Using Points at your home resorts

[PoppyBentley]

Hello all,
Me and my partner are soon hopefully to become new members of DVC. After MUCH research and debating we have decided that instead of buying direct from Disney we are going to buy resale. The question that is confusing us a little is about the use of points.
We live in the UK so our vacations are planned well in advance (our last one which we have just got back from was booked 13 months in advance!) and we are very flexible as to when we can go, so on this basis we are debating whether to buy one contract or two smaller ones. I understand about the home resorts and picking where you would like to stay most, but I think all the DVC resorts are beautiful and all offer different things.
Anyway my question is...
If we decided to get 2 smaller contracts could we use the points for both the contracts at the 11 month window or only half of the points?
e.g 2 contracts, one at SSR (50 points) and one at BWV (50 points) could we use 100 points at either resort at the 11 month window? or would we have to book 50 at the 11 month and 50 at the 7 month?
Sorry, I hope thats clear enough!!
Thanks

 

[nderh2o]

As I understand it ( I have been researching for some time to decide whether or not take the plunge and buy in), you can only use the points at the home resort at the 11 month window. You cannot combine several smaller contracts at different resorts into one large allottment for use at the 11 month window.
The only practical reason I can see for having small contracts at several resorts is to stagger the banking and borrowing of points so that you can rotate where you stay every 2-3 years or so.
Hope this helps and, more importantly, it is correct.

 

[DVCLiz]

Hello all,
Me and my partner are soon hopefully to become new members of DVC. After MUCH research and debating we have decided that instead of buying direct from Disney we are going to buy resale. The question that is confusing us a little is about the use of points.
We live in the UK so our vacations are planned well in advance (our last one which we have just got back from was booked 13 months in advance!) and we are very flexible as to when we can go, so on this basis we are debating whether to buy one contract or two smaller ones. I understand about the home resorts and picking where you would like to stay most, but I think all the DVC resorts are beautiful and all offer different things.
Anyway my question is...
If we decided to get 2 smaller contracts could we use the points for both the contracts at the 11 month window or only half of the points?
e.g 2 contracts, one at SSR (50 points) and one at BWV (50 points) could we use 100 points at either resort at the 11 month window? or would we have to book 50 at the 11 month and 50 at the 7 month?
Sorry, I hope thats clear enough!!
Thanks

At 11 months, you can only use the points you own at the particluar resort to make a reservation at that resort. In your example, you could make a 50 point reservation at SSR and a 50 point reservation at BWV at 11 months out. But you couldn't combine them to make a 100 point reservation for just SSR or a 100 point reservation at just BWV. At the 7 month mark, though, you can do just that - use all your points together, no matter what the home resort, and book anywhere there is availability - even outside your two home resorts.

Another way many owners of more than one contract work it is to bank and borrow. You could bank those SSR points this year and then have 100 to use for next year at the 11 month makr. Then, you could borrow 50 points from BWV next year, and combine them with this year's 50 points to make a 100 point reservation at BWV at the 11 month mark. See how it works? You could even do a 3 year plan - bank this year's points, and stay next year while also borrowing from the following year, for a total of 150 points. If you had 3 home resorts at 50 points each, you could have a 150 point vacation at each resort every third year while assuring yourselves of the 11 month advantage.

Hope this helps!!!!

 

[PoppyBentley]

Hello both,
Thanks for that - thats exactly what we needed to know, and its pretty much as we figured it would be. We plan to go every other year by combning two years worth of points, so I think its best to go for one contract with the aim to stay at our home resort. All that left now is to decide on the home resort! eek!