Would DVC make sense for us?

[tbaptista]

So if you buy a DVC are you then committed to visiting WDW every year or can you trade it to travel to other places? And is it easy to trade.

 

[nala1128]

Same here. I've stayed off site in hotels and other timeshares. I did that to save money. My preference is to stay on site and once I could afford it I stayed on site. Once on site I moved from values, to moderates to eventually DVC. Notice how I skipped the deluxes; could never justify paying those rates. This all took place over the last 20+ years.

We are almost the opposite of you! LOL! We stayed Deluxe every trip either with a public discount, or AP discount and a few times with the elusive 40% off room only pin code.... still an expensive venture though!!!!

About 10 years ago, we first considered DVC direct after speaking to a guide in the lobby of WL... but the financial commitment at the time was too scary a prospect with two toddlers and a big mortgage. Looking back, had we joined DVC then we would have been past the break even point already with the amount we have spent on WDW trips since then. As the kids get older and bigger, we are happy to be able to have more space and as others put it we like to be in the "bubble". We like to vacation a certain way and this works for us!!!!

 

[k3chantal]

So if you buy a DVC are you then committed to visiting WDW every year or can you trade it to travel to other places? And is it easy to trade.

This will be a loaded question on this forum. Even though the members are extremely well informed, I find that there is a definitely vocal group that believes that DVC should only be used at WDW. It would be interesting to go to DVC and find out what percentage of members use DVC to travel to other places and trade their points with RCI. If you are able to find the percentage of DVC members who a. are on these boards and/or b. use their membership in other ways, keep that information in the back of your head.

My experience:
No you are not committed to visiting WDW every year. We go about every three years but have no formal plans on when or how often we go.

Yes, you can trade it to travel to other places. We used it to go to Princevalle, Kauai, Hawaii and stayed in a beautiful condo facing the ocean that easily fit my family of five. At the time of booking, I was given two choices of resorts on Kauai. Please keep in mind that the ability to trade changes on availability and availability occurs when DVC and RCI members choose to use their timeshares in other ways.

We have also used our points to take a Disney 7 night cruise to the Mexican Riviera.

So, in five years of using my points, I have been to WDW three times, Vero Beach twice, DL once, a cruise, and to Hawaii. For a total of around 47 vacation days. Keep in mind also I have 280 points to work with a year and currently I have 24 points left in my 2013 use year.

 

[chalee94]

So if you buy a DVC are you then committed to visiting WDW every year

you have the option of banking and borrowing pts to go every other year. you are allocated a set number of pts each year with DVC and you have the option to move those pts up or back one year. but when you move the pts, that is final and the pts cannot be moved again.

or can you trade it to travel to other places? And is it easy to trade.

it is possible (sometimes). but the best value with DVC is when you use the pts at DVC resorts onsite at wdw.

using pts for DVC resorts at vero beach, hilton head or hawaii is a decent option for offsite. trading out of the DVC system (currently RCI is the main choice) can be a little more iffy and your options can be limiting depending on what the other RCI timeshare owners deposit and how far in advance you make your request.

i would agree with k3chantal that hawaii trades through RCI can be a good deal but in a lot of cases you are trading very expensive DVC pts with expensive maintenance fees for timeshares that can be found on ebay for $1 or so with maintenance fees of around half of a DVC 2BR...so it's silly to pay a premium to buy a lexus just so you can trade it for a honda fit.

 

[cz4ever]

So if you buy a DVC are you then committed to visiting WDW every year or can you trade it to travel to other places? And is it easy to trade.

As PP said, this is a loaded question.

If you buy DVC, you are not committed to visiting WDW ever, it's just the most efficient (cost-effective) use of DVC points. The current ways that DVD allows you to use DVC points outside of DVC stays all have fairly poor exchange rates. If you want to stay at non-DVC timeshares, there are much cheaper ways to do so, e.g., by buying into other timeshare systems where you can find much cheaper properties with equal or stronger RCI trading value as DVC. If you want to go on a Disney cruise, the DVC point cost is quite high and there are serious complications if you have to cancel (your returned points are heavily restricted in how they can be used). With a modest amount of effort, you could rent your DVC points for a lot more cash than would be needed to book a comparable stateroom. Same goes for Adventures by Disney and the other options --- the point cost is very high compared to how many it would require if you were willing to rent your points and use the cash to book the ABD trip directly.

There's certainly nothing wrong with using your DVC points on non-DVC properties, just realize that you are not getting the most bang for the buck by doing so. Given the rental market, you should probably treat DVC points as if they were worth $10 in cash, and then decide how you want to use them each year. DVC stay (good exchange rate), rent (cash is always good), or exchange to RCI/ABD/DCL/... (not so good exchange rate, but it doesn't require renting, which some people consider a major hassle or complete non-starter).

 

[JimMIA]

If exchanging out of DVC via RCI is important to you, it's important to understand what RCI means for DVC owners. There are two major differences between traditional RCI and the "RCI Lite" that DVC offers.

