Is Disney Vacation Club Worth It? 2024 Update

In this week's episode, Jared revisits the Disney Vacation Club with updated numbers and asks whether or not its worth it?

Transcript

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On this week's Episode of A Dryer Dose of Disney, Jared discusses the Disney Vacation Club and whethere or not its worth it. Intro Music Welcome to this week's episode of a dryer dose at Disney. I'm your host, Jared dryer. And today we are going to be doing an update on Disney vacation club and whether or not it's worth it. And the reason we wanted to do this is we did an episode in 2023 on Disney vacation club. And now we're into 2024. It's early in January, and obviously they've updated their points. But by far, this was the most controversial episode we've ever done. It had some of the highest views and the most comments we've ever seen. So what I'm going to do today is I'm going to walk you through a Disney vacation club, whether or not it's worth it. And if you're watching us on YouTube we're doing a screen share. So we're going to be taking you through each of the websites. And all of the point values and all of the different dollars. And we're going to be showing you step-by-step whether or not Disney vacation club is worth it. If you're watching us, like I said, on YouTube, I'm down in the bottom corner over here. You can see me on the screen, but if you're listening to us on the podcast, you're going to get the audio format of this. And I'm going to give you step-by-step everything that we're looking at. We're going to talk you through every single step and we're going to let you know whether or not Disney vacation club is worth it. Now, before I dive in, I do want to ask wherever you're listening to us, go ahead and click that pause button and find the subscribe button smash that. So that way you're going to get this content delivered into your inbox each and every single week. And if you listen to us last week, we talked about Moana's journey of water. And I did say that we are running out of topics and ideas to be covering. So you may start seeing some breaks between different episodes. Just because we don't have enough content to cover. Now, our goal is to start traveling to Disney international and to start sharing those parks with you as well as where we're staying, how we planned it, all the foods we experienced and the whole nine yards. So hopefully that'll be coming later this year as we start to explore out and going to international Disney parks. So that's going to be a lot of fun for us, and it takes a lot of planning. So I know. For a lot of you out there, you plan your own vacations and you're going to want to know all those tips and tricks for how to get the best priced flights, how to make it as easy as possible and how to really plan an international trip. So we're going to be covering all that for you on some future episodes. As we start doing that ourselves. So a lot of cool things in store, but because of that, we may have some lapses between the weekly episodes. So you may not see them every single week dropping. Like we have been because we've got about 80 episodes out there now. But what we do commit to doing is as Disney in the U S keeps updating things. So if they add a new restaurants, we've obviously got Tiana's, that's going to be coming here soon. And that's already actually opened at Disney land in California. We haven't made it out there yet. But as Disney starts opening new restaurants, we are going to be covering those covering new rides and keep you guys updated on the best tips and tricks or different strategies. So for rope drop strategy changes. I will let you know those as well. Now, currently. The rope drop strategies are all correct. So no need to worry about that. And then we've got epic universe coming in 2025. So we'll be doing that next year as well. But that's a ways out. So if you do have any podcast ideas or tips or tricks you would like to learn more about, please find us over at Facebook at a Dryer dose at Disney and let us know, and we will be sure to get an episode out there for you on that tip or trick or that topic. Now, in addition to that, if you find any of these tips or tricks, save you money. And in fact, today we're going to be doing that. When we talk about Disney vacation club, we do encourage you find us at Patreon, which is down in the links below on the podcast description. And support the show over there, as well as know that at our highest tier at Patreon, we do have our biggest Disney tip or trick ever. It is really special. It's a great tip or trick. It is something we didn't want to release publicly. So we really debated putting it out there at all. But we went ahead and said, okay, at our highest Patreon level, it's definitely worth it. So if you want to get that temper trick, you're going to want to go out to Patreon and find that over there, again, down in the links below. So like I said, we did in 2023, a Disney vacation club episode. And it was our most heated episode. We got tons of comments and feedback over a hundred different comments that came in. And we got everything from, thank you. This is something that I really needed. Too people that said, yeah, I did DVC. And if you haven't watched that episode, we did say at the end, we didn't believe it was worth it. We're going to talk about that again today. And they said that they agreed. And then we had a couple dozen people that got really, angry and said that we were crazy. We didn't know what