Marriott owner considering Disney SSR purchase

[Rush]

Greetings All you helpful TUGers out there -

I purchased 2 platinum and 1 platinum plus Orlando timeshares over the last coupld of years - all 3 resale, and during our visits down there, I've developed a fondness for Disney's Saratoga Springs resort - which, of course, I can't trade into b/c of Marriott's local block.

I am aware of Disney's impending switch from II to RCI, and my intended use for this purchase would not be to trade, but rather, to visit annually, for a week at a time, as we are tied to school vacations.

Would very much appreciate hearing about what I can expect about owning a Disney t/s v. the Marriott ones I own, whether now would be a good time to buy at Saratoga Springs, and how fellow Marriott owners who've stayed at this resort would compare it to, say, Cypress Harbour, or Grande Vista.

Thanks in advance!

 

[littlestar]

We own points at SSR and the resort grew on me. I like staying in the Grandstand section. I think right now you could pick up a deal on a resale at SSR. I would consider $70 to $78 a point a nice deal (depending on whether there were 2008 points included or not). I've heard the buy back for ROFR from Disney has been from a low of $69/$70 a point up to somewhere in the $70's here lately. If the economy wasn't so bad, I would love to add 100 SSR points on to our membership.

I really like Marriott's Cypress Harbour, which actually reminds me a lot of Disney's Old Key West - except I think Cypress Harbour has better rooms, furnishings, TV's, etc. Disney's Saratoga has pretty grounds like Cypress Harbour

We like DVC and Marriott both, but for different reasons. Disney for the theming and location. And Marriott for the actual overall comfort of the units (great bedding, nice linens, furnishings, large TV's with full cable). When hitting the Disney parks, it's so nice to be on Disney property and have that convenience and the fun theming. We enjoy both vacation clubs very much.

A few months back I had actually thought about selling our DVC points and just staying at Marriott in Orlando because of the economy. But I'm glad we kept the DVC points. I think I would miss staying on property once a year if we didn't have the points. Our plan now is one trip a year on Disney property and the rest pretty much Marriott Vacation Club. We travel to Orlando 3 to 4 times a year.

 

[1965]

IMHO you will really not like the High point charge
of friday and saturday nights
vs
Sunday-Thursday night
in
the Disney Vacation club system

I am sad. I can no longer transfer into DVC with
Interval/Fox run deposits
but
the extra (2) nights/especialy since weekends
are
so valauable to me

 

[capjak]

DVC is very easy to use for home resort reservations no issues at all getting your home resort.

DVC is expensive though as a 2 bedroom at my home resort BCV is 350 points for the entire week during the season we like to go. Therefore we switch off for weekends as the weekend are 75 points vs 40 points per weeknight.

Again DVC is very flexible can stay 1 night to ...no arriving on F/Sat/Sun arrive any day of the week etc..

 

[skifast]

We absolutely enjoy being on-site. We especially like the flexibility of DVC. You pay for what you use - high season vs. low season, studio, one bedroom, two bedroom, or Grand Villa. The weekend nights are high point usage, so usually we stay somewhere else for Friday or Saturday night. Plus, not being locked into a seven night stay is a plus for us.
The service and accomodations, in our opinion, are comparable, although Marriott has larger rooms.
We have never had a problem getting into the resort of our choice, which beats the 12 month, 8:00 in the morning phone lottery we go through to reserve our desired week with Marriott. Also, no extra charge to stay at another DVC resort, if available. Don't forget, they have California and Hawaii comong online.
Good luck with your decision. For us, we are just sorry we did not do it sooner!

 

[tug15]

Hope there will be better news with RCI than I've heard so far..

We were quite happy with the variety of quality resorts offered through Interval...Now with this change to RCI, taking a quick look, not impressed with RCI resorts....Upper end seem few and far between..

Hope this shakes out better than initial impression..Alot of details up in the air, so hopefully in January, DVC members will know more...

I personally bought DVC with the notion that if I wanted to I could trade into similar quality resorts...Looking quickly, RCI doesn't offer many similar quality resorts..That is dissapointing to me right now..Hope DVC members are pleasantly surprised with RCI...