The first and most importance difference is that you do not have access to ALL RCI resorts. RCI has about 4,000 resorts worldwide, but DVC gives you access only to about 600 of those. There are many, many destinations where RCI has resorts but none of them are available to DVC owners.

That's not the end of the world for a DVC owner -- if you can get an exchange you are comfortable with in a place you want to visit, that's really all you wanted in the first place. But understand that your options are limited.

Second, DVC owners are NOT members of RCI. DVC has a corporate affiliation with RCI and all DVC points reservations have to be made through DVC Member Services. That particular limitation is not a big deal, but what is a big deal is that you miss all the other benefits of RCI membership.

For example, RCI members can search and book directly online with complete access to all 4,000 resorts.

More important, RCI has several other options including deeply discounted cash reservations at RCI resorts with excess inventory. This February, one of our DIS DVCers got a two-bedroom deluxe at Wyndham Bonnet Creek (just offsite at WDW and actually closer to the parks than some Disney resorts) for less than $500 for a full week.

Other cash deals are often two-bedrooms for as low as $199 per week. And there aren't a few of these deals -- there are hundreds, probably thousands.

In addition to the limitations, a prospective buyer should understand that RCI exchanges require learning how to use a second system. Timeshare exchanges typically are planned MUCH further in advance than DVC reservations and there is a learning curve to using RCI.

 

[tbaptista]

Thank you everyone for your opinions and information. It has truly been helpful with figuring if a DVC is right for our family.

We truly love Disney but love so many other places as well from beach houses on Cape Code and lake houses on Lake Winnipesaukee to cruises in the Caribbean. I think it would be to much of a change for our family jumping through hoops trying to get a place to stay.

We have never had an issue finding a summer home to rent or booking a cruise we wanted to go on.

We used to own a timeshare in Kona which was part of RCI and all I remember was the hassle of trying to exchange it. I still cringe when I think of it. And than every December I would get the annual maintenance fee assessment for $1,000 (which is like 2/3 of a summer rental house). Merry Christmas to me..

I'm sure DVC's are still better than a regular time share as when Disney does things they always do it better.

But if it ain't broke don't fix it.

Thanks for all you help!

 

[Dean]

So if you buy a DVC are you then committed to visiting WDW every year or can you trade it to travel to other places? And is it easy to trade.

IMO this really is a simple question with a simple answer, assuming we're talking about someone buying in and making that decision as part of the process. You're certainly not absolutely committed to your home resort or even WDW, but many situations put you in a VERY negative position looking beyond even your home resort. The bottom line is it is not reasonable to buy in to DVC today with the idea of using non DVC options and that is an absolute without an exception IMO. Even only for DVC resorts it's often not reasonable for a given family depending on their travels times and ability to plan. Cash type equivalent exchanges (DCL, Disney Collection, Concierge Collection) are never a good value and AT BEST they are a break even with significant risk on all fronts, it may be a necessarily evil if you own already but not for buying in. BVTC is limited in both available resorts and availability. DVC members are at a dramatic disadvantage trading in RCI and exchanging timeshares in general is a crap shoot at best. That's not to say one can't be successful at times, just not very often for high demand options and/or high demand times. That's partly because of the specifics of DVC as it relates to exchanges and partly because this is the nature of timeshare exchanges in general. In that past I've laid out the one strategy that maximizes the possibilities for those that do own and chose to attempt an exchange. The only reasonable option as a new buyer is to buy the points you plan to use at DVC and no more other than POSSIBLY a small cushion to guard agains reallocations or longer/bigger trips than anticipated. For one looking at a studio for 5 days adventure season (S-F) that might be 20% while one looking at a 2 BR Magic/Premier should likely buy no extra points or even less than they think they need.

I've issued the challenge before for anyone to show me a guaranteed non DVC resort option that's a good value, truth is there aren't any, zero. There are a very handful of potential options in RCI that would be a good value IF (BIG IF) you could get them. Here's an extreme but real life example I've posted before. A few years ago we went to Cabo for 2 weeks. Our total cost as an RCI exchange was around $600 for the 2 weeks including around $350 of that as exchange fees. Had we used DVC for those 2 weeks it would have been 1500 points plus just under $200 in exchange fees.

 

[brinkley07]

I have stayed on my friend's DVC in Thailand and NYC before DVC used RCI. She also used her points for a trip to China and African safari previously. I will say the accommodations were wonderful, and we loved where we stayed. She hasn't used her DVC points on a trade since RCI took over. However, my father purchased time share at a different property years ago. All of his timeshare weeks are deeded ownership with low fees under 500 per week. His upfront costs were also significantly lower than Disney buy in rates when he purchased. If he were to trade any of his weeks it would be worth it as his costs are so low and he owns a property that is very desirable for trading. With DVC I have run numerous scenarios and have difficulty making it cost effective to use points anywhere besides a DVC property. Keeping that in mind it's also hard for me to justify buying direct and spend the extra money.