we were doing. And of course, every single one of them was a DVC member. So I will say right out of the get, go. If you're watching this and you are already a DVC member, you probably don't need this episode and you probably don't want to watch it. This is going to be an episode for people that are considering DVC. If you are already a DVC member we believe here and I'm going to spoil it a little bit, that the consensus hasn't changed. DVC is not worth it. It's a bad investment. And we're sorry that if you already dumped some money into that but we're hoping to help people that are considering getting into DVC and talking about whether or not it's worth it. And for each family, it's going to be totally unique. And we're going to give a lot of different examples now. Like I said, we got a lot of really negative comments. People saying that we don't own a calculator. We don't know how it works. And I'm going to take you through screen by screen on the website. And I'm going to show you everything that we're looking at now in those debates, because we did respond to some of the comments. We did have one subscriber who did a really good job of putting together a whole bunch of numbers. And they said that everything was really accurate. Minus one thing. And it was a mistake that I made and that mistake was when I looked at Aluani out on Hawaii. I use the weekly figure as the daily figure. So I did make one mistake on that episode. We won't make that mistake this year as we go through it. And I'm going to show you on the screen. Every single calculation that we do, because a lot of people said. You don't own a calculator. You don't know what you're doing. You don't understand this. And I do work in finance. I am very good at what I do and trust me when I say I have used a calculator for every single one of these calculations. And I know for a fact that they are accurate. So if you don't like it, if you feel like you made a bad investment, keep that opinion to yourself. You can say, I disagree with this. That's fine. But don't accuse people of not using a calculator. When in fact we did, and we know that it's completely accurate. So we do want to take you through what is Disney vacation club? How does it work and give you some calculations and some examples, so you can determine for you and your family, if it's worth it or not. We feel it's not, and there's a reason behind that, which I'm going to share at the end of the episode, when I give you our, I can do this all day tip of the day. Now, of course, each of these calculations, and I will say this upfront, There is a break even point where you do start saving money with Disney vacation club. So there is the potential to save money long-term if you insist on staying onsite and you want to get that magical experience every single year. There does come a point when you do start saving money with Disney vacation club. So I'm going to throw that out there right now. That it is a money saving technique. Long-term. In the short term or for the frugal minded people. It may not make as much sense. So we're going to give you examples, like you said, of every single possible scenario so that you can make the best determination for you and your family. So with that. Let's dive in. It's 2024. I'm using 2024 numbers. And again, if you're watching on YouTube, you can see I'm on safari. I've got about 10 or so tabs ready to go. We're going to take you through step-by-step Disney vacation club and what we see on the screen. And again, if you're listening to us on the audio format of the podcast, I will describe what I'm seeing on every single page. So starting out we are on the cover page for Disney vacation club. It says, explore the Disney vacation club. And right here at the top, it gives you a big savings thing that says save up to 50% and it says. For decades to come, obviously you're going to get these points and you're going to be able to use them. And we'll explain that here in a couple of slides. But you get the opportunity to now save up to 50% on feature accommodations by locking in tomorrow's vacations at today's purchase price. And that is actually true when you're comparing future Disney vacation club prices. So this is not necessarily true when you're considering people that are paying with cash or card to go to the same resorts. But it is true when you're looking at what's the cost going to be in 2030 for Disney vacation club so that's where it's the difference is going to be. So you can save up to 50% against future members of Disney vacation club. So you're going to get to also the ability to get lots of cool discounts and, get lots of cool perks and benefits through DVC. And we'll talk about some of those as well. But what you're going to do through DVCS on the screen here, it says you're going to become a member. You're going to basically purchase into these, this timeshare option here at Disney. So you're basically owning a piece of Disney. And then you get points every single year. And we'll talk about that more on a future slide here. But you're going to be able to use those points and you can take a vacation pretty much every single year. And based on the calculations we're going to do three today, it is feasible. It is possible, and it's going to be customized to you. So they're going to work with you. They're going to talk to you about how many people you have in your family. What kind of vacations you want to do where you want your home resort to be, because that does matter a little bit. And in the example