RCI..Any more info??????

No Offense taken, but you actually might find some nice places in Idaho!!! :) DH and I had a lovely time last summer in McCall and Cascade. There are some amazing places here, lots of beauty, and some very nice people too. No, it isn't Italy, but we :love: it here!
But no truly nice resorts in II or RCI. A few worth staying at but not at 160 or 270 DVC points.
 
On the topic of resorts in Idaho, there are actually some areas of Idaho (namely, those near Yellowstone) that are quite high demand in summer. However, I don't think there is any resort near Yellowstone, in either II or RCI, that is considered adequate quality for a DVC trade.

But no truly nice resorts in II or RCI. A few worth staying at but not at 160 or 270 DVC points.

I agree that there is nothing in Idaho that I'd pay 160 points for. There was at least one resort, though, in Idaho that qualified for DVC trades in II -- Pend Oreille Shores in Hope, ID. However, it trades in both RCI and II, I believe, so it may still be available after the switch to RCI.

In general, there is not much in RCI that I would consider trading DVC points for -- probably the Manhattan Club and a few Hawaii Hiltons would be the only ones. The Grand Mayans are supposed to be nice, but they are part of the Registry Collection, which costs a phenomenal amount of points (600 and up in high season!) There are far, far cheaper ways to get a Grand Mayan week.

There was more that I would have considered trading DVC points for in II (Four Seasons, Atlantis, some of the Marriotts and Westins). However, I'd only trade the points if they were expiring soon and I didn't want to take the time to rent them; otherwise, renting the points out would generally be a better deal.
 
I was on the phone doing other things with MS, and I asked about the nightly point options since I found the RCI link while surfing around on hold. Anyway, this is what I was told for points night when booking RCI by the night (not sure which properties it referrs to but she made it seem like it was for all that offer nightly stays):

For a 1 bedroom (season, S-Th, Fr-Sat) :

Low, 15, 25
Med, 17, 29
High, 19, 32
 
I was on the phone doing other things with MS, and I asked about the nightly point options since I found the RCI link while surfing around on hold. Anyway, this is what I was told for points night when booking RCI by the night (not sure which properties it referrs to but she made it seem like it was for all that offer nightly stays):

For a 1 bedroom (season, S-Th, Fr-Sat) :

Low, 15, 25
Med, 17, 29
High, 19, 32
According to the website, those numbers are not correct. If you sign on to the member website, click member getaways, World Passport then click RCI (on the left side) it will give you the links you need including the per night points, per week and the list of resorts.
 

Just out of curiosity, does anyone have any idea what percentage of DVC points expended each year go to the "other than Disney" vacation options? Is this a minor sideline for Disney, or does it represent a significant part of the action? Based on what seems to be available (and what's going to become available) it doesn't seem like something they're pushing very aggressively.
 
Just out of curiosity, does anyone have any idea what percentage of DVC points expended each year go to the "other than Disney" vacation options? Is this a minor sideline for Disney, or does it represent a significant part of the action? Based on what seems to be available (and what's going to become available) it doesn't seem like something they're pushing very aggressively.
I don't know number of points but about 200-300 exchanges a year and a success rate usually in the 50-60% range. The last couple of years have been more in the 300 range for #of exchanges in BVTC. For II 's been around 3% and slowly increasing the last few years. One question is what % of the DVC population will this really affect as that 3% per year is likely a mix of repeaters and new members. I'd guess that it's no more than 10% over the past 10 years and likely around 10% total that would have ventured into this arena at least once over the next 10 years. If you add DCL, DC, CC, II (RCI) and BVTC all together it's likely around 50% of members or more that would have participated at least once. Realizing that the specifics really haven't changed much for HOW the system works, there some of the resorts are on both lists (II & RCI) and that for the right person this move may be good, I don't think this change will make much real difference overall.
 
It looks like RCI offers nice resorts on various location; however, most of All-Inclusive resort's mandatory fee is nothing short of joke. It is outrageous, some seasons require over $3000 as mandatory fee. It is good that DVC offers RCI trade but I do not know how many people would take it when it requires $3000 PLUS DVC points.. Maybe it's just me...
 
