Rumor: Disney Vacation Club Raising Sold-Out Resort Prices

[emchen]

I am still wondering why they would increase the number of contracts they take in rofr, they can own 100% but if they aren't going to sell them because they raise prices to insane rates, don't they have to pay the dues on those points if they are just holding them?

I would argue that they are already at "insane rates" before this latest price-hike, and there are still waitlists. This bump in direct prices is not going to do didley to the existing waitlists. I've read multiple posts here by people on waitlists for more than a year, and not a single one saying this 5-10% bump is going to cause them to take their names off.

I'm always amused at the VGC direct price. I've been on the waitlist for 2 years now and they never have points. (I want a 25 point contract, which is why I'm willing to go direct). I've been on the waitlist for any UY and 25 points. My guide calls me 1-2 a quarter to tell me I'm still on the list (and tries to get me to buy something else, which sometimes I do, haha). But they don't ROFR it (ever) and they don't sell contracts but maybe 1 every few months. Why have a direct price at all?

...exhibit A. This latest $20 price increase, if @anomamatt were to be offered his desired contract, would cost $500 more than before the price increase. Doubt he/she would decline after 2 years on the waitlist. The "sunk cost fallacy" is hard to defend against and I don't think I would be better able to deny it, even though I recognize it.

 

[Jennasis]

I assume they are desperate to sell Riviera and this is how they are hoping to nudge people in that flagging direction. If we ever add on it won't be direct. another head shaking move from Disney that disappoints but ultimately doesn't affect me.

Man am I happy we bought back in 2014. Love our little 100pt contract.

 

[Jennasis]

I assume they are desperate to sell Riviera and this is how they are hoping to nudge people in that flagging direction. If we ever add on it won't be direct. another head shaking move from Disney that disappoints but ultimately doesn't affect me.

Man am I happy we bought resale back in 2014. Love our little 100pt contract.

 

[anomamatt]

I would argue that they are already at "insane rates" before this latest price-hike, and there are still waitlists. This bump in direct prices is not going to do didley to the existing waitlists. I've read multiple posts here by people on waitlists for more than a year, and not a single one saying this 5-10% bump is going to cause them to take their names off.



...exhibit A. This latest $20 price increase, if @anomamatt were to be offered his desired contract, would cost $500 more than before the price increase. Doubt he/she would decline after 2 years on the waitlist. The "sunk cost fallacy" is hard to defend against and I don't think I would be better able to deny it, even though I recognize it.

They could do worse than a $20 and I’d still want to buy. But my case is weird. I already have quite a few DVC points and I want a very small VGC contract. I’m not fast enough to get them resale and 25 pointers don’t really ever come up for resale anyhow. And to be complete, I would never buy 100 points direct for what they want for VGC.

while my situation is unusual, you are totally right: A lot of resorts have waitlists despite the ever increasing direct prices. People still buy BCV direct after all. At a price where renting points is cheaper from day-1.

 

[SL6827]

Maybe the sales at Rivera are really that bad, hence the desperation of Disney to raise prices twice in one year?

 

[Cyberc1978]

It will be interesting to see if the price increase will lure more people to buy at DRR

 

[Bing Showei]

Maybe the sales at Rivera are really that bad, hence the desperation of Disney to raise prices twice in one year?

Or maybe we are reading what we want to into things that don’t mean anything more than: Breaking News... Disney raises prices.

If they had lowered prices instead, talk would’ve been how unprecedented such a move was and how desperate Disney is to compensate for slow Riviera sales. If a few months back, hey had lowered the blue card buy-in to 50, it would’ve been a clear move of desperation to sell Riviera, instead we saw Disney raising buy-in to 100... in a clear move of desperation to sell Riviera.

If you look at the numbers, the resort is selling fine. Did recorded sales dip this month? Sure. But as real estate tends to be a lagging indicator of bigger economic trends, you can see this dip correlated with the consumer confidence index which took a dive in August.

If we ignore the chatter and noise and look purely at the data, it tells a different story. In 2017 at CCV, the first eight months of sales averaged less than 60,000 points sold/month. Over its first six months, Riviera is averaging 96,000 points/month. 60% more points sold on average each month, all before the place even opens. Compared to CCV, Riviera is killing it.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the plan was originally that the price of all resorts including Riviera was scheduled go up after a few weeks of Skyliner operations, but because of the “hiccup” a couple of weeks back that the Riviera bump was iced.