today, we're going to use one specific home resort. That's probably the least expensive. So that way we can use easy math and try to show you when that's going to break, even for you. But there's a lot of cool tools on this website. So we encourage you to go check it out. My favorite part of the website, we said this last year in the episode, Is down at the bottom where it has these four circles. I explore membership points and flexibility, cost of membership, and then the discovery portal. And if you click through those, which is what we're going to do today you get a chance to see all the different aspects of the Disney vacation club. So we're going to go next to learn how the points work. So this is the second bubble there. From what I just showed you, and basically you're going to receive, after you purchase the Disney vacation club, you're going to receive an allotment. Of annual vacation points. In our example that we're going to use today, we're going to use 150 points per year. Of course you can get higher ones. They are incremental, meaning that if you're doing a double the points at 300 a year, you're paying double the price. So you are paying for your points upfront. We think 150 is the. The baseline to get in and do a vacation every single year. And I will show you that here on a future slide, but you're going to get points every single year. So for our examples today, it's going to be 150. You're going to use those points to book your accommodations. Please note that there is a it's like a 90 to a hundred dollar fee to book your accommodation every time you do a booking. But that's a small incremental fee. And then you're going to enjoy the flexibility because you can use these points at multiple different resorts. Both domestic and abroad, and there's a whole bunch of different options there. So we encourage you explore where you want to go. Like we said, at the top of the episode, we're looking to travel internationally as well. We've done Disney cruises. And so now we're. Looking at all those options. And does this make sense for us at this point in time? So you're going to be able to look at that yourself and work with a planner. Through DVC and figure that out for you and your family. Now, the cool thing is you do get the ability to move points back and forth. So you can bank your vacation points for next year. So say this year, you're not going to be using your points or something came up and you can't travel. You can bank those for either a bigger vacation or more vacations next year, which is nice. Or you can borrow points. So maybe you're going to use next year's points this year for a bigger vacation or a better trip. So you do have the option to go back and forth. Now, again, you can only do that one year forward or back. There are some rules on that. We encourage you to check out the fine print on that because there are, like I said, rules on how you can do that. But you can borrow our bank, your vacation points. You also have a site out there and I'm not going to dive into this a whole lot. Where you can buy and sell points. So maybe somebody else. They can't travel, they want to sell some, you may be able to buy some. So there are options for getting more points. If you need that. And we encourage you again, talk to a DVC, a sales person, they're going to let you know how that all works and where you can go to find all that information. And you can always go back to the Disney vacation club site and search through there. But we're going to keep this at a high level today. We're not going to dive into buying and selling points. We're just going to talk to you about your allotment and how that's going to work. Now they do give you a couple different options here. And this is just to give you some samples of what you could use your points for. So you could do a seven night vacation for two and a deluxe studio at bay lake, which is going to be one of our examples today. We'll talk about that. That's 150 points. Just to give you an idea. You can do a family vacation. You can stay five nights at a one bedroom Villa that sleeps up to five people. For 205 points, or you can do a big family vacation at Disney's Vero beach resort. That one's a six night get away for up to 12 guests in a three bedroom place for 367 points. So you can see where maybe you use some of this year's points next year, and you borrow a future year to go do that big family vacation. If you're doing 150 points a year, of course, like I said, at the earlier in the episode, you can always buy more points upfront and go in at 300 a year. Maybe do a couple of vacations a year, or do that big family reunion every year or every so many months. But those are just some examples now. Now again. And I said this on the last episode, and people got really frustrated with this. These are examples provided by Disney. On the Disney vacation club website. These are not examples that I'm coming up with. These are not things that I'm creating. People said this isn't accurate and I'm telling you, this is from their website. If you're watching us on YouTube, you can see the URL at the top of the screen. This is the Disney vacation club website. These are their examples. So I am not coming up with any of these examples on my own. But let's go into the cost. So here you can see, they have that same plug that you can save up to 50% against future accommodations. And again, that's for people that are buying into DVC in the future, and you can finance this. I would recommend that you don't finance