Use year help, please.

[KelNottAt]

Please help me figure out what use year is best for us.

I know we want 300 points at BWV, which means we have to go resale. Therefore we won't have the help of a Disney guide in determining our use year needs. Hope the DIS can guide us!

Typically, we take summer vacations. We've taken a few long weekends in Jan/Feb/March. Since DH works for an NFL team, travel during the season is pretty much out of the question for us. The kids don't get a week-long Spring break, so that's not a factor for us, either.

I was assuming that Sept or Aug would be a good YU for us cuz it'll give us an 11 month window for August or July. But, in a brief conversation with a Disney guide, she cautioned against that logic...said last minute cancellation would result in lost points, not bankable points. So now I'm totally confused.

What about Feb YU? Any advice? Thanks.

 

[JOC]

Your Use Year and the 11-month booking window are two separate issues. You would have the 11-month booking window at your home resort (BWV) regardless of your UY. Others on this board have said that it's a good idea to have a UY BEFORE you normally vacation. If you know that you'll be vacationing in July or August every year, then a March, April or June UY should work for you, since you would still have time to bank your points should you need to cancel your July/August vacation. If your vacation dates change from year to year, then UY shouldn't be too much of a factor in your decision. For all you UY experts, was my explanation okay?

 

[FredS]

Sounds like a December use year would be good for you. Your situation could always change, BUT if you don't anticipate fall vacations then I would go with December!

 

[KathyR]

You may make reservations anytime of the year 11 months from checkout, so your UY does not determine that. All that is required to make a reservation is that you will have the points available by the time you check in and you meet the 11 month home resort and 7 month other resort booking windows.

If most of your trips are in the summer, the best UY would be June. That way you can bank up to 100% of your points by Nov 30, up to 50% by Feb 28 and up to 25% by March 31. This would make it so if you had to cancel a Summer vacation, you would still be able to bank the points if need be or have until May 31 to reschedule your trip and use them. Your Feb, March and April trips would be subject to the banking deadlines above, so I would take a bit more caution w/those trips. But, how often do you have to cancel a trip? Plus, you would still have until May 31 to use them if you had to cancel.

I hope this helped. If not, someone else may explain it better. Or ask for a clarification on anything

 

[Happy Birthday Cat]

June is without a doubt the best month for your UY if you know you will want to vacation in the summer. It only matters if you need to cancel a planned trip.

Even with what you say about sometimes a long weekend in March. In that case if you have already banked your points, you would simply borrow the next year's points and go. You would be all set.

You have an 11 month booking window regardless of when your use year is. You could call today for check out on March 17, 2004 at your home resort.

Good luck,

HBC

 

[disneyberry]

well, i'm still a Use Year expert-in-training, so here's my first attempt at Use Year advice...

Use Year only matters if you need to cancel your trip last minute, and as a result miss a banking deadline. the DVC guide was correct in warning you about that.
if you are worried that you might ever have to cancel a trip last minute, then you should pick your Use Year carefully. otherwise, any Use Year is fine.

(as an aside, your Use Year has nothing to do with the 11mo ressie window.)


let's see if i can come up with a good recommendation for your situation.

there are two things that i've observed:
1) that it's riskier to vacation towards the end of your Use Year
and conversely
2) that it's best to vacation at the beginning of your Use Year

for #1: it seems you will probably never vacation during the months of Sep, Oct, Nov, or Dec.
based on that alone, the best UY would be February.
February should work very well for vacations anytime from February through the end of August.
this is assuming you will cancel at least 31 days out, 'cause if you cancelled any later, your points would be in a holding account, and thus banking deadlines would be a moot point since you cannot bank holding account points.
the one problem with a February UY is that your January vacations would have to be very carefully planned since you will be out of luck in terms of banking if you need to cancel a January trip last minute.
but a last minute cancellation of Jun,Jul,Aug,Feb,or Mar vacations would all be within your 100% banking deadline.

for #2: it seems you probably will vacation the most during summer, which would be the months of Jun, Jul, or Aug.
based on this alone, the best UY would be June.
June should work very well for vacations anytime from June through the end of December.
for your Jan, Feb, or Mar trips, you will still need to plan carefully. should you need to cancel those winter/spring trips last minute, you will be within your 50% banking limit.

i would say that both February or June would be pretty good Use Years for you.
maybe a good way to choose one is to determine which one is the bigger certainty: 1) that you will never vacation Sep - Dec or 2) that you will always vacation Jun - Aug.
hopefully this makes sense.
(experts, how did i do?)


oh, and btw, just wanted to add that Sep or Aug UYs would be the worst use years for summer trips.

