Current owners: Do you feel that renters are impacting resort availability?

[DougEMG]

The simplest thing to DVC to do is to start enforcing its own rules. There are stated limits as to how many points an individual can own. I'm doing this from memory but I think it's 2000 points at a single resort and 5000 overall. So let's actually enforce that. It's pretty easy to determine if a single person is listed as an officer of a dozen different LLCs which collectively blow past the limits.

And in conjunction, start enforcing the limit of 20 rental reservations per year. The number of members who would actually book more than 20 reservations without themselves as the lead guest is infinitely small. And if there's actually someone out there who routinely books 20+ giveaway trips for friends and relatives in a year, well, I'm sorry but you're collateral damage.

Further down the road, tech enhancements to the website such as:

1. Eliminate the ability to use APIs to automatically query availability
2. Better management of waitlists, so that rooms aren't routinely slipping thru and being available to book
3. Eliminate any point management glitches, like allowing reservation points to be reapplied to existing reservations

Nobody is expecting massive changes which result in AKV Value rooms to remain bookable at 7 months. But any changes which make it more difficult for the worst offenders to operate will ultimately benefit the rest of the membership.

Disney does enforce the 20 reservations per rolling 12 month period, or at least they did 10 years ago. This is per membership though, not per member and that is a big difference. I've ended up with 4 memberships. My wife and I being on 2 of them and my daughter being the addition on the other 2 memberships. So, I could book 20 reservations per membership so could end up with 80 reservations. If someone really wanted to, they could set up multiple LLC with many memberships and easily get around the 20 reservations issue and I don't see Disney ever doing anything to stop this.

Wait list work the same way I think, it is 2 per membership.

The renting out of any reservation probably does annoy Disney as the new trust product that Disney has created for Fort Wildness has completely different rental rules. From the looks of it, Disney has the sole discretion to determine who is commercial renting and aren't even required to tell you what they think commercial renting is. I definitely wouldn't be buying there thinking that you'll be able to rent out your points whenever you felt like it.

 

[Sandisw]

It’s wonderful that you agree with me. They should enforce the POS, that would help tremendously. We wouldn’t even need the lottery if they did that.

The thing is that DVC gets to define renting for commercial purposes, per the POS, and they have.

But, not everyone likes it…it’s 20 reservations in the name of others in a rolling 12 month period per membership. that triggers the review.

And, none of us have information they are not doing that. Even what some see on the rental sites doesn’t mean they are all booked in the same membership. Plus, advertising them to rent doesn’t mean they end up rentals until the name is changed…

So, if a membership has 50 or 60 reservations in one or two night increments and the owners are on the bulk of them, then until that changes, they are not in violation.

Not to say those bothered should not let DVC know there concerns, and I think the new language of CFW means they want to tighten it up.

 

[DonMacGregor]

Plus, advertising them to rent doesn’t mean they end up rentals until the name is changed…

So regardless of the gun and the note, it's not bank robbery until they hand over the money?

 

[Sandisw]

So regardless of the gun and the note, it's not bank robbery until they hand over the money?

In the case of rentals and the POS, it’s not an actual rental until it’s in the name of someone else.

So, your analogy doesn’t make any sense. As long as an owner has their name on a reservation it is not considered rented.

Some may not like it but that is the reality of the situation.

And, DVC can’t, nor should they count those as anything but for the owners use until that happens.

Of course, they can keep a closer watch on those memberships, and for all we know, they do.

But, in the end, if an owner books and advertises a lot but ends up only actually renting under the limit, then they are not in violation of what DVC uses to define it.

Yes, I know others don’t agree.

 

[Chuck S]

As Sandi said, just because reservations are being offered, doesn't mean those reservations are actually being rented, especially at some of the prices they've been asking. They could just be rolling through, cancelling and re-booking a later reservations before they go into holding status. And as she said, a rental isn't legally a rental until the primary name is changed to the name of the renter.

Even though it may walk like a duck, and look like a duck, it isn't a duck until the name is changed.