it if possible because it obviously is going to charge you more than what's going to be posted below. But they do have that option. So they're telling you your purchase price is going to be starting at $217 per point. For that setup. So if you did a hundred points here's their example. They just had two zeros. It's going to cost you 21,700 to buy into the program for a hundred points a year now, because the base rate, I think for vacation starts at about 150 points a year. That's the example we're going to use. Today's 150 points for the Disney vacation club. And then of course you have some closing costs because you are buying a real estate timeshare. That's inexpensive when you compare it to the big price. So we're not going to talk a whole lot about that, but then you do have annual dues and those do come into play. And in some examples down below we will show you what those annual dues are. But roughly they're about 12 to $1,300 per year. Sometimes more, depending on what resort you go to. But you do need to be mindful of that. So let's go ahead and scroll down and then they have the school calculator on the screen. You can figure out how many points are right for you based on what you want to do. But we did set it at 150 points. That again is what we think is the base to do one trip per year. And you can go all the way up to 300 points on the scroller. Of course, it's going to double your cost cause it's a, you saw up here it's $217 per point on average. So we're just going to stay at the one 50. Now, like I said, there are multiple resorts you can buy into. But you can use your points at any resort. So my recommendation is you may want to look at, and again, talk to the DVC counselors and the salespeople. They'll walk you through all this. But you may want to buy into a less expensive resort. Like on this example here, the Riviera resort versus the villas now. Aluani, ironically is a little bit cheaper than the villas. But you may want to buy into one that's a little less expensive. Maybe save a little money there because your points are good anywhere. So you're able to use those at any of the resorts. So you can see down here for 150 points per year. So keep in mind, you do get this 150 every single year. It's going to cost you about $32,000 at the Disney Riviera resort. The villas is about 34,000 at Aluani. It's 31 5 and then they do have some financing terms where you could play pay 450 500 bucks a month to do this. We recommend, again, you're better off if you can just pay the 32,000 up front. So whether you take some equity from your home or you save up over time. If you are not paying interest on this, that's going to help you in the long run. So $32,000 roughly to get in, and then you can see down here, you have your annual recurring cost. So annually, you're going to be paying a here at Riviera. You're going to be paying $110 a month, which is about 13, 20 a year. To keep these points going at the other resorts that goes up a little bit more. That's going to be closer to 1440 a year. But here we're talking 13, 20 14, 40 per year. To keep your points active and keep going with your annual dues. So think about that for you and your family and your budget. Is that something you can afford a is to pay this 110, $120 a month to keep your points going. Plus if you do finance it, then you know, up to $500 per month, in addition to that, so you could be. Paying upwards of six, 700 bucks a month to be part of this program or maybe pay a large lump sum up front, then you're just paying your recurring annual due fee. Okay. So that's how it works. That's a timeshare at a very high level. You're buying an interest in this property and it's going to cost you 30 some thousand dollars, and you're going to have to pay a monthly due on that to keep that service and keep that going. And you get 150 points a year. You can use at the different resorts. That is it at the highest level? Again, if you have questions, we encourage you to go back to the website, check it out, talk to a sales person through DVC and let them take you through that. Now we're going to go over here to the discovery portal. And it's going to talk to you about all the options you have and what Disney does. Great. And there's no question. And our time at Disney has the highest level of service. They've got some great food. They've got some great options. They've got all those really cool things. And Disney is definitely worth the money. The question is going to be is it worth this much money? And we're going to walk you through that, but they do have different ways you can do sample vacations romantic getaways summer in Hawaii. So we're on the fourth tab again here. On the DVC and they do give you again, more samples that you can do. I love this one, the fabulous fall escape. This is 75 vacation points. For three nights in a deluxe studio, you can sleep up to four over at Disneyland. So maybe you can do that a couple of times a year and go to the parks over at Disneyland. For the 150 points a year. So you could do that twice a year for three nights. That would be a lot of fun. We definitely enjoy going as often as we can. So there's a way to do it. So these again are some of the Disney examples and experiences you can do, and then they let you walk through pricing and then you can talk to a guide about all of this. Again, this is your discovery portal. Now here, we've got different ways to, and I'm going to show on my screen here, we're on the destination stab. I did pull up the cruise line one, but