DVC Question - Don't Understand

Hey guys! I want to go back to Disney so bad but I’m on a tight budget. I’m only 23 and am on a recent graduate budget lol. I see that people rent DVC points and get Disney resorts cheaper. Could someone explain this to me. I don’t really understand any of it. And how much cheaper is it usually? Or if there is an even better way of getting better prices on resorts besides DVC… Let me know! I want to go back so bad!!!

I’ve not done it myself, but I have been looking into it. You can rent through a site, like David’s, and can get the DVC properties for much cheaper than anything similar through Disney. I think it depends on what your goal is. I found that its still cheaper (although not by a ton) to stay at a value resort. However, you might get a very nice resort for not much more. (Ex: I looked at a random 6 nights in November and it was about $300 more to stay at AK Lodge Studio through David’s than rack room rate at AS Movies).

Hope that helps! Good luck!

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Renting DVC points is a good way to stay at Deluxe resorts at a discount. However, it is not the cheapest way to stay on site - the Value resorts will be far cheaper.

At any rate, this blog post has a lot of info on renting DVC points: Tips For Renting Disney Vacation Club Points | TouringPlans.com Blog

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Renting DVC points for a studio is often comparable to the price of a moderate. It’s a way to stay in a deluxe for less, it’s not the cheapest way to stay at Disney.

Keep in mind that if you happen to have hotels.com points or points/rewards/bucks from other travel booking sites, you can book a Disney room through them and get all the same perks, so that is another way to save on a Disney stay. Otherwise, look for Disney discounts for dates you might stay, and plan to visit off season (during the school year) for cheapest rates.

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If I had a group of 5 people I guess it would be cheaper to get a 1/2 bedroom that way and split it instead of getting two value resort rooms… right? How do you look up the prices.
Is it Davids Vacation Club or Disney Vacation Club?

It’s Disney Vacation Club, but the places you’d rent from are third-party vendors and they all have slightly different pricing. There are a few… I’ve used DVCRentalStore in the past.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that it will most definitely still be more expensive to get a 1br (which will have a king bed, a pull-out queen sofa bed and possibly a pull-out chair bed or murphy bed) than it would be to get a suite or 2 rooms at a value resort. All DVC resorts are deluxe level, and while renting points is cheaper than paying for them outright, its still more expensive.

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My experience for this year: I figure it was about $100 more a night to rent points at Bay Lake Tower than getting a suite at Art of Animation. For us, it still was a good deal because we got a washer & dryer in the room, a kitchen and the ability to walk to the Magic Kingdom. The washer/dryer and kitchen saved us on laundry costs and the kitchen saved on food costs…but the biggest benefit to us was walking to the Magic Kingdom and not waiting for a bus.

It all depends on what it’s worth to you.

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If you decide that renting DVC points isn’t the way to go, you could also look into using magicalvacationstravel.com
I read about them here and we decided to use them for our trip and I’m still amazed at how much they were able to save us

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I’m currently in the process of setting up a trip with the intention of using renting DVC points next September. I’m looking at doing Bay Lake Tower Park View and compared to staying in a similar room in the A-frame building, it definitely is cheaper, though certainly not the cheapest way to get back down there (as others have already said).

For some hard(ish) numbers…
For my trip, I need 164 points (going by the calculator over at DVCRentalStore.com DVC Points Calculator - DVC Rental Store). 164 points x $18.00/point = $2,952.00 would be the total if I would go this year (I’m told it will probably go up next year by $1 a point)

For the same stay at contemporary’s theme park view a-frame building booked through Disney : $4638.41 (room + tax) and that’s with the “15% enchanted escape room discount” they’re offering.

$2,952.00 ← DVC cost
$4638.41 ← Normal Disney cost (with currently running promotion)
--------------
$1686.41 ← Total Room Savings

So really, it’s not a huge savings, but it is fairly significant when comparing relative rooms.

Though, as others have mentioned, at a “value resort” you can stay at Disney way cheaper. For example, the exact same stay as above at All Star Movies (in a standard room) comes in at $789.07 total with the enchanted escape discount and tax.

Regarding the splitting of the room, the calculator would better help with that. Based on the parameters above, it would be cheaper to go with a value resort… BUT that is not the cheapest DVC option available. You can probably get something fairly close to 2 Value resort rooms. With just a quick look, looks like Board Walk standard room comes in at almost the same price.

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That’s 36% less than promotional rates… I’d call that a pretty big savings!

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Wow! Lots of information you all are giving me. Thank you all so much! Looks like I will have to do some research!

Is that a travel agency? How did they save you a lot?

MVT is a travel agent. My understanding is they reserve and pay for room blocks in advance which allows them to offer their clients an excellent rate for certain resorts at certain times of the year.

I hadn’t used MVT yet, but am hoping to use them for a 2018 trip…

That is correct. I’ve never used a travel agent before this trip but I decided to dive into the water on this trip. Basically the only difference is that payment for your trip and changes/cancellations must go through the travel agent. Your reservations show up on your MDE account, dining and fastpass is all done by you and can be changed easily by you, party tickets and memory maker can be purchased by you.

But yes, the way I understand it is that they purchase rooms using a group discount as most travel agents do but whereas most agents have the option to sell back unsold rooms to Disney, MVT purchases WITHOUT the option to sell back to Disney and therefore Disney gives them a bigger discount which is passed along to you.

I have yet to find a downside

Also, if they’d need 2 rooms at the value resort (5 people, so I’m guessing they mostly need bed space) then they’d need a 1 bedroom villa if the did a DVC rental… studios often sleep 5, but that’s a squeeze even if 1 or 2 are children because that would be a queen bed, a sofa bed, and either a chair bed or a small single murphy bed and only petite adults fit on those plus they’d only have one bathroom). That nearly doubles the amount of points needed per night.

For example… in September a weeknight in a 1BR park view at Bay Lake Tower would be 49 points per night, and a 1BR standard view at OKW/BW (they’re the same price) would be 30 points per weeknight still. At the regular rental rate of $17/point that’s $510/weeknight, when a value room runs around $125-165 (so $250-330/night for 2 rooms), and a value suite runs $300-400 per night.

If they were willing to squeeze into a 5-person studio (and OKW would be out, as their studios only sleep 4) then it would be $238/weeknight to rent the 14 points needed, and would be a better bet than 2 values or a 5-person moderate (space-wise… a 5 person moderate would be a little cheaper, but even more cramped) or 5-person deluxe (5 people fit more easily here, but it would cost significantly more) room.

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lol 80% or bust! heh I guess “huge” is a relative term a bit, I consider 50% or more to be in the realm of “big.” But yeah, I agree it’s certainly nothing to sneeze at.