I don't know number of points but about 200-300 exchanges a year and a success rate usually in the 50-60% range. The last couple of years have been more in the 300 range for #of exchanges in BVTC. For II 's been around 3% and slowly increasing the last few years. ....
Dean, so you are saying about 200-300 trades for BVTC, plus maybe 3% of total DVC annual points being traded per year -- is that what you meant?

It looks like RCI offers nice resorts on various location; however, most of All-Inclusive resort's mandatory fee is nothing short of joke. It is outrageous, some seasons require over $3000 as mandatory fee. It is good that DVC offers RCI trade but I do not know how many people would take it when it requires $3000 PLUS DVC points.. Maybe it's just me...
I've been an RCI member for years, and the all-inclusive mandatory resorts in Mexico are generally horrible deals. Regular RCI members can often get book a week at an AI resort through "Extra Vacations" for just a couple hundred dollars (plus AI fees, of course); there is no way they are worth spending many DVC points on. Plus, a number of RCI members I know have said that guests who booked through a travel agent, rather than through RCI, were actually charged much lower All-Inclusive rates than RCI guests were. So, you'd be paying DVC points for the opportunity to be overcharged on All-Inclusive fees!

Unfortunately, most of the nicer Mexico resorts in RCI are either mandatory all-inclusive, or are part of Grupo Mayan. Grupo Mayan has very nice resorts, but they only allow RCI members to stay at any one of their resorts once every five years. Plus, the top-of-the-line Grupo Mayan resorts (the Grand Mayans) are part of the Registry Collection, which charges an enormous number of DVC points -- definitely not worth it.

If you want to trade into a Mexican resort, your best bet would be to go through one of the independent exchange companies, not RCI. I do a lot of trades through independent exchange companies, and would be happy to give advice on them to anyone who emails me. (Emails are better than PMs; my PM box is full!)
 
It looks like RCI offers nice resorts on various location; however, most of All-Inclusive resort's mandatory fee is nothing short of joke. It is outrageous, some seasons require over $3000 as mandatory fee. It is good that DVC offers RCI trade but I do not know how many people would take it when it requires $3000 PLUS DVC points.. Maybe it's just me...


Agreed, actually the more I hear about RCI/DVC the more it seems to me it's more a deterent to trade out than an expansion to the membership.
That's what I see on the surface, anyway. I'll have to do more research before I come to definite opinion, but I can say I already see us wanting to trade out less than when it was II (and we weren't rushing to trade out much then either).....
 
It looks like RCI offers nice resorts on various location; however, most of All-Inclusive resort's mandatory fee is nothing short of joke. It is outrageous, some seasons require over $3000 as mandatory fee. It is good that DVC offers RCI trade but I do not know how many people would take it when it requires $3000 PLUS DVC points.. Maybe it's just me...
Often those resorts have lower fees for owners, sometimes MUCH lower. The trading power of the owner at that resort reflects the lack of demand for most of them.
 
Dean, so you are saying about 200-300 trades for BVTC, plus maybe 3% of total DVC annual points being traded per year -- is that what you meant?
I added the number for Club Cordial and Club Intrawest which have been around 300 total for 2006 & 2007 plus the II audit info for the same years which has been slowly inching up to just over 3%. Realize some will be repeat exchangers and others will be new each year.


Unfortunately, most of the nicer Mexico resorts in RCI are either mandatory all-inclusive, or are part of Grupo Mayan. Grupo Mayan has very nice resorts, but they only allow RCI members to stay at any one of their resorts once every five years. Plus, the top-of-the-line Grupo Mayan resorts (the Grand Mayans) are part of the Registry Collection, which charges an enormous number of DVC points -- definitely not worth it.

If you want to trade into a Mexican resort, your best bet would be to go through one of the independent exchange companies, not RCI. I do a lot of trades through independent exchange companies, and would be happy to give advice on them to anyone who emails me. (Emails are better than PMs; my PM box is full!)
There are a number of non AI and very nice MX resorts but they are easy to get relative speaking with a cheap exchange. That's esp true of the GM resorts. I'd concur with the rec. for independents in this situation or better yet, buying something to trade outside DVC for those that want to do it periodically.
 
