Should I Buy???

[Deano520]

Hello All, I am the biggest Disney fan ever. I have taken my wife and 2 girls every year for the past 5 years and I will continue to do that. You would think the DVC makes the most sense...I just can't get myself to see it. There are NO other benefits except for the room. Can someone please convince me that I should do it...Am I missing something. I would love a reason to do this and be apart of DVC...I just can't get the numbers to work out and when I do (I believe they do in the longterm), I get upset that there are no other benefits to make you feel like "members"...Please help! Thanks for your time.

 

[Inkmahm]

Hello All, I am the biggest Disney fan ever. I have taken my wife and 2 girls every year for the past 5 years and I will continue to do that. You would think the DVC makes the most sense...I just can't get myself to see it. There are NO other benefits except for the room. Can someone please convince me that I should do it...Am I missing something. I would love a reason to do this and be apart of DVC...I just can't get the numbers to work out and when I do (I believe they do in the longterm), I get upset that there are no other benefits to make you feel like "members"...Please help! Thanks for your time.

Do you stay on property when you are at WDW? What kind of resort- value? Moderate? Multiple rooms or just a regular hotel room?

There ARE other benefits to owning DVC, you need to do quite a bit more research before making a buy decision so that you know exactly what it is you are buying.

 

[sjpvac]

I understand what you're battling: the Magic of Disney vs. the Reality of the Pocketbook. When I bought in 1995, we got free admission to all parks with the reservation and it was a great deal.I've tried all the "benefits" such as exchanging for non-Disney accommodations (some really nice- some really horrible) and the ever dwindling discounts on food and merchandise. I've seen the ticket discounts disappear, the removal of the few perqs such as valet parking, and when I run the numbers, as I'm sure you have, I don't see that the value of my investment has gone anywhere but down. I go every year, sometimes twice, and sometimes to Disneyland or Disneyland Paris. Seeing my annual dues nearly double since I bought into OKW, I can say that if it were presented to me today. I would take the money I pay for annual dues and just use that to pay for a room.
I can't argue that the mini-apartment style rooms you get through DVC beat the two beds and an armoire you otherwise get, but how much time are you spending in your room?

 

[Pakey]

I'm another long time owner who would not buy today. With the huge promotions that Disney has been offering, I'd rather have that money back in the bank and I'd just pay cash.

 

[friends with mickey]

Hello All, I am the biggest Disney fan ever. I have taken my wife and 2 girls every year for the past 5 years and I will continue to do that. You would think the DVC makes the most sense...I just can't get myself to see it. There are NO other benefits except for the room. Can someone please convince me that I should do it...Am I missing something. I would love a reason to do this and be apart of DVC...I just can't get the numbers to work out and when I do (I believe they do in the longterm), I get upset that there are no other benefits to make you feel like "members"...Please help! Thanks for your time.

Actually the room/villa is the most important part. Not the fact that any DVC room gives you more space than a room plus a kitchen. washer/ dryer, the ability to bring back a doggy bag from a restaurant. The real value in DVC is capping your vacation accomodations at todays prices for the next 32 to 50 years depending on which resort you choose. You have been coming for the last five years, have your room rates gone up? Do you think they are going to go down? If you are going to visit each and every year than DVC will work for you. Buying in the resale market will be less expensive than purchasing from Disney and make your vacation dollar go even further. We have been enjoying DVC since 1992 and still look forward to our Disney vacations.

 

[mdsd8700]

I think that DVC for many is much as an emotional purchase as it is a financial one. We considered DVC for more than a decade and seriously ran numbers for at least the last 5. Honestly for us it was hard to justify the cost plus the annual dues. Each time we would decide it wasn't for us. Finally this past June after once again "seriously" considering DVC we took plunge. There were many reasons that played into the factor of purchasing and honestly one of the biggest was being able to have our grandchildren experience all the same things our children have for the last 14 years. Since we always stayed deluxe we wondered if they would be able afford it. It was a pre-paid guaranteed room for them. Of course the fact that we were able to pay cash was also important. For us, we didn't want to finance something like that. DVC is definately not for everyone and you are in the right place to gather all the important information on every aspect of ownership (pros and cons). We are thrilled that we will have nearly 50 more years of Disney Memories. Those memories could have been anywhere, but we chose for them to be at Disney.

