New DVC Member - Perspective of a Direct Buyer

nydisneydad

Earning My Ears
Joined
May 26, 2017
I'm a brand-new DVC Buyer (still in my 10-day cool-off window as of this post) and I've been reading these boards closely. I see a lot of recent discussion about resales and the benefits/hassles/experiences, but not as much about direct sales, so I wanted to share my experience/thoughts for others who might be considering direct.

My wife and two kids (12 and 9) went to Disney last week and stayed at the Wilderness Lodge (CY bunk bed). It was our first trip in five years, and the first that we fully planned (last time was a 4-day trip my parents put together for the six of us). We live in New York, but I've been to Disney plenty of times, including for my honeymoon and many times with my family growing up. We almost exclusively stay at deluxe resorts.

It was actually the first time we've done a full week family vacation with just the four of us. I spent tons of time planning (all part of the fun!) including listening to many podcasts. It was through one of the podcasts that I learned about DVC, and for the fun of it I did some research before my trip and put together a spreadsheet to calculate the costs, factoring increased maintenance dues, closing costs, etc. Being in the fortunate position to have the cash to buy in at 100-130 points, I mused on the possibility of it and made an off-hand comment to my wife about it, which she promptly rejected.

I knew about the tours (and the gift card and bonus fastpasses), so wasn't surprised to see an invite letter show up in our room on day two. I didn't really expect anything of it... I considered doing the tour for the bonuses, but didn't expect it to go anywhere given my wife's initial reaction back home. But she blew me away while lounging at the pool that evening when she suggested we consider it, about how nice it would be to make this a regular thing. That was all I needed to hear... I promptly made an appointment for the tour, and started giving serious consideration to what had previously just been a playful fantasy.

Going into the tour, here's what really appealed to my wife and me about DVC:

* Disney vacations are our family's speed. We're not campers or sightseers. We like to have a plan and activities, and we also like a lot of down-time at the hotel, so hotel quality and room size are important to us.

* We want to take trips more often, and going every other year at least was appealing to us.

* We live five minutes from a small airport that has direct flights to Orlando, so it's an ideal recurring vacation spot.

* We really like the idea that we could bring our family members down for larger trips together, or even let them borrow our points on years we don't go.

* It was killing me that I had no chance of seeing Pandora (opened just days after we left), so that's a DVC benefit (I know, not guaranteed) that appeals to me.

Now, I will confess that at the time I didn't know anything about the resale market. I knew about renting points to stay at DVC properties, but not much about the actual logistics. I really didn't even know that much about banking and borrowing points (that was the one main question I had planned for the tour).

The "tour" (more of a presentation, as the only room we saw was a studio) was at the Polynesian. Things didn't get off to the best start... we had a 1:10 pickup from Hollywood Studios and due to some confusion there was only one driver and two pickups going in opposite directions. We ended up having to wait an extra 10 minutes for a different van, which isn't a huge deal, but given that they're trying to court us to drop a lot of $$$, I didn't feel it was a very good first impression.

That said, I cooled down by the time we got to the Polynesian (both literally and figuratively) and getting there late fortunately didn't affect our tour. Our sales agent was fantastic. Very welcoming. Having already crunched all the numbers, we didn't take much convincing. Knowing that we could borrow/bank points and just plan trips every 2-3 years pretty much sealed the deal for us. She only presented the Polynesian and Copper Creek as options, and pointed out that the Poly maintenance rates were about a dollar less. We talked about home resort and booking at 7 months, but she assured me booking 7 months in advance would be fine for our target vacation dates (usually in late January or May).

We opted for 120 points -- basically the cost to stay in a Studio for 6-7 days -- knowing that we could upgrade to a 1-bedroom or 2-bedroom villa by banking/borrowing points. Our use year would be Dec 1 and our incentive (if we signed while on vacation) was to have our points begin in 2016, so basically an extra 120 points to spend by Dec 2018.