 

[DougEMG]

I've issued the challenge before for anyone to show me a guaranteed non DVC resort option that's a good value, truth is there aren't any, zero. There are a very handful of potential options in RCI that would be a good value IF (BIG IF) you could get them. Here's an extreme but real life example I've posted before. A few years ago we went to Cabo for 2 weeks. Our total cost as an RCI exchange was around $600 for the 2 weeks including around $350 of that as exchange fees. Had we used DVC for those 2 weeks it would have been 1500 points plus just under $200 in exchange fees.

Och, that sure makes using DVC points to trade into RCI real expense even if one assumed only MF of $5/point for those 1500 points, $7500+$200 for DVC vrs $600+$350 for non-DVC.

 

[Dean]

Och, that sure makes using DVC points to trade into RCI real expense even if one assumed only MF of $5/point for those 1500 points, $7500+$200 for DVC vrs $600+$350 for non-DVC.

Actually the $600 (maybe just over) included the exchange fees. The prices were so reasonable that I ended up getting an additional week in a 3 BR that ran concurrently with one of our other weeks (1 day off but starting 1 day earlier than our 2nd week) at a different Gold Crown resort for the same costs. That actually raised our total cost to just over $900 for the 2 weeks. We ended up enjoying the first resort so much that we did not even check in to the second resort. We were able to stay in the same OF unit for all of the 2 weeks.

As I noted, this is an extreme example but it illustrates principles that I see at every turn trading with both II and RCI. IMO, there are negatives when you exchange including the risk of things beyond your control such that you might have to cancel late or not make the exchange. There are also risks of getting "the dumpster view" and that most resorts are not comparable to DVC. When I exchange I try to always be in a situation where I'm upgrading, usually at least in unit size or resort quality, often both. For example, I might trade a studio at a lessor resort for a 3 BR at a better resort, have done this several times. That way if something happens and I can't go or can only stay part of the week, no real harm done. Part of the issue is that I place a significant value on my DVC points.

 

[crisi]

We used to own a timeshare in Kona which was part of RCI and all I remember was the hassle of trying to exchange it. I still cringe when I think of it. And than every December I would get the annual maintenance fee assessment for $1,000 (which is like 2/3 of a summer rental house). Merry Christmas to me..

I'm sure DVC's are still better than a regular time share as when Disney does things they always do it better.

But if it ain't broke don't fix it.

Thanks for all you help!

I think that there are timeshare people and not timeshare people. Dean is a timeshare person, he wants to understand the system and work it and get value for it. I suspect he takes some enjoyment in getting bargains. Other people are not timeshare people. I'm really not. Cash is fine for me. DVC used within the DVC system is "timeshare lite." You don't need to understand the RCI systems, you don't need to do much more than book your trip far enough in advance to get a room and pay your dues bill, and go to Disney often enough to use up your points. However, for all that it is still a timeshare - you still need to make use of it. You'll still find that availability can be challenging, even within the system. You are still at the mercy of the timeshare management company.

It doesn't sound like you are a timeshare person. And it doesn't sound like you are convinced you'd go to Disney often enough to make it a good deal.

(I don't leave my house on Black Friday, either. But I know people who are already planning their post Thanksgiving shopping trip).

 

[Dean]

I think that there are timeshare people and not timeshare people. Dean is a timeshare person, he wants to understand the system and work it and get value for it. I suspect he takes some enjoyment in getting bargains. Other people are not timeshare people. I'm really not. Cash is fine for me. DVC used within the DVC system is "timeshare lite." You don't need to understand the RCI systems, you don't need to do much more than book your trip far enough in advance to get a room and pay your dues bill, and go to Disney often enough to use up your points. However, for all that it is still a timeshare - you still need to make use of it. You'll still find that availability can be challenging, even within the system. You are still at the mercy of the timeshare management company.

It doesn't sound like you are a timeshare person. And it doesn't sound like you are convinced you'd go to Disney often enough to make it a good deal.

(I don't leave my house on Black Friday, either. But I know people who are already planning their post Thanksgiving shopping trip).

My view is either you eat the bear or it eats you, that's true with DVC and every other timeshare I know even the ones that are fixed week, fixed unit and never exchanged or rented. With DVC you can restrict yourself to DVC resort usage only and decrease the amount of education and planning that goes into it but the principles remain the same. Like stocks, the best and worst decisions are made on the buy in. IMO, if one is not willing to put a certain amount of planning and effort in, may as well stay on the sidelines.

 

[icypsycho]

Does owning DVC make you a florida resident?

 

[Dean]

Does owning DVC make you a florida resident?

It does not make you a FL resident and it does not give you access to Disney discounts which they choose to offer to FL residents.

 

[Deb & Bill]

Does owning DVC make you a florida resident?

Like Dean said, no. Those statements are in the DVC literature when you buy.