 

[samsp99]

[I have been drinking so I may regret this post in the morning]

Thinking about this some more, what if Disney stamped down on commercial renting, but offered the ability to rent points back to Disney.

This would be beneficial to Disney / DVC in a number of ways:
- It gives them more inventory to rent
- It reduces the competition with their own hotel rentals
- It gives DVC owners a good way to handle points they can’t use
- It makes it easier for non commercial members to get the reservations they want, improving the membership experience.

Part of the deal would be for Disney to not book before 6 months before the reservation, so members can get their 11 and 7 month priorities, and have a much better chance at cheaper rooms.

The rent back would be at some fixed rate per point (say $20/pt, the same as their buy back for the first year they sometimes do) but limited to renting a max of N points over Y years (covering 1 year of membership, but not renting all points every year), figures TBD.

It would harm the businesses making money off DVC rentals and agencies, but they always knew that they were at the risk of upsetting the mouse, and it’s not unheard of for Disney to crack down on businesses that make money off them.

 

[JackosinDIS]

The thing is that DVC gets to define renting for commercial purposes, per the POS, and they have.

But, not everyone likes it…it’s 20 reservations in the name of others in a rolling 12 month period per membership. that triggers the review.

And, none of us have information they are not doing that. Even what some see on the rental sites doesn’t mean they are all booked in the same membership. Plus, advertising them to rent doesn’t mean they end up rentals until the name is changed…

So, if a membership has 50 or 60 reservations in one or two night increments and the owners are on the bulk of them, then until that changes, they are not in violation.

Not to say those bothered should not let DVC know there concerns, and I think the new language of CFW means they want to tighten it up.

This article (2008) sets out the full wording of the update to the POS re commercial purposes and the ‘multiple reservation rule’

https://dvcnews.com/index.php/dvc-p...commercial-renting-limitations-amended-to-pos

My reading of that is that more than 20 reservations would trigger the review. It doesn’t mention ‘in the name of others’.

So, if you made your 21st reservation in a rolling 12 month period, you would then need to show that all 21 are for personal use. Easy if they are all in your name, not so if the majority are in others names.

 

[Chuck S]

[I have been drinking so I may regret this post in the morning]

Thinking about this some more, what if Disney stamped down on commercial renting, but offered the ability to rent points back to Disney.

This would be beneficial to Disney / DVC in a number of ways:
- It gives them more inventory to rent
- It reduces the competition with their own hotel rentals
- It gives DVC owners a good way to handle points they can’t use
- It makes it easier for non commercial members to get the reservations they want, improving the membership experience.

Part of the deal would be for Disney to not book before 6 months before the reservation, so members can get their 11 and 7 month priorities, and have a much better chance at cheaper rooms.

The rent back would be at some fixed rate per point (say $20/pt, the same as their buy back for the first year they sometimes do) but limited to renting a max of N points over Y years (covering 1 year of membership, but not renting all points every year), figures TBD.

It would harm the businesses making money off DVC rentals and agencies, but they always knew that they were at the risk of upsetting the mouse, and it’s not unheard of for Disney to crack down on businesses that make money off them.

But I'm not sure it would be a benefit to Disney/DVC, since they already rent out their own points, any unsold points in the pool, any unrented rooms that there may be (called breakage rooms in the POS) and basically any points people allow to expire every year by either not using them or not banking them...and I'm sure there are far more expired points. every year than we can imagine.

 

[Sandisw]

This article (2008) sets out the full wording of the update to the POS re commercial purposes and the ‘multiple reservation rule’

https://dvcnews.com/index.php/dvc-p...commercial-renting-limitations-amended-to-pos

My reading of that is that more than 20 reservations would trigger the review. It doesn’t mention ‘in the name of others’.

So, if you made your 21st reservation in a rolling 12 month period, you would then need to show that all 21 are for personal use. Easy if they are all in your name, not so if the majority are in others names.

Thanks for clarifying…maybe the “in the name of others” is something that has been implied over the years since owners being a guest means it’s for the owner.

But it still remains that as long as the owners name is on them, DVC will consider them for personal use and they will most likely not trigger a review unless they see evidence or patterns that make them concerned of a violations on those memberships.