We agreed to take a few days to sleep on it, and since I knew I'd have almost two hours to kill between checkout and our Magical Express departure on our last day, I set up an appointment for then. Oh, and at the end of the tour, I mentioned being a little unhappy about the late van (in the context that I could not afford for the van to be late on Sunday), and my agent apologized and gave us an additional bonus fastpass that we were able to use for ANY specific ride any time that day. We chose 7DMT (normally not on the list of possible bonus fastpasses), which worked out great because we were planning an evening trip back to Magic Kingdom. That was unexpected and hugely appreciated.

Between our tour on Wednesday and Sunday I did some more number-crunching, mostly just to figure out how many points to get. At this point I still hadn't visited this section of the DisBoards. On Sunday, we decided to move forward with the buy, and I had quite an afternoon of going back-and-forth between the Wilderness Lodge and the Polynesian. (I went by myself not realizing my wife had to sign, didn't want to deal with signing through the mail, so brought the contracts back to WL to have her sign, then went back to Poly to hand them over). All through the process, everyone I interacted with from my agent to the drivers (three different ones!) was fantastic. I made it back to the WL with about 10 minutes to spare before my Magical Express departure. Whew!

The contracts were signed, payment plan was set up (charges through Disney Visa which we can just pay off with cash on hand, so that we could at least get some reward points for it). Total cost was about $21,500 for 120 PVC that expire in 2066. No financing needed (either from Disney or from Credit Card), as we'd never have even considered buying into DVC if we didn't have the money available.

We felt great about the decision. And then after the trip I started reading articles here on the DisBoards and elsewhere. What is this about resale? Cheaper? Other home options? Uh oh...

I started having concerns that maybe I'd jumped in a little too quickly. Except I hadn't been entirely unprepared. I had done research. I'd even gone into my meeting using inflated numbers (CCV maintenance instead of Poly) not realizing then that Poly was cheaper, and my initial calculations didn't factor the incentives either.

Nevertheless, I did quite a bit of reading, and ultimately felt more and more comfortable with my decision to go direct instead of resale. Here's why:

1. Whether it's cars, appliances or whatever, my wife and I tend to always buy new. At the end of the day, the question we ask is -- can we afford it, and is the price reasonable? Even buying DVC direct, the answer to both was yes. So just because we *could* have gotten it cheaper (in theory) doesn't mean we were taken.

2. I'm not a negotiator. The idea of surfing the market for the right offer, then having to go through a month-long closing process is stressful to me. There's a cost there that can't be measured in dollars. It's the same reason I tend not to buy used... having a smooth and, more importantly, certain process is worth a lot to me. It's part of the reason I went through the rigamarole to get the contracts signed while we were still in Orlando.

3. Ultimately the 1-Bedroom Villas will appeal to us most, which made me question our Poly choice, but.... We love the convenience of being on the lake or monorail, and we can always get adjoining studios. Also, for now even just a studio at times will be enough for us. We did fine in a WL Bunk Bed room, and that's not nearly as spacious as the Poly studios. Also, since we don't plan to travel at the peak DVC times, it seems like we won't have much trouble getting villas at most of the other resorts at the 7-month mark. So ultimately I think the Poly was the best choice for us, which meant direct was really the way to go anyway.

4. The membership card. It's a small thing, and not a deciding factor, but we really liked getting our embroidered DVC bag, and it does add just a little bit to the exclusivity. Yeah, you can do resale + direct to get those benefits, but see #2 above.

Bottom line... I think Direct vs. Resale really is going to be a personal decision. For me, not having to deal with uncertainty, hassle or possible stress is worth any money we might have saved otherwise. But for others, the cost difference could be the factor that makes joining DVC possible.

Of course, I'm still fresh off the decision to purchase, but I feel really good about the choices we made.
 
Interesting to read your experience! We've never done the tour and have only purchased resale, but I can absolutely see the appeal of buying direct.
 