Barring macroeconomic shifts, I would expect to see a Riviera price bump just after real life photos and videos hit the inter web knocking a ton of fence straddlers straight into the win column.

If you thought the model rooms goosed sales figures when it debuted in May, when people see the actual facilities, Riviera will be selling like it was 1929.

 

[Ruttangel]

Apologies for the newbie questions as I only started looking into DVC in August.
But why is there even a home resort? (is this US Real Estate Law maybe?)
Why aren't we just buying points with access to all resorts at 11 months?

That's what I thought DVC was before I looked into it.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

Apologies for the newbie questions as I only started looking into DVC in August.
But why is there even a home resort? (is this US Real Estate Law maybe?)
Why aren't we just buying points with access to all resorts at 11 months?

That's what I thought DVC was before I looked into it.

That would be chaos.

 

[anomamatt]

That would be chaos.

And no one would ever buy the more expensive resorts.

The real problem (with the idea that all points could book anywhere at 11 months) is that not all resorts are created equal.

 

[Ruttangel]

That would be chaos.

I know booking would be a chaotic... I was just pointing out that at least DVC would be straightforward to understand when you first come into it
I bet if this contract existed at $300ppt someone would buy it......

 

[Great3]

Apologies for the newbie questions as I only started looking into DVC in August.
But why is there even a home resort? (is this US Real Estate Law maybe?)
Why aren't we just buying points with access to all resorts at 11 months?

That's what I thought DVC was before I looked into it.

That would be a trust system, a system that Marriott used with DC points and WorldMark uses as well, along with other timeshare systems.

DVC has the home resort concept, similar to what HGVC does and what the old Wyndham system does. Now Wyndham is trying to change that with their CWA (Club Wyndham Access) system, that behaves more like the trust system.

So, it just how the timeshare system was created from the get-go.

Great3

 

[CraigInPA]

Personally what Disney should be doing is allowing DVC members to add-on a ticket/dining plan package to their membership that has a buy-in and then yearly fee which is capped on rate increase. It would also only be active when staying on your own points (thus making it required that they all be direct and ones that you purchased).

$100/point upfront plus $50/point yearly.

It would cover up to the room occupancy and only be Deluxe Dining Plan (or possibly its only Quick Service and then the others are an upcharge).

Your math does not work.

Say I have a 1 bedroom reservation for my wife and I at 200 points. That makes the yearly charge for the dining plan $10k. The DxDDP ala carte for 2 people for a week is about $1,650. Your math only makes sense if I could cram 10 people into the 1 bedroom... It's a little better is my wife and I stayed in a value studio for 20 days, where the DxDDP would be $4,660, but that's still double the $10k cost you suggest. We'd have to have 2 more adults in the studio to even come close to breaking even. The variability of the number of people in the accommodation is the problem. You can't price a dining plan based upon the number of points.

A discount on dining plans as a blue card benefit might help DVC sell a few contracts, but the discount would have to be more than the current discount on ala carte meals at restaurants to be meaningful.

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

Or maybe we are reading what we want to into things that don’t mean anything more than: Breaking News... Disney raises prices.

If they had lowered prices instead, talk would’ve been how unprecedented such a move was and how desperate Disney is to compensate for slow Riviera sales. If a few months back, hey had lowered the blue card buy-in to 50, it would’ve been a clear move of desperation to sell Riviera, instead we saw Disney raising buy-in to 100... in a clear move of desperation to sell Riviera.

If you look at the numbers, the resort is selling fine. Did recorded sales dip this month? Sure. But as real estate tends to be a lagging indicator of bigger economic trends, you can see this dip correlated with the consumer confidence index which took a dive in August.

If we ignore the chatter and noise and look purely at the data, it tells a different story. In 2017 at CCV, the first eight months of sales averaged less than 60,000 points sold/month. Over its first six months, Riviera is averaging 96,000 points/month. 60% more points sold on average each month, all before the place even opens. Compared to CCV, Riviera is killing it.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the plan was originally that the price of all resorts including Riviera was scheduled go up after a few weeks of Skyliner operations, but because of the “hiccup” a couple of weeks back that the Riviera bump was iced.