:yay: So, I just signed up for DVC on a cruise (not even really understanding much of how timeshares work). Part of the reason we signed up is that we saw that you could stay at Marriots. We didn't realize that they are indeed actually hard to book. Needless to say, when I got back home and saw that the RCI switch was happening, I started gettting really nervous. :confused3 Then as I've learned more, I've learned that it isn't really worth trading DVC points for non-Disney places. So, it seems like it cost 124 points in low season for a trade. So, it seems like you could sell 124 points for around $1240 and book accomodations through normal means. I looked and you can find stuff at least as good as the RCI resorts for around 700-900 for 7 nights. I'm I thinking about this in the right way? We will probably stay at Disney 2 times a year 3-4 nights during the week since we are only 1 hour away, and take a longer vacation elsewhere. Does this sound logical to you DVC veterens?


Also, how are the accomodations that the Buena Vista offerings? They look like they might be more worth a DVC point trade.

Regardless, I've loved Disney since I was a young girl (I'm now 31 with a 2 year son that LOVES Mickey Mouse), so I am super excited!!! :yay:
 
One thing I haven'e ever seen discussed is what kind of rights the II or RCI owners have in regards to booking DVC?

I assume part of the trade off is that DVC becomes part of their exchange option?

If so, what is available to them? Some or all of the DVC resorts? If so, what kind of booking window do they get? Does DVC budget a set number of revervations for exchanges for a given time period?

Just curious how much DVC booking competition we get from other TS owners...
 
One thing I haven'e ever seen discussed is what kind of rights the II or RCI owners have in regards to booking DVC?

I assume part of the trade off is that DVC becomes part of their exchange option?

If so, what is available to them? Some or all of the DVC resorts? If so, what kind of booking window do they get? Does DVC budget a set number of revervations for exchanges for a given time period?

Just curious how much DVC booking competition we get from other TS owners...
We don't have details yet on how DVC will be offered to RCI members (via RCI Points or RCI Weeks). I'd expect the general quantity, variety and timing to be similar to recent years experiences through II but we'll have to see. Keep in mind that DVC inventory offered through RCI will be balanced against DVC members trading out to RCI destinations. It should be a fairly equal swap of time.

My experiences include 5 exchanges using other timeshare into DVC's BWV through II since 2003. I've seen all DVC resorts offered except AKV. Most units are studio and 1BR units -- although there have been sightings of both 2BR and 3BR (Grand Villa) units. Most weeks tend to be off season (Sept, Jan, etc) -- but there are a few holiday week surprises. While it may be possible to see DVC weeks as far as 11 months from travel ... most of the weeks I've booked tend to be closer to 10 months from travel.

I'm not sure how DVC selects weeks to deposit. Certainly there are more SSR/OKW weeks offered than VWL or BCV. I'd like to think that the weeks going to II/RCI are from the home resort of the DVC owner who initiates the exchange but I have no basis for that idea.
 
One thing I haven'e ever seen discussed is what kind of rights the II or RCI owners have in regards to booking DVC?

I assume part of the trade off is that DVC becomes part of their exchange option?

If so, what is available to them? Some or all of the DVC resorts? If so, what kind of booking window do they get? Does DVC budget a set number of revervations for exchanges for a given time period?

Just curious how much DVC booking competition we get from other TS owners...
With II they had any and every resort and week that was deposited. II does limit the availability based on resort quality of the other person and establishes a line with the order based on trade power of those in the line. There is no competition other than with other DVC members and DVD based on the weeks/resorts chosen for deposit. With the BVTC that is not necessarily true and it works much like a redlight that is out. One side has a few people that reserve and then they stop until the other cathes up. But it's possible that they may be actually reserving time that have not yet been deposited, but only in limited numbers and with a timing as not to interfer with home resort priority. We don't yet know with RCI. If DVC's weeks mostly with RCI, it'll work like II. For RCI points we don't know as there are no other resorts in the RCI system that works with RCI the way DVC will but I think it's reasonable to assume it won't impact home resort reservations for those that plan ahead and should have little impact overall regardless.
 
