Disney Vacation Club Sales Slump
There have been a lot of interesting Disney Vacation Club developments in the last couple of months impacting both the direct and resale markets, which we think are interesting for current and prospective members. This post runs down the news, with thoughts on buying, selling, and more.
The most recent news is that Walt Disney World is resuming Annual Pass sales later this month. With that, eligible Disney Vacation Club Members will have the opportunity to purchase the DVC Disney Sorcerer Pass online beginning April 13, 2023 as part of their Membership Magic benefits.
To purchase the Disney Sorcerer Annual Pass, DVC Members must be eligible for Membership Extras. To be eligible for Membership Extra, you must be a “blue card” Disney Vacation Club member, meaning that you purchased directly from Disney or bought before the resale restrictions were implemented back in April 2016. This may seem totally unrelated to a post about the DVC sales slump, but it most definitely is not.
Within minutes of this news breaking, Bill Diercksen, the SVP of Disney Vacation Club, sent out an email to members informing them of the welcome update. That email also included the following line, which was not in the public announcement: “The DVC Disney Sorcerer Pass is expected to be on sale more often throughout the year, even when the pass is not broadly available for sale to Florida Residents.”
In addition to this, many members reported that their DVC Guides actually called to inform them of the announcement. This is unsurprising, as the lack of AP sales had been a sore subject among members, and was a heated topic during last year’s annual Condominium Association Meeting.
The impression from DVC leadership was that they had been pushing for Annual Passes to return, but that their hands were tied. It certainly makes sense that Disney Vacation Club would want members to be able to purchase passes; that’s a very big benefit of membership.
It’s also a selling point for DVC. Without the ability of prospective buyers to purchase APs, they were undoubtedly losing sales. The lack of Annual Passes was also almost certainly a contributing factor in tipping the scales in favor of some existing members selling their contracts.
Honestly, it amazes me that Walt Disney World didn’t leave an option for DVC Annual Pass sales all along. The company could have turned the sales pause into a selling point to push people towards Disney Vacation Club, one of the parks division’s cash cows and best ongoing revenue streams. Instead, it became a way to alienate existing members.
That’s why I suspect there’s a distinction being drawn between the DVC Disney Sorcerer Pass and the standard Sorcerer Pass, with the latter able to sell out and the former on sale “more often throughout the year.” Better late than never, I guess. (It’s also possible the reservation allocation or pass perks differ, but I highly doubt it.)
To that point, there are already reports on social media and in forums of previously-disillusioned members pulling their listings from the resale market. This is entirely anecdotal, but it appears to be surprisingly widespread. The various DVC forums have really come alive at the news of Annual Pass sales resuming, with the reaction being overwhelmingly positive. (The negative is mostly from people who just returned from their trips and bought multi-day tickets. Understandable that they’d be upset–I would, too.)
I wish I had the foresight to look at the number of listings on the major resale sites yesterday morning when the news first broke so I could corroborate or disprove those reports. Regardless, I’ve done so today, so if there is a meaningful shift one way or the other in the next couple of weeks, I’ll follow up on this.
Speaking of the Disney Vacation Club market, it has been not-so-hot over the course of the last year or so. Year over year, direct sales volume is down over 25%, with actual drops being even sharper than that during some recent months. The explanations for this are likely multifaceted, including higher baselines coming out of the pandemic when pent-up demand was high and people were putting stimulus money towards DVC contracts.
The new resort smell has also worn off Grand Floridian and Riviera to some extent, and other potential purchasers are likely in a holding pattern waiting for the Disneyland Hotel and Poly towers.
With that said, DVC direct sales volume is weak in absolute numbers, not just relative ones or percentage declines. Per DVCNews, the average monthly volume thus far in 2023 is about 100,000 points, which is only slightly better than the worst months of the pandemic and on par with the decade low levels before that. To put that into better historical context, in the 12 months prior to the launch of Disney’s Riviera Resort (in 2018-2019), average volume was just above 170,000 points per month.
It’s a similar story on the resale market. There has been an influx of inventory, with an increased number of listings among the various sellers. Data from DVC Resale Market shows that the average resale prices have declined for 11 consecutive months, now at $127 per point. That’s a 17% decrease from their peak last April. Specific data from other sellers is unknown, but it likely follows suit as the once-frothy market enters an apparent correction.
