DVC Resort Maintenance - Do they really refurbish like they should?

newfangled

Mouseketeer
Joined
Nov 12, 2014
A few years ago we purchased a DVC contract with Wilderness Lodge Villas as our home resort. We sold a couple of years later for various reasons.
  • As Florida residents we wanted to be more spontaneous with our visits...yet stay "where we wanted". That was hard to do using points.
  • We had a string of bad luck, like our weekend family gathering in a grand villa booking being ruined because the room went down for maintenance (the day before the trip!), and we needed to change our Christmastime at Wilderness Lodge plan because of the construction for the new additions - Beach Club at Christmas just wasn't the same)
  • We started to feel like the DVC areas were the most distant to other resort activities....was it exclusive or just shoved off to the side?
  • The value of our points had increased with the announcement of the expansion, so we actually made a profit - effectively resulting in 3 free vacation stays over the course of our ownership....given our other issues this made the decision somewhat easy.
  • Finally....and the reason for this post. We felt our DVC stays ended up in rooms that were not kept up to date as diligently as normal deluxe resorts.
Now I am getting the itch to buy DVC again. There was something a little intangible about doing things like going to Top of the World Lounge and generally owning a little "part of the Disney experience". The new restrictions on resale are a little bit of a concern....but not too much. We probably wouldn't buy as big a contract so we could pay cash for spontaneous trips and use points for bigger planned vacations (though then I would feel like I'm over paying when staying on cash...ugh I don't know). Anyway I digress...I'd like to know how others feel about resort maintenance. Do you feel they are doing justice to the maintenance fees you pay? or are you happy with how fresh they keep them?

I don't want to buy again only to regret it. Our stay at Beach Club that Christmas was really terrible (I think they started refurbishing the next spring). AKL wasn't much better, and although we never did get to stay at our home resort, I wasn't hearing good things on the boards at the time about WLV either). I was starting to think that our DVC rooms, while roomier, felt dirtier and more out-of-date as a whole. Anyone know if the refurb cycle is less frequent or the same as deluxe resorts?

And for those that used to stay in deluxe resorts regularly before buying DVC....do you miss staying in places like in the atrium at the Contemporary or closer to the volcano pool at the Poly?


Thanks for the feedback!
 
If you always want to stay in a spotless, up to date resort, forget about buying DVC. Even with the more frequent schedule of doing soft and hard renovations now, they aren't as frequent as the Disney owned resorts. Little problems never bother me. If I find a bigger problem like a problem with AC, I notify Maintenance as soon as we discover the problem. If I find lots of little problems, I'll notify Member Satisfaction by email after the fact. Taxes and wages are the biggest cost to member fees.

We only stayed at the Polynesian before we bought (we bought on that trip) and have no desire to go back there. We have stayed at the Contemporary South Wing on cheap points from another member. We stayed in GF Sugarloaf on cash for one trip. We stayed in Jambo House 5th floor Concierge before they renovated rooms to DVC villas. Our son got us a few nights at AKL and GF for cash stays when he was a CM. But we did stay a few nights at POR and POFQ, Coronado Springs and Caribbean Beach for cash. I still prefer OKW.
 
I find it's not too unusual to find a little problem or something that is slightly more worn than ideal (especially if the resort is coming due for a reservation). But if you find something truly broken, as Deb said maintenance will fix/replace it. We've had a dishwasher and a refrigerator replaced on our trips when we found they didn't really work, in addition to random sink maintenance etc.

The problems I've had have been more with staff: contemporary not having enough bellhops for 5AM DME departure, or BCV staff repeatedly telling us our luggage was about to arrive, when in reality it had been lost by Delta and DME never had it. But those problems aren't particular to DVC as it's the same staff for DVC or not.

Given the desire to be spontaneous, and that it sounds like you would prefer newer rooms over the savings you get from buying DVC and planning ahead, I think I would hesitate to buy DVC again if I were you. Especially right now given questions about the economy and even what WDW will be like in the next couple of years.

Bruce
 
It doesn't sound like buying DVC again at this point would be a good idea. DVC and spontaneity don't work out well together. We have owned for about 15 years now, and sometimes the rooms have seemed dated. I too have called maintenance with issues and they were fixed quickly.

With the points you raised, you might regret getting into it again, and the cost has gone up since you originally bought in.
 



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