Tired of SSR being blamed

[CanadaDisney05]

Is the 7 month booking window even for studios really that big of a deal outside of a few expected weeks of the year? We all know the extremely valuable rooms (AKL Values, BLT Standards, BWV Standards, BC Studios, etc...) are not going to be available most of the time to non-owners, but there seems to be plenty availability of BLT Lake view studios, BWV Garden View rooms, AKL Standard view rooms.

The ability to book those low cost/high valued rooms are already built into the price differential to purchase the points.

 

[Sandisw]

Is the 7 month booking window even for studios really that big of a deal outside of a few expected weeks of the year? We all know the extremely valuable rooms (AKL Values, BLT Standards, BWV Standards, BC Studios, etc...) are not going to be available most of the time to non-owners, but there seems to be plenty availability of BLT Lake view studios, BWV Garden View rooms, AKL Standard view rooms.

The ability to book those low cost/high valued rooms are already built into the price differential to purchase the points.

I agree, The issues with booking outside home resort is only an issue for those hard to get rooms if booking right at 7 months but some places are harder than others to get into to at certain times of the year.

I do think that booking less than 7 months out has become harder and people buying SSR to use as sleep around points has increased over the years.

Having said that, I think there is nothing wrong with it and that if one can trade out with what they own, that is wonderful because that is what DVC is about! If

 

[AdamsMum]

I'm lucky enough to be able to book my home resorts 11 months out most of the time. I've stayed at other resorts a few times when I had to book later. I prefer my home resort though, and once I've booked, I'll move heaven and earth to get there. I'm reading posts now about it getting harder to book studios at 11 month window due to the number of people (or businesses) walking. Now that could be a problem for me, lets face it, at BW not many of us want to pay the BW view points to stay in a pool garden view.
The 7 month window was always there and it's a fair game. I agree with some that it's the number of points being sold these days that makes it difficult to get what you want at 7 months. But DVC keeps marketing it with the stay wherever and look how cheap you can stay in a studio.

 

[ScubaCat]

I blame SSR for many of the problems in my life. But to each his/her own.

 

[SL6827]

I'm lucky enough to be able to book my home resorts 11 months out most of the time. I've stayed at other resorts a few times when I had to book later. I prefer my home resort though, and once I've booked, I'll move heaven and earth to get there. I'm reading posts now about it getting harder to book studios at 11 month window due to the number of people (or businesses) walking. Now that could be a problem for me, lets face it, at BW not many of us want to pay the BW view points to stay in a pool garden view.
The 7 month window was always there and it's a fair game. I agree with some that it's the number of points being sold these days that makes it difficult to get what you want at 7 months. But DVC keeps marketing it with the stay wherever and look how cheap you can stay in a studio.

Businesses are now walking? Really?

 

[AdamsMum]

Businesses are now walking? Really?

I think I read on another post there are business renting points that are walking.

 

[SL6827]

I think I read on another post there are business renting points that are walking.

Wow, now that could really make an impact I bet.

 

[Sandisw]

I think I read on another post there are business renting points that are walking.

It would be owners, though, still doing the walking. Businesses just connect the owner and renter, can’t imagine why any owner would put in that much work for a renter, unless the broker is paying a premium.

 

[Disney1fan2002]

It would be owners, though, still doing the walking. Businesses just connect the owner and renter, can’t imagine why any owner would put in that much work for a renter, unless the broker is paying a premium.

I have rented points through David's more than a few times, and I can tell you that David's does not have us walk reservations. We get the dates that the client needs, and if the room is available we book it, otherwise they notify the client the room is not available. They do a pretty good job of checking availability before reaching out to a DVC owner for points.

 

[Brianstl]

It would be owners, though, still doing the walking. Businesses just connect the owner and renter, can’t imagine why any owner would put in that much work for a renter, unless the broker is paying a premium.

If the business owns the points, they have every incentive to walk reservations especially for BWV standard in the fall.

 

[Sandisw]

If the business owns the points, they have every incentive to walk reservations especially for BWV standard in the fall.

There are rules for commercial renting. It is not allowed so any points owned would have to be titled in such a way to have multiple memberships that stay below the number of reservations that flag it for commercial.

I am not saying they can’t find a way, but they’d still have to set up lots of memberships to get it to work,

I know there was a post about a business having a reservation others Didn’t have but that isnt proof of a walk, but rather could have just been having owners that booked several weeks in a spec renting way.

 

[SL6827]

So someone who booked a CL studio at AKL in December for a week could really demand more than the $18 a point that most brokers charge.

 

[SherylLC]

I blame SSR for many of the problems in my life. But to each his/her own.

OMG ROFL

 

[disneydreamer781]

I purchased when OKW first opened and yeah I do stay at other DVC resorts, in particular, BWV. I don't think that qualifies as a SAP (whatever that stands for) but if it does then so be it. I'm pretty happy staying at OKW though which seems to have become harder to get at 6-7 months for certain times of the year. To be honest I never even thought about it and I've been pretty successful with waitlists over the last few years but usually only in a 1 BR accommodation. Studios are another story. I also rent out points but usually at OKW itself. I've also rented points at other resorts a bit more infrequently and usually for short stays.

 

[CarolMN]

If the business owns the points, they have every incentive to walk reservations especially for BWV standard in the fall.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this. Why would anyone work harder to get a reservation when it is so easy to just rent the points for another time or booking category? Doesn't make sense, especially as there is more demand for points than there is supply.

