Is DVC for cruises really never worth it?

[bananapepper]

Calling all math people! Is it really never worth it? With cruises costing my family of 5 around 12k per trip during school break times, is there really no amount of cheap points worth it? To even go every other year?

We like to get two connecting ocean view staterooms.

With how much cruises cost I just find that hard to believe

 

[_auroraborealis_]

Unless you bought OKW at inception, really, no.

If you are buying now, there are no cheap points that can be used to book a cruise via Disney. They have to be direct points.

Any points can be used in a rental agency's cruise exchange program, and those can be worthwhile. But they don't use Disney's points charts for cruising.

The big mistake most people make looking at the cruise point charts is that they don't account for the points costs being per person.

 

[TexasChick123]

Calling all math people! Is it really never worth it? With cruises costing my family of 5 around 12k per trip during school break times, is there really no amount of cheap points worth it? To even go every other year?

We like to get two connecting ocean view staterooms.

With how much cruises cost I just find that hard to believe

Rent out your points to pay for the cruise. If you don’t want to rent them yourself, use one of the rental brokers. You’ll get a lot more bang for your buck that way. I think one of the rental brokers actually lets you rent points in exchange for cruise reservations. I don’t know how it is set up with them, but look into it.

ETA: Here is the link - https://dvcrequest.com/dvc-owners/dvc-cruise-swap-program

 

[GoUgaDawgs]

Unfortunately in my experience it just isn't ever worth it. Even on popular weeks like spring break they just make you pay more points. For example a 5 day cruise March 29, 2021 oceanview stateroom costs 3961 for 2 people. The cost on points is 236x2=472. That is only 8.39 dollars per point. And they keep that ratio fairly consistent whichever week you look at.

It really doesn't even matter where you buy your points or how much you paid for them, you can get better value renting your points at a service like David's.

One of the dvc guides tried to explain a system to me where you could book one person in points and pay the rest cash for some kind of discount, but honestly his math was so suspect and the process was so confusing I really doubt it ever works out like he was claiming.

 

[ClemTig]

Rent our your points to pay for the cruise. If you don’t want to rent them yourself, use one of the rental brokers. You’ll get a lot more bang for your buck that way. I think one of the rental brokers actually lets you rent points in exchange for cruise reservations. I don’t know how it is set up with them, but look into it.

ETA: Here is the link - https://dvcrequest.com/dvc-owners/dvc-cruise-swap-program

This is the most cost efficient way.

 

[bananapepper]

This is the most cost efficient way.

Any idea how many points I’d need to pay for two ocean view staterooms? And at what point I’d break even ?

 

[TexasChick123]

Any idea how many points I’d need to pay for two ocean view staterooms? And at what point I’d break even ?

They’re currently giving owners $15.50 for every point rented 7-11 months out. Take the cost of your cruise and divide it by $15.50. That’s the number of points you’ll need.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

I think the challenge you're having believing that points exchange is never a good deal is you're equating a cruise with a DVC unit, and the system isn't set up with them as equal partners. DCL is a separate system that DVC contracts with for a trade. DVC takes profit on trades. Thus, a point trade doesn't even equate to your dues cost per point in some cases, let alone any accounting for your capital expense of buy-in.

You still have to pay for all 5 people. It's not like a DVC unit, where so long as it fits 5, the cost is the cost whether you book 1 person to the unit or 5.

 

[bananapepper]

They’re currently giving owners $15.50 for every point rented 7-11 months out. Take the cost of your cruise and divide it by $15.50. That’s the number of points you’ll need.

So a cruise is about 12,000 for us. So to go every other year we would need about 387 points. We'd basically break even after about 3.5 cruises if we bought AK resale. Then we'd just have the dues but even 2 years' worth of dues is huge savings vs the full cost of a cruise for 5 people. So that seems like a pretty good deal? Am I missing anything?

 

[cruisehopeful]

It might not make financial sense, but it if it makes it possible for you to cruise when you otherwise wouldn't do it, I'd say go for it. Financial sense and personal satisfaction are 2 completely different things.

One way you can do the math is to price out how many points you need for a cruise. Remember to add a chunk of points for each passenger (not count the first chunk of points as 2 people). Add all the points up and multiply by how much you pay for annual dues per point. Add in any additional fees. When I owned, I needed to pay $95 to convert to DCL. This will be your base for comparison.

Look at the identical cruise on the DCL website and figure out how much it will cost to pay cash for the whole thing. Now, you will compare the totals. Is it close enough to use the points for a cruise?

If you want to save a little more off the cash cruise, consider booking through an agent that gives you on board credit or booking with Costco if you shop at Costco and they will send you a Costco gift card after the cruise.

Add up how much $ you'd get from renting out your points and apply that to the cash price of the cruise. You should get a pretty set idea of what is most valuable for you and not for anyone else.

 

[cruisehopeful]

So a cruise is about 12,000 for us. So to go every other year we would need about 387 points. We'd basically break even after about 3.5 cruises if we bought AK resale.

Are you saying that you'd buy resale DVC to use towards cruises? I don't think you can do that. I think you have to buy from retail from DVC to use for cruises. And are you figuring in the annual dues that go up every year?

387 seems like a small amount of points for 5 people in 2 different rooms. Can you post a link to where you saw that or copy/paste that?

 

[bananapepper]

Are you saying that you'd buy resale DVC to use towards cruises? I don't think you can do that. I think you have to buy from retail from DVC to use for cruises. And are you figuring in the annual dues that go up every year?

387 seems like a small amount of points for 5 people in 2 different rooms. Can you post a link to where you saw that or copy/paste that?

Oh you can't use resale for a cruise? Did not know that. But I would just be swapping them or renting them out so it doesn't really matter right where I got them?

