Waitlisting?

[Missy1225]

I'm trying to book a trip to AKL Grand Villa for October. The choices are all waitlisted for part of the trip -- 3 nights available, 4 nights not available. Is it a good idea to waitlist the trip? Does anyone know what this means, anyway? When I put in my dates -- Oct 13-20, the nights available are Sat, Mon, Tues. The nights not available are Sun. & Wed-Fri.
I'm frustrated with being a DVC member because it seems like there's never any rooms available when we want to go, and this time booking 6 months in advance doesn't seem unreasonable. Is there something special going on that week? It's annoying that we always seem to get stuck in Saratoga Springs. Oct 18 will be our 15 yr anniversary, so we're not that flexible on dates.

 

[WsPrincess]

October is a busy time at Disney and I think trying to book a Grand Villa at 6 months out is always going to be hard since there are not that many and many people plan a long time in advance to get them. I don't know the possibilities of a wait list coming through for a Grand Villa but I would think they are not that good.

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

To help with future frustration I'd recommend taking a little more time to learn about DVC busy times, popular room categories etc. Once you have more knowledge you can know what you need to do to get the reservation you want or when to expect that a later booking will mean SSR or no availability.

October is one of the busiest DVC times so in that case booking 6 months out and expecting availability in most categories is not going to happen. At other times of the year you could perhaps get more options but GV's themselves are limited in number so it's always safest to book those at 11 months or hope for something at 7 months. If not doing that then flexibility in dates is going to be key and unfortunately that isn't an option for you.

If you are absolutely going then you should book whatever you can find available because as I mentioned it is a very popular time and availability will only decrease. Once you have accommodations booked then either set up a waitlist for the GV for the entire stay or, if you have enough points and don't have to borrow you could book the open nights at the GV and waitlist for the others while keeping the backup reservation. I know GV's are a lot of points though and most people won't have that option. Shorter waitlists will have a greater chance of filling but if you don't have the points then the safest is to waitlist the entire time.

Otherwise if you only want to go if you have the GV then book the open days, waitlist the others and hope for the best.