you can go through the resorts and they do give you a point chart for every single resort. That's part of the program. So that way you can see, Hey, maybe I want to go to bay lake. Maybe I want. And that's at the contemporary resort, by the way. Maybe I want to go to the grand Floridian. Maybe I want to go to Aluani. You can go through and search these resorts. You can also look at the cruise line. You can do the national geographic expeditions, which I hear are amazing. We have never done one. They are a little bit pricey, but we've heard that those are awesome. And then adventures by Disney, which is similar to the national geographic expeditions, where they take you into different cities and ports around the world. And you get a chance to explore them all and then you can go worldwide. So there's a lot of different options here on the destinations tab. Again, we do encourage you, whatever you and your family want to do. Go check this out and just get an idea of how many points you're going to need per year, and then go back to your point calculator and then figure out how much it's going to cost you to buy in. To that level. What I want to do now is I'm going to go through, and I'm going to give you a handful of examples of what you and your family could do. And I'm going to give you three different ones. And this is where again, last year when we did this, we got a lot of heated comments. People said we, we didn't know what we were talking about. Those prices were inaccurate. And we didn't own a calculator. I'm going to show you on my screen. So hopefully you're watching us on YouTube. And if you're not, you can always jump over to YouTube, go right into the middle of the episode. And then you're going to find where we're at right there. But I'm going to show you on my screen. Exactly what I'm looking at. And exactly what I'm talking about. So that way that I'm being accurate and honest with my depiction and my calculations for you. Like I said, I did make one mistake last year on one chart, and I'm going to point that out to you right now. So I'm pulling up the first examples bay lake tower at the contemporary resort. This is one of the first examples. They give on their site. And you can see they do give you a different point value for Sunday through Thursday. They give you a point value for the weekend, which is a little bit higher, and then they give you a weekly point value. You can see they do it for deluxe studio, a one bedroom Villa, which sleeps up to five. Two bedroom, which goes up to nine and then the three bedroom that goes up to 12 and you can see for a weekly rate you're talking six, 700 points on the high end for that one that does up to 12. And if you can only bank a year forward in a year in the past the most you're going to be able to get out of it's 450 points unless you buy more. So again, if you want to do that group of 12, you're going to probably need to buy more points somewhere in the 300 point range per year. So it's going to be double the cost. It's going to be about $64,000. If that's something you're interested in. But most people are just doing their family. So deluxe studio will sleep up to a family of four. Maybe you have a couple more kids and you need to get into a one bedroom Villa again, look at your weekly points. And that's probably what I would shoot for. On an annual basis is just to make sure we can go at least once a year. And then you can see on the left-hand column here. We do have date ranges because they are different for different times of year. Of course, at the very bottom here. And we're not going to go through examples on Christmas. Just because it's astronomical. You're talking 250 or so points just for a week at the base rate here at the deluxe studio to go at Christmas time versus their lowest time of year at, in September is about 136. And you can see, as you look down the column here, 1 46 at this time of year 1 55, 1 67. So that one 50 point range feels about right, for a normal family of four. Now you may be asking what is the SLT across the top? And that is over here and that's going to be your view. So a standard view, a lake view, or a theme park view. So that just gives you an idea. If you want a standard view, you're going to save some points you can get in for under a hundred points for a week over at the bay lake tower, which is a great deal. And I want to give you as close apples to apples comparison. So familiarize yourself with these point charts based on where you'd like to go. If you're always going to Orlando maybe find the resort down there. You want to go to pull up their point chart, figure out exactly how many it takes to get a week based on the number of people you have. And that's the level I would buy in at. So we have three people in our family. So we can do this deluxe studio that would work for me again, one 50 is about the right number for me. So about 32,000 initially then plus that $1,320 per year to keep those points maintained. Okay. So now what we're going to do is we're going to compare this 136 points or that 150 points per year. Against what I would be paying. If I went out of pocket. So again, a lot of people said these dollar amounts that I gave on the last episode were inaccurate and were not feasible. And so here. Again, we're at Disney's contemporary resorts to the same resort. I'm giving you a a garden wing resort view. This is $583 per night. This one is resort view. So this one is going to be closer to either the lake view or the theme park view. So somewhere