This is likely being driven by Disney not exercising its right of first refusal over the past six months. For those unfamiliar with the term, right of first refusal (ROFR) is the option Disney Vacation Club has to step into the shoes of the buyer and purchase the property themselves at the terms agreed upon by the seller and original buyer. Disney can elect to purchase (or not) during a review of every pending DVC transaction.
Among many other things, ROFR sets a price floor for the resale market. In a way, it’s an artificial distortion–prices are manipulated by the mere threat of ROFR as prospective buyers who don’t want to lose out to the dreaded ROFR beast. This is part of why, in the past, Disney has exercised ROFR even at times when direct sales were anemic.
ROFR provides a price backstop and stabilizes the resale market, sending a message to potential buyers and sellers that transactions will actually be scrutinized. This has value to Disney (nothing the company does is benevolent), as a chasm between direct and resale prices pushes informed buyers towards the latter. With few exceptions, Disney has largely declined to exercise ROFR since last September.
Another, presumably related, measure that Disney Vacation Club has taken is lowering its minimum purchase to 100 points. It’s likely that this is a matter of incentivizing demand in the face of rising per-point costs and reducing sticker-shock at the total contract price. That’s one way to attempt to reverse lackluster sales numbers; the other is offering better incentives or decreasing prices.
This is the first time in recent memory that the threshold has decreased, and follows several years of incremental increases. The last time the requirement was only 100 points was back in September 2019. Since then, successive changes nudged it to 150 points. Unfortunately, the requirement is still 150 points in order to qualify for Membership Extras (for now). So anyone wanting to purchase one of the DVC Sorcerer Passes will still need to purchase at least 150 points.
Whether to take the plunge now or wait is a good question, and likely one that’s on the mind of many Walt Disney World fans and prospective Disney Vacation Club buyers. The most sage piece of wisdom that can be imparted here is that you can’t time the market. That applies equally to stocks and DVC memberships. It should also be noted that the “you” who can’t time the market includes me, as much as I might like to think otherwise.
It’s entirely possible that the return of Annual Passes will cause more previously-jaded members to pull their resale listings, resulting in less supply and shifting the scales in favor of remaining buyers. In other words, the resumption of AP sales could be a pivotal moment; a turning point for the DVC market.
Personally, I’m skeptical that this is as big of a factor as it’s being made out to be. I don’t deny that some owners were pushed to sell by the AP issue, but I can’t imagine that was the sole cause for many. Rather, I suspect there’s a bit of selection bias at play among the very vocal minority of DVC members who are active online. Who knows, though.
The bigger factors are undoubtedly Disney’s exercise of ROFR, consumer confidence, household balance sheets, monetary policy, and the economy as a whole. Where all of these things are headed is an open question. As noted above, right of first refusal helps to set a price floor, without which market participants would naturally find one themselves.
It thus stands to reason that the absence of ROFR would lead to a continued downtrend in prices until that level is reached. In essence, the last ~6 months have been a still-ongoing price discovery process for the Disney Vacation Club resale market without ROFR to set that standard. If Disney were to flip a switch and start getting aggressive with ROFR once again, price trends would likely reverse in a hurry as there would, essentially, be an instant reset to the baseline.
While it might be the single most identifiable factor, ROFR is likely a symptom of a larger cause rather than one onto itself. Credit card debt has been climbing for close to two years at a record growth rate, according to Federal Reserve data. Servicing this debt is also becoming increasingly expensive due to interest rate hikes and depleted household savings levels.
This plus inflation on necessities should eventually result in reductions to discretionary spending. Meanwhile, consumer confidence and sentiment remain surprisingly resilient, suggesting most Americans are shrugging off higher prices and headlines about layoffs.
Then there’s the question of a recession. It’s been difficult to make it through a viewing of the evening news without hearing of a supposedly-looming recession for much of the last year, and yet, nothing. A majority of economists are still forecasting a recession later this year, but it could be mild. During past recessions, consumers first reduced their expenditures on nonessentials and luxury goods.
