Renting DVC points thru David's - has this happened to you?

Walt Disney World
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I had earlier today posted on the Chat app that I was going to spend an extra $3K to change from an AoA Cars suite to a 2 bedroom Grand Floridian villa.I was both super excited and sick to my stomach over the expensive decision. I had confirmation from Dave’s that the dates I wanted were available. It was not my first choice of dates so I had the option to get my small deposit back but I wrote back saying I was in. They then sent me this email:

“Your resort/room choice above is currently available in the Disney Vacation Club inventory of rooms. However, booking a DVC reservation through us is a two-part process. The availability of the resort/room is the 1st part and the 2nd part is that we also need a DVC Owner to reserve that resort/room for you. Currently, we do not have a DVC Owner on file that can book your reservation. According to DVC rules, because your dates are more than 7 months away, we will need a DVC Owner that owns at that resort._
Your OPTIONS are:
1. Wait in Queue - you can choose to have your reservation request put in the queue to wait until a DVC Owner joins our service that is able to book your stay. DVC Owners join every day and we have been very successful in booking reservations for guests that have chosen to wait, assuming the resort/room availability remains.
_2. Cancel Request - if you do not want to wait, you may choose to cancel your reservation request and we will issue a refund/void for your deposit.”

The purpose of posting this is to ask all you tremendously knowledgeable and helpful people if this has happened to any of you and did you “Wait in Queue” and end up getting the reservation? Dave’s has been incredibly responsive and I know they have an outstanding reputation. I guess I was caught off guard (didn’t read up enough on the process?) I agonized over spending the extra $3K and was so excited when I finally decided to go for it— and now I might not have it afterall.

What if a DVC owner never joins and/or availability disappears? And how long do I wait before I need to give up so I don’t lose out on other viable options? (And the uncertainty means I will have to wait to book airfare since the GF dates aren’t perfect - if I am not going to get the reservation, I would tweak the dates a bit.)
Has anyone had experience with this or have any suggestions? There were other DVC villas available but not my first choice (I am now really jones-ing for GF) and of course I am not sure if they would clear the 2nd step either…

[EDIT on 3/26/2019 - see my update below - got 5 nights via David’s!]

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No, I didn’t experience that. I got something like this:

Your choice of Animal Kingdom Villas (Kidani Village) Studio Standard View for the dates of May XX-XX, 2019 is currently available in the inventory of DVC rooms. Verifying room availability is step-1 of our process.

We are proceeding with step-2 which is to search for a Vacation Club Owner who is available to book this reservation for you. These accommodations are not 100% yet.

We aim for a 24-hour turnaround time and you should hear from us with either with the booking confirmation or an update on your request.

If we are successful in securing your stay, then… full payment is due within 24 hours of you receiving your confirmation number so that we can pay the DVC Owner for the use of their points.

If a DVC owner never joins or availability disappears, then you’re out of luck. How long until your trip, roughly, and are you trying for a standard view? Dave’s website indicates that you should book a standard view 2-bedroom at the GF eleven months out. I have very little experience with DVC, so take this with a grain of salt. If you’re close to when Dave’s site says you should book, I wouldn’t wait very long for Dave’s to come up with an owner. I’d either book a room for which they had an owner on hand, look for a different broker like DVC Rental Store, consider renting points directly from an owner (though that means finding someone reputable on your own), or book a normal room through a regular travel agent. Can they tell you the resorts of interest to you where they do have an owner on hand so that you don’t go through this a second time if you try for a different resort?

Here’s my logic. The Grand Floridian is pretty expensive point wise. I’d figure that someone who bought home resort points there is probably pretty affluent. I’m betting that they’re less likely to monetize their points by renting them. Not to say that it doesn’t happen, but I would expect it to less often. (Though I could be wrong.) I wouldn’t want to stake my vacation on the right point owner just happening to sign on with Dave’s.