 

[laura-k]

I feel like the rental companies are more to blame. I get multiple emails a month from rental companies with tons of dates for sale. (I think I signed up for last minute deals or something at one point) And the ease of renting your points through them. Less points are going unused then in years past. It's only been the last couple of years for us that it been more difficult to move at the 7 month mark if we wanted to. Then at the 6 month mark it has been close to impossible if you want any kind of extended stay. 1br are a little more accommodating But not much

I really agree with this ,really very few points are going unused with so many rental companies and everybody realizing that its an option now
This combined with the newer resorts with cabins and bungalows going unused

 

[luckyman_apd]

I was just there 2 weeks ago and had some Poly owners behind me in line for a ride. We got to talking and I am in the camp that believes the bungalows have put excessive pressure in the 7 month window. Really, how many points were purchased there to actually be used on bungalows? There is an excess of points sold that people expected to use on poly studios where the bungalows have caused the supply of studios to be way shy. Obviously certain times of year were ALWAYS difficult to book (jersey week, holidays, first 2 weeks of December) but I've seen a major uptick in 7 month availability competition.

As far as SSR.... I wish I was an SSR owner. I wanted to buy there but the wife wanted BLT. We had young kids and she had visions of the monorail (took us an hour and 15 minutes to get back to our BLT room from epcot one night last trip). I enjoy the "resort" part of SSR so much better. Warm weather trips (like summer) we want to spend at resorts with better/more pool options. So I'll gladly take the SSR room for a BLT room.

 

[Soap_1984]

Honestly, I don't think DVC is a good fit for those people. I think DVC is a good fit for someone who doesn't mind staying at the same resort every stay, booking at least eight months out - more if you want studios or specialty rooms like BWV standard - and who sees it as a plus if they log in at seven months and can get a different resort for variety sake - if they want to.

If what you want is to stay at the BC this year because you are bringing your growing gills nephew and next year you want GF because its going to be a more adulty romantic trip, and the next year you want the Contemporary because it will work great with all the stroller laden MK trips you are taking, and then the Poly - because that was where you had your honeymoon, and then you want SSR because you think you'll be at DTD a lot - you are far better off renting points or using cash through CRO.

There are exceptions - people who don't mind moving mid stay may be happier. People willing to waitlist and stalk might be happier. But you need to be realistic - DVC is a timeshare, timeshare means you may not get what you want if you try and trade around. And with a points based timeshare, you may not be able to reliably get what you want even at home at eleven months - if you are looking for a VGF studio in early December.

This is a bit of a blanket generalization. I agree if you have very few points and want to sleep around in studios dvc may not be a good fit. We bought to stay in one bedrooms and dont book 11 months out; why would I buy a more expensive resort if I can get what I want every time for less? I'm not going to do it just to satisfy some people on the Internet that is for sure.

 

[Wakey]

Re Poly bungalows, not nearly as big a problem as Copper Creek cabins. See this below which was posted elsewhere:

The Poly bungalows do not impact as much as the cabins at CCV there are more studios at Poly. DVC really did do the owners no good with those cabins at Copper Creek- huge availability problem. I said it would be ages ago when they started selling it, it was just a mathematical calculation- it did not make sense. I am still convinced those cabins and bungalows are about the most profitable real estate on earth. I would be surprised if they cost more than $250 to build, but let's be really generous and say $500k. The total points for the cabins are 41,350 a year. What was the average selling price? Say $170? That is over $7 million per cabin- can you imagine?
Lets look at it a bit further. There are 3,321,966 points in total at Copper Creek. There are 26 cabins. So just under a third of the total points at Copper Creek are on these cabins alone (26 x 41350= 1,075,100.)
There are 42 studios. There are also 36 2 bed lock offs, so potentially some of those will go as studios- say half. So maybe there are a total of 60 studios at any one time. Not that many really. A studio costs 6243 points per annum. So if we assume half of 2 bed lockoffs go as studios (could be more or less but wont be far off), total points allocated to studios are 374,580 points a year. So the points available for studios are a fraction of what those cabins are. Imagine if instead they had built studios, there could have been over three times as many as there are now.
Let's look at square footage. A studio is 338 square feet. So DVC sell 18.47 points per square foot for a studio. Now a cabin is 1,737 square feet. They sell 23.80 points per square footage of cabin. Not only that, but if they are not booked up at 60 days, DVC can take them as 'breakage'. Initially this money goes to paying towards DVC but tops out at a sum I cannot remember, then that goes into profits for DVC. Any wonder on these maths they like to build cabins!?
Now let us compare to Poly. Poly has a massive 360 studios and only 20 bungalows. So an unbelievable 300 more studios than Copper Creek and 6 less cabins/ bungalows. This will hopefully explain it very clearly why studio availability has not been as bad at Poly- despite those bungalows often being unbooked at Poly.
The issues at Copper Creek will not go away because of the maths above.

 

[crisi]

This is a bit of a blanket generalization. I agree if you have very few points and want to sleep around in studios dvc may not be a good fit. We bought to stay in one bedrooms and dont book 11 months out; why would I buy a more expensive resort if I can get what I want every time for less? I'm not going to do it just to satisfy some people on the Internet that is for sure.

Have you been able to get GFV the first week in December - even in a one bedroom. Or a room at GCV seven months out when you want it? BWV standard view one bedrooms over Food and Wine? VAKL Concierge rooms? If you are never going to want these things - you have a better crystal ball than most people who want what they want when they want it. Forty years is a long time for ownership. Disney availability patterns will change, as will what you want.

The problem is that no one knows what they want twenty years from now. Maybe you will at that point only want studios. Or need two bedrooms. And if you aren't happy with your home resort, you'll be unsatisfied with the product. Its my opinion, and its just an opinion, that you plan for the worst and hope for the best. Planning for the worst isn't assuming that you will always want one bedrooms and that they will always be available.