Best Economical DVC Resort to Purchase: Fall 2018

Disney Vacation Club Polynesian Village Resort lobby statue and decorated sitting area.

At DVC Resale Market we like to keep an economic Disney Vacation Club (DVC) Resort ranking maintained for our clients as prices, dues, resorts and Disney can change over time. We started this ranking in the Fall of 2014, and this blog represents our 9th in the series: Fall 2014, Spring 2015, Fall 2015, Spring 2016, Fall 2016, Spring 2017, Fall 2017 and Spring 2018.

The chart below provides a long-term economic ranking of Disney Vacation Club resorts to own. The long-term value considers price, dues and years remaining on the deed to ultimately get to a price per point per year. This ranking may provide directional information in choosing a resort to own, especially for those Members or potential New Members who are less concerned about home resort priority and more focused on economic savings.

Fall 2018 Changes in DVC Economic Ranking

The Polynesian breaks into the top 3! Rarely, do we see a newer resort get ranked this high this soon. Typically, prices of newer resorts in the resale market remain high for various reasons. First, many sellers may still have high loan payoffs, and second, with many years remaining on the deed the price/value typically stays high. And, while the price of Polynesian is higher than most other DVC resorts it has not maintained resale prices as high as its monorail neighbor and other recently sold-out DVC resort, Grand Floridian.

In September, the average resale price of Polynesian was $153/pt., while Grand Floridian’s average resale price was $169/pt. Perhaps this price difference can be attributed to Grand Floridian’s popularity when compared to Polynesian or it could simply be the room mix. Grand Floridian includes all the typical room sizes DVC Members are accustomed to such as studios, one-bedrooms, two-bedrooms and grand villas where Polynesian just has studios and bungalows.

Polynesian Bungalow

Just 2 years ago, this same blog ranked Polynesian as the ninth most economical DVC Resort to own long term. Since then, Polynesian’s selling price has increased less than 5% and the dues have increased less than 2%.  With little change to price and dues over the past 2 years, and still with many years remaining Polynesian has climbed up the economic rankings. Polynesian’s deed does not expire until 2066, the second longest of all DVC Resorts (Copper Creek is the longest, expiring in 2068).

Another DVC Resort jumping 2 spots in the rankings in 2018 is Vero Beach. It is one of the few DVC Resorts that has a lower average selling price in the Fall, than it did to begin the year. This may be in part to Disney lowering the direct price of Vero Beach earlier this year from $115/pt. to $100/pt. On January 17th, while all other DVC resorts experienced a price increase for direct purchases, some with increases well over $30/point, the price of Vero Beach actually dropped. In a year where many resorts experienced slight to moderate resale selling price increases, Vero Beach was able to scoot farther up the list with its resale price remaining relatively the same if not slightly less. UPDATED 11/14/18: After the proposed 2019 dues were released Vero Beach only jumped 1 spot as the dues for Vero Beach increased 11.2% from 2018 to 2019.

Which DVC Resort Ranks #1?

The answer to which resort ranks #1 has been the same since we’ve been performing these rankings for the past several years, Saratoga Springs. With the lowest dues in the network, a below average resale price and 36 years still remaining it is tough to beat on value. Granted, part of the reason the price remains low is due to the 11 month home resort priority not being a factor for this resort unless you are trying to book the tree-house villas. Outside of the tree-house accommodations, Saratoga Springs is typically the easiest DVC resort for availability.

Saratoga Springs Pool

Technically, an Aulani subsidized dues contract would rank ahead of Saratoga Springs with a total cost per point per year of $8.21 vs. $9.29. However, do to their scarcity, much like Vero Beach subsidized contracts we do not include them in the rankings. However, we do include Extended Old Key West contracts as they are not as scarce and continue to grow in numbers. Whenever Disney buys back an Old Key West contract and resells them, they are automatically given an extended 2057 deed expiration date vs. a 2042 end date. Conversely, whenever a subsidized contract is bought back by Disney, it will no longer be subsidized when resold.

DVC Resort Economical Rankings: Fall 2018

Resort Avg. Cost Per Pt. Years Left Cost Per Pt. Per Year from Price Proposed 2019 Dues Per Pt. Total Cost Per Pt. Per Year Rank: Spring 2018 Rank: Fall 2018 Rank Change 
Saratoga Springs $104 36 $2.89 $6.40 $9.29  1  1   —
Bay Lake Tower $135 42 $3.21 $6.40 $9.61  3  2   +1
Polynesian $153 48 $3.19 $6.76 $9.95  4  3   +1
Old Key West (Extended) $106 39 $2.72 $7.23 $9.95  2  3   -1
Grand Floridian $169 46 $3.67 $6.39 $10.06  6  5   +1
Aulani $101 44 $2.30 $7.86 $10.16  7  6    +1
Animal Kingdom $113 39 $2.90 $7.44 $10.34  5  7   -2
Copper Creek $155 50 $3.10 $7.43 $10.53  9  8   +1
Grand Californian $195 42 $4.64 $6.27 $10.91  8  9   -1
Old Key West $98 24 $4.08 $7.23 $11.31 10  10   —
Boulder Ridge $103 24 $4.29 $7.32 $11.61 12  11   +1 
Vero Beach** $61 24 $2.54 $9.48 $12.02 13  12   +1
Hilton Head $83 24 $3.46 $8.56 $12.02 11  12    -1
Boardwalk $129 24 $5.38 $7.17 $12.55 14  14  
Beach Club $147 24 $6.13 $6.94 $13.07 15  15  
 – Average cost per point based on Average DVC Resale Selling Prices for September
 – *Aulani with subsidized dues are $8.21 for a total cost per pt. per year (proposed dues for 2019 are $5.91/pt.)
– **Vero Beach with subsidized dues are $10.02 for a total cost per pt. per year (proposed dues for 2018 are $7.48/pt.)

