Questions as new DVC owner

[tink_lover]

OK, we finally bought and will get our AKV points in Dec. We plan on using the developer points for GC. I am trying to figure out stays for next year. Do any of you actually stay over on a Fri or Sat night? Doesn't it seem like a huge waste of points? Also, because the numbers don't work out to the exact number of points, are you always banking a few unused points or borrowing a few from next year's? Any help in how you manage would be useful. Thanks!

 

[305gang]

We seem to be in a using a few more points than an annual grant but we are ahead of the game for the moment due to the developer points.

 

[Figment2]

There are those who move on the weekends and those who don't. I bought enough points so I don't have to move. Friends & I usually take a 10 day trip in late October and stay over two weekends. Plus we sometimes do long weekends where we arrive on Thurs or Fri and stay till Mon or Tues.

I don't see it as a waste of points. I bought into DVC so I wouldn't have to pay cash for a room. By the way, I'm always in borrowing mode which is why I did my 5th add on.

JMHO

Cyn

 

[Donald is #1]

There are those who move on the weekends and those who don't. I bought enough points so I don't have to move. Friends & I usually take a 10 day trip in late October and stay over two weekends. Plus we sometimes do long weekends where we arrive on Thurs or Fri and stay till Mon or Tues.

I don't see it as a waste of points. I bought into DVC so I wouldn't have to pay cash for a room. By the way, I'm always in borrowing mode which is why I did my 5th add on.

JMHO

Cyn

I agree with Figment2 except that I haven't gone into borrowing mode yet. Although I know that there are many people who move over the weekends, I bought enough points (with my 2 add-ons) so that I don't need to. I also do some long weekend trips and use my DVC points for them along with 7-12 night trips.

 

[edk35]

You will get a lot of answers to this. I asked this same thing not too long ago. This past summer I paid cash for my weekend nights ...got a dvc discounted rate. This allowed us to take a longer vacation by spreading our points out over weekdays. We did 4 matter of fact. We did on arrival night at OKW which was a Sat. and the following weekend too. Then on our very last night at BCV we did a cash night there too because it was a Friday and would have cost us 75 points. Some people move to other resorts on the weekend. I personaly would rather pay the discounted cash night if available and stay a couple of extra weekdays.

 

[vandy]

We usually go ahead and stay on the weekends. Should we decide not to, it is because we have made a side-trip to another destination such as Kennedy Space Center, Tampa Bay and so forth. If no other side-trip is planned, we have enough points to stay the weekend and have no regrets doing so.

 

[bookwormde]

I am one of those people who is bored after 5 days and am ready for a change so points on weekdays and cash on weekends. If you go every 2 years at least the extra/borrowed point’s work forward easily, it is just a question of whether you have enough points for your ongoing needs.

bookwormde

 

[Disney_Villain]

We tend to stay 12 nights at most in a single run . . . that way we use only 1 weekend of "weekend points" rather than 2 for a vacation that "almost" 2 weeks.

 

[revrob]

We usually have a two weekend vacation - come in on one Friday, leave the following Sunday. We usually either spend the first weekend somewhere with cash, and then check in on points on Sunday and stay the full week. OR, do the reverse - check in on Friday, stay a week, and spend the last weekend somewhere on cash.

We just purchased an add on, so that may change. That is, of course, unless we start going with only one bedroom stays, which will eat up those points quickly.

 

[tink_lover]

Thanks for all the replies! I can see where an add-on may become necessary in the near future! I'm taking the kids solo in October on a non-DVC booked vacation with a resort switch (POP to WL) so will soon find out how I feel about moving resorts mid-stay.

 

[tksbaskets]

We made sure we had enough points to stay the week between Christmas and New Years if we wanted. We have never moved in the middle of the stay. That in mind, I do have a split reservation for NYE as the Boardwalk View is wait listed for NYE and the next night.