As I said, even the commercial brokers who advertise a lot of rentals, until they actual rent, and those rentals are indeed all under memberships with the same owners, it’s not as simple as “it is a violation”.

I said earlier, if all people were seeing was a lot of SSR or OKW being advertised, I am not sure people would be as upset as they are when they are seeing owners choosing to rent high demand rooms.

There is no question the rental market has expanded and I think you have a lot more owners doing it, including renting confirmed reservations vs. just offering to make a reservation.

As long as FL timeshare law, and the POS give us the explicit right to rent, then DVC is going to be expected to come up with definitions for “renting for commercial purposes” that balances that. Some will have no issue with how they define it and enforce it and others will, but ultimately they get to decide.

Going back to the topic of availability, those hard to get rooms are hard to get for a reason and even if they complete stopped the ability to rent those rooms, you might go from a 1% chance to a 1.5% chance?

Now, if someone, renting or not, is has found s computer program to somehow book multiple rooms at once without a real person, then I am all for them putting in something to ensure a real person is doing the booking and the membership can only book one room at a time.

 

[Minniesgal]

Demand has nothing to do with renters as to rent it is still owners booking their points. We had points we wanted to rent this year but there was little rental demand so I booked an extra trip to use the points and had a blast. Points are too expensive for owners to let expire so if they weren’t renting then owners would be using them or gifting them to family

 

[BeachClub2014]

There is no question the rental market has expanded and I think you have a lot more owners doing it, including renting confirmed reservations vs. just offering to make a reservation.

So, within the context of the question in this thread's title, do you believe that the rental market and the pervasiveness of commercial rental entities are impacting resort availability? It is really hard to argue that they haven't.

Going back to the topic of availability, those hard to get rooms are hard to get for a reason and even if they complete stopped the ability to rent those rooms, you might go from a 1% chance to a 1.5% chance?

Okay, great. Going from a 1% chance to a 1.5% chance is still an increase of 50% to the positive side of the ledger. Many of us have acknowledged that there will always be scarcity and competition for certain rooms at certain times of the year. I don't think anyone is arguing against that reality.

My issue remains with the rental agencies seemingly leveraging technology to tilt the playing field in their favor. Do I know this for 100% certainty with proof to support this belief? No. Having said that, there is no other explanation for the sheer volume of those most-coveted reservations ending up in the hands of a few brokers.

 

[samsp99]

So, within the context of the question in this thread's title, do you believe that the rental market and the pervasiveness of commercial rental entities are impacting resort availability? It is really hard to argue that they haven't.

Absolutely.

Demand has nothing to do with renters as to rent it is still owners booking their points. We had points we wanted to rent this year but there was little rental demand so I booked an extra trip to use the points and had a blast. Points are too expensive for owners to let expire so if they weren’t renting then owners would be using them or gifting them to family

I think there is a difference between owners putting up a listing for points to rent in a forum like this, and commercial entities that are making a boat-load of opportunistic bookings based on predictions of sales, and then rotating those reservations based on actual sales. Most owners don't have the points to book 10's of weeks at a time. In the case of individual point rentals - unless the owner is super proactive, they are less likely to book prized studios at 8:00:00 am on the 11mo window, or walk reservations for months to make that happen. Commercial entites that have scripted the site can do that at 0 cost once they have the scripts setup. As an individual you can't really compete against a bot, its like the auction sniping on ebay, that will put in a bid the second before the auction closes, or buys up batches of Taylor Swift tickets as soon as they go on sale.

 

[Sandisw]

So, within the context of the question in this thread's title, do you believe that the rental market and the pervasiveness of commercial rental entities are impacting resort availability? It is really hard to argue that they haven't.




Okay, great. Going from a 1% chance to a 1.5% chance is still an increase of 50% to the positive side of the ledger. Many of us have acknowledged that there will always be scarcity and competition for certain rooms at certain times of the year. I don't think anyone is arguing against that reality.

