After being rumored for years, the moment has finally come for Disney Vacation Club owners. Disney’s Polynesian Villas & Bungalows have joined the fold as one of the 13 featured resorts. Better yet, the addition of the Polynesian increases the number of properties at actual Disney theme parks to an even 10, 90 percent of which are located at Walt Disney World. This is the moment a lot of DVC aficionados have been waiting for, and now is a great time to decipher what it means for current and potential members.
1. What’s the big deal?
Anyone with a sense of Walt Disney World history appreciates that there are three seminal resorts onsite. The Grand Floridian and the Contemporary Resort are two of them. Not coincidentally, the two most recent prior additions to the DVC portfolio were both located at these resorts. In the case of the Contemporary, an adjoining building was constructed, which is now called Bay Lake Tower.
The Polynesian is the final crown jewel. It sports a tremendous location, a monorail ride away from Magic Kingdom and (after a transfer) Epcot. Its beach also features an unforgettable view of the nightly fireworks display at Magic Kingdom. For many people, the Polynesian is the coolest, most memorable of all Disney resorts. From this point forward, any new DVC property will probably have to be an entirely new endeavor in order to achieve the same amount of buzz as Grand Floridian and now Polynesian have. This is Disney’s final anchor resort. Its addition to the DVC catalog is a huge deal.
2. The financial cost
Nobody reasonably expected the Polynesian to be cheap. After all, the recently announced DVC price increases hinted at impending sticker shock for this resort. Given these concerns, many owners (including myself) were pleasantly relieved to see a relatively respectable cost of $160 per point. When the Grand Floridian debuted in May of 2013, it came with a price tag of $145 per point at a time when older resorts such as Beach Club Villas and Boardwalk Villas cost $115 per point.
The January 2015 rate spike for those properties could have foreshadowed a similar price difference for the Polynesian. With most popular participants currently charging $155 per point, the Polynesian seems downright economical at $160. Consider that some of the other DVC entrants have contracts that expire as soon as 2042. A purchase at the Polynesian costs only $500 for every 100 points purchased yet the contract lasts until 2066. That’s a bunch of presidents and Olympics from now. For that matter, Haley’s Comet will have come and gone again by the time a Polynesian purchase reaches its time limit.
3. The points cost
This topic is not quite as rosy. Staying at the Polynesian will require a significant point expenditure. If you have a lot of points, you can ignore this part of the conversation. If you are like me and only own a week’s worth of points each year, here is the economic breakdown.
A week’s stay at the Polynesian’s cheapest option, a deluxe studio with standard view, will cost 118 points during the slowest season. These time frames include January, September and the first two weeks of December. The busiest weeks defined as Premier Season for 2015 are April 1st – April 11th and Christmas Eve through New Year’s Eve. These weeks require a whopping 227 points. That’s the same high-end cost as Grand Floridian, and the low-end is only seven points per week cheaper. If you want to stay at one of Walt Disney World’s signature properties, it’s going to cost you.
Along those lines, if you want one of those gorgeous two-bedroom bungalows, the points cost borders on crippling. A single night at a bungalow costs no less than 115 points. For comparison, an entire week for a studio at Beach Club Villas during Dream Season costs 120 points in 2015. Bay Lake Tower is 123 points. Both of these resorts also provide close proximity to Epcot and Magic Kingdom, the two most trafficked theme parks in the world. Grand Floridian also costs 125 points for Adventure and Choice Season while Dream Season would cost 153 points. Ergo, 115 points for a single night is a massive cost.
If you want to spend a week at a bungalow, the absolute lowest points cost is 824 during January and September plus December 1st through the 14th. The highest cost occurs during Christmas week once again as well as March 24th through April 6th. One of the bungalows during that time would be an almost unimaginable 1,419 points. Just to put that in perspective, it is the equivalent of almost six full weeks of a theme park view studio at Bay Lake Tower.
In case you are wondering, that is the largest possible point expenditure at DVC. Technically, it is tied with Grand Floridian, which also has a 1,419 weekly rate for its Premier Season grand villa. Polynesian thereby becomes the fifth member of the exclusive thousand points a week grand villa club at DVC. It joins Aulani (1,288 points during peak season), Bay Lake Tower (1,287 points) and Grand Californian (1,358 points) plus the aforementioned Grand Floridian.
4. The weekly option
With the debut of Grand Floridian, DVC introduced a new concept, which is the weekly purchase. The idea is that some people steadily frequent Walt Disney World at the same time each year. Rather than fight the DVC crowd by trying to secure reservations 11 months prior to your vacation, Disney now provides customers with the option to lock in that week every year.
The obvious target date here is Christmas week. Everybody understands exactly how much competition there is during this crowded point on the calendar, as families try to spend the holidays at the happiest place on Earth. There are other uses as well. If you happen to celebrate a birthday, holiday or anniversary at Walt Disney World each year, the idea can be appealing.
As an example, my wife’s birthday and our anniversary line up in a manner that causes us to visit in May. Were we interested, we could secure the requisite dates from now until 2066, at which point my titanium exoskeleton and Google Brainpal© will be sustaining my existence long after my original body has given out. Making such a purchase comes at a price, though. Expect to pay 10% more than the cost of an appropriate amount of points for the week in question in order to secure your annual visit. So, Christmas week would be $40,000 by my calculations (227 points at 10% markup from $160 per point). If you want to do this, you have to accept and be willing to tolerate the additional cost of doing business.
5. The miscellany
The maintenance fees start at $6.02. I would describe this as a bit of a surprise in that the Polynesian is already in the upper tier with regards to maintenance fees for Walt Disney World properties. The Wilderness Lodge is effectively tied with it at $6.02, while Bay Lake Tower ($5.05), Beach Club Villas ($5.97), Grand Floridian ($5.52), Old Key West ($5.84) and Saratoga Springs ($5.17) are all lower. Only Boardwalk Villas ($6.07) and Animal Kingdom Villas ($6.30) cost more. The two most recent additions to the DVC family, Bay Lake Tower and Grand Floridian, had maintenance fees of $3.67 and $5.41 to start. Presumably, the cost of renovating the property is grafted in at least somewhat. Whatever the explanation, the costs for maintenance fees at the Polynesian are a bit disappointing.
The rooms themselves are sublime. The “smallest” DVC rooms at the resort are studios that are 447 square feet. For comparison, the previous record-holder for largest DVC studio at a theme park was Old Key West at 390 square feet. The actual smallest DVC studio rooms are at Bay Lake Tower. Those are 339 square feet only there is technically one type of room at Animal Kingdom Villas that is even smaller at 316 square feet. So, there is 41% disparity between the smallest DVC studio and the basic room choice at Polynesian.
If all of the above intrigues you and you are already a DVC member, you can purchase points already. If you are considering joining and Polynesian is the property you want, sales will open to the general public on February 9th. If you want to win Valentine’s Day, this is your best bet.