Barring macroeconomic shifts, I would expect to see a Riviera price bump just after real life photos and videos hit the inter web knocking a ton of fence straddlers straight into the win column.

If you thought the model rooms goosed sales figures when it debuted in May, when people see the actual facilities, Riviera will be selling like it was 1929.

I brought a point up when CCV first went on sale and someone argued what a flop - how poorly it was doing in sales. DVC was still marketing PVB in it's lead spot and actively promoting it and did for the first few months of CCV. Historically whatever they are pushing is what they sell the most of. In the case of Riviera it was almost simultaneous that they did their version of declaring a resort sold out - ie, stop placing it in the lead marketing and raise the price of CCV So for virtually the entire time Riviera has been on sale it's been the lead product.

 

[sethschroeder]

Your math does not work.

Say I have a 1 bedroom reservation for my wife and I at 200 points. That makes the yearly charge for the dining plan $10k. The DxDDP ala carte for 2 people for a week is about $1,650. Your math only makes sense if I could cram 10 people into the 1 bedroom... It's a little better is my wife and I stayed in a value studio for 20 days, where the DxDDP would be $4,660, but that's still double the $10k cost you suggest. We'd have to have 2 more adults in the studio to even come close to breaking even. The variability of the number of people in the accommodation is the problem. You can't price a dining plan based upon the number of points.

A discount on dining plans as a blue card benefit might help DVC sell a few contracts, but the discount would have to be more than the current discount on ala carte meals at restaurants to be meaningful.

I am just throwing rough number based on a studio out there for BWV. Disney would need to do the actual breakdown.

Point was more so a way to lock in total cost of vacation.

 

[anomamatt]

I brought a point up when CCV first went on sale and someone argued what a flop - how poorly it was doing in sales. DVC was still marketing PVB in it's lead spot and actively promoting it and did for the first few months of CCV. Historically whatever they are pushing is what they sell the most of. In the case of Riviera it was almost simultaneous that they did their version of declaring a resort sold out - ie, stop placing it in the lead marketing and raise the price of CCV So for virtually the entire time Riviera has been on sale it's been the lead product.

It's all apples to oranges anyhow. Riviera is an entirely new entity, unlike CCV, Poly, etc. That alone will cause it to be slower to sell. It's very difficult to look at historical comparisons here....

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

It's all apples to oranges anyhow. Riviera is an entirely new entity, unlike CCV, Poly, etc. That alone will cause it to be slower to sell. It's very difficult to look at historical comparisons here....

I actually don't agree that it being brand new resort will cause it to sell slower so we're coming from a differing POV. It is "brand new" in other ways though that might cause it to sell slower. However the post was stating how Riviera was selling better than CCV.

 

[The Jackal]

It's all apples to oranges anyhow. Riviera is an entirely new entity, unlike CCV, Poly, etc. That alone will cause it to be slower to sell. It's very difficult to look at historical comparisons here....

I do not agree too, CCV is a hard 4 on studios and 1 bedrooms. This puts a family of 5 in a 2 bedroom. RIV studios and 1 bedrooms all sleep 5. Granted RIV rooms are more point hungry than CCV room it is still less than a 2 bedroom.

 

[Bing Showei]

I actually don't agree that it being brand new resort will cause it to sell slower so we're coming from a differing POV. It is "brand new" in other ways though that might cause it to sell slower. However the post was stating how Riviera was selling better than CCV.

I agree that it’s hard to draw any definitive conclusions based on historical sales data for two vastly different resorts.

My bigger point is that the sales numbers are not suggesting the failure that seems to be the prevailing sentiment in threads like this one and others. The sales numbers just don’t support it. Year over year is lower, but so many other economic factors will play into that even.

Barring an economic downturn, it will take several months of open-resort sales to get any indication as to how the resort performs relative to historic sales, but even those comparisons will be plagued with all the same apple and orange issues we see today.

With every monthly sales report that comes out, the little bit of wishful thinking that I’m grasping for (that the restrictions will be reversed), slowly withers away. The final nail for me is going to be the spike we see in sales when the resort goes live.

 

[Jenniebee]

With every monthly sales report that comes out, the little bit of wishful thinking that I’m grasping for (that the restrictions will be reversed), slowly withers away. The final nail for me is going to be the spike we see in sales when the resort goes live.

Even if they were to reverse them, how would they do this? All the contracts are all out there already written this way.