 

[wishicouldgomoreofte]

I'm another long time owner who would not buy today. With the huge promotions that Disney has been offering, I'd rather have that money back in the bank and I'd just pay cash.

Agree.

 

[ToddyLu]

I can understand your hesitation. I was an emotional buyer and just wanted to own a piece of Disney. DH and I travel there yearly for at least 9 nights. We stayed in values. At 40 I decided I wanted something more. We decided not to take money out of savings to pay for it and financed. Once we walked throught the door and saw giraffes off the balcony DH was with me hook, line and sinker. We purchase in 2009--have stayed twice with two SV studios each take and took his Mom. This year my parents are going and once again we will have 2 sv studios...oh wait we are returning in May and have another 8 nights just he and I. We purchased our APs with $100 discount in Dec and will have used them for three trips before they expire.

It would have been more difficult for us to afford this on a nurse/firman pay grade but call it my midlife crisis purchase. So far we have used 4-$3500rooms --and will add to that this year if we had paid out of pocket. We do not have children but DH and I love it....in fact it is the only real place I can get him to go...he has no interest in Europe, Vegas, NYC or the beach. We get it all at Disney. I have been to those places except Vegas--so traveling with him, DVC is easy.

Is a rolex, corvette worth it?? That is sorta what DVC is for us.

 

[sleepydog25]

If you wish to stay in deluxe accomodations and if you regularly plan to visit WDW over the next 20 years or so, then the numbers can make sense. Otherwise, I'd say no. Obviously, you're the only one who can make the determination whether DVC would be worth it for your situation.

 

[khmiller]

When I looked at buying direct from Disney 5 years ago, it didn't make sense. I found the resale market recently and now the numbers make sense for us. Without getting into alot of details, here was our thought process. We figure we pay it off in 15 years at a cost of $1200/year (includes interest). Add the $800 in maintenance fees and that equals $2000/yr. With the points we are buying, we can go approximately 1-1/2 times/yr so the cost for the room is only $1333/trip, which is about what we would pay if we stayed in a value room for a week with the discounts they are running.
Plus, add in the discounts and the tax advantages for us and we come out ahead.

Our youngest is 2 so we plan on going for a while.

 

[chalee94]

Hello All, I am the biggest Disney fan ever. I have taken my wife and 2 girls every year for the past 5 years and I will continue to do that. You would think the DVC makes the most sense...

if you typically stay in a deluxe - and don't mind the lack of housekeeping, - it probably does.

There are NO other benefits except for the room. Can someone please convince me that I should do it...Am I missing something. I would love a reason to do this and be apart of DVC...I just can't get the numbers to work out and when I do (I believe they do in the longterm), I get upset that there are no other benefits to make you feel like "members"...

while there are other benefits besides the room (discount on AP, dining/shopping discounts), these can go away at any time. these perks are not worth including in your decision process IMO.

if the numbers don't work for your situation and you'll get aggravated every time cash guests get "free dining" or 7/4 or 40% deals, then IMO, DVC would be a waste of time for you.

DVC is about buying a real estate interest (a "lease"). think of it in terms of "ownership" and not "membership." there are risks involved...not many privileges other than access to your home resort at 11 months out. if you're better off "renting" rather than "owning" - stick with that.

 

[ssawka]

We are relatively new members (joined 6/09) and I absolutely love our DVC, but I'm not sure what I would do now if I was trying to decide again. I would probably still buy, but would probably go resale. When we bought, I looked at resales, but I really wanted BLT. Back when we bought (just 2 years ago) Disney's base price was $112 pp, with discounts we paid $92 pp; Now Disney is going to a base price of $140 If you assume the same discounts, that would be almost $8K more for the number of points we bought. We could get a another resale contract for that difference!

 

[mouseaider]

We also looked at DVC about five years ago and couldn't make sense of it when we had to buy a minimum of 160 points at $100 per point. We didn't have the cash on hand and didn't want to finance so we waited.