Congratulations, and welcome home! You mentioned that you're still in the 10-day cooling off period; does that mean you're still open to discussion about direct v. resale? ;) (In the interests of full disclosure, we just bought resale at BLT and added on 25 points direct.) When I was reading your account, I really thought you were going to go with CCV since you know that you'd want 1BR in the future. We love the feel and the restaurants that the Poly, but ... not having an 11-mo booking window on a 1BR (or, practically speaking, a reasonable 2BR) sealed it for us.

One thing I think your guide may have "sold" less than truthfully as an "incentive" was to get 2016 points with a Dec. UY. For purposes of use year, you are still "IN" 2016 until Dec. 1, so you're not getting any extra points that you would have gotten had you signed later. You could even call up your guide as late as July 30 of this year to get the 2016 points AND bank them so you'd have 240 points to use in 2018. It's not an incentive if you were entitled to it anyway.
 
Fair enough... but you realise you just paid 185 a point and the highest dues on WDW property and it's costing significantly more than you could have paid for essentially the same experience? It just sounds a little bit like your post is trying to justify to yourself why you have spent so much.

But hey if you've done all your research and are happy with your purchase best of luck to you. Welcome home and I'm sure you'll look back and say it was money well spent.
 


May I make a suggestion? As you have started investigating something that you didn't know about as of 5 days ago - and something that could potentially save you quite a bit of money - to take more time to investigate? You have this one small 10 day window to rescind a $21K purchase that was decided on during the fun of the vacation you were having. Take that opportunity and rescind and do a bit more investigating into things. You can always call back the very next day should you wish and get it all going again.

- consider all the possible home resorts
- consider the point requirements of resorts in addition to the dues. CCV has lower point requirements and has the larger villas which you are interested in staying in.
- you stated more than once that 1BR's are what interest you. IMO you should definitely buy someplace that at least has them! PVB - it's studios and high point requirements for those studios. If you use those expensive PVB points to stay elsewhere it's also like tossing money out the door as you could have paid less up front.
- really consider the "extras" that sold you on direct. Many are new, will eventually go away and unless you are a local to Orlando are announced late enough that unless you have a stay already planned you won't experience them.
- Home resort can be pretty important. What wasn't a difficult time to reserve a few years ago has gotten tougher and you should at least buy where you won't mind staying.
- Negotiating on resale is frankly nothing and you don't have to and will still save lots of money. Otherwise it's pretty much offer a few dollars off of listing and see if they accept or hold firm. That's it. It's only as difficult as you want to make it.
- that $21K for 120 PVB points is not enough for even a week in any 1BR each year even at the cheapest times. If you also look at May then you're well short and if a week long yearly vacation were to become the preference you could even be looking at another $21K.

To put it in perspective - for $21K resale - no negotiating - you could get 250 SSR points, 250 AKV points, 210 BWV points, 175 BLT points or even 150 PVB points. Other than PVB all the other resorts listed are more in range for the point requirements for 1BR's and have 1BR's.

And did the guide cover UY's for you?
 
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May I make a suggestion? As you have started investigating something that you didn't know about as of 5 days ago - and something that could potentially save you quite a bit of money - to take more time to investigate? You have this one small 10 day window to rescind a $21K purchase that was decided on during the fun of the vacation you were having. Take that opportunity and rescind and do a bit more investigating into things. You can always call back the very next day should you wish and get it all going again.

- consider all the possible home resorts
- consider the point requirements of resorts in addition to the dues. CCV has lower point requirements and has the larger villas which you are interested in staying in.
- you stated more than once that 1BR's are what interest you. IMO you should definitely buy someplace that at least has them! PVB - it's studios and high point requirements for those studios. If you use those expensive PVB points to stay elsewhere it's also like tossing money out the door as you could have paid less up front.
- really consider the "extras" that sold you on direct. Many are new, will eventually go away and unless you are a local to Orlando are announced late enough that unless you have a stay already planned you won't experience them.
- Home resort can be pretty important. What wasn't a difficult time to reserve a few years ago has gotten tougher and you should at least buy where you won't mind staying.
- Negotiating on resale is frankly nothing and you don't have to and will still save lots of money. Otherwise it's pretty much offer a few dollars off of listing and see if they accept or hold firm. That's it. It's only as difficult as you want to make it.
- that $21K for 120 PVB points is not enough for even a week in any 1BR each year even at the cheapest times. If you also look at May then you're well short and if a week long yearly vacation were to become the preference you could even be looking at another $21K.