As much as fans might view Walt Disney World as “essential,” timeshares fall squarely into this category. As an anecdotal point, we bought into Disney Vacation Club during the peak of the Great Recession, and that was the lowest price we’ve ever seen DVC. (Disney Vacation Club contracts expire, and should decline in value. Ours appreciated tremendously in the decade that followed and the value remains higher today than it was almost 15 years ago.)
All of that is a long-winded way of saying who knows what’ll happen with the DVC market. In my view, the linchpin is ROFR, but even that does not exist in a vacuum. If Disney started exercising its right of first refusal tomorrow, average resale prices would look very different in a matter of weeks.
Of course, for that to happen, the company would want to take on more DVC inventory that they’d have to sell themselves, all while Aulani, Riviera, and Grand Floridian are all still available. It would also happen as towers at Disneyland Hotel and the Polynesian are coming soon, and bringing more inventory online.
Disney would also have to exercise ROFR while there’s significant economic uncertainty in the air, and the future is unclear. Personally, I think that would be a pretty bold bet to make…but I also would not bet against it. While I think a sudden shift is highly unlikely, Disney has resumed exercising ROFR in the past at uncertain moments like this, wanting to protect the market and the perception of Disney Vacation Club as a premium product unlike other timeshares.
While we’re potentially in the market to buy more DVC points, that has been the case for us for years. We have a target price in mind, and if it doesn’t reach that, so be it. We’re on the opportunistic side, and don’t have a pressing need for more points. If our circumstances differed and we had a greater sense of urgency, I’d probably be watching the ROFR thread on the Disboards and firing out offers on the basis of what’s currently competitive. I suspect it might take a few tries before achieving success, as stubborn sellers might expect to still get circa April 2022 prices for their listings, rather than April 2023 rates. To each their own, though.
Finally, it’s worth noting that even with prices entering a correction, joining DVC still does not make sense for everyone. Prices are still historically high and whether Disney Vacation Club is right depends upon your personal circumstances and financials. Always be sure to do the math, and never finance DVC. To that end, if you’re considering joining DVC and want more guidance, be sure to read our Ultimate Guide to Disney Vacation Club.
That guide covers the pros & cons, resale v. direct, how much money you’ll save, and other important things to know before taking the plunge. If you still can’t decide whether membership is right for you, “try before you buy” with the recommendations in How to Save BIG on Deluxe Disney Accommodations Renting DVC Points.
YOUR THOUGHTS
Do you plan on purchasing Disney Vacation Club points in the near future? Think the current prices are as good as it’ll get, or will you hold off for something better? Think DVC will offer more aggressive discounts? Expect Disney Vacation Club to resume ROFR soon to stabilize the market, or think that would increases their inventory too much with Disneyland Hotel and the Poly tower coming online soon-ish? Any other reasons you would or would not purchase right now? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? If you’re an existing Member, what do you think? Share any questions, tips, or additional thoughts you have in the comments!
I’d never lock myself into Disney with DVC. They can, will, and have changed the rules to their advantage once they have your money. I go in, get my Disney fix, and get out.
I was intetested in joining about 7 years ago, the buy in was less than $15K. But I wanted to wait to pay off my car and had just bought a house. the by in since has jumped up so much in such little time that I am sure thst alone, above point prices or maintenance fees, has scared most of prospective members away.
Right now I see 2,189 listing on https://dvc.market/listing/
When I bought my resale BWV contract a year ago there were between 800-900 listings. A few months later ther were 1,400 and then it went back down to around 1,000 for a few months. I think it was the Fall that the numer of listings really started to increase. The high was a couple months ago at almost 2,500. It has tranding down in the last couple of months. No ROFR started about September for most properties.
I paid $130 per point and now I’m seeing reports on DISboards of around $110 per point. Timing is everthing LOL
Always enjoy your attention to detail…. Would love to see more dvc articles….
When the sale of AP stopped I decided it was time to sell. Owning 700 points and paying $6000 a year in annual dues it would have been unreasonable to buy tickets for each trip. Still having my AP but not wanting to renew for months I wouldn’t be using it, decided to rent out my points. When the announcement came that sales were starting again I
Pulled my points from reservation renting. I’ve loved being a DVC member for 15 years. But without the AP I’m done. I bought DVC for Disney World and all it has to offer.
