What's the difference in Grand Villas?

[rjthkids]

So, on WDW property, there are three places that have Grand Villas, Old Key West, the BoardWalk and Saratoga Springs. Is there any difference between the three? I was looking through my points book last night and I was suprised to see that the Grand Villas at Old Key West cost far fewer points than at Board Walk or Saratoga, over a hundred points less for a week in certain seasons!

I was just curious as to why it would be so many less points at one than the others. Are they all essentially laid out the same?

 

[Caskbill]

Actually I think the GV's at OKW are the best of all. The points are lower because that's the first resort built and DVC didn't have a good feel for how popular GV's would be. When they built BWV they made up for that mistake.

They did do a slight point reallocation in 1996 at OKW and increased GV points a little, but of course that meant they had to decrease points somewhere else. Basically they're stuck with the point system now in place.

All GV's at OKW and SSR are two floors. BWV has both 2-floor and single floor GV's.

Note that I'm only comparing the room accommodations themselves and not their locations.

 

[Chuck S]

The GVs at OKW are HUGE, but the second floors are not accessible to wheelchairs (no elevators). The overall point chart for OKW is less than other resorts. OKW was the first DVC resort, and they are kind of "stuck" with those point charts, as the total points for a particular resort resorts chart can not change, but can be re-allocated within specific guidelines. OKW already has had one re-allocation (1995 or 1996), but it is not an easy process to re-allocate, as those resort totals must be accounted for. I doubt we'll see any more re-allocations, unless they lower weekend points and raise weekday points at all resorts.

 

[RobDoc]

As noted by Chuck and Caskbill, all OKW GV's are two floors, with no HCA access to the second floor. In addition, there are only 2 GV's (out of 27) that are accessible at all- one in building 48 with ground level access for the first floor and one in building 63 with elevator access to the first floor of the GV. All others are up a flight of stairs to get to the first floor of the GV.

BWV does have elevator access to all GV's and does have some with a single floor layout and some with 2 floors. (Total of 7)

At SSR, all are 2 floors, but both levels of all GV's may be accessed by elevator (it's still a short distance to the GV from the elevator, but none will involve stairs to get to either floor).

At VB, none of the 6 Beach Houses are accessible- there are stairs to get into the GV and all are 2 levels- all BRs are on the first level.

At HH, all GV's are two levels and none have elevator or ground floor access. All HH GV's have the first floor accessed from the second level of the building (there are NO ground level villas at HH - all of the first floor villas are up a short flight of stairs and the GV's are above that level- up 3 flights of stairs).

Caskbill mentioned the reallocation of points at OKW back in 1996 (announced in fall of 1994). Each of the room types experienced some change. GV's went up a few points in Adventure and Choice Seasons and went down for Dream, Magic and Premier Seasons.

Pre-1996, GV's were 31/77 (weekdays/weekends) in Adventure Season and in 1996 went to the present 36/88. In Choice it was 37/92 and went to 38/91.
In Dream it was 45/112 and went to 45/107, Magic went from 52/130 to 51/123 and Premier went from 68/170 to 66/162.

(Off topic- but Adventure Season saw an increase for all room types and Choice saw an increase for weekdays, decrease for weekends for all except Studios which remained the same. The other seasons saw weekends decrease for all room types, decrease for weekdays in 1BR, 2BR and GV's and stay the same for studio weekdays. - actual points needed provided on request! )

 

[DBBN]

I posted this simple analysis of points vs square footage between OKW and BWV on 2-10-2004. I believe a similar anaylasis including SSR would show similar results.



BWV is simply a more expensive neighborhood. This statement is not meant to stir up a debate on which resort is better. They are both GREAT resorts.

Looking at a different perspective...I'll try to explain my observations when comparing each size villa (square footage) within a particular resort. A pattern seems to appear.

For example at OKW a 1 bdrm gets you 35.33 sq ft per point, a 2 bdrm gets you 36.58 sq ft/pt and the GV gets you 37.19 sq ft/pt. Only a 5.3% spread. Not really much of a difference, meaning the number of points needed for a particular villa appears linked proportionally to the size villa (square footage).

In the case of BWV a 1 bdrm pref gets you 20.12 sq ft per point, a 2 bdrm pref gets you 23.27 sq ft/pt and the GV gets you 21.45 sq ft/pt. An 8.4% spread. More spread than OKW but I don't consider it significant. These numbers show a pattern similar to that present in the OKW example. Here again the number of points needed for a particular villa appears linked proportionally to the size villa (square footage).

You get a lot less square footage at BWV for your point. The numbers are further exagerated by the size of the villas within each resort. For example the OKW GV is 68% larger than the OKW 2 bdrm. While the BWV GV is 100% larger than the BWV 2 bdrm.

If given the total number of points needed for the whole resort for a year and tasked with determining the points needed for each size villa within a particular resort my results would be very close to the current points chart.

The square foot per point calculation was based on the total number of points needed for one year in that particular villa at that particular resort. Square footage figures were obtained from this thread. The number of points needed for one year at each villa was obtained from The DVC Planner by Caskbill (Thanks Bill).