Just math to get that number. 12,000 is roughly how much it costs us OOP for a cruise divided by 15.5 = 774. If we wanted enough points to go every other year by banking/borrowing, we'd need half that amount. 774 divided by 2 = 387.

 

[cedricandsophie]

you cant use resale points for the cruise unless you are grandfather meaning you purchased them a few years ago. You can only use grandfathered resale points or direct points for a cruise. However there are sites that let you exchange resale points for a cruise if you rent them. Just google it. A couple sites come up.

 

[bananapepper]

you cant use resale points for the cruise unless you are grandfather meaning you purchased them a few years ago. You can only use grandfathered resale points or direct points for a cruise. However there are sites that let you exchange resale points for a cruise if you rent them. Just google it. A couple sites come up.

Yes, I do not mean I would book directly through Disney with resale. I would trade points through a site or just rent them out.

 

[aoconnor]

So a cruise is about 12,000 for us. So to go every other year we would need about 387 points. We'd basically break even after about 3.5 cruises if we bought AK resale. Then we'd just have the dues but even 2 years' worth of dues is huge savings vs the full cost of a cruise for 5 people. So that seems like a pretty good deal? Am I missing anything?

I mean, if you bought 400 points at $105 average on the resale market that's $42,000 plus dues are $3,068. After 6 years (3 cruises every other year) you'd have paid $42,000 for the contract plus ~$19,000 in dues (they go up every year) for a total of $61,000. If you rented all those points each of those six years at $15 each you'd have collected $36,000- so you're still out the door $25,000.

It really doesn't make sense to buy DVC only to rent it out.

 

[bananapepper]

I mean, if you bought 400 points at $105 average on the resale market that's $42,000 plus dues are $3,068. After 6 years (3 cruises every other year) you'd have paid $42,000 for the contract plus ~$19,000 in dues (they go up every year) for a total of $61,000. If you rented all those points each of those six years at $15 each you'd have collected $36,000- so you're still out the door $25,000.

It really doesn't make sense to buy DVC only to rent it out.

With dues being 7.5 a point roughly right now, if we banked and borrowed to go every other year, once we break even each cruise would cost us 2 years worth of dues which would be about 5,700 or less than half the cost of a cruise if we paid for it out of pocket. Right? We'd probably try and buy 390 points.

 

[zavandor]

It's more difficult to do the calculations now because the charts have point ranges rather than an exact number for most dates and room categories. Anyway, the point conversion varies for awful to terrible, it's never convenient.
I've read in the past a couple of posts of people who made this work:
- paying in points for one person and cash for the others. Someone the came out ahead
- one person found a cruise that was in low season for the DVC chart but in high season for DCL. This way their point conversion was very similar to renting the points
Both were years ago, I doubt something like this works (anymore).

The general rule is: best to use DVC points for the DVC resorts.

 

[RoseGold]

Unless you bought OKW at inception, really, no.

Even if you bought OKW at inception, renting out the points and paying cash is probably better.

But this post has no math, so hard to say for sure.

 

[ludari]

As others have mentioned that financially it doesn't make sense to use your DVC points towards a cruise, however I have friends that have purchased a large number of points many years ago and don't stay at the resorts very often and for them it's worth it to use those points towards cruises. Personally I don't have that luxury of having that many points to use them for cruises.

 

[CanadaDisney05]

So a cruise is about 12,000 for us. So to go every other year we would need about 387 points. We'd basically break even after about 3.5 cruises if we bought AK resale. Then we'd just have the dues but even 2 years' worth of dues is huge savings vs the full cost of a cruise for 5 people. So that seems like a pretty good deal? Am I missing anything?

I think your missing something. Don't think about it as your DVC will cover cruising. Think about them as separate transactions.

1) Buy DVC and pay annual dues
2) Sell your DVC points every year in exchange for cash (or credit)
3) Use the cash (or credit) and use it to pay for the cruise.

Example 1
Lets say you bought 400 Saratoga points direct @ 160.

400 x 160 = $64,000 purchase price
400 x 6.76 = $2,704 annual dues every year (then adjust for inflation)

If you use Disney's cruise swap program, they will give you about $8 per point worth of cruise credit.

400 x 8 = $3,200
Annual Dues = $2,704
Cruise Admin Fee = $95
Savings in year 1 = $401

It's going to take a lot of $401's to pay back the $64,000 you paid up front.

Example 2
Let's say you bought 400 Saratoga points resale @100 per point.

400 x 100 = $40,000
400 x 6.76 = $2,704 annual dues every year (then adjust for inflation)

If you use a cruise swap program with one of the rental brokers, they generally give you about $15 worth of credit and don't charge the $95 fee.

400 x 15 = 6,000
Annual Dues = 2,704
Cruise Admin Fee = 0
Savings in year 1 = $3,296

Ignoring things like inflation and time value of money, your pay back period is about 12 years using this method.

There are some risks you need to be aware of and be prepared to live with. The biggest risk is that demand for DVC goes down. The cruise swap programs only work because what's really happening is your renting your points to another family. If demand goes down, it may be more difficult to rent, and you may no longer get $15 per point.

Another issue could be if the brokers shut down. You may be forced to do these transactions on your own.

I believe your fine tax wise if doing one of the cruise swap programs, but if your flat out renting your points and then using the cash to book the cruise yourself, you will likely need to pay tax on the income. That could extend your pay back period.

Edit: I probably should have mentioned, that even in the second option, your really only saving $3,300 per year on a 12K cruise. To be able to cover a 12K cruise every other year, you would need close to 800 points. 800 SSR points (most economical) would cost about 80K upfront.