Making a trip in two weeks. Have airfare and tickets. Have previously looked into DVC twice before. Backed out once, did nothing the other time. Now, looking into buying Riviera, but disappointed the points can't be used now for this trip in another DVC resort!! Doesn't seem right. I can buy Aulani at same price as Riviera, or something even cheaper $/pp, and be able to use the points right away. But I don't think I want my home resort to be in Hawaii. Does home resort really matter? I always plan my vacations about 3 months out. Any thoughts?
DVC is not for you, its that simple.
If you understand the system the fact that you can not use your Riviera points right now makes total sense.
You are exchanging your stay at Riviera with someone else to stay at the resort at which they own. Great. You take my stay for a week in mid September, and Ill take your stay at the Riviera for the same week. You go to my home resort, check in and have a blast. I go to your home resort and sleep on the road because its not open yet.
If your vacation patterns are such that you always book three months out you will be disappointed with DVC.
I would venture to say that a good percentage of people selling their contracts on the resale market did not 'INTEND to sell'
If you really love the poly that is where you should be buying. You can add on 75 points direct either there or possibly at another resort
Thank you for the feedback. Yes, we are doing Annual Gold passes, as our 8 night trip in less than two weeks has us already paying over half the price in tickets alone. You make excellent points. I don't have to buy at Riviera, in fact our favorite resort is the Polynesian (it's where my husband proposed 20 yrs ago, so more of an emotional attachment than anything), but you can't beat the price of Riviera now at 188pp, with the extra incentive offer, vs 235pp if we were to go with points at Polynesian. And we can get 270 points (paying for 250) vs only 200 at Poly. Of course we considered buying Aulani for the same price, as well as the incentive offer that is still out there I think. But as I peruse the boards here, I see that many people combine or buy more resale points later. Maybe that's an option, too? And now, I see that maybe we should just buy SS for dollar value too. AND i can use my points now!
What do you mean by use your points now? Are you referring to the Riviera again? or Direct Vs. Resale? If you are talking about resale, yes, its a month or two before you can use them, vs direct. If you are talking Riviera, you can use those points now, you just can not book a stay until after Dec 16th. If you think you can buy direct points and use them now and get something before 12/16, you might be in for a shock. We are getting into DVC high demand time, and I would say availability until the end of the year is very spotty at best in most cases.
Also, you do not seem to be considering annual dues into your cost equation - they are high at Riviera like 2$ more than poly (along those lines)
If you would be happy at SSR and OKW - then DVC might work for you. Otherwise, you need to adjust to booking AT LEAST 7 months out to make it work. Disclaimer, I basically always book 11 months out to the day.