My issue remains with the rental agencies seemingly leveraging technology to tilt the playing field in their favor. Do I know this for 100% certainty with proof to support this belief? No. Having said that, there is no other explanation for the sheer volume of those most-coveted reservations ending up in the hands of a few brokers.

No, I don't think its impacting it in a meaningful way because we are allowed to rent our points. More owners are renting points which means more renters in rooms. Personally, it doesn't matter to me who is using the room because its the owner who booked it...I don't see the guests using them as different. If I loose a room to a broker who booked it with their membership or to the average owner, it makes no difference to me...its the nature of FCFS...

And, no, going from a 1% chance to a 1.5% chance is not an increase of 50%...its saying I had a 99% chance of losing the room....but now that all renting has been stopped, I have a 98.5% chance of losing the room...its a meaningless change in the scheme of things.

I do agree that using technology to snatch up rooms, if it is indeed being used by any owner, should be looked in to, regardless of whether they are renting rooms or not.

But, I can say that many of the hard to get rooms that I see out there tend to be ones that are for 1 night or 2 nights, and still being adveristed well within the 30 day window. That leads me to believe that at least some of them are being snagged when they show back up, that they didn't get them right at 11 months, and more importantly, they are not always renting them out, which means they are creating a lot of holding points in the process....which tempers when those points can be used.

And, I know some don't want to hear this, but maybe the handful of owners who are snagging those coveted rooms up for renting, even a night here and there are a group of owners that have decided to all use or are connected to those specific agencies?

If you take the more than 15 rentals in a 12 month period...and spread them across 20 memberships, all owned by different people (no duplicate owners), that is 300 reservations at one time, but none of that is in violation of what DVC currently uses to "review".....

Heck, my family alone could have 7 different memberships, each owned by the adults invidividually, and rent out trips every single year and never even come close to being considered "commericial".... if that is what we wanted to do.....

The biggest concerns certainly seem to revolve around seeing those hard to get rooms, like BWV SV and AKV Value, being rented out...and I am not sure there is a way to stop the renting of specific rooms, if they are indeed renting them from multiple memberships, which are owned by multiple people.

Now, one rule change I would be in support of is triggering a review for any and all memberships that one is an owner of to be reviewed if it gets to 20, even though it might impact me who has a lot of personal reservations booked at once across my three memberships.....though, the closest I have come is 18...which is what I have now....

That might be a way for DVC to keep a better eye on owners who are using the "per membershp" idea to get around the idea of commerical purposes.

 

[BeachClub2014]

No, I don't think its impacting it in a meaningful way because we are allowed to rent our points. More owners are renting points which means more renters in rooms. Personally, it doesn't matter to me who is using the room because its the owner who booked it...I don't see the guests using them as different. If I loose a room to a broker who booked it with their membership or to the average owner, it makes no difference to me...its the nature of FCFS...

And, no, going from a 1% chance to a 1.5% chance is not an increase of 50%...its saying I had a 99% chance of losing the room....but now that all renting has been stopped, I have a 98.5% chance of losing the room...its a meaningless change in the scheme of things.

I do agree that using technology to snatch up rooms, if it is indeed being used by any owner, should be looked in to, regardless of whether they are renting rooms or not.

But, I can say that many of the hard to get rooms that I see out there tend to be ones that are for 1 night or 2 nights, and still being adveristed well within the 30 day window. That leads me to believe that at least some of them are being snagged when they show back up, that they didn't get them right at 11 months, and more importantly, they are not always renting them out, which means they are creating a lot of holding points in the process....which tempers when those points can be used.

And, I know some don't want to hear this, but maybe the handful of owners who are snagging those coveted rooms up for renting, even a night here and there are a group of owners that have decided to all use or are connected to those specific agencies?

If you take the more than 15 rentals in a 12 month period...and spread them across 20 memberships, all owned by different people (no duplicate owners), that is 300 reservations at one time, but none of that is in violation of what DVC currently uses to "review".....

Heck, my family alone could have 7 different memberships, each owned by the adults invidividually, and rent out trips every single year and never even come close to being considered "commericial".... if that is what we wanted to do.....