Do we know for how long Disney has the contract with RCI? I have heard 1 year and then 10 years... any thoughts on this?
 
Do we know for how long Disney has the contract with RCI? I have heard 1 year and then 10 years... any thoughts on this?
Likely 3, possibly 5 or 6 but no official word.
 
I added the number for Club Cordial and Club Intrawest which have been around 300 total for 2006 & 2007 plus the II audit info for the same years which has been slowly inching up to just over 3%. Realize some will be repeat exchangers and others will be new each year.

Thanks, Dean. Did you have to have "inside information" to get the II audit info, or is that something II makes publicly available?


There are a number of non AI and very nice MX resorts but they are easy to get relative speaking with a cheap exchange. That's esp true of the GM resorts. I'd concur with the rec. for independents in this situation or better yet, buying something to trade outside DVC for those that want to do it periodically.
Dean, I agree that RCI has some nice Mexico resorts without mandatory all-inclusive fees, and that members can trade into them with a weak trader. The main problem though, is what I mentioned in my last post: Many of the nicer non-AI Mexican resorts are managed by the same company (Grupo Mayan), so they all have the dreaded "1-in-4 rule", except this case it's actually 1-in-5. (For those not familiar with RCI, many RCI resorts only let RCI members trade in once every 3, 4, or 5 years -- this is what is known as "the 1-in-4 rule.") So, an RCI member can only trade into any of the Grupo Mayan resorts once every five years. That's one reason I suggested using an independent exchange company; none of them have 1-in-4 rules.

About buying a non-DVC timeshare for trading, I agree with you 100%. Definitely, if someone is planning to trade regularly, buying a non-DVC timeshare for trading is the way to go, regardless of whether they are trading via RCI or through an independent. The annual fees (and buy in cost) for DVC is just too high to make it cost effective to use for trading on a regular basis. There are lots of strong traders out there that cost less than $1000 to buy and have fees under $500 a year.
 
Only 12? I'm guessing that must be developer inventory, else why not include more of them? They are all very nice.
I have been affiliated with RCI for over 20 years now and have yet to get a trade that is as nice as a Disney DVC resort. I am glad they are hand-picking from RCI that to which they are willing to assign the Disney trade rights. I was actually quite alarmed when I first read this was happening even though I understand Disney has been affiliated with RCI in the past.
 
Thanks, Dean. Did you have to have "inside information" to get the II audit info, or is that something II makes publicly available?
No, it was actually on the website for the 2007 info released June, 2008 Try this link for multiples years info.


Dean, I agree that RCI has some nice Mexico resorts without mandatory all-inclusive fees, and that members can trade into them with a weak trader. The main problem though, is what I mentioned in my last post: Many of the nicer non-AI Mexican resorts are managed by the same company (Grupo Mayan), so they all have the dreaded "1-in-4 rule", except this case it's actually 1-in-5. (For those not familiar with RCI, many RCI resorts only let RCI members trade in once every 3, 4, or 5 years -- this is what is known as "the 1-in-4 rule.") So, an RCI member can only trade into any of the Grupo Mayan resorts once every five years. That's one reason I suggested using an independent exchange company; none of them have 1-in-4 rules.

About buying a non-DVC timeshare for trading, I agree with you 100%. Definitely, if someone is planning to trade regularly, buying a non-DVC timeshare for trading is the way to go, regardless of whether they are trading via RCI or through an independent. The annual fees (and buy in cost) for DVC is just too high to make it cost effective to use for trading on a regular basis. There are lots of strong traders out there that cost less than $1000 to buy and have fees under $500 a year.
Actually the Mayan resorts have gone to a 1 in 5 fairly recently but they made it retroactive from what I hear. If you trade to 1, you can't trade to any other for 5 years. It's based on exchange ID and I wonder if you can trade once from a weeks resort and 1 from a points resorts (I hope so). It does not apply to independents so this would be a great option to use for SFX or TPI. It's unlikely this will apply to DVC but at those points, it'd be a favor to the DVC member if they did restrict it.
 















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