I don’t know how often new owners approach Dave’s and how many tend to come from different resorts. I could be totally wrong, maybe there’s a decent chance of an owner coming along in the near future. Maybe another poster can shed some light on that.

The more I think about it, the more I think I’d check with DVC Rental Store to start with, though. I am not sure how far you can go before making a financial commitment, but I think it’s worth exploring.

Edited to add: If you want to track availability, you can check out this site.

Also, if one or two days at the beginning or end of your desired timeframe are not available, you could consider a split stay.

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I have been put in the queue twice so far when dealing with David’s the second time just 2 weeks ago. The first time it only took a couple of days and had no problem securing the reservation. The second time I waited over a week and still had not heard. As you said they cant guarantee that a room will be available when they finally get a DVC owner to join so I was getting nervous. I was looking for a studio which are the first to go in all the DVC resorts. I really wanted to stay at Boardwalk but was happy to switch to AKL. I stayed in the queue and sent in another request for AKL at the same time.

I ended up getting the room at AKL the same day then just emailed back after everything was payed for and asked to be taken out of the queue. Never had an issue getting a refund from Davids in situations like this. Turns out by switching to AKL instead of BW I was able to get 2 more nights for the same price.

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I was once queued for about 2 months. The reservation for a studio ended up coming through.

It’s just a gamble. The word really is out about renting DVC (and David’s is not the only place that does this). I think it will get more difficult, which is one of the reasons we ultimately decided to buy a contract last year. I don’t want the stress of the 2 part process.

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I think an added issue is that you are looking for a lot of specific points. I know some owners are looking around for the brokers offering the highest amount for their points.

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I rented through DVC Rental Store and I think it was similar to this (with one MAJOR difference). In my initial request I sent dates and preferred resort/rooms/whatever. I heard back that what I was looking for wasn’t available. I asked what WAS available and got a list of options. I did another request based on that list and had to give a small deposit. The person helping me explained that although there was DVC availability for when I was looking for the next step is posting my listing and waiting for an owner to “match up” to in order to move forward with the renting. I jumped on it right away thinking it would take a while (we were needing a 2-bedroom), but it only took a few days. It was at that time that I paid the larger deposit (I think it was half the cost). My hesitation with David’s was that you have to pay so much up front to find out anything while at DVC store you’re able to do half–this let me feel better about holding onto my original (through Disney) reservation at AoA suites until I knew for sure we had a DVC rental.

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Thanks everyone for the feedback. Just FYI - we all know that renting points is much cheaper than going directly through Disney, but I thought I’d call this morning for the heck of it.

My original first choice, Beach Club Villas, was bookable for the full week that I wanted (versus availability with Dave’s and DVC Rental was only 4 nights) and the cost was $8,693 . If there was 7 night availability on Dave’s, the price would be $5004. That is a pretty huge difference. I didn’t bother to ask her about GF Villas since I knew I couldn’t afford it.

So - moral of the story — renting DVC points is definitely a HUGE savings AND - this is a big eye opener for me — it seems Disney Reservations has additional availability for villas than what you see on the point rental sites. (Note - you have to call Disney, can’t use website to book {there were a few offerings on line but not the full availability.)

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Holly, with Dave’s, I only had to pay ~$110. That was it. And it’s refundable now. I did chose to stay in the “queue” and will give it about 2 weeks…
Interesting - I am looking to replace my AoA reservation too. Where are you or did you end up switching to?

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The inventory Disney CRO holds for DVC villas is completely separate from the inventory for members.

Disney hold around 3% of all points at each resort, plus they get any points that owners use to book things like cruises. Owners cannot book CRO inventory on points and Disney cannot pilfer from the owner inventory.

As for the difference in procedure between David’s and the Rental Store, that’s just down to their own preferences. I think David’s wants to be sure people are serious when making an enquiry, to avoid an owner responding to a matched request, only for the renter to back out. The Rental Store probably use a different method to try and attract more potential renters, but risk an owner responding only for the broker to have to tell them “sorry, they don’t want it”.