 

[Y-ASK]

Not sure how much detail you would like but I recently spent what was suppose to be a 9 day vacation over thankgiving this year. The 1st 7 days was at Marriott's Cypress Harbour and the last two were at SSR. I own SSR and also Marriott's Horizon's Orlando. I was extremely happy with Cypress Harbour and extremely disappointed with SSR. My main complaints with SSR:

#1. Did not like the lock-off aspects of the 2 Bdr that we stayed in.
#2. The Studio part of the lock-off smelt really, and I mean really, bad. It was all BO and bad breath ordor.
#3. The beds were extremely hard and very uncomfortable.
#4. The furniture looked pretty worn with the pillows on the couch in really bad shape.
#5. No screens on the porch.

We only stayed one night instead of two at SSR. The bed was that hard... The bus service was a little slow and I think next time I stay on site I will just drive to the parks. So I tried to air the Studio out while I had both rooms open and the smell did not go away it just went into the other room. I tried to open both sliding glass doors and with no screens available we we're visited by several flying things. I felt spoiled with Marriott and ripped off because I paid more for SSR DVC.

Y-ASK

 

[ciscogizmo1]

I own at Beach Club Villas. Over Thanksgiving we traded into Marriott Grande Vista as I was out of points. We spent 1 night at All Star Movies, 7 nights at Marriott Grande Vista and 3 nights at the Swan (on hotel points). Anyways.. personally I prefer to stay onsite. I thought we'd enjoy visiting other locations in Orlando but we only did one or two things off site. So, we rented a car for 11 nights just to do one or 2 things offsite. I'd rather rent a car when we need it not for the duration of the trip. I also did not like having to take a car to the parks especially Magic Kingdom. You need to leave 2 hours before you want to get in to get to Magic Kingdom (the way the parking is set up). We are happy just taking the bus or walking to the parks. For us a vacation is not having to drive the car. WE do that more than enough the rest of the days of our lives. I liked being able to have a few drinks in Epcot and not having to worry about whether I was okay to drive home. I had one of those beers and Germany and there is no way I would drive home. I love Disney theme at the resorts. I liked that if I wanted to go shopping the kids and dh could go to the park and we could meet back at the room. It was hard to that this trip because I was buying Christmas presents. I couldn't show up with packages in my arms otherwise, the kids would want to see them.

I know there is a lot of cheaper arguments for staying offsite but I like the magic of onsite. Marriott Grande Vista was nice. The unit was huge and clean but who really needs a pantry for Orlando when you are barely in the room. We didn't buy enough food for that.

Good luck deciding...

 

[Rush]

Thank you

I would like to thank you all for your mist helpful replies, which will no doubt assist me in making a rather difficult decision.

My inclination - b/f I read yoru replies - was to not make the move at this point, and after reading them, I think I will stand pat for a bit.

We're headed to Horizons later this week after Christmas, and may check out an SSR villa, tho I would imagine they'll be pretty busy during this Boxing week...

Anyway, thank you all again, and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas, and health and happiness in the New Year!

 

[Dean]

I would like to thank you all for your mist helpful replies, which will no doubt assist me in making a rather difficult decision.

My inclination - b/f I read yoru replies - was to not make the move at this point, and after reading them, I think I will stand pat for a bit.

We're headed to Horizons later this week after Christmas, and may check out an SSR villa, tho I would imagine they'll be pretty busy during this Boxing week...

Anyway, thank you all again, and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas, and health and happiness in the New Year!

Buying a smaller points package and using that for a few days before or after a regular timeshare stay in Orlando (avoiding or minimizing weekends) can be a great approach for your situation. One correction on your first post, the block of trading in was not Marriott's but Disney's, they do the same for HH. But if you are a member of the FL club, you could have made a non Orlando reservation and potentially traded in. Of course the switch to RCI will change all that. I'm assuming DVC will adopt a 1 in 4 or 1 in 5 rule but we shall see.

 

[1965]

Dean
is it possible that we won't be able to trade our RCI timeshres for
RCI/Disney vacatoin club?

many people it will be a points only access thru RCI
instead of a weeks access thru RCI
for DVC

some people even believe that RCI will rent out DVC
for Cash instead of allowing for trades

 

[dioxide45]

Dean
is it possible that we won't be able to trade our RCI timeshres for
RCI/Disney vacatoin club?

many people it will be a points only access thru RCI
instead of a weeks access thru RCI
for DVC

some people even believe that RCI will rent out DVC
for Cash instead of allowing for trades

I doubt the last point will happen. DVC is not big on competition, I am sure they have something in their agreement with RCI that does not allow them to rent out weeks. DVC doesn't bulk spacebank that I am aware of so any rentals on RCIs part will be very obvious.