Another factor affecting DVC sales is that third party travel agents are able to rent DVC villas 24 months in advance, and this is why many DVC owners find out that all of the select villas are not available even at the eleven month window. This is contrary to the DVC contract and should not be allowed. The seven month window is a joke.
Renting out DVC points should not be allowed.
Travel agents would sell DVC from the cash inventory (unsold points, exchanges, and breakage) which would not affect availability from members.
The cost of DVC membership has gotten out of hand in recent years. Soaring prices, rude sales folk, lessened and/restricted access has placed them out of reach for many young families. These high pricing is a problem that colors my decision to not buy more points at this time. We were looking to add another 150-200 points, but at $+200/point, the benefits just don’t outweigh the high costs.
Now, more to the point at hand. DVC ownership now has split levels of benefits. First- direct sales which provide all the bennies offered, and then the aftermarket sales, which have greatly reduced benefits. Understandable I guess but really not fair for the mere distinction of ownership. I’ll explain more on this later in this discussion.
I have a friend who bought aftermarket points after becoming disgusted with his description of obnoxious sales staff. They wanted points at a certain resort but it were told it was sold out, time after time, and much higher priced resorts were being pushed instead. But after a few similar annual meetings with sales, he gave up. Another friend mentioned aftermarket sales, and lo and behold, that desired resort was available in many package sizes and at about 1/2 of current direct sales pricing, and all with the same expiration date. He bought and his family ( 2 little kids) are now enjoying their purchase and making more frequent trips to WDW because of it. Now this type of ownership is clearly looked down upon by DVC, and especially so by a few of the DVC sales staff. Strange really, as the aftermarket packages bought will be actively used, families will enjoy the parks, spend their money and hopefully raise up a new generation of Disney fans. But these folks are now treated as 2nd class citizens when benefits are considered. Sad? Unfair? Poor customer care? A little portion of each I think. Really, no one’s a loser here as the aftermarket owners have a nice vacation option for the next 40 years, Disney was paid in full up front by the original owners- who in this case had to sell due to family problems. Also, Disney gets a very happy new owner who pays annual dues on time and without hesitation. I see no downside to this, except the loss of possible commission for direct sales which could have been avoided if the ROFR had been invoked, but wasn’t . Additionally, I see no difference in succession of ownership between aftermarket purchases vs.!inheritance of existing DVC package. And more likely, the inherited package will most likely be sold anyway – hardship, not usable enough to make it worthwhile or put out for rentals. But the treatment of the owners will be different based on this method of ownership.
My friend is happy with his purchase despite the reduced benefits. But I feel that they should have at least some of the benefits we direct sales purchasers have. We both are owners, we use our memberships regularly, but they are excluded from opportunities that we have (and our purchase prices are about the same based on the earlier purchase I made.
what’s ironic is most resale brokers are former DVC guides. so it make more for sense for them too lol
I also think that a strong resale market makes the purchase of direct points more reasonable. Knowing that I can buy points direct and then sell the excess off down the line makes the investment feel less daunting. If Disney continues to make point resale unappealing, then my worry is that I will be saddled with a fully depreciated asset.
but if you have a direct sale membership, You can always add on with resale contracts. as long as they are titled exactly the same as your direct sale membership, it’s the same membership. And you will get benefits. That’s how most DVC members expand their portfolio.
I have 3 memberships and multiple contracts between them. One membership is titled with all of my siblings. The other membership was titled with just my father. now the third membership I screwed up. I thought I would add it to my second membership but it was after my father was deceased and I had not removed his name from the contracts. So it generated a third membership. And that one does not have benefits. however I have resale points on the other two memberships and they all count for benefits.
I agree that the direct sale prices have been incredibly inflated for the last 10 years. they priced me out of the market. I also do not like the restrictions they put on the newer resorts. they have completely crippled resales of Riviera contracts. resold Riviera contracts cannot be used to book other resorts. So unless you are a huge fan of Riviera and want to stay there every trip, you are SOL
I know this isn’t a sales pitch post, but if you are paying $88 per month currently in maintenance fees (over $1,000 per year), which is equivalent to 3-4 nights at onsite or a good offsite hotel….and this doesn’t include your 5k per year in payments, unless you bought these points at huge discounts, I can’t see this ever making financial sense for anyone…..and that isn’t even including the decrease in flexibility of your vacations.
