Yup - interesting though, that a 2br would sleep 10, as would 2 studios. I wonder what the point difference is (to get a dining area and laundry...) (sorry too lazy to look it up) I could see a family of park commandos with teens doing 2 studios, but choosing a 2br with little kids (or older people, like my dad) or for ease of laundry.
Agree 100% - especially on - you could resell if you needed to, and hopefully break even or not lose too much. In life circumstances where you'd need to resell in a hurry, I would think that I'd be more concerned about the life circumstances and less so about whether reselling my DVC is going to get me the best deal.
We own at BLT, VGF and RIV. My resale contracts are grandfathered, so all points are "unrestricted" for 7mo booking. BUT - if I only had to use my RIV points at RIV, I would be happy to do that. DH and I continually debate whether VGF or RIV is our favorite resort. Our current consensus (after having just stayed at both over Xmas/NYE): VGF is preferred for Christmas because of the decorations, RIV (standard view no less) preferred for NYE where you have a decent chance of seeing both MK AND EP fireworks. I originally thought I would pick up a resale RIV on the cheap solely for booking standard rooms at the 11mo window, because our other points are unrestricted. And ended up loving the resort so much that we didn't want to hunt and wait and compete for the "right" resale contract.
Our very first resale contract (BLT) had almost double points and we had around 300 points to play with for our first booking. That is dangerous because we immediately felt like we needed more points. And so we added on ... and on ...
That is a great way of putting it. When you put actual numbers on it, it is almost nothing. Like maybe it can function as a tiebreaker, but it should not stop you from picking one over the other based on where you actually WANT to stay.
I feel like this is setting up VGF direct to be priced a little higher - but perhaps lower than what they are now. Maybe at or just under Poly? Has someone done a poll on this? Would be interesting.
Totally agree. Our oldest is 10 and already there's a lot of pressure to stick to school break weeks, which cost a LOT of points. I feel like the Riviera layouts are very smart and the extra space in the entry is well-designed. The hooks just inside the front door are great for hanging ponchos, masks, park bags, etc. although the "bar" counter space in the VGF kitchen kind of does the same thing. Also with both VGF and RIV, the second bath has the split bath layout that has 2 showers, so even though you don't have 3 full BA like BLT, you do have 3 showers. My dad stayed with us in a VGF 1br (5 people) over Xmas and it was a pain having to share 1 shower with 5 people.
I think 1BR will either be easier or the same for booking and here's why:
Look at May/June 2022 for a week:
| 2 std studios | 1BR std | 2BR std |
points | 264 | 282 | 387 |
# guests (up to) | 10 | 5 | 9-10 (LO has more) |
baths, showers, sinks of any kind | 2, 4, 4 | 1, 1, 3 | 2, 3, 4-5 (LO has more) |
Looking at this, if there's even some hope of connecting studios, I think there is a good case to be made that studio demand will continue to be high, and if there's any competitive pressure it will be on 2br and not 1br, which clearly seem to be the "luxury" use of points for smaller families or couples. I still think if you have teens or park commandos who don't need a kitchen, you're going to value putting a lot of people in the unit and having lots of showers and sinks to use. Toilets are just going to be a problem no matter what.
(Yes, I cherry picked a time period where a 1br cost *more* than 2 studios. But even for Xmas week, 1BR = 2 studios. I personally would not try to stick 9-10 people in 2 studios or a 2BR but for large families it's definitely an option.)
This also sounds like how having a
FP lightning lane makes the standby lane move even slower.