Disney World. It is deemed as the happiest place on Earth.
A lot of people can end up saving a lifetime to take their families and others may fall in love with it so much that they take annual trips to Disney properties.
Eight of the top ten most visited theme parks in the world are Disney parks. With tens of millions of people visiting these parks every year, a select group wants to make a longer-term commitment with Disney with the Disney Vacation Club.
So, how does the Disney Vacation Club work? And what is the Disney Vacation Club?
This guide will answer all of those questions plus go over the DVC benefits.
How Does the Disney Vacation Club Work?
For those of you who are not familiar with the Disney Vacation Club, think of it like a timeshare. You are paying to have access to a certain room at a certain property for a certain time of the year.
You would need to buy a minimum amount of points which would cover you every year for the next couple of decades. Obviously, the more points that you buy, the better rooms, properties, and dates during the year you would have access to.
Let’s say you wanted to get a three-bedroom villa instead of a regular hotel room for your group every year. You would need to invest more points into your DVC membership in that situation.
The same applies if you wish to book a room every year during Christmas week. That is one of the busiest times of year for most Disney properties, so it would end up costing you a lot more money than if you wanted to book the room every year in September.
Before you join the DVC, you need to think about what property you like, what dates during a calendar year you ideally would want to go, and how big your group is.
Cost of Membership
Let’s get into the fun stuff, how much is it going to cost to become a member of the DVC? Well, the answer is it depends on how many points you wish to purchase.
When it comes to purchasing directly through Disney, you must buy at least 150 points. That can cover a certain amount of nights on some properties, depending on how old your property is and what time of year you want to go.
If you decide to buy points through another renter, there is no minimum but we will get to that a little later.
Well, the starting cost for points is about $201 per point with the DVC. That means it would be about $30,150 if you were buying the bare minimum number of 150 points.
Despite that cost sounding high to some, there are times when there are sales and offers on the prices such as in the link above where some hotels that participate in the DVC are knocking hundreds or even thousands of dollars off of that point purchase price.
However, unfortunately, that is not your only cost upfront. There are also closing costs that need to be accounted for when making a property purchase like this. That can start as low as $628 but it varies depending on what type of deal is being made.
Then, there are your annual dues. These are costs that go into resort maintenance, real estate taxes, and general operating costs of the property that you are staying in. This cost starts as low as $105 per month.
Still, that adds up to at least $1,260 per year just in annual dues. Doing the math here, you are most likely looking at around $32,000 minimum as soon as you sign up for DVC and make your first booking. Not to mention that there will be annual dues of at least $1,260 per year and possibly more in the future.
You need to be prepared for those costs in advance but Disney does have financing options and loan terms that can be options for you with a 10% down payment.
Adjusting Points
The good thing about these points is that they do not have to be permanent. If you decide to add points to your package later on, Disney has terms that allow you to do that.
You also have the option to bank points for a future year. Let’s say that you have a plan that allows you to get 200 points per year. However, you may have skipped travel altogether this year but are now afraid that you are going to lose those points.
Disney lets you carry those points over to the next year. So, if something in your personal life comes up or you want to take a bigger trip in a future year, you have those options to manage your points.
But, there also may come a time that you no longer feel like you need all of the points that you have in your plan and you want to release a little bit of the financial burden. Not to worry, there are resources out there that allow you to sell your points to another buyer.
The DVC resale timeline for this is usually about three months for closing in most situations but it can vary. The link goes over each step of the process more thoroughly but one important note to keep in mind with this route is that Disney does have the right of first refusal for these types of sales.
So basically, you need to make sure that the deal is fair and you most likely are not going to be able to legally sell these points to a friend for $1 each.
Plan for this part carefully because choosing the right points in the right property can get you faster access time for the booking by as much as four months.
Become a Disney Vacation Club Member
These are some of the most important things to know when it comes to how does the Disney Vacation Club work. Remember that your points can be somewhat flexible but you should be aware of the cost of those points plus annual dues before committing.
For more relevant information, check out our Travel section.