 

Additionally, this cost per point per year from the chart above can be used to help determine what a DVC Member theoretically pays for a Disney Vacation Club Villa. For example, let’s say you purchased a Boardwalk contract and were going to stay at Boardwalk in a standard view studio for one night on a weekday in Choice Season during the Food and Wine Festival at Epcot. The amount of points needed for that one night would be 10, and the estimated cost per point per year according to the chart above would be $12.55. So multiply the number of points needed by the cost per point and the result is 10 x $12.55 or $125.50/night.

Access all DVC resale listings and learn more about buying and selling with DVC Resale Market.

Comments

  • David
    October 25, 2018

    Love your Blogs. When purchasing, would you consider current-year Seller paid-up points that can be banked as a reduction to the avg cost per point In your above calculation.? For example, would a 100 – point SSR contract at $106 with 100 Seller paid points reduce the avg cost per point to $101 (rounding the dues per point down to nearest dollar)?

    • Nick Cotton
      October 26, 2018

      David, thank you for your response. Certainly, a contract with 2018 points that has dues paid by the seller adds great value. If you are getting the full year of 2018 points with dues paid by the seller and you still have the 11-month booking window with those points, DVC Rental Store will pay up to $13.50/pt. After taxes (as this is rental income) you may be netting around $10/pt. So that can significantly impact your value.

      DVC Rental Store: https://dvcrentalstore.com/how-do-i-rent-my-unused-dvc-points/

  • Eric Arseneau
    October 18, 2018

    The only thing this doesn’t cover is the length of stay per year that your points will get you. Another good comparison would be price per week per year.

  • Jeff
    October 17, 2018

    What a great, in-depth article.
    Very interesting.
    Thank you.

  • Ed
    October 17, 2018

    This analysis and data is very welcome and I greatly appreciate it. I think this provides half an answer and half an analysis. The goal was to provide “a long-term economic ranking…(to help in) choosing a resort to own.” Although this is a price per point conclusion, that doesn’t actually help decide what to buy. Disregarding home resort priority is to ignore a very important part of ownership. Otherwise, we should all just buy SSR and stop thinking about it.

    When you combine price per point with points per stay, you get a wildly different answer. As an example, you can perform this analysis to get an example “price per night” analysis:

    Dream Season, Sun-Thurs, Studio (for consistency), Drop AKV Value and BWV Standard (due to low availability) and look at the lower categories/views/locations. You get the following price/night:

    SSR $113.75
    AKV $125.58
    OKW $140.40
    BLT $155.21
    CCV $165.76
    BRV $179.52
    PVB $197.19
    BCV $201.12
    BWV $202.81
    VGF $205.80

    As you can see, this puts the Poly, VGF Beach and Boardwalk in much different order than the price-per-point analysis would yield. I think this real-world example of “what does it cost to get a night’s stay” is much more relevant in the decision-to-buy.

    Again, thank you for all the transparent data!

    Ed

    • Jason
      October 17, 2018

      Probably not surprising that the most expensive rooms using Ed’s analysis are the studios that accommodate 5 people. So now we need to add a price per person wrinkle to the analysis, because that’s where I need to stay.

      • Ed
        October 17, 2018

        Great point about sleeping 5 vs. 4. I also think the top 4 in price are in the most popular locations, either Monorail to MK or walking to EP or HS. On a location-only basis, BLT is a bargain…but studio only sleeps 4.

    • Nick Cotton
      October 17, 2018

      Ed, thank you for your thoughtful response. I don’t think our analysis is half-way done as much as it is a fundamental different approach as we are working off two different assumptions. Your analysis assumes that the resort you buy is the resort you always stay at, while our analysis assumes you are buying at a DVC Resort, but will be staying at that resort as well as different resorts. Additionally, we provide this analysis mainly for those looking to join or add-on with a focus on economics and less on preference of resort. In our 2nd paragraph of this blog we state, “This ranking may provide directional information in choosing a resort to own, especially for those Members or potential New Members who are less concerned about home resort priority and more focused on economic savings.”

      We have blogs that certainly focus on the importance of Home Resort Priority, especially for those that do have a preference. For these blogs you will see that I’m of the opinion if you do have a preference in resort that should be an extremely strong consideration in your decision. Please see the following:

      https://www.dvcresalemarket.com/blog/dvc-home-resort-priority-vs-years-left-on-a-dvc-contract/

      https://www.dvcresalemarket.com/blog/the-ever-growing-importance-of-home-resort-priority/

      Also, to your point, I believe considering point charts is important as well, and so late last year I wrote the following blog too:

      https://www.dvcresalemarket.com/blog/best-disney-world-resorts-for-stretching-your-dvc-points/

      Your analysis could make a case for combining two important blogs, point charts and long term economics, however, it would have to include the assumption you are only going to stay where you buy. Perhaps, we could do a follow up blog combining both with that assumption.

      Again, thank you for your thoughts and analysis.

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