To put it in perspective - for $21K resale - no negotiating - you could get 250 SSR points, 250 AKV points, 210 BWV points, 175 BLT points or even 150 PVB points. The other than PVB all the other resorts listed are more in range for the point requirements for 1BR's and the have 1BR's.

And did the guide cover UY's for you?
As usual excellent advice.
 


Oh - and just to point out. You could have resale and your DVC tote bag too as you've already gotten that! :cool:

Even buying resale and doing a small direct add on is a possible scenario to get you into a resort with the villa size you want and get you the direct benefits.
 
Your experience is like all other direct buying stories. Disney is very good at selling and of course they were wonderful to you. If you feel that you got the resort that you really wanted, the UY that benefits you and you don't mind the cost, then wonderful. Now that you are an owner you can expect that you will have the same issues that all of us have and don't expect help from your guide unless he thinks that you will be buying again soon.

:earsboy: Bill

 
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We bought direct too and while I am glad that our first experience was so smooth, I think that for our next contract, we are going to go resale. The pressure to have everything perfect and smooth isn't there for this one. If I can't find the contract that works for us or if repeated contracts fall through, then I will go back to direct purchase. DVC will always be there :)

Glad that you had such a good experience and thank you for sharing!
 
Appreciate the feedback, and I'll continue to take in the information and advice.

Despite the benefits, I've almost certainly ruled out resale, for all the reasons mentioned above... As a web programmer who frequently has to turn down freelance work, time is literally money for me. And just having to wait a month to find out if the sale is going through would be unsettling. The process of the resale just wouldn't be worth it for me. My point about buying "new" is that my wife and I don't mind paying a premium for convenience of a more direct purchase. At the end of the day I'm looking at whether we're getting value in what we're paying, and we feel we are.

Oh, and while I mentioned some of the benefits/perks, I should clarify that ultimately they have pretty much no influence on my decision. I mean, I like the potential of them, but they have nothing to do with why I was willing to pay more direct.

As to the incentives... I was under the impression that normally after the signing the direct contract, points wouldn't begin accruing until the first use year (in this case starting December 2017). Obviously this would be different under resale. But maybe I was wrong and we should have gotten 2016 points anyway. If anyone who has bought direct knows for sure, let me know. I have a "welcome" call tonight so I'll certainly seek clarification.

I certainly considered CCV, but A. The maintenance cost is considerably more, and B. given that we don't tend to travel in peak DVC season it seems likely we'll have options for staying elsewhere. I hope I'm not wrong about that, but I suppose only time will tell. Nevertheless, there's a lot we like about Poly, so even if we had to do a double-studio on occasion, we're fine with that. Some of the other resorts sound great... but I've never stayed at a deluxe off the lake, so I certainly wouldn't want to commit to one as my home resort.

And we're well aware of the various point costs for stays in various easons... right now our intention is to only go every 2-3 years, so 120 points is really more like 240+ points for us. And if we do get to a point where we're going annually... well then we'd almost certainly buy a second contract -- probably resale at that point, and at a different home resort to lock down the 1- and 2-bedroom villa availabilities.

I do still have a few days though, so I welcome other thoughts.
 
I'm a brand-new DVC Buyer (still in my 10-day cool-off window as of this post) and I've been reading these boards closely. I see a lot of recent discussion about resales and the benefits/hassles/experiences, but not as much about direct sales, so I wanted to share my experience/thoughts for others who might be considering direct.