My thoughs exactly. I will never understand how people justify the cost, lack of flexibility in vacation planning, and dealing with rule changes/ price changes / availability issues / various frustrations that pop up. Maybe it’s just the satisfaction of belonging to a club. Seems a lot easier to just book a hotel and go play!
I pay roughly $2,500 a year in maintenance fees for baylake Tower. with that i book a 14-day stay in October in a one bedroom Villa. If I were to rent that room it would cost me $1,066 plus tax a night. So the entire trip would cost me around $15,000.
My points were purchased resale outright. No financing. it was just an investment from some savings into something else.
So as you can see I save $12,500 every year I book my vacation. And I have the option to not take the vacation but instead rent out my points. The current going rate for renting points is $18/pt. That wouldn’t get me $6,120 in rent. minus the maintenance fees and I have $3,600 to invest, save or use for another vacation elsewhere.
do you see the math?
timeshare should never be purchased with a mortgage. it is an investment in either reducing vacation costs and future or possibly generating income through rent. Disney is one of the few timeshares that actually retains its worth over time and can generate rental income on a reliable basis.
I do think the lack of annual pass sales over the last 2 years has had a chilling effect on the DVC community and market. It’s one thing to save money on hotels, but it’s an entirely different thing if you then have to fork over more just to visit the entertainment venue they’re next to. frankly there are many more places to vacation in the timeshare world. And a lot of DVC members discovered that in the last 2 years.
what Disney should do is offer more discounts for tickets. allow DVC members to purchase all four levels of annual passes they offer to Florida residents. allow DVC members to purchase passes on a monthly payment plan. Universal and SeaWorld offer that. DVC members are the most lucrative market for Disney. Not only do they finance the building of new hotels they also pay for its maintenance. there has been a big debate in the DVC community about how well the company values them. And over the last two years, it is not felt like Disney cared anything about it DVC members.
Brogan – thanks for the info. Do you mind sharing how much you spent when you brought the points to get you the 2 weeks for the villa?
Not sure you and I out seeing the same math. I am looking at the Poly. With discounts I can get a room for $550 per night. With $1,000 in maintenance fees that is about 125 point which is more than 6 nights if I stay the same week I am looking. So $3,300 dollars vs $1,000. That’s a savings of 2,300 per year. Paying full price of current listings it will take 8 years of savings to fully pay the contract. If you go for the next 20 years you are saving over $25,000 in lodging expenses. There is math that works.
Grant – You are not looking at the same inventory that I am. what’s you’re trying to compare is a hotel room at the Polynesian which is just a bed and a bathroom compared to a one-bedroom apartment at Bay Lake Tower. Polynesian DVC villas have no one bedroom apartments. they only have studios. which include a bedroom, a bathroom and a kitchenette. they use a total of 264 points to stay the last week of September and the First week of October. My stay is 14 days.
If I were to book it at Polynesian DVC, I would pay a minimum of $2984 in rental fees (18/pt) to a DVC owner or $2098 in maintenance fees as a DVC owner. most likely no owner is going to rent to you for anything less than $20 per point. maybe even 22.
however if you were going to rent the same room direct from Disney, it would cost you $14,155+ tax for the same room over the same period of time.
do you understand the difference?
Brogan – but didn’t you have to spent $$ for those points? So you are paying the 2k or whatever you are paying in maintenance fees AND whatever dollars you spent buying into the DCV?
GoodLee,
Yes I had to purchase those points. I did so from some savings I had at the time. it cost me around $100 per point for 360 points. currently if I were to resell those points I would net $150 per point on the resale market. So I consider this just another form of investment. unlike any other timeshare, I know this one retains its value. So for 20 years I can use it and have access to reduced priced vacations at Disney and then recoup all of my money with a bit of interest when I resell them.
A lot smarter people than me have crunched the numbers and found that when you purchase DVC your break even point is around 10 years of ownership. After that, You are paying less for your vacations then you would have if you paid cash all that time. And that’s including the purchase price.
