Question regarding David's Vacation Club Rentals

[MegRaeWhay]

Good morning everyone...My husband and I are considering renting points from David's Vacation Club Rentals for our next Disney vacation. We want to rent a 2 bedroom villa at Bay Lake Towers for myself, my husband, our son, sister and brother in law. Has anyone rented from this site in the past?

We are looking for feedback to see if this process was difficult or if using a third party to book your vacation resulted in a loss of services or amenities at Disney.

 

[Pixie Princess]

Good morning everyone...My husband and I are considering renting points from David's Vacation Club Rentals for our next Disney vacation. We want to rent a 2 bedroom villa at Bay Lake Towers for myself, my husband, our son, sister and brother in law. Has anyone rented from this site in the past?

We are looking for feedback to see if this process was difficult or if using a third party to book your vacation resulted in a loss of services or amenities at Disney.

I have used them and it went very smoothly. I would recommend them to anyone. I rented points on a last minute deal offering. We stayed at SSR (last minute deals are almost always for SSR) during the week of Thanksgiving. There was no loss in service or amenities for me. If you didn't already know, when you book a stay on points, it is like renting a condo or house. There isn't daily housekeeping unless you pay for it. I did not choose to do this, so I can't comment about that. Otherwise, everything was as expected in terms of housekeeping, items in room and service in general. I had no issues checking in or out at the resort either.

 

[MegRaeWhay]

Thank you for your response. I did know that we would not have maid service but I do have one question about that. Did you have trouble finding a place to dump your trash?

 

[DebbieB]

At BLT, there are trash rooms on each floor.

 

[pigletto]

We've used Davids several times and it's been a smooth process every time. I have zero hesitation in recommending them and would use them again if the opportunity arose.
You are subject to the DVC rules on housekeeping like mentioned. For stays fewer than 8 days you get "trash and tidy" on day four. If longer than 8 days you get a full cleaning on day 4, and "trash and tidy" on the 8th day.

My only concern is the whether Davids will have the points for the 2 bedroom villa at BLT. I find (and what they recommend) is to have a few choices picked out. There's no way to know without checking with him but I do recommend having a back up choice.

 

[cigar95]

One thing to consider with David's service is that there is no option to reschedule your trip if something comes up - the rental is for the dates you book, and that's that. If you can't travel on those dates, the points - and your money - are gone.

When I've worked directly with DVC members on about 15 rentals over the years, we've always come to an agreement that if something happened, they'd work with me to try to reschedule our dates if something came up. It's not that difficult to work out terms that are fair in that regard for both member and renter.

To me, this is a bigger deal than the extra $2 or $3 a point that I can save by going direct.

 

[rachellm]

I found the people at Davids to be great and very easy to work with - but we didn't end up renting because they were unable to reserve ANY 2 bedrooms other than SSR or OKW. We went on their lists prior to the 11 month mark and gave up about 7.5 months out.

To be fair, they may have been able to get me something else at the 7 month mark - but I was told BLT and a few others were already sold out.

I think the chances of you getting a 2 bedroom at BLT through them are very slim. Would you consider a private rental?

 

[Missyrose]

The problem people are running into is that DVC owners (especially at BLT, BCV, BWV and VGF) can rent their points for far more than David or the other rental agencies will pay them, so they rent them out themselves on the Rent/Trade board. This is leaving the agencies with fewer options to fill rental requests (especially at the harder-to-get resorts).

 

[Deb & Bill]

We've used Davids several times and it's been a smooth process every time. I have zero hesitation in recommending them and would use them again if the opportunity arose.
You are subject to the DVC rules on housekeeping like mentioned. For stays fewer than 8 days you get "trash and tidy" on day four. If longer than 8 days you get a full cleaning on day 4, and "trash and tidy" on the 8th day.

My only concern is the whether Davids will have the points for the 2 bedroom villa at BLT. I find (and what they recommend) is to have a few choices picked out. There's no way to know without checking with him but I do recommend having a back up choice.

They called it trash and tidy many, many years ago until guests got confused when the housekeeper did not tidy the room. You get trash removed and towels and other amenities replaced. No bed making, no vacuuming, no dishes washed. So now they refer to is as trash and towels.

Also, David doesn't own the points. He merely acts as a broker between a member and someone who wants a reservation. So, if no member who owns the points at the resort you want has offered them to David to rent out, you arent' going to get that reservation at 11 months out. Maybe ten, maybe eight, maybe four.