 

[dioxide45]

Buying a smaller points package and using that for a few days before or after a regular timeshare stay in Orlando (avoiding or minimizing weekends) can be a great approach for your situation. One correction on your first post, the block of trading in was not Marriott's but Disney's, they do the same for HH. But if you are a member of the FL club, you could have made a non Orlando reservation and potentially traded in. Of course the switch to RCI will change all that. I'm assuming DVC will adopt a 1 in 4 or 1 in 5 rule but we shall see.

Unfortunatly Horizons at Orlando is not a Florida Club property. So that wasn't an option.

 

[Dean]

Dean
is it possible that we won't be able to trade our RCI timeshres for
RCI/Disney vacatoin club?

many people it will be a points only access thru RCI
instead of a weeks access thru RCI
for DVC

some people even believe that RCI will rent out DVC
for Cash instead of allowing for trades

I've never been one for the conspiracy theory but DVC will add a certain amount of oversight in this area if it is true otherwise. We don't really know how DVC will fit in from RCI's standpoint but info from DVC suggests it'll be a hybrid. That DVC members trading for full weeks will trade more as weeks and that non 7 days stays will trade as points. This likely means it'll be listed as a points resort from RCI's side but it MIGHT only be listed as an RCI Registry Resort. It'll have to be some type of points resort but I wouldn't be surprised to see two resort numbers. With II DVC had DIRECT access to II's computer system and did their own trades just like any supervisor you might talk to at II and with similar authroity. I'm doubting they would give up that type of access in this change. It should be interesting how this plays out. DVC has never bulk spacebanked nor put in developer weeks to my knowledge so I agree that any rentals should be transparent given DVC members won't be able to trade points for cash equivalents through RCI.

Unfortunatly Horizons at Orlando is not a Florida Club property. So that wasn't an option.

It would be for my suggestion which was to buy a few DVC points to use a few days at DVC nonweekend PLUS a full week at an off property option preferably a week that didn't start on a Saturday. That could be at Horizons or on an exchange.

 

[rickandcindy23]

Buying a smaller points package and using that for a few days before or after a regular timeshare stay in Orlando (avoiding or minimizing weekends) can be a great approach for your situation. One correction on your first post, the block of trading in was not Marriott's but Disney's, they do the same for HH. But if you are a member of the FL club, you could have made a non Orlando reservation and potentially traded in. Of course the switch to RCI will change all that. I'm assuming DVC will adopt a 1 in 4 or 1 in 5 rule but we shall see.

This is an II block, not Disney's block. II has regional blocks, and Disney will not have those blocks in place with RCI points, but I expect the special transportation fee into Disney will be SIGNIFICANTLY higher with RCI. I also expect the DVC availability within RCI to be on the points' side, which is very separate from the weeks' side. I hope I am wrong, though, because I have some supertraders with RCI that will pull about anything out there, and I would love to see how I do with DVC. I also have RCI points and can see great possibilities for that, except I really believe the concierge/ transportation fee to DOUBLE with RCI, from $95 now with II to somewhere over $200. That may keep me away from DVC forever, unless they also include free internet, but I doubt it.

 

[Dean]

This is an II block, not Disney's block. II has regional blocks, and Disney will not have those blocks in place with RCI points, but I expect the exchange fee into Disney will be SIGNIFICANTLY higher with RCI. I also expect the DVC availability within RCI to be on the points' side, which is very separate from the weeks' side. I hope I am wrong, though, because I have some supertraders with RCI that will pull about anything out there, and I would love to see how I do with DVC. I also have RCI points and can see great possibilities for that, except I really believe the concierge/ transportation fee to DOUBLE with RCI, from $95 now with II to somewhere over $200. That may keep me away from DVC forever, unless they also include free internet, but I doubt it.

It is an OPTION that II offers and the developer decides whether to select it or not, I was making the point that it was not instituted by Marriott. DVC has chosen to do so for both Orlando and HH, not sure about VB as there really isn't anything there to compete close enough but a couple of poor resorts. It remains to be seen what will happen as RCI has cut DVC a specific deal. I do expect the regional block to go away but I don't think that's absolute as I believe there are resorts in a couple of places with RCI that have blocked other resorts from exchanging in from locally, HI is one example if my recollection is correct. I doubt the resort services fee will change but there is a small chance it could evaporate as DVC didn't have the same fee when with RCI years ago if I understand correctly. We shall see.