DVC resorts are leased for 50 years. It’s estimated that they will retain their value for at least 35 to 40 years. That’s when you’ll be able to resell them at a higher price than you bought them and be able to recoup your sale price.
by the time my ownership gets to that point I will be in my ’80s. given my health I probably won’t be traveling then. I might not even be alive. in that case my ownership will pass to my heirs and they can decide what to do with it. it won’t be an out-of-pocket expense for them. just a reduced rate for a stay at the expense of the maintenance fees every year. or they could decide to sell the contracts and convert them to cash.
I would do worse if I put that money in a CD and let it just sit in the bank getting a tiny bit of interest every year. interested I will pay taxes on by the way. I may be able to do better by investing in a mutual fund, or I can lose my shirt as many have over the last year. (Don’t even get me started on my investments. let’s just say I hate the current administration and their economic policies. they put me back about 5 years in my savings goal. another subject for another time.)
Most things Disney related hardly make “financial sense” IMO. There is the nostalgia/emotional component that is hard to quantify though. I pay around $1400 a year in maintenance fees for my AK points. We are a family of 6, so we use those points to get 2 bedroom villas so we have plenty of room while we are there. For the most part, those run at least $1k per night if you were going to pay cash. So if you go 3 nights per year on average, you are “saving” about 2k per year. I put saving in quotation marks as you can obviously stay elsewhere for cheaper if you really wanted to cut costs. But if you enjoy staying at Deluxe resorts and value the extra space the 2 bedroom provides when compare to a Family Suite at AoA for example (and we do), it is “worth it” to us. I could sell my DVC points today for more than I paid for them in 2017, so I would make my money back and then some. So I dont really factor in my purchase price into my equation.
Brody – thanks for the information, that definitely makes more sense from an economic point of view. Because of the flexibility challenges and also because I have a crapload of Hilton points, it’s likely never going to make sense for us to join DCV, although we might splurge one time and stay at a resort.
GoofLee, I also have a large investment in Marriott vacation Club. points and legacy weeks. My parents started buying them in the early 2000s and then I joined in with them. I’m the one who decided to add DVC to the mix mostly so that we could have the easy transportation to the resort without needing a car and have the easy transportation to the parks with the buses.
at least once a year I spend a combined with trip at Disney and Marriott. there’s a very nice one over by SeaWorld that I love to visit. So I’m in town for a month. 2 weeks of Disney and 2 weeks at Marriott. I get to enjoy all of Disney as well as SeaWorld and Universal. And I bring my car with me.
but my Marriott timeshares allow me to go other places. I’ve been to Hilton Head, London, Williamsburg, Atlantic City. And my family has been to Utah, San Francisco, Marco Islands, etc.
in my family, my father and I built a large vacation portfolio of timeshare so that we could share it with our extended family. My siblings and my nieces and nephews. It’s an opportunity for us to take a trip together and reconnect. something that’s very precious to me now that the children have grown up and gone their own way.
at first I did not want to do DVC because it was much more expensive than Marriott. The two things that swayed me was having the bus transportation to the parks so that our groups could split up and no one was limited to a vehicle. You do not realize how important that is until you are off site with your family and have only one vehicle.
The second thing was that annual pass discount. It’s something that I’ve taken advantage of ever since I’ve been a DVC owner. frankly without it I would not be going to Disney.
The thing that I find outrageous is people paying $15,000 to spend a week at one of the deluxe resorts in just a little studio hotel room. I have friends who’ve done that and I think they’re insane. for that amount of money you can go on a luxurious cruise and be catered to like a king.
Tom — What’s you take on when the 2042 resorts resale pricing will collapse? I have been perusing the resale sites and am amazed that BC and BW have kept their value despite termination in less than 20 years. Thee math just doesn’t work to recoup your “investment” buying resale as there is not enough run time left. What am I missing?
I’ve been expecting a drop in those contracts for a while, especially now that they have under 20 years remaining. My only guess is that the *rental* market is propping them up, as they’re still advantageous to own from an “investment” perspective if you’re simply renting out the points.