 

[pigletto]

They called it trash and tidy many, many years ago until guests got confused when the housekeeper did not tidy the room. You get trash removed and towels and other amenities replaced. No bed making, no vacuuming, no dishes washed. So now they refer to is as trash and towels.

Also, David doesn't own the points. He merely acts as a broker between a member and someone who wants a reservation. So, if no member who owns the points at the resort you want has offered them to David to rent out, you arent' going to get that reservation at 11 months out. Maybe ten, maybe eight, maybe four.

Thank you for the correction. The towel/trash service is in fact what I was referring to. And I did not say he owned the points but was saying it's a good idea to have a back-up choice or 2 for a better chance of him having the points, for exactly the reasons you stated.

Op.. he very clearly lays this all out and explains on his website. Like I mentioned we've used the service several times and found his information clear and easy to understand, and we've never had any issues.

 

[MegRaeWhay]

Thank you all for your answers...We will most likely try to book 12 or more months in advance. How do you go through private DVC owners?

 

[Indecisive]

I have a 2-bedroom villa booked through David's at BLT for May 3-10, 2014. I had submitted my request 12 months ahead of time and it took several months before something became available, but I did get my first choice. The only issue I've noticed so far is that although I was able to connect my reservation to My Disney Experience, there was some kind of snafu in that although we have 4 adults and 2 children on the DVC reservation, My Disney Experience is only recognizing 3 adults and 2 children. I thought David's would be able to fix this, but they told me that they cannot because DVC and Disney are separate companies and there are some issues between the two computer systems. David's assured me that my reservation itself at DVC is fine and shows 4 adults and 2 children, and that it should not be a problem that My Disney Experience is missing a person. However, they said the missing person will not be able to, for example, use FastPass Plus. I think that is actually a fairly significant issue. So far, I have been unable to get this resolved. DVC will not talk to me because I am not the Member. Disney has been no help either. I have spent a long time on the phone, been transferred to a lot of different people, and this is still not fixed. Hopefully it will get fixed sometime in the next 178 days, but I have no idea how since Disney, DVC, and David's all say they can't help me. Well, if none of them can help me, who can?!

 

[Denise W]

It sounds like you need to be contacting the IT department for MDE to get that part resolved. It has nothing to do with David's or DVC. Good luck!
Denise

 

[peaches0313]

I could be wrong, but I don't think you can book DVC farther out than 11 months (David's or an owner on the rent/trade boards). I just rented points through David's for the 1st time for next fall. So far, everything has gone well. All of our people on our reservation are showing up on MDE.

 

[MAO]

Thank you all for your answers...We will most likely try to book 12 or more months in advance. How do you go through private DVC owners?

On the DIS, there is a subforum called (I think) 'Disney Vacation Club'. Within that subforum, there is a forum called something like 'Rent/Trade Board'. Check out the rules at the top of that forum - it's a sticky post; I don't believe you actually post what you want but the owners who want to rent will post how many points they have and what resort(s) they own at -- so you'd want to look for a BLT owner with enough points for rent that you should be able to get the room you want on the dates you want. I *think* there is a link in the DVC subforum to the points charts -- it should be up above the posts themselves, if I'm remembering correctly. Find the chart for BLT, look first for the timeframe you want to go, then find the spot in that timeframe for the two-bedroom options. Count up how many points it will take, noting that Friday and Saturday nights "cost" more, and then you'll know how many total points you need to look for.

As an aside, there should be at least one post in that DVC forum that talks about good contracts between renters and owners that you should take a look at. Also, I think there's a sticky post on how to check out owners -- if not, I think that the basic suggestion is to click on their DIS id and go through some of their posts here on DIS to get an idea of what kind of person they are. Somewhere, if you really want to get into it, there will be a link to the Florida website that has all the documentation of who owns at that resort so you can verify that the name an owner gives you matches the information they're claiming in terms of actually owning and having enough points to rent to you. I'm sure there's more info in that subforum; you've got some time so I do recommend you browse around in there.

Do note that you cannot technically book 12 months in advance -- an owner has to wait until 11 months out to make a reservation. Certainly, however, getting the process started at 12 months in advance is a very good idea.

