We were in the same situation. We wanted to join and while we thought SSR was nice, we really love the Epcot resorts. Mostly for the location-we love being able to walk into Epcot and love the Boardwalk at night. We also love the first two weeks of December becasue it's less crowded and all the Christmas decorations are up. Our guide told us we could make a 7 mos ressie for an Epcot resort-no problem. However, after reading this board for a while, I realized that probably would not be the case. It turns out that Dec 1-14 is a VERY busy
DVC time and it's difficult to get the BWV or BCV at 7 mos. Also, our next favorite time is Oct or Nov. Apparently, these months are somewhat hard to get at 7 mos. at BCV and BWV also, becasue of the food and wine festival in Epcot. I must have read "buy where you want to stay" like 20 times in three months and that's what we decided to do. We bought a BWV resale from the timeshare store. They have a link at the top of this page. The were really great and everything was very fast and easy. I'm not too sure about July, I'm sure there are others on this board who can give you more info of your chances of getting BWV at 7 mos. They do have a wait list and I read all the time that people have their waitlist request come through. I'm just a planner and it would drive me crazy to not know for sure, where we were staying. I need to plan restaurants for breakfasts, dinners, etc. My husband laughs, but it would drive me nuts!

If you like SSR a lot and it wouldn't bother you if you couldn't switch to BWV than it really doesn't matter too much. Good luck with whatever you decide!