Personally, I wouldn’t purchase one of the 2042 resorts, but to each their own.
I bought at Boardwalk last year and had no problem with the 2042 end date because I’m 59. So I’m just hoping I can still make it around WDW in 2041!
I agree that the rental market is helping pop up BCB and BWV ownership. I own 100 BWV points. I bought them resale before 2012 and they were grandfathered in to the benefits program. now I’ve been sitting on them debating when to sell them. what stops me is that I can make a good rental price on them and frankly they’re in a great location. My sister and I love staying there for food and wine festival. but eventually I probably will sell them. And if I do so I want to get the best rate so that I can turn around and buy a resort with a longer lease.
what we don’t know is if Disney will offer a contract extension like they did to OKW.
Tom, in your opinion, how often should one vacation at WDW to justify buying into vacation club?
In general, I’d recommend checking out our DVC buying guide for stuff like this: https://www.disneytouristblog.com/disney-vacation-club-reviews/
You can make it work if you only visit once every 3 years, but annually is ideal.
1 — Those active in online forums are the most passionate and knowledgeable DVC owners. I don’t think most buyers really take the AP into consideration at the time of their initial purchase. If anything, as DVC owners add more points and increase the frequency of their trips to multiple times per year, that’s when they want that AP perk. (It definitely may therefore be a force in encouraging existing owners to add more points).
2 — The reduction to the 100 point minimum is much more being done to juice sales. It really reduces the “starting at” buy-in price significantly.
3 — To me, while there are various factors at play, a big factor is saturation. Given that a DVC contract lasts decades, it really isn’t a disposable product. At some point, you basically run out of a market. There will be a massive market of buyers in 2042 when contracts finally expire. But right now, no contract is expiring for another 19 years… You have Grand Floridian, Riviera and Aulani all in “active” sales.. you have people waiting on Villas at the Disney Hotel and Polynesian to go active in the next year.
For 200,000 points per month — you need over 1,200 buyers per month… over 15,000 buyers per year. Now, 15,000 per year may sound small relative to the 50 million guests Disney gets per year. But now, out of Disney’s 50 million annual guests, eliminate all 1-time and infrequent guests… You’re selling to only those that want to take frequent trips for decades and that can afford it.. eventually you run out of people to sell too. (and while there is a market for existing owners adding more points, you can only go so often into that well). Put another way, a Disney enthusiast who books a cash room in 2023 may book another cash room in 2024.. 2025, etc. But someone spending $40,000 on a DVC contract in 2023 is unlikely to keep buying additional $40,000 contracts every year.
Mostly agree and agree with your first two points.
The third one is very interesting, and something I remember reading in 2008…2012…2015…
Heck, I remember this being one of the big arguments in favor of the first “Moderate” DVC Resort, when that tower was rumored for the other side of CBR (across from the Pirate rooms). Eventually, it will be correct and DVC will need to find a new way to expand its audience. Maybe then we’ll actually see that Moderate DVC actually come to fruition. For now, that’s one of those things that I’ll believe when I see. Not because I doubt your analysis–it is sound–but because we’ve been here before and DVC defied those predictions.
Good article and some very good comments.
Also remember the greatly increasing annual dues AND the number of venues that
no longer offer the DVC discount (or just honor it for lunch and not for dinner – surprise, surprise, surprise!!!). We enjoy our points and enjoy using them for cruising but feel that we are being ‘pushed’ out of the market for additional points.
The reduction of where and how much DVCs get a discount, even APs, irks me. From restaurants to merch it should be 20%.
We bought into DVC in 1998 and have always enjoyed our time there with the children and now the grandchildren. We have not been since the pandemic and are planning a trip in November. I am actually dreading it. The need for “reservations” the cost of the tickets, the inability to park hop and the cost of Genie Plus have taken all the joy and fun out of Disney for me. We will most likely not return after this trip, instead using our points to cruise or visit Hilton Head which is my husband and my preferred “resort”.
Out of curiosity, what’s the origin of the sales figures cited in your post?
DVCNews.com, which is (to my knowledge) the only resource that reports those volume numbers. I’ve added the links to the relevant paragraph of the post–sorry for the oversight!
anyone buying direct instead of resale at this point either has enough money to not be bothered with the hassle of resale or is bad at math and in desperate need of a calculator. Disney’s direct pricing is way out of proportion to resale even for the incentivized resorts.