in this range here. But basically. Over a six night period. So a week. So I come in on Sunday, I'm leaving on Saturday. I'm going to do all my days at the park. For a week, that's obviously going to be about $3,500. Okay. So just trying to use round numbers, it's going to be about $3,500. Now for that same week. That I did here using these points. That's going to use about a year's worth of points. And again, just rough numbers. Rough estimates here. Yes, you could go with the least expensive one and probably get a, another vacation squeezed in there every other year. And that would definitely help you. But let's just say that I'm spinning my 1320 and my annual dues versus 3,500 for that room. And then that's going to basically be saving me 2150 a year. So every year that I go through DVC, I'm saving $2,150. But keep in mind, I paid that 32,000 upfront. So again, just really rough math. You can verify this with a calculator, if you want. If I'm saving 2150 a year and I paid 32,000 to get into it, it's going to take me about 15 years of doing that. For that Expense to be recouped and for it to become a wash. And then year 16 going forward, I start saving money. So that's the question for you is when I'm looking long-term at doing DVC and saving some money. Is it worth paying?$32,000 upfront and going every single year for 15 years to break even. And then of course, going into your 16 to start saving about $2,000 a year. So that's the question that you need to ask yourself. And again, people said my math was off. You, guys sat here firsthand 583. I'm doing six nights. That's almost $3,500 for the, that trip. Versus the 1320, I paid here savings at 21 50 15 years to recoup the 32,000 check my math on that. If you think it's inaccurate or I'm wrong, please reach out to us over on Facebook and let me know, or put a comment on the video below. But people said that my math was wrong on the last one, and I know that it's not. So it takes me about 15 years to break even. Now one important call out here is this is only for my lodging. This does not include any food. This does not include my park tickets. This does not include my plane tickets, or maybe my gas. If I drove there. It does not include those other expenses that are going to be tacked on. Now with the DVC, you do have the option of getting an annual pass. That's a really cool feature. You can get the same one that we have, which is the sorcerer's pass. But you're going to be paying an almost full price for that. Anyways, you do get a small little discount being part of DVC. And if I'm going once a year, is it worth getting an annual pass? And I will say at the end of the day, probably not. But you can always explore those options to see if there's any other potential money saving options out there for you, but looking at it right now, I can tell you, it's going to take about 15 years to break even on your lodging alone. Okay. Now let's go over here to Aluani. Cause this is a really cool vacation destination in Hawaii. A lot of people want to go there again, 20, 24. The hotel room sleeps up to four. They have the deluxe studios, they have all these different things. And then you can see the point values up top, and then you can see the weekly rate. So we're going to be talking about a weekly rate. We're going to use that same September timeframe. So this is 112 points for the week. So yeah, every, every other year you may be able to squeeze an extra vacation in whether it's to Disneyland Disney world or by moving points around, you may be able to get that third trip in there based on 150 points a year, but we're using the example of 112. And then for me at Aluani for just the standard view it's $634 per night at that same timeframe. So if you're looking at my screen, you can see that I mid September, again, my family, two adults, one child. And so it's 634 per night. So over the course of a six night, stay that weekly stay Sunday to Saturday, that's going to cost me$3,800 if I'm paying that 634 per night. Okay. So 3,800. Versus then again. I'm saving a little bit of money here because I'm only going to be paying 1320 for those points. If I do it at the base level. And it's going to take me roughly about 13 years. So I'm going to actually be saving more here. 13 years to break, even on that$32,000 that I spent up front. And that's because you're saving about $2,500 a year. Now you do have the ability to get an extra trip in here. If you are banking your points or moving them around a little bit. So I do encourage you to look at that as well. That could be a way to curb it a little bit and maybe even break even closer to 10 years. But it will take you about 10 years if you're really good with your points. To break even going through Aluani now, again, this is the point value. I'm going to jump back to the screen just so that I'm fully transparent. I'm saying if you buy into Rivera resort, so the 32,000 you guys can see that's my first column over here on the left, 150 points a year. And then I'm saying. Use your points at Aluani. I'm not saying buy into Aluani. If you look at this example, that was a little less expensive. Over here. Each different resort is going to have different perks to it. So again, I encourage you talk to an advisor over at DVC to figure out exactly what's going to work for you. But the big question is, how long does it take for me to break even on this investment? And Aluani. Traveling there every year. It's about 13 years. Maybe closer to 10, if you're able to squeeze in an extra trip or