Would you travel in the last week of your use year?

[mouseclick1]

We were hoping to do a concierge collection (Tanque Verde) exchange next year in April, but DH recently told me this will be almost impossible because of a huge deadline he has at work in early May. Summer is out of the question since we are talking about Arizona, and horseback riding in 105 degree weather does not sound that appealing to me!

Our other option (other that waiting till 2004) is to go in February. The problem is that we have a March use year, and our winter break is the last week in February. This means we would need to borrow the points from 2003. It also means that we would risk losing a lot of points if anything were to happen that would cause us to cancel our trip. I am really hesitant to book a trip that close, and am leaning toward not going at all. I suppose we could go for a long weekend in March, but that seems like quite a distance to go (from MI) for a long weekend. Does anyone take that risk by traveling at the end of their use year like that?

 

[erick10520]

Yeah, we will be doing it this year (Dec use year) when we arrive on Thanksgiving day thru Dec 12. I guess the advantage would be combining 4 years of points on this vacation, disadvantage as stated if something goes wrong, well.........

 

[auntsue]

We are doing exactly that for Memorial Day. We are going from May 23 - May 28. We have a June use year and we made the reservation at the 11 month window, so you can say I was very optimistic. My biggest concern was that I'm providing our group of 11 with a 2BR, a 1BR and a studio, and although I'm happy that I am able to do this, I certainly don't want to get scr----. I explained that once they committed, unless there was some catastrophic emergency, they had to go, and so far, so good.

I understand your trepidation, because I really debated whether this was a good idea or not, but I'm glad we went for it, because it's an awesome way to celebrate getting our Master's degrees.

Have you ever had to cancel vacation plans? We never have, so I felt it was worth the gamble.

 

[dvc_bwv]

Question for erick10520....

I guess the advantage would be combining 4 years of points on this vacation ...

How do you get 4 years of points? My understanding is the most you can get is 3 years - 1 year of banked points, the current year points and 1 year of borrowed points. Did I miss something here?

 

[WDWfantasy]

If your use year was June, for example, and you are planning a trip for May 25 - June 8, 2002 (like we are, but we aren't using points this time). If you had banked your June, 2000 points into 2001 and used those points plus your June, 2001 points for the part of the reservation that is May 25 - May 31. Then you use your June, 2002 points plus you borrow your June, 2003 points to cover the part of your reservation that is from June 1 - June 8. You are in fact using 4 years worth of points to cover one vacation. Get it?!?!?!

 

[erick10520]

Let me see if I remember exactly.

Dec 2000 use year banked
Dec 2001 use year banked/borrowed
Dec 2002 used in current year
Dec 2003 Borrowed

Vacationing Nov 28 thru Dec 12, so the Dec 2000 use year points are being used up on the three remaining days in Nov reservation (Nov 28,29,30) and some points from 2001. 2001 banked and 2002 current points all used plus I think 70 points borrowed from 2003. We will be in 2 bedroom plus a studio for two weeks+ and have 270 points per year.

I think this only works if you vacation near the end of your use year and are able to bank and plan way ahead of time. This is our first DVC vacation so it kind of happened by accident.

 

[Chuck S]

We have a June use year and are always at OKW the end of may through the first part of June.

 

[Laurabearz]

There is always travel insurance.... I am not sure how costly it is or what it covers (I think it is $5.00 a point)

I think traveling in Feb is risky anyway... with the snow and all.... Good luck with your desision... I know how hard they can be!

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