studio would be a fantastic addition, but also sub-optimal for lock-offs. It also kinda fits into my 'swap with Poly1' conspiracy theory: build standard Deluxe Studios as part of 2BRLOs in the Tower, and convert existing Deluxe Studios into a new type of Studio, such as Resort Studios or King Studios or whatever.

Maybe it has to do with them taking them in relation to the two DVC cruises that are happening next June and July?

They can pull rooms for those that used points and it can be at any resort.

 

[ehh]

Maybe it has to do with them taking them in relation to the two DVC cruises that are happening next June and July?

They can pull rooms for those that used points and it can be at any resort.

Maybe! Looks like the cruise on the Magic requires at least one passenger to be using points, which probably means 200k-400k points traded, which is substantial.

I'll keep monitoring the Poly1 inventory and periodically start checking other resorts that are unlikely to be refurbished to see if this is widespread.

If the Poly1 inventory disruption is long enough, it would point back to a refurbishment-class disruption rather than a cruise-swap. And if so, I'll return to my suspicions of it being related to Poly2.

 

[Sandisw]

To clarify, I think they can replace any of the queen beds with a king without issue, in any resort that has the room, as long as the amenities of what makes the rooms deluxe studios remains.

But, if they want unique options, it makes logical sense to do it with the Poly tower construction.

 

[Epcot Forever Forever]

Follow-up question: can they swap the location of rooms?

Example, take 70 Deluxe Studios and convert them to Resort Studios and build 70 Deluxe Studios (e.g., as part of 2BRLOs) in the new Tower?

I went to look at what is guaranteed in the POS and accompanying documents (sometimes the UK docs have more details than the US ones) and I realized that Technically, deluxe studio isn’t a room type, 2 bedroom lockoff is. So I think the answer to Deluxe->Resort is a clear no. Resort-> Deluxe as a name is a clear no, but I don’t see anything prohibiting Disney from increasing the offering of a Resort Studio beyond what is guaranteed in the POS as they have several times at other resorts by adding the 5th sleeper, and matching the deluxe.

 

[Epcot Forever Forever]

YC to be announced as soon as RIV is near sold

I reaaaaaaaaaaaally struggle to believe they would.

 

[Sandisw]

I went to look at what is guaranteed in the POS and accompanying documents (sometimes the UK docs have more details than the US ones) and I realized that Technically, deluxe studio isn’t a room type, 2 bedroom lockoff is. So I think the answer to Deluxe->Resort is a clear no. Resort-> Deluxe as a name is a clear no, but I don’t see anything prohibiting Disney from increasing the offering of a Resort Studio beyond what is guaranteed in the POS as they have several times at other resorts by adding the 5th sleeper, and matching the deluxe.

The deluxe studio is indeed a room category because there a resorts in which there are dedicated studios.

Of course, at PVB there are all studios and defined that way. Adding a 5th sleeping space under TV doesn’t change the nature of the studio.

So, whatever they do to the current PVB rooms they have to stay as a “deluxe studio” as that is how they are declared.

Thinking more, could they change the definition of a “deluxe studio” for all the resorts then make every deluxe studio go to two beds??? Maybe…

But what they can’t do is convert what is a deluxe into a resort studio because the language in the multi site POS which defines the two is different. For example, A resort studio doesn’t have a wet sink but deluxe studios do.

That’s why if they add Poly tower to PvB, they can definitely have them in there. I just don’t believe they can change the make up of the current rooms to something else.

 

[Epcot Forever Forever]

It could mean that Poly2 construction needs a bunch of Poly1 rooms to go offline to for barely-related reasons (like noise or construction safety).

It could also be for construction elsewhere,