two. Now we just got back from a Disney cruise. We went on the Disney fantasy. Out there in the Caribbean and here is their chart and this is an eye chart. So I really apologize if you are watching us. On YouTube. It's very difficult to see these points. I didn't want to zoom in and take up too much of the screen because then it takes off the video, but I'm going to show you right here. I am. I'm starting at a room with a veranda. So when we travel on a cruise, we definitely like to have that balcony, which they call it here a veranda, and I'm going to use the base level for that. And I'm going to again, use that mid-September timeframe. Because that is the least expensive on points and least expensive on dollars, but you can see here it's 225 to 247 points. And that's right where my cursor is on the screen. Let's just call it 240 points to go. On a cruise, depending on when you're going In that September timeframe. And then keep in mind. That's only for two people. Okay. So that's a seven night Eastern, Caribbean. If I wanted to bring our daughter along, which we definitely do, that's about another 120 points. So I'm looking at about 360 points to go on a cruise. With my family of three. Okay. With a family of four, you're going to be adding on another 120 points or so, so you're looking at about 480. So that's about three years worth of points. Right now, we're going to be talking just at the 360. Level and trying to balance it out as close to that as possible. Now. For that same cruise. And this page always takes a second to load because there's some graphics here. I'm going to be pulling up the exact same cruise. So this is seven, nine Eastern Caribbean on the Disney fantasy. The one that we just went on, I have that same room. A veranda room is a 51 90. For the three of us. Okay. So that's the dollar amount we're going to be using in our example. So it's either 360 points or 51 90. So if I did it every other year and to do it every other year, I'm going to have to move some points around. Okay. I can do it every other year and, pull some points from a future year. And do this cruise. It's going to be saving me. Cause now I'm paying two years worth of dues. So I'm paying that 1320 for two years. It's going to cost me 26, 40 to go. I'm paying 51 90 and this is just at a base price. We're not including the gratuities. Cause of course, you're going to pay gratuities on a cruise. You're going to pay for all those other things. It's going to take me about 30 years to get the value out of it. So that was one comment that did come up very often is on our last episode, I did advocate and say the cruises, I thought were some of the best values. And a few of the people said the cruises are actually the worst value because they take you the longest. Just to breakeven. They're correct. It is the longest to break even. It does take about 30 years to break even , if you're doing it on cruises. What I like though about the cruise is fully inclusive. Meaning you're going to be getting a lot of cool entertainment, fun things to do. You don't have to buy park tickets. And you're going to get all of your food and dining paid for. Whereas if you go to like the bay lake and the example that we gave you earlier, Aluani. You are paying for your food in a addition to going on the trip. Now that's true. Whether you use points or whether you use cash and pay for it. So we did not include that in any of our calculations, but I do think it's worth calling out that if you're going to go on a cruise, you do get extra value because all your food and activities are covered. So that is one big benefit. We absolutely loved our cruise. We went on Halloween on the high seas, which is what on my screen here. We had a great time going to these places and it was awesome. We went to Tortola St. Thomas and the Castaway Cay. But it was totally awesome. We absolutely enjoyed it. a ton and we've been on now, five different cruises. And this was our favorite one by far. What was going on the Disney cruise. So again, I encourage you. If you want to go on a Disney cruise, we do have episodes on that right now. We do have three of them out there. We have one where we talk to our friends. Anthony and Lisa about their cruise experience, because they're the ones who convinced us. To go on a Disney cruise and then I've got two episodes about our experience on the Disney cruise. And then as a Disney cruise worth it, when you compare it to other cruise lines, So definitely go check out those episodes, but for the sake of DVC you can do it about every other year and it's going to take you 30 years to break even. So like the comments said last year, when we did this episode it is probably the longest one to break even. So they say it's the worst example to use. You're going to be better off going to bay lake or to Aluani every single year and breaking even a little bit quicker. So those are three examples. Again, I do encourage you check my math. I'm not wrong on my math. I definitely went through and made sure that I use the right charts this time and the right line. Cause I was looking at the wrong line last year and made sure that we use the right value here. And again, every resort can have a different value and a lot of different options. And those are up on the screen right now. I've been clicking through those. So go check those out and I can tell you there, there's nothing better than going and talking to somebody who works for DVC. They can explain this better than I can, because I'm doing it at a high