Guide to Buying a Disney Vacation Club (DVC) Contract
When buying a DVC contract, there’s so much to learn! From choosing a home resort to determining how many points you need, here’s some insight on where to start and what to consider as you begin browsing the resale contract listings.
Home Resort
One of the biggest decisions to make is which resort to choose as your home resort. Besides each resort having its own unique theme, they have different contract expiration dates, prices per point, points charts, annual dues, and of course locations. You’ll have to prioritize what matters most to you.
The home resort that you choose is the one that you will be able to book starting at 11 months out from your desired check-in date. This is when availability is best. At the 7-month mark, you can use your points to book at the other DVC resorts (with the exception of resorts like Riviera, the Villas at Disneyland Hotel, and The Cabins at Disney’s Fort Wilderness that have resale restrictions). At the 7-month mark, availability can be more limited, so it’s important to stay flexible with your resort options. If your travel dates fall during a busy season, it’s a good idea to book your home resort early to secure your stay.
Number of Points
The size of the contract will depend a lot on your travel habits, such as how often you vacation, how long your trips are, what room type you need, the time of year you travel, the points chart at your home resort, and your budget. It often helps to plan out a typical vacation for yourself and use the points chart to see how many points that would be at your home resort. For a deeper dive on how many points you should own, see this blog.
Use Year
The Use Year is when your Disney Vacation Points become available for booking each year. Your Use Year also determines the banking deadline for your points (4 months before the end of your Use Year) and expiration date for your points.
For example, if you have a February Use Year, your year’s worth of points become available starting February 1 each year. You’ll have until September 30 to bank any unused points. Otherwise those points expire on January 30 of that year. There are 8 Use Years available:
- February
- March
- April
- June
- August
- September
- October
- December
Note that the Use Year doesn’t impact when you book your trips. You can always book at your home resort as early as 11-months out from your check-in date. Use Year just impacts which year’s worth of points you have available to make your reservation. Learn more about the ins and outs of Use Year by reading What is a DVC “Use Year” and Does it Matter?
Number of Points Available
Listings will let you know how many current points a contract has. However, not all contracts are equal. On the resale market, you’ll find that some contracts have more current points available to use than others.
For instance, double points contracts will have twice the points available if the seller has a full year’s worth of banked points. This means you have extra points for more vacations, or you can rent out those extra points and put that cash towards your annual dues!
Other contracts may be considered “stripped,” which means that they do not have any points available to use in the current Use Year or the next one. While it may seem like a disadvantage since you won’t be able to plan vacations right away, these contracts also sell for less than a typical contract and can be a great deal!
Making an Offer
Some sellers are firm on their asking price while others are open to negotiating. Not sure where to start in terms of making an offer? Take a look at the DVC Resale Market’s monthly blog for some benchmarks. You’ll find their monthly resale average sales prices report and the right of first refusal report, which shows the highest buyback price per point at each resort. Together, these reports can give you an idea of the resale market trends and what price per point may have a better chance of passing right of first refusal.
With DVC Resale Market, you can have confidence in our team’s wealth of knowledge with a combined over 200 years of direct Disney Vacation Club experience. Our experienced agents will guide you at each step of the DVC contract process. Contact us today to get started on finding the perfect DVC contract for you!
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