TK

 

[bangzoom6877]

We don't want to have to move once we are there, so we are looking for a resale at BWV with 150-point contract. This would allow us to go every other year in a one-bedroom for 10 nights, one weekend included. We are teachers so we have the whole summer off, and we have always taken advantage of traveling mid-week wherever we go because of that. The 2 weekend nights we would be staying would be in our point "budget" for a 10-night stay. Should we ever decide to go every year (possible when the boys get a little older, we have discussed it), we have enough points for a 10-night stay annually in a studio, during Magic season also. We always travel in July so this was easy for us to figure out.

So, we figure if we arrive on Sunday or Monday that will be perfect. My family might join us in 2010, but they only want to stay 5 nights, and they know if they stay Sun. through Thurs., we could afford them each a studio (2 rooms) if we also get a studio for our 10-night stay. This is with borrowing from the following year, but as I said, the plan right now is to go every other year and I know that in 2011 my entire family is going to plan a cruise, so we will definitely not be going to Disney that year. We would go back in 2012 and again have enough points to either stay in a studio for 10 nights, or one-bedroom for 10 nights if we borrow points from 2013.

Does that make sense? DH and I sat down a LOT last week to crunch the numbers and all the possibilities that fit within our vacation habits. That way we did not overbuy or underbuy points since this is for the long-term and we wanted it to be customized for us. We do not plan on using points for vacations other than our DVC home resort. BWV is perfect for us because we said on our trip to WDW last month that we always want to stay in that area (never have yet but we saw the area) due to the convenience of walking to 2 theme parks, the beautiful area, and the central location to the other areas of WDW. So we chose BWV for our home resort so we can stay there every trip.

 

[dcfromva]

Do any of you actually stay over on a Fri or Sat night? Doesn't it seem like a huge waste of points? Also, because the numbers don't work out to the exact number of points, are you always banking a few unused points or borrowing a few from next year's? Any help in how you manage would be useful. Thanks!

tink_lover,
I think it does at first. It took us a while to work into staying over Fri/Sat nights. I think after a while you will get a feel for what works best for you in points usage.

 

[DebbieB]

I usually go Saturday to Friday, so only 1 weekend night. That also works out with my time off work, I leave Saturday morning and coming home Friday night gives me time to regroup before going back to work on Monday.

 

[photobob]

We generally are doing the Sun-Thurs thing so not to use the high points for weekends. i have stayed at an OVIR at Vero Beach on a Fri and Sat night at 29 points per. Some will arrive on Sat and stay at a Value resort and then check in at the DVC resort Sunday morning. We did that once, may not again it was a hassle.

I don't think I'd mind staying in a studio for weekend points buy the larger villas would eat up my points to quickly.

 

[NDM#1]

Our developer points put us way ahead. We currently have an entire year's worth of points banked for next year. But I will say we will almost always check-in on Sunday and check-out on Friday. Also, we will see our point gain dissipate in a couple years because we plan on trying to squeeze 2 trips/year out of our points. Tricky business . . .

 

[Brancaneve]

We live in California and have found that we enjoy stretching out our vacation as long as possible because of the long flight. Therefore, we may be there for more than one weekend. One way to solve the big hike in points on the weekend is to take a 3, 4 or 7 night cruise sometime during our stay. We usually use points for DH and myself and pay cash for the kids(about $500). The 3 night cruise leaves on a Thursday and returns on a Sunday. I don't have exact figures, but it doesn't seem like many more points to go on a cruise versus staying in DW and we get all the experiences and food!

 

[delmar411]

we do weekends at DVC. I cannot even fathom trying to pack up and move our family back and forth just to save weekend points. With longer trips scheduled I'm trying to make sure we only cover 1 weekend though.

 

[edk35]

I think a good alternative is to do a dvc discounted cash night for both or one weekend. I figure if it allows me to stay 2 or 3 extra week days...it is worth it. Plus if you look at how much a weekend stay at say BCV is in July ....in a 2br...it is 75 points a night. If I rented those points from someone for 10 bucks a pop.....I would spending 750 bucks for a weekend night. If I can get a disc. room for less than 500 bucks. I think I paid 457.50 this summer at BCV then we feel it is a good value. At OKW I paid 397.50 for our two cash nights. Now if we only want to go for say 7 days......like we are in Nov. We are using all points at SSR. This summer I wanted to go for 14 days....so we paid our weekends in cash.