We bought a small 100 point contract last August, paid cash and enjoyed everything about it. We've just added on with another 55 points so we can take some grand kids with us from time to time, but we feel we own enough points to make uds happy without a huge financial burden.

Good luck with your decision.

if you typically stay in a deluxe - and don't mind the lack of housekeeping, - it probably does.

I actually enjoyed NOT having daily housekeeping during our first DVC trip a month ago.

 

[FindingFigment]

I'd imagine if the lack of 'benefits' aren't enough for you and your decision to purchase is based soley on the numbers making sense, then purchasing on the resale market would be the only way to go (unless you have your heart set on BLT since the resale price isn't much different than the direct price with incentives).

Are you crunching resale numbers or direct numbers?

 

[cseca]

I agree with PP.
If you normally stay in
1. mod or above
2. Pretty frequent visitor (min once every 2 years)
3. Would prefer the ammenities of deluxe resort
4. Financially stable (as stable as you can forsee for awhile)
5. Comfortable with long term planning (if you're picky on the resort preferrence).

I would look at resale and crunch the numbers.
There are some decent deals out there for certain resorts. As long as you don't have your heart set on BLT which is still highly priced even for resale.

Or you can wait until March 21st and see if the resale price goes any lower.

Personally I would only crunch the numbers if I at least meet the above list. Again, that's a personal opinion.
Also definitely agree on PPs that if I were to start looking at DVC direct sale now, I probably wouldn't even seriously consider it. The starting price is crazy, even with the promos (and this comes from someone who bit the bullet and bought BLT... )

 

[PrincessPaczki]

Hi. cseca - I said yes to 1-5 and would love to buy into a DVC. You mentioned some good deals and good properties. Could you give an example of which property you would look at? Thanks so much.

 

[chalee94]

Hi. cseca - I said yes to 1-5 and would love to buy into a DVC. You mentioned some good deals and good properties. Could you give an example of which property you would look at? Thanks so much.

if you are just happy to be onsite, SSR and extended OKW contracts are a good deal. large resorts = more supply = lower resale prices. annual dues are relatively low as well (but currently higher than BLT.)

SSR contracts also provide home resort access at 11 months to the treehouses.

 

[PrincessPaczki]

chalee94, thank you for the quick response. We did have a chance to see OKW on our last trip, and it is beautiful there. But the closeness of the BLT is so appealing to us.

 

[sleepydog25]

chalee94, thank you for the quick response. We did have a chance to see OKW on our last trip, and it is beautiful there. But the closeness of the BLT is so appealing to us.

BLT is expensive, relatively speaking, to most of the other resorts. If you're interested in resale, search through some of the threads, and you'll find names of reputable resale clearinghouses, such as The Timeshare Store. Then, you can see the pricing on various contracts at each resort. When viewing them, keep in mind the Use Year, how many points come with the contract (is it stripped or loaded--the former is cheaper but the latter means you can begin to use your points sooner), and whether maintenance fees have been paid, among other items. Good luck!

 

[evenrude]

I'm also a long term owner (since 1999) and seen the service, quality and perks on a steep decline as maintenance fees rise (manageable for now, but no real value returned IMHO), basically if you do buy you should consider the only guranteed advatage you will have is Large Deluxe Living Spaces w/Kitchens/Laundry (Makes long trips with many family/friends possible and comfortable, and maybe more economical if you eat in).

When I bought it was down right magical (as it should be) upkeep was immaculate and your were treated as a world class citizen and perked up big time (tickets, valet parking, golf, pool hoping, discounts,exclusive stuff etc...), most of the perks have been eliminated, restricted or scaled back to where they are a joke for the most part, for example the cruise points are outrageous now when they used to be a good deal. And overall the maintenance/upkeep of the resorts even the new ones, is back on par with your average hotel, I will admit this upkeep problem also extends to the parks and other facilities.

With the early good years I belive I have gotten a good return on my investment, overall, however, there is no way I would do it at the prices they have set today and even resales would be a big if for me. In fact I have taken trips outside points to deluxe resorts using the advertised discounts got free dining, upgraded deluxe rooms, tickets for less than my annual dues bill.

It's just a shame to see them cost cut and remove magic over the years!