David's DVC: Seeking Advice

[aristocatz]

We submitted a reservation request for January, 2019 for a 2BR BLT. The week we are seeking is not a popular time to go to WDW. David's just got back to us to let us know there is resort availability, but no DVC owners availability at the present time. We are placed into a queue until they are able to find a DVC owner with the points needed.

Is it likely they will locate an owner or should we seek other options?

We tried David's once before, but we put in our request less than 8 months out back then, so they were not able to locate an owner. This time we are in a much larger time frame, so I had hoped it would work out.

Thoughts or advice?

Thanks!

 

[LaurenT]

What dates in Jan? Right now you'd need an owner whose home is BLT andbyour date would have to be Jan 7 or earlier ... otherwise it falls outside the 11 month window. There should be plenty of availability since no one can book yet if they're arriving past Jan 7.

 

[disneynutz]

If you want the dates, plan something else as a backup. If David comes through you can cancel the backup.

Bill

 

[BillPA]

Jan IS a popular time at WDW. Especially marathon weekends. There are very few NOT popular times anymore.

 

[aristocatz]

Thank you. It's not during Marathon Weekend. It was for 1/7-1/11.

 

[Disneycouple99]

Marathon weekend runs from 1/9 to 1/13. Runners start arriving on the 7th and 8th.

 

[LaurenT]

Thank you. It's not during Marathon Weekend. It was for 1/7-1/11.

Today is the 7th .... they wouldn't have had any owners who could book until today. I don't think you're going to have a problem. I bet David will come through in the next couple of days

 

[The Jackal]

I would make an alternative arrangement and give David’s some time. Someone else had the same issue but it only took a short time to find an owner.

 

[aristocatz]

Marathon weekend runs from 1/9 to 1/13. Runners start arriving on the 7th and 8th.

Ooh they told me the marathon was different dates when I spoke with them on the phone.

Should I change the dates? I don't want to be there during marathon weekend.

 

[bobbiwoz]

Ooh they told me the marathon was different dates when I spoke with them on the phone.

Should I change the dates? I don't want to be there during marathon weekend.

Yes, you inadvertently will overlap with some Marathon weekend time. I would think about changing the dates.

 

[aristocatz]

I just changed our dates to 1/14-1/19, as an effort to avoid the marathon.

 

[LaurenT]

I just changed our dates to 1/14-1/19, as an effort to avoid the marathon.

That should make for lighter crowds - just keep in mind that David will need to try to find an owner whose home resort is BLT starting on the 14th - that's when the 11 month window begins. I bet he'll have it lined up for you by 2/21

 

[BaymaxForever]

I received the same message when I rented with them in 2016. About a week later the reservation came through. It was about 1-2 weeks into the 11 month mark. You’re not at the 11 month window and perhaps owners aren’t renting their points for that timeframe yet. Give it some time, but, I would have a backup plan, though. Good luck!

 

[aristocatz]

That should make for lighter crowds - just keep in mind that David will need to try to find an owner whose home resort is BLT starting on the 14th - that's when the 11 month window begins. I bet he'll have it lined up for you by 2/21

Yes, so glad someone posted that! The whole point of our dates was to go during a non-eventful lower crowd time lol
Dave's told us they can try to book on 2/14.

 

[aristocatz]

We got an email from David's this morning stating the following:

I wanted to send a quick message today to follow up from our earlier email explaining that due to the Disney Vacation Club’s booking guidelines the earliest we are able to secure your stay would be February_.
I will be honest with you due to the high demand for reservations there is the possibility that come February 14,2018 we might not have a Bay Lake Towers Owner that holds the points to book this reservation right away.
Our point inventory changes on an hourly basis between renting out points and Owners joining. I just want to be 100% transparent so that if you choose to wait a few days until we secure this you are not disappointed if we do not have a Owner that holds the points.
Please let us know if you would like us to hold onto your request until the 11 month booking window opens or if you would like us to refund your deposit.

I'm so disappointed, as the reviews online state great success with using David's Are they basically telling us to not bank on this working out?
Any guidance is appreciated-thanks!