 

[4greatboys]

I vote for June also since you vacation in the summer. That way if you cant go in the summer or something come up you still have time to bank your points. We have Aug and Oct use years and vacation in the fall or Dec/Jan. We still have time to bank our points if we havent gone by Jan. And if you bank and find you can go then just borrow some points for your trip.

 

[Jimbo]

Well, maybe I'm living in denial, but I don't think use year is that important. We have to fly to WDW, and once we buy the tickets we feel we're locked in to a trip. It's pretty unlikely we'll ever cancel a trip on short notice. It could happen, of course, and probably will someday. But I also expect that somewhere in the next 40 years we'll change our travel habits too. And a great UY now might be a poor UY then. Que sera, sera.

When shopping for a resale, my advice would be to forget about use year and focus (in order) on the resort, the number of points in the contract, cost per point and the current status of the points. If I couldn't decide between two resales, I'd use UY as a tiebreaker. But that would be it.

 

[CarolMN]

Originally posted by disneyberry
well, i'm still a Use Year expert-in-training, so here's my first attempt at Use Year advice...

Use Year only matters if you need to cancel your trip last minute, and as a result miss a banking deadline. the DVC guide was correct in warning you about that.
if you are worried that you might ever have to cancel a trip last minute, then you should pick your Use Year carefully. otherwise, any Use Year is fine.

(as an aside, your Use Year has nothing to do with the 11mo ressie window.)


let's see if i can come up with a good recommendation for your situation.

there are two things that i've observed:
1) that it's riskier to vacation towards the end of your Use Year
and conversely
2) that it's best to vacation at the beginning of your Use Year

for #1: it seems you will probably never vacation during the months of Sep, Oct, Nov, or Dec.
based on that alone, the best UY would be February.
February should work very well for vacations anytime from February through the end of August.
this is assuming you will cancel at least 31 days out, 'cause if you cancelled any later, your points would be in a holding account, and thus banking deadlines would be a moot point since you cannot bank holding account points.
the one problem with a February UY is that your January vacations would have to be very carefully planned since you will be out of luck in terms of banking if you need to cancel a January trip last minute.
but a last minute cancellation of Jun,Jul,Aug,Feb,or Mar vacations would all be within your 100% banking deadline.

for #2: it seems you probably will vacation the most during summer, which would be the months of Jun, Jul, or Aug.
based on this alone, the best UY would be June.
June should work very well for vacations anytime from June through the end of December.
for your Jan, Feb, or Mar trips, you will still need to plan carefully. should you need to cancel those winter/spring trips last minute, you will be within your 50% banking limit.

i would say that both February or June would be pretty good Use Years for you.
maybe a good way to choose one is to determine which one is the bigger certainty: 1) that you will never vacation Sep - Dec or 2) that you will always vacation Jun - Aug.
hopefully this makes sense.
(experts, how did i do?)


oh, and btw, just wanted to add that Sep or Aug UYs would be the worst use years for summer trips.

Good job, disneyberry! IMHO, you can drop the "in-training" tag!

I think you gave KelNottAt good advice. I would only again emphasize that use year matters ONLY if you have to cancel a vacation. It has nothing to do with WHEN you can call to make a reservation. Jimbo also gave good advice - I agree wholeheartedly that when buying a resale, resort, # of points, price per point and # of banked/borrowed points are more important considerations than use year.

 

[KelNottAt]

Thanks to all of you!
I have a much better understanding now. Will remember all your advice when we get ready to buy.