My wife and two kids (12 and 9) went to Disney last week and stayed at the Wilderness Lodge (CY bunk bed). It was our first trip in five years, and the first that we fully planned (last time was a 4-day trip my parents put together for the six of us). We live in New York, but I've been to Disney plenty of times, including for my honeymoon and many times with my family growing up. We almost exclusively stay at deluxe resorts.

It was actually the first time we've done a full week family vacation with just the four of us. I spent tons of time planning (all part of the fun!) including listening to many podcasts. It was through one of the podcasts that I learned about DVC, and for the fun of it I did some research before my trip and put together a spreadsheet to calculate the costs, factoring increased maintenance dues, closing costs, etc. Being in the fortunate position to have the cash to buy in at 100-130 points, I mused on the possibility of it and made an off-hand comment to my wife about it, which she promptly rejected.

I knew about the tours (and the gift card and bonus fastpasses), so wasn't surprised to see an invite letter show up in our room on day two. I didn't really expect anything of it... I considered doing the tour for the bonuses, but didn't expect it to go anywhere given my wife's initial reaction back home. But she blew me away while lounging at the pool that evening when she suggested we consider it, about how nice it would be to make this a regular thing. That was all I needed to hear... I promptly made an appointment for the tour, and started giving serious consideration to what had previously just been a playful fantasy.

Going into the tour, here's what really appealed to my wife and me about DVC:

* Disney vacations are our family's speed. We're not campers or sightseers. We like to have a plan and activities, and we also like a lot of down-time at the hotel, so hotel quality and room size are important to us.

* We want to take trips more often, and going every other year at least was appealing to us.

* We live five minutes from a small airport that has direct flights to Orlando, so it's an ideal recurring vacation spot.

* We really like the idea that we could bring our family members down for larger trips together, or even let them borrow our points on years we don't go.

* It was killing me that I had no chance of seeing Pandora (opened just days after we left), so that's a DVC benefit (I know, not guaranteed) that appeals to me.

Now, I will confess that at the time I didn't know anything about the resale market. I knew about renting points to stay at DVC properties, but not much about the actual logistics. I really didn't even know that much about banking and borrowing points (that was the one main question I had planned for the tour).

The "tour" (more of a presentation, as the only room we saw was a studio) was at the Polynesian. Things didn't get off to the best start... we had a 1:10 pickup from Hollywood Studios and due to some confusion there was only one driver and two pickups going in opposite directions. We ended up having to wait an extra 10 minutes for a different van, which isn't a huge deal, but given that they're trying to court us to drop a lot of $$$, I didn't feel it was a very good first impression.

That said, I cooled down by the time we got to the Polynesian (both literally and figuratively) and getting there late fortunately didn't affect our tour. Our sales agent was fantastic. Very welcoming. Having already crunched all the numbers, we didn't take much convincing. Knowing that we could borrow/bank points and just plan trips every 2-3 years pretty much sealed the deal for us. She only presented the Polynesian and Copper Creek as options, and pointed out that the Poly maintenance rates were about a dollar less. We talked about home resort and booking at 7 months, but she assured me booking 7 months in advance would be fine for our target vacation dates (usually in late January or May).

We opted for 120 points -- basically the cost to stay in a Studio for 6-7 days -- knowing that we could upgrade to a 1-bedroom or 2-bedroom villa by banking/borrowing points. Our use year would be Dec 1 and our incentive (if we signed while on vacation) was to have our points begin in 2016, so basically an extra 120 points to spend by Dec 2018.

We agreed to take a few days to sleep on it, and since I knew I'd have almost two hours to kill between checkout and our Magical Express departure on our last day, I set up an appointment for then. Oh, and at the end of the tour, I mentioned being a little unhappy about the late van (in the context that I could not afford for the van to be late on Sunday), and my agent apologized and gave us an additional bonus fastpass that we were able to use for ANY specific ride any time that day. We chose 7DMT (normally not on the list of possible bonus fastpasses), which worked out great because we were planning an evening trip back to Magic Kingdom. That was unexpected and hugely appreciated.