I am a DVC member currently on a Disney cruise and at one of the member events on board they announced 40% (!!) off Animal Kingdom points if we purchased on board— I think it required a substantial point volume though. Still, I haven’t seen anything that dramatic direct from Disney before. They tried to sell me 20 year remaining BCV at $250 only a few months ago on the Wonder.
One problem you didn’t mention is, in my opinion, that DVC is badly oversold. Getting a reservation at the resort of your choice is more difficult every year. Again, in my opinion, Disney needs to build some additional DVC rooms and NOT sell them in order to rectify this. Or, another solution is to possibly further curtail cash sales of DVC rooms. My DVC family participants have approximately 5000 combined DVC points. It’d be nice to be able to use them for the resorts we like without having to plan almost a year in advance. To us, this amount of planning and juggling takes away much of the desirability of DVC. Interestingly enough, as I travel a lot, I have elite status with lots of hotel chains, and I have never had a problem booking a last minute “points” room right outside of Disney Springs. IMO, anyone buying into DVC right now is making a mistake.
It’s not actually possible for DVC to be oversold.
What you are likely experiencing is that the resorts and room types you want to book have high demand and I’d expect that you aren’t booking in your home resort window. If you have every DVC member trying to get studios at GF, there aren’t enough to accommodate everyone.
Also it was made pretty clear to us when we purchased the DVC isn’t really for people who want to book “last minute” or even with a normal vacation planning window, you need to think 8-12 months ahead.
Except that we book a minimum one bedroom and one used to be able to book much closer to the vavstoon dates. We also have 7 “home resorts”. Been members sinc DVC started.
My DVC Guide (bought direct), who is awesome anyway, called me within 5 minutes of the announcement of new APs. We have APs but have been longing to upgrade and she knows it. I have also mentioned that the blackouts dates for our APs doesn’t make it attractive for us to buy more points. She of course wants us to buy more points so she has been calling member services for us to try to secure that.
Coincidentally, DVC is running a sale right now on direct AK, Floridan and Polynesian without financing for over 100 points, but only $7-12 off which ends May 1 (they want me to buy more points and I have a hard time saying no) the thing with that is that these resorts “sold out” years ago for their 1st offering so I am assuming these are foreclosure points available or first right of refusal take backs?
I think the tide is shifting and Disney knows it. Covid money is running out, fewer people using Disney Vacation Planner to spread out their $15k annual family vacay in no-credit check monthly installments. Yes people are still there now, but they booked months ago……future bookings maybe looking a little slim.
Do you think Disney will ever lower the prices on DVC to the existing DVC owners? I want to for an extension or an added contract?
Always appreciate your take on DVC, Tom. We aren’t the target audience for DVC (only go to WDW once every 4-6 years because there are so many other places we want to spend our money…like all the places on travelcaffeine), but I enjoy learning about this other approach to WDW. Many other sources seem, typically, all-in on DVC. I appreciate your even-handed approach.
We were going to buy but then they did that terms change with Riveria and absolutely have not, will not. It was an absolute deal breaker for us. Disney is crazy for that.
Yeah, I wouldn’t buy at Riviera unless the price were right…and that’s not even close to being the case (and probably never will be). To each their own, though!
OTOH, Riveria at $125/point resale — purchasing just enough points for the intended vacations — may reflect and adequate discount given the resale constraints. YMMV
I’m with you on not wanting to buy Riviera. I do not like the exclusions Disney put in the contracts. And frankly Disney lost me years ago when they jacked up their prices for direct sales. I only buy resale now. I already have two memberships that were grandfathered in for all the perks. So I just add on to those memberships.
Riviera looks to be a beautiful resort. And someday I may stay there for a few days. but right now I say it’s Saratoga Springs in the spring, Bay Lake in the fall, and I squeeze in a trip at Boardwalk for December. those resorts make me happy. mostly because I get to take my family with me. And we had a lot of Disney lovers in our family. It’s one reason why we’re very glad the annual pass sales are open again. More family want to buy them.