bcv and dvc resales

[ollie]

Hi chaps, advice please, just about to complete on 270 points @ ssr, whilst we are spending, would you advise getting resale points for the bcv? as epcot is our fave park and bcv wins best location award IMHO. How many points do you need to qualify to make bcv your "home"? Has anyone had a problem booking bcv just 7 months in advance for around sept or oct? Just the 2 of us, so we would like a quiet studio/room, any recommendations as to where to ask for (room numbers etc).

[Bob_and_Dawn]

To be honest Ian and Lynn, if we had the choice over again then we wuld have bought at the BCV and not at SSR.

Never tried booking for the September but could not get booked for October and December at the 7 months for BCV.

Bob

[Hal]

How many points do you need to qualify to make bcv your "home"? Has anyone had a problem booking bcv just 7 months in advance for around sept or oct?

Just to clarify that your home resort is the one where the points are located - so if you buy points for BCV, that will be your Home for those points. Just to elaborate, if say you bought 50 points at BCV, then BCV would be your Home for those 50 points so you could book those points at the 11-month window. If you wanted to use your SSR points to book BCV you would nneed to wait until the 7-month window to use those SSR points (you could of course use the SSR points for SSR at the 11-month window).

[scottfeltham]

hi weve been to the bcv the last two septembers.had no problems booking,even though it was 11 months in advance
but id say it was half empty
the first two weeks after labour day the pool area is not even 1/4 full
id say you have a very good chance of booking there
scott

[ollie]

thanks for the replies guys, broadband has been down locally til now so have been unable to view the dibb. Ok, interesting information here (what do i do mmm?). has anyone bought resales, any probs/pitfalls or recommendations? Its just clicked about home points(thanks Hal). 15% discount at the moment for ssr but we would not stay there too often by choice, so, any suggestions?

[Hal]

Ollie there's an extended thread on http://www.thedibb.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=68573 which covers a lot of this however here is an edited recap on my comments from that thread to a similar question:-

The cheapest way to get into DVC is through the secondary or resale market. I purchased this way last year based on the positive feedback from Dibb DVC members.

The Maths
If we assume that you want 270 points. If you buy this from Disney you will currently be paying say $83 a point (allowing for the 15% discount), but the process is easier.

If you were to buy in the secondary market you could get points for say $70, plus closing costs of say $5 per point - making $75 per point in total.

So...buying direct from Disney will cost you $8 a point more (depending on the resort) but is far more convenient. If you buy from resale you could buy a property other than SSR. The choice is yours.

Is it worth it?
The $70 resale price would include the brokers commission, so it is reasonable to assume that you could re-sell it for $60 (allowing for say $10 per point brokers commission).

In other words the "Goodwill" element or true cost of your DVC buying resale would be $15 x 270 or $4,050.00. (You would need to add on the interest cost of the total purchase price - if borrowed - or the opportunity cost, if using savings too.)

Seen like this it looks quite reasonable If something untoward were to happen in the future and you had to sell your DVC points, that $4,050 is the "loss" you would make. You probably lose more in depreciation on your car each year.

As new DVC points climb in price each year, the resale value of existing points should rise too - perhaps not as fast but its simple supply and demand. So, say over 5 years new DVC points climb $20.00 - it is quite probable that existing points would climb $10-$20 also, which would mean that when new points are for sale at $115.00, you might have recouped your "Goodwill" outlay and be able to sell your points at +/- what you paid for them. Seen like this you could recoup your investment in as little as 5 years.

At some future point in time when there are 25 years left to run on the initial DVC leases, you will have to start depreciating the value of your investment, but that's some time off. In the meantime just enjoy that quality accomodation and happy holidays.

So the cost of your DVC would be the upfront capital cost of the purchase say $60 a point, plus the Goodwill element $15-$24 a point depending upon whether you buy from Disney or from a re-seller, plus the ongoing annual service charge of say $4 a point (this varies between the resorts).

Which resort?
If it is as easy as Scott says to book into BCV at the 7-month window then the ideal solution would be to simply buy into the cheapest on-site DVC resort with the lowest maintenance, which is OKW. This would mean buying resale.

Old Key West is the cheapest of the on-site resorts to buy into. Disney is presently selling its newest resort, Saratoga Springs ("SSR"). SSR has a longer term than the other resorts but IMHO this is not much of an additional benefit.

If you are limited to going at specific times you should buy into the resort you want to stay at as owners at home resorts can book accommodation 11 months in advance - non home resort DVC members can book 7 months in advance (which means the dates you want may already be gone).

If you are not bothered about staying on-site at WDW but just want quality holiday accommodation I would heartily recommend Marriott Cypress Harbour, opposite Sea World, which is considerably cheaper.

[ollie]

Thanks Hal, loads of info here, i will look at the other threads as well but i think you have covered all my concerns. I will talk with Lynn later, but in the meantime i'll have a look at the resale sites. anybody got any other comments on resale companies and experiences Thank you once again, Ian