 

[Indecisive]

Yes, I should have clarified that. I submitted my request at 12 months to "get in line," but I knew 11 months would be the earliest I could get a reservation. It took a couple months *after that* before something became available. It was hard to wait, but I did get my first choice.

And to the previous poster, yes, it seems clear to me that Disney IT is the place to resolve my problem with My Magic Experience. The trouble is--good luck getting to the right person. I've been on hold several times for ages, transferred to different people, I've been *promised* they would get it fixed, etc., etc., and NO RESULTS. And part of the problem is that the moment any Disney CM finds out it is DVC, they want to hang up on me and send me to DVC because they assume it is a DVC issue. Then DVC won't talk to me because I'm not a Member. David's says they can't do anything. So I just go around and around, wasting time and getting nowhere.

 

[letsgoreds]

Yes, I should have clarified that. I submitted my request at 12 months to "get in line," but I knew 11 months would be the earliest I could get a reservation. It took a couple months *after that* before something became available. It was hard to wait, but I did get my first choice.

And to the previous poster, yes, it seems clear to me that Disney IT is the place to resolve my problem with My Magic Experience. The trouble is--good luck getting to the right person. I've been on hold several times for ages, transferred to different people, I've been *promised* they would get it fixed, etc., etc., and NO RESULTS. And part of the problem is that the moment any Disney CM finds out it is DVC, they want to hang up on me and send me to DVC because they assume it is a DVC issue. Then DVC won't talk to me because I'm not a Member. David's says they can't do anything. So I just go around and around, wasting time and getting nowhere.

The DVC owner needs to call and add the missing child to the reservation. They simply need to call member services. Easy peasey. I have only rented directly from DVC owners, and this is what they did anytime there was a mistake with the reservation (kids ages were wrong, etc.). Then look for the update in MDE.

OK...lemme ask, when you look at the reservation outside of MDE (perhaps email confirmation from David's...owners send this to me), is it correct? Just incorrect at MDE? If it is incorrect at everywhere, it is a problem with the reservation, and you should pressure David's to fix it (which means they need to contact the DVC owner to make the call, as noted above). Not a big deal.

If it is correct when you look at the reservation (outside of MDE), but wrong at MDE, then call any 407 number, say 'My Disney Experience' for the issue, and it will transfer you directly to IT. We had a DVC/MDE issue, where my DVC reservations had a dulplicate of my 3yo, one that didn't have tickets/FP+ associated...which meant that the magic bands wouldn't work at the parks, just at the resort. The IT guy was super helpful, asked that I change the duplicate identity to something obvious (added 'NOT' in front of the identical name), and he conferenced in DVC IT (separate entity from normal Disney IT), and fixed it while I was on hold. Took about 30 minutes total from initial dialing to hanging up. I was satisfied.

VERY important, call during normal business hours as the DVC employees don't have the same hours as the other DVC CMs. They are 7 days a week, but I don't think they hold evening hours on the weekends. The initial IT guy was worried that they might have gone home for the day when I called on Sunday. I was pleased that he (IT guy) escalated the call to DVC, because they never would have worked with me...can only fix issues directly from the DVC owner, and will ask for membership #/etc. if you try to call.

Good luck. DEFINITELY fix this now, not having FP+ is a big deal. Don'tgive up!

 

[Indecisive]

Thank you for suggestions. I will give this a shot!!! To answer your question, David's did send me a screen shot showing me that the DVC system has the reservation correct, so it appears to be more of a MDE issue. I blame this on the fact that my husband and father-in-law have the same name (junior and senior), so I think the MDE system erroneously believed there was a duplicate. Grrrrr. Thank you again for your help and encouragement!

 

[letsgoreds]

Thank you for suggestions. I will give this a shot!!! To answer your question, David's did send me a screen shot showing me that the DVC system has the reservation correct, so it appears to be more of a MDE issue. I blame this on the fact that my husband and father-in-law have the same name (junior and senior), so I think the MDE system erroneously believed there was a duplicate. Grrrrr. Thank you again for your help and encouragement!

Yeah, definitely a call to Disney is in order. I have had to call IT twice, and both times were pleasantly surprised....after reading so much gloom and doom on the DIS. The only other advice I can share is that the main Disney IT guy had a list of #s to call (get ahold of DVC), and the first one he called took him to a voice mail, so he called a different #. He did put me on hold for quite a bit of time...but then explained that during that time he was fixing the problem with the DVC IT guy. Have a great trip!