Between our tour on Wednesday and Sunday I did some more number-crunching, mostly just to figure out how many points to get. At this point I still hadn't visited this section of the DisBoards. On Sunday, we decided to move forward with the buy, and I had quite an afternoon of going back-and-forth between the Wilderness Lodge and the Polynesian. (I went by myself not realizing my wife had to sign, didn't want to deal with signing through the mail, so brought the contracts back to WL to have her sign, then went back to Poly to hand them over). All through the process, everyone I interacted with from my agent to the drivers (three different ones!) was fantastic. I made it back to the WL with about 10 minutes to spare before my Magical Express departure. Whew!

The contracts were signed, payment plan was set up (charges through Disney Visa which we can just pay off with cash on hand, so that we could at least get some reward points for it). Total cost was about $21,500 for 120 PVC that expire in 2066. No financing needed (either from Disney or from Credit Card), as we'd never have even considered buying into DVC if we didn't have the money available.

We felt great about the decision. And then after the trip I started reading articles here on the DisBoards and elsewhere. What is this about resale? Cheaper? Other home options? Uh oh...

I started having concerns that maybe I'd jumped in a little too quickly. Except I hadn't been entirely unprepared. I had done research. I'd even gone into my meeting using inflated numbers (CCV maintenance instead of Poly) not realizing then that Poly was cheaper, and my initial calculations didn't factor the incentives either.

Nevertheless, I did quite a bit of reading, and ultimately felt more and more comfortable with my decision to go direct instead of resale. Here's why:

1. Whether it's cars, appliances or whatever, my wife and I tend to always buy new. At the end of the day, the question we ask is -- can we afford it, and is the price reasonable? Even buying DVC direct, the answer to both was yes. So just because we *could* have gotten it cheaper (in theory) doesn't mean we were taken.

2. I'm not a negotiator. The idea of surfing the market for the right offer, then having to go through a month-long closing process is stressful to me. There's a cost there that can't be measured in dollars. It's the same reason I tend not to buy used... having a smooth and, more importantly, certain process is worth a lot to me. It's part of the reason I went through the rigamarole to get the contracts signed while we were still in Orlando.

3. Ultimately the 1-Bedroom Villas will appeal to us most, which made me question our Poly choice, but.... We love the convenience of being on the lake or monorail, and we can always get adjoining studios. Also, for now even just a studio at times will be enough for us. We did fine in a WL Bunk Bed room, and that's not nearly as spacious as the Poly studios. Also, since we don't plan to travel at the peak DVC times, it seems like we won't have much trouble getting villas at most of the other resorts at the 7-month mark. So ultimately I think the Poly was the best choice for us, which meant direct was really the way to go anyway.

4. The membership card. It's a small thing, and not a deciding factor, but we really liked getting our embroidered DVC bag, and it does add just a little bit to the exclusivity. Yeah, you can do resale + direct to get those benefits, but see #2 above.

Bottom line... I think Direct vs. Resale really is going to be a personal decision. For me, not having to deal with uncertainty, hassle or possible stress is worth any money we might have saved otherwise. But for others, the cost difference could be the factor that makes joining DVC possible.

Of course, I'm still fresh off the decision to purchase, but I feel really good about the choices we made.


I want to thank you for all of this. I read every word because I too am thinking of buying Direct. I know there is resale but since cost is not a problem for me either at this point in time we chose direct for the ease of transaction and the fastness of getting the points. My husband and I have a family of 4 10yr old twins we also have an older daughter getting married and we figure 100 points will do just fine for now as they grow we are sure we can buy more if needed. We just don't want to deal with the hassle of resale . I just hope where we want is doable we would like BCV since that is where we always stay and we love it. Welcome home and congratulations. what works well for you may not work for some. We all have to do what is best for us and some its resale and others is direct. Thank you, you put my mind at ease of buying direct.
 
