That thought started going through my head this week, after reading on DVC News about the latest Disney Vacation Club incentive to encourage people to purchase either more points, if you’re already a Member, or to join. It’s a good one, this time they’re offering 45 years of free points.
Free points - now available at Animal Kingdom Lodge
Yes, wipe your eyes, read that sentence again, because it’s true! I must admit I did a double take and wondered if there was a typo somewhere, but apparently not. As Tim explains so well on his site, you get 20 free points with every 100 that you buy, and they’re available each year for the whole life of the contract.
So will that make you buy into the Disney Vacation Club, if you’re not already a Member, or Members has it got you thinking about buying even more points? I’ll be honest, the thought is running through my head with this offer. Ok, so I don’t have the cash right now, but if I did, I would be tempted.
Will the new incentive be enough to tempt you to buy points in Aulani? (photo courtesy of Kellie Losenicky)
We’ve always joked in the Owning Your Magic forum on the PassPorter message boards that when you become a Disney Vacation Club Member, it’s like eating chocolate. You always want more, with plenty of people adding on more points. We’ve added on three times already, and the prospect of a few Animal Kingdom Lodge Villas points is very tempting. That’s what makes this so attractive. It may not be the greatest saving ever, and Tim kindly breaks it down into cash terms, so you can see what you’re getting for your money, but it’s the prospect of having additional points to play with that appeals to me.
I feel bad confessing this, but I don’t even remember the incentives on offer every time we added on. I just know that they were so good that we couldn’t resist! I know on at least one occasion, there was a saving on the base price per point, and that’s been a traditional selling tool the Disney Vacation Club has used for many years.
However, more recently, we’ve seen a move to a different kind of reward. Remember last year’s offer, when if you purchased enough points, you could get a free stay at Aulani in Hawai’i or a cruise on the Disney Dream? Put your hands up, if like me, you looked enviously at that offer, then sadly realised that there was no way you were in a position to add nearly enough points on to qualify for either…
On our last cruise on the Magic, the incentives were so good, we came home with more Disney Vacation Club points!
Before the latest incentive was unveiled, purchases of more than 100 points, as well as attracting a handsome discount, also offered a $500 Disney gift card. And one thing I do remember getting as an incentive when we bought more points on our Disney cruise around the Mediterranean in 2007 was that we got a die cast model of the Disney Magic, which still has pride of place in our living room.
So what do you think of the latest incentive to buy points from the Disney Vacation Club? Does it have you tempted to either buy in for the first time or add more points? And what would you like to see them offering as an incentive in the future? It’s over to you….
I hope they offer this again – we bought in with the usual 160. We haven’t even stayed on points yet, but we’re realizing that it’s “not enough”!
We blow through our 355 points halfway through our use year. I would LOVE more points. I think it would be an incentive to drop the price. You would get ppl in the door.
We would love it if DVC owners could be eligible for some type of free dining plan when it is offered to everyone else…we would absolutely up our points for that!
Rose, how much is it a point? and how many points does it take to really have enough to go for 1 week a year?
I’ll see if I can help with your question. Points through the DVC themselves range from $130 per point at Animal Kingdom Villas to $155 per point at Bay Lake Tower. You may be able to get points cheaper through retail.
It’s hard to say how many points you’ll need, but the minimum purchase through the DVC is 100 points. The number of points varies hugely, dependent on what time of the year you want to travel, the size of accommodation (from a studio sleeping four to a grand villa sleeping 12) to the resort you want to stay in. At the bottom end of the WDW resorts, you could get a week in a studio in Old Key West in January, September or early December for 76 points. However, going at the same time of year for a week in a studio with a Magic Kingdom view at Bay Lake Tower would set you back 139 points, just to give you an idea…