level overview, but basically, and I really want to try to sum it up the easiest way that I can. So if you've never done DVC or you're looking into it for the first time, the easiest way for me to sum it up. Is you're going to spend up front over $30,000 to get 150 points a year. For that 150 points a year, you can travel for about one week per year to a Disney property. And that covers just your lodging. Okay. Now, if you do a cruise, like we just given their example, you may need a couple of years points, but you can get your food covered there. You're going to be paying for your food. In addition to that, you're going to be paying for your transportation, your airfare. In addition to that, You're going to be paying for your park tickets in addition to that. Okay. But it's going to cost you just over 30,000 to buy-in and about 13 to 1400 per year to keep these. Everything active to keep the dues going right. So the question is it worth it? And we said in our last episode, and I stand by this, we do not believe it's worth it. And here's why, and this is the, I can do this all day tip of the day, which you can see my water bottle over the, my. Shoulder here. We have our, I can do this all day merchandise out there with the captain America logo and the Disney castle in the middle of it. We absolutely love that merchandise it's available on our Etsy page in the description below, but our, I can do this all day tip of the day on this. Is for that same annual due you're going to be paying every year. So that $1,300 or so you're going to pay every single year. I want you to think about for that same $1,300? Can I go stay six nights at a different hotel that may be off property out there in Orlando or in Anaheim? And the answer is easily. Yes, you certainly can. There's a lot of hotels out there that are 150 $200 a night. And for six nights, you're going to be saving money going over there. And basically you could even say it's a wash. But you're never going to have to pay that $32,000 upfront. Okay, so you can definitely save money by staying offsite at a normal branded hotel. I will even take it a step further and say there's a lot of VRBO properties, Airbnb properties. We have a property down there that we do put out through Airbnb VRBO. That's in the links down below as well. Ours is about $150 a night. So for the same six nights, you're paying about $900 plus a cleaning fee. And so you're going to be saving money there and you get three bedrooms and two bath, which is going to be way better than a single hotel room with just one bathroom for your whole family. So there's a lot of great options out there to save money and to make it even better. So the question that comes up and what I want you to think about and encourage you to think about is, it important to you to stay on resort? Or not. And we do have episodes about that. So I encourage you to go check those out as well. But it's an important to be on resort. If it is then DVC may be right for you. You may say we want to go every single year and being on resort is important to us then. Yeah, I would definitely say then do it because after 15 years or 13 years or 10 years, depending on how you slice and dice it, you can get to the point where you are now starting to save money every single year going forward. But you're going to be locked into this long-term commitment with them. So go check that out. Definitely talk to a person about that. If staying on resort, isn't that important to you? And you realize, Hey, I'm going for the parks and I'm going to have a great time at all the parks. And I don't care where I sleep, which is what we talk about in that episode. Doesn't really matter to you where you lay your head at night, because that's going to be the biggest difference. If it doesn't matter to you where you lay your head at night, you're going to be able to save a lot of money by staying off resort and going to a traditional hotel or a VRBO or Airbnb. And you may even get a lot more room with also the same type of pool and resort type amenities out there depending on where you go, because a lot of the hotels have the waterslides. Now they all have the splash pads and a lot of the cool things for the kids. I encourage you definitely go check it out. But if you have any questions or you want any recommendations, you can again, find us on Facebook at a Dryer dose of Disney, and we're happy to give you those recommendations and talk to you guys about it. So with that. Again, I hope. That you guys got a lot of good information out of this episode today. This episode is definitely geared towards those that are looking at DVC for the first time. If you've already invested in DVC and you feel like I'm bashing DVC. I apologize. It's not a personal thing. You made that investment. I did not make that investment and my math is accurate on it. This time, a hundred percent. Because I am using all the exact point charts and pointing this up for you on the screen and doing the calculations live for you. So you guys can all see that. I encourage you guys to definitely check that all out. With that we hope that you have a very magical week as you're planning your next vacation. And like I said, at the top of the episode, we may not have episodes every single week going forward as we're working to get more material for you and covering those international parks. But we will get the episodes out. there to you as soon as possible. But we hope that you have a great week and we'll talk to you guys next time. Bye. Bye. Exit Music,