Regarding 2016 points - when buying direct, unless it's a resort that isn't open yet, you should get current points which is what 2016 points are for a Dec UY. But, for example a Feb UY it's 2017. Resale is actually the only possible way to get the previous years points though. Continuing with a Dec UY one might run across a contract that has banked 2015 points as well as current 2016.

Your belief in wasting time on resale I assume is simply about if DVC were to exercise ROFR? Even then, you could decide to go with direct if something happened that way. The time to get an offer done and contracts signed could actually be 30 minutes or less. After that there's nothing else on your end until signing closing paperwork and sending the check. Yes, some people don't have the patience but that's all that's required - not any active work by you during that time.

BTW - I've bought both direct and resale. Direct points were new resorts that weren't otherwise available but also back in the day when there wasn't such a huge difference. Resale - I had one transaction that actually was done faster than a direct from DVC. Completely unusual but it happened. I've never considered resale anything difficult or stressful and have both bought and sold.
 
Appreciate the feedback, and I'll continue to take in the information and advice.

Despite the benefits, I've almost certainly ruled out resale, for all the reasons mentioned above... As a web programmer who frequently has to turn down freelance work, time is literally money for me. And just having to wait a month to find out if the sale is going through would be unsettling. The process of the resale just wouldn't be worth it for me. My point about buying "new" is that my wife and I don't mind paying a premium for convenience of a more direct purchase. At the end of the day I'm looking at whether we're getting value in what we're paying, and we feel we are.

Oh, and while I mentioned some of the benefits/perks, I should clarify that ultimately they have pretty much no influence on my decision. I mean, I like the potential of them, but they have nothing to do with why I was willing to pay more direct.

As to the incentives... I was under the impression that normally after the signing the direct contract, points wouldn't begin accruing until the first use year (in this case starting December 2017). Obviously this would be different under resale. But maybe I was wrong and we should have gotten 2016 points anyway. If anyone who has bought direct knows for sure, let me know. I have a "welcome" call tonight so I'll certainly seek clarification.

I certainly considered CCV, but A. The maintenance cost is considerably more, and B. given that we don't tend to travel in peak DVC season it seems likely we'll have options for staying elsewhere. I hope I'm not wrong about that, but I suppose only time will tell. Nevertheless, there's a lot we like about Poly, so even if we had to do a double-studio on occasion, we're fine with that. Some of the other resorts sound great... but I've never stayed at a deluxe off the lake, so I certainly wouldn't want to commit to one as my home resort.

And we're well aware of the various point costs for stays in various easons... right now our intention is to only go every 2-3 years, so 120 points is really more like 240+ points for us. And if we do get to a point where we're going annually... well then we'd almost certainly buy a second contract -- probably resale at that point, and at a different home resort to lock down the 1- and 2-bedroom villa availabilities.

I do still have a few days though, so I welcome other thoughts.
I think that you need to decide when you actually will travel. UY ideally should be 2 months before your ideal travel time to ensure that you have optimum time to take or bank your points if you are unable to go on your scheduled trip. If you like to travel in the fall , DEC UY is not the one to have( that is truly the one thing that I would change if I could about my direct purchase).
 
I work 70 hours a week. You put in an offer, it's accepted, you sign a contract, email it back with 10% then wait a few weeks. Assuming it goes through it then closes and you wire the cash. It takes no time to sort really. You are justifying it. Take the advice on here. Cancel your purchase, do some research then decide.
Your posts scream 'I'm unsure about this' there is no need to be unsure.
 