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

We got an email from David's this morning stating the following:

I wanted to send a quick message today to follow up from our earlier email explaining that due to the Disney Vacation Club’s booking guidelines the earliest we are able to secure your stay would be February_.
I will be honest with you due to the high demand for reservations there is the possibility that come February 14,2018 we might not have a Bay Lake Towers Owner that holds the points to book this reservation right away.
Our point inventory changes on an hourly basis between renting out points and Owners joining. I just want to be 100% transparent so that if you choose to wait a few days until we secure this you are not disappointed if we do not have a Owner that holds the points.
Please let us know if you would like us to hold onto your request until the 11 month booking window opens or if you would like us to refund your deposit.

I'm so disappointed, as the reviews online state great success with using David's Are they basically telling us to not bank on this working out?
Any guidance is appreciated-thanks!

I'd say they are being up front and honest - which I consider good customer service. Keep in mind that they are brokers and have zero control over owners wanting to rent out thru them. They don't know until they have them signed up to offer the points. With David's comes some security of a refund should something happen with the reservation but renting directly you have a chance to locate a BLT owner yourself and know that they have the points to make the reservation for when you want. It's a trade off.

 

[aristocatz]

I'd say they are being up front and honest - which I consider good customer service. Keep in mind that they are brokers and have zero control over owners wanting to rent out thru them. They don't know until they have them signed up to offer the points. With David's comes some security of a refund should something happen with the reservation but renting directly you have a chance to locate a BLT owner yourself and know that they have the points to make the reservation for when you want. It's a trade off.

Thank you. Yes, I definitely appreciate their honesty & have been very impressed with their customer service so far. I"m just surprised that our window has nmot yet opened & they are sounding like there is minimal chance we will get a reservation.

 

[drusba]

What view are you requesting? If low point cost standard view, you should assume you will have real difficulty since those rooms book full for any given time period long before others and failure to find a BLT owner renting points quickly will be deadly. Theme Park view has a better chance but you still probably need to find a BLT owner. If instead, you are requesting Lake View, then you have a real chance of being able to get it even if they cannot find a BLT owner, because it will most likely be open even at 7 months out for the time requested (Jan 14-19) and all David's will need then is any owner from any resort renting the points needed.

 

[aristocatz]

What view are you requesting? If low point cost standard view, you should assume you will have real difficulty since those rooms book full for any given time period long before others and failure to find a BLT owner renting points quickly will be deadly. Theme Park view has a better chance but you still probably need to find a BLT owner. If instead, you are requesting Lake View, then you have a real chance of being able to get it even if they cannot find a BLT owner, because it will most likely be open even at 7 months out for the time requested (Jan 14-19) and all David's will need then is any owner from any resort renting the points needed.

We requested standard view, with lake view as our back up. They said Disney has availability for both, but David's doesn't have an owner.

 

[crisi]

Thank you. Yes, I definitely appreciate their honesty & have been very impressed with their customer service so far. I"m just surprised that our window has nmot yet opened & they are sounding like there is minimal chance we will get a reservation.

There is a good chance for your lake view, as others have said. But this is the way a broker works.

You (the renter) requests a reservation. Me (an owner) has points I won't use. I decide to rent my points through David. If David has owners waiting for renters, he sends out an email to those owners asking who wants to book it. Someone will generally take him up on it, but there may be reasons any owner doesn't - they might be busy the day the email comes through and not want to bother, for instance. Or they might want a better match for their points. If there are more renters in line, then David asks the next owner who contacts him to make that reservation - again, it might not be a great match for the owner, so they might say "um, I'll pass on that one" in which case the broker is going to look through their waiting renters to find a better match. The broker might even make that determination early - if I have offered between 175 and 185 points to David and you have a 160 point rental, it isn't a good match because I'm stuck with 15 - 25 points I wanted to get rid of - too small to rent to someone else.

There are resorts where the supply/demand is out of whack, and I'd suspect BLT is one of them. More people who want to rent points to stay there than there are owners looking to rent their points out. If David currently has 15 people waiting for BLT owners, it could be weeks before he gets to your reservation.

I further suspect that the brokers get a lot of very impatient renters who want regular updates on status that are impossible for them to project out. So sending this kind of message to you is both good communication - there is no guarantee this will work - and it also might take care of some of their demand issues if people understand this isn't a sure and easy thing.