Both rely on owners to offer their points, and both depend on availability to be able to fulfill the demand. Demand from renters will always outstrip the supply of points going forward, now that word is out.

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I have considered Dave’s but found it was not a savings for I and my wife. On the other hand we have booked via Magical Vacations Travel twice and saved much more than using DVC points. I looked at buying DVC but cannot figure out how one figures they are coming out ahead. The initial investment plus upkeep charges come out to more than booking direct and the restrictions on booking are unbelievable. I can see DVC for a large family but then again the up front investment is a lot. I think many young families do not understand the costs and limitations.

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I used the other rental store and the resort booked up before an owner picked up my reservation. Bummer. But it all worked out because I found an owner to rent points from directly and we are going to try BLT for the first time in November. Not our first choice, but it will be new for us. Good luck with your reservation!

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Maybe it depends on where you’re staying. I’m staying at AKL in a studio for about the same cost as MVT charged for a regular POR room. For us, we can upgrade our lodging (nicer resort, better restaurants, better pool area, a private balcony/patio, a kitchenette, free parking) without paying more. Don’t get me wrong, I think MVT is great.

I think that points used to be a lot cheaper. Were you using Disney’s cost per point? I think that the price on resold points is significantly lower, too.

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I think this happens slot if you are more than 7 months out because they have to find an owner that actually owns at grand Floridian. I would probably wait in the queue until I reached the month mark which opens up to all DVC members

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That’s because Disney holds a percentage of rooms separate from what is held for DVC owners. Disney will not book you a room from those available points if they run out of bookings and you won’t be able to use Disney bookings to rent DVC. They are legally separate entities

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The problem is that the 7 month window has been looking very tight once Galaxy’s Edge opens so it may be challenging.

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Did I see on chat that you are getting close to being within the 7 month window? With the GF 2-bedrooms being so many points, I would imagine that they might have decent availability still. David’s should definitely have plenty of points he can use at 7 months. It should make it a little cheaper too!

One thing I do know is that if David’s has rentals like yours that he can’t secure, he regularly sends out emails and advertisements soliciting the points. So hopefully he will find someone!

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I booked at 11 mos with DVC Rental Store and it took me less than a week to get what I wanted (actually was my 2nd choice). I could have gone with a 1 BR at first choice, but decided it was more than I wanted to pay. This was ALL before SW:GE opening announced.

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Yes mecort10, my 7 month window will be a week from today so hopefully that will give me a better chance. However, I agree that SW will hurt our odds.

I will post an update once I get confirmation or when I give up.

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At today’s DVC prices I think this can certainly be true to an extent. We bought back i 2003 and added on in 2004 and 2007. So far our four contracts (600 points) have cost us $40,310, including the initial cost plus all annual fees. For that money we have had about 300 nights in 1 or 2 bedroom or Grand Villa accommodations (we don’t do studios). That works out at $135 per night, which is about the same as rack rate at the All-Stars resorts for our upcoming stay in early May. So, for us it’s definitely made sense financially. As for the booking restrictions, that’s never been an issue for us, but we were well aware of the terms when we purchased, and were happy that they suited the way we travel.

Our upcoming stay is two weeks in a 1 bedroom villa at the Beach Club. This is not one of our home resorts, but we had no problems booking it just under seven months out. Rack rate for the BCV 1BR in early May is just under $800 per night, which is absolutely insane (I doubt anyone actually pays that much). Next year we’re taking my family, and booking one 2BR and a studio. They’ll be paying us the equivalent of the maintenance fees for the points their accommodation uses up (two studios - we’ll be using the 1BR portion of the 2BR), which works out at around $1000 per studio for two weeks…

DVC isn’t for everyone, but it’s definitely been a great purchase for us. Our only regret is not buying in earlier. :slight_smile:

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I just looked the other day for 7 mos out and there was not much of ANY accommodation available anywhere. And very spotty - not a lot of back to back days. It was concerning. Like to the point I wondered if the site was having a MDE glitch