I want to thank you for all of this. I read every word because I too am thinking of buying Direct. I know there is resale but since cost is not a problem for me either at this point in time we chose direct for the ease of transaction and the fastness of getting the points. My husband and I have a family of 4 10yr old twins we also have an older daughter getting married and we figure 100 points will do just fine for now as they grow we are sure we can buy more if needed. We just don't want to deal with the hassle of resale . I just hope where we want is doable we would like BCV since that is where we always stay and we love it. Welcome home and congratulations. what works well for you may not work for some. We all have to do what is best for us and some its resale and others is direct. Thank you, you put my mind at ease of buying direct.


yeah why would anyone want to save $10,000+? Even if you can afford it just doesn't make sense. yeah you might have to wait 2 months to get thru a resale but it's not hardnor time consuming. It's all done through email and just send the extremely lower priced check in the mail. just think what other things you can do as a family with that extra 10+ grand maybe put it towards your kids education. and you're still getting the same product minus the perks that aren't guaranteed anyways
 
I also thought your post would end with purchase at Copper Creek Villas and not PVB. If you are happy staying at pvb and have to stay there most of the time for the remainder of your contract then Pvb is a good purchase. Sure you can save a little with resale over direct on poly but not the same amount as resale savings at other resorts. What Poly has over CCV is that the Poly rooms sleep 5 and CCV - even one bedrooms only sleep 4. The best advice I've read is to purchase where you want to stay. PVB resale over direct imo not worth the hassle factor on 120 points, especially factoring in that you most likely wont get the 2016 points on the resale pvb and you will also pay around $600 closing instead of around $200 direct closing on the PVB contract. Any other resort unless it's only 25 points - 50 max you are better off resale. If you plan on trying to use those poly points primarily at 7 month mark at resorts with a one bedroom option you may as well rescind the poly contract and purchase a resale contract that costs a whole lot less and get the points you actually need for a one bedroom option at the resort you want. If that resort is CCV then purchase CCV direct over PVB.
 
OP..congrats on your purchase! We purchased 100 pts at the Poly 2 years ago. Love it there and haven't looked back!
 
I say - to each his own and congratulations. I also say, the time it took you to write up that post, you could have found and made an offer on a resale contract at poly for a significant savings. BUT I feel you. I'm not a bargainer and if I'm being honest, a bit of an elistist. I want the REAL thing whenever possible and even when it doesn't make a difference. I am totally a person who buys into marketing (and I'm in marketing). But even I couldn't justify direct to myself and though I got the card before the change, I've never once shown it to anyone- no need. I dont go to the lounge or events- I have premier passes with a better or equivalent discount and would never have missed it. Now, do I wish I could book the Disneyland hotel, yeah I do but for the cost difference, I could just pay cash to stay.

At first my reaction was- back off this dude, who cares as long as hes happy. But by the end it really felt like you were feeling a little heartburn. My two cents? Make the difficult phone call and rescind. If you rebuy it- great. I LOVE poly and it is hard to get in at 7 mos now but 1 bedrooms are where its at and your traveling style sounds a lot like ours. I'm never gonna go camping, or make a check off list, or some super strict budget or plan. 1 bedrooms may be a "waste" but having done a split stay with just me and my 2 kids in April between POLY and BCV 1 bed - I will be booking 1beds only. Plus Polys pool chair situation was infuriating. Awesome transport options though- the best in the resort in my opinion. But I think those are things you need to mull over a bit more. Going resale will give you a couple more choices like Grand Floridian which has 1 and 2 beds, a chiller pool scene, and the same transport options along with fab dining.

Either way you go- no regrets. I was warned off big contracts on here like crazy and it made me feel kind of bad about my purchase until I realized that it works for us. We dont care about selling it later, we have no intention to and if we did and lost some $ we dont care. Its so much easier to just have the points. In fact, we jus got another large contract. Go look at fidelity. (Can i say that?). They have the best values and ive used them twice. At Aulani and VGF. Easy. Like easier than the post you wrote ; ).

Enjoy DVC. Its a sound purchase : )
 
Just some thoughts. Resale contracts were direct contracts sold by Disney originally, same product. If you buy, you are about to align yourself with a company that deliberately delays resale purchases and restricts benefits to those who buy resale.
This policy keeps our family and friends from buying direct unless we have to. While we love the history of Disney and the overall quality of the product, DVC has taught us that Disney is just out for Disney and out to make a ridiculous amount of profit.

:earsboy: Bill

 

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