The biggest concerns certainly seem to revolve around seeing those hard to get rooms, like BWV SV and AKV Value, being rented out...and I am not sure there is a way to stop the renting of specific rooms, if they are indeed renting them from multiple memberships, which are owned by multiple people.

I guess we will agree to disagree. I find it exceedingly difficult to believe that the current rental market with some serious mega renters is what DVC envisioned when first establishing the POS, which allowed renting. Combine the very active businesses with leveraging technology not available to the average DVC owner, and it creates an unbalanced playing field for the mom-and-pop owner who just wants to use their membership for their own vacation.

I get the FCFS argument but find it a hollow excuse for commercial renting, which is clearly happening to anyone willing to see it and acknowledge that it exists. I don't see those two dynamics as good for the program's overall health.

 

[WilsonFlyer]

Depends on what you use as a barometer for the 'health' of the system.

 

[Grumpy by Birth]

Demand has nothing to do with renters as to rent it is still owners booking their points. We had points we wanted to rent this year but there was little rental demand so I booked an extra trip to use the points and had a blast. Points are too expensive for owners to let expire so if they weren’t renting then owners would be using them or gifting them to family

Yes, but it seems a lot less likely that an owner just trying to avoid having their points expire would be booking multiple very-hard-to-get rooms across multiple resorts at 11 months on the dot. There would still be competition for low-density, high-demand rooms. But I believe it would be less difficult than it is now to snag a room if there wasn't such rampant commercial renting occurring.

Because it's for profit, commercial renting, these entities are laser-focused on booking as many of the most profitable rooms as possible. If it was just "average" owners booking for their own use, I think on average the specific rooms they're trying to get would be spread out more across various types (including some not-so-hard-to-get), which would ease the fierce competition at least somewhat for certain rooms.

 

[Bearval]

The simplest thing to DVC to do is to start enforcing its own rules. There are stated limits as to how many points an individual can own. I'm doing this from memory but I think it's 2000 points at a single resort and 5000 overall. So let's actually enforce that. It's pretty easy to determine if a single person is listed as an officer of a dozen different LLCs which collectively blow past the limits.

And in conjunction, start enforcing the limit of 20 rental reservations per year. The number of members who would actually book more than 20 reservations without themselves as the lead guest is infinitely small. And if there's actually someone out there who routinely books 20+ giveaway trips for friends and relatives in a year, well, I'm sorry but you're collateral damage.

Further down the road, tech enhancements to the website such as:

1. Eliminate the ability to use APIs to automatically query availability
2. Better management of waitlists, so that rooms aren't routinely slipping thru and being available to book
3. Eliminate any point management glitches, like allowing reservation points to be reapplied to existing reservations

Nobody is expecting massive changes which result in AKV Value rooms to remain bookable at 7 months. But any changes which make it more difficult for the worst offenders to operate will ultimately benefit the rest of the membership.

The one thing that Disney never saw coming when DVC was first started was the internet. They expected people who needed to or wanted to rent their points out it would be to friends/family and word of mouth. Disney didn't envision a secondary industry would develop where points/reservations would be resold/rented commercially that would undercut their own business.

 

[Bearval]

I guess we will agree to disagree. I find it exceedingly difficult to believe that the current rental market with some serious mega renters is what DVC envisioned when first establishing the POS, which allowed renting. Combine the very active businesses with leveraging technology not available to the average DVC owner, and it creates an unbalanced playing field for the mom-and-pop owner who just wants to use their membership for their own vacation.

I get the FCFS argument but find it a hollow excuse for commercial renting, which is clearly happening to anyone willing to see it and acknowledge that it exists. I don't see those two dynamics as good for the program's overall health.

For all intents and purpose the internet didn't exist when DVC was 1st started. You can bet when Disney was planning DVC back in the late 80's they never had any idea that something like the internet would be a "thing" and the commercial impact it would have on businesses including theirs.

 

[Chuck S]

I doubt renting is the primary factor, though it is a contributing factor, iin the perceived shortage of studios. Another contributing factor is the abundance of small contract owners. When DVC first started it was based on every owner having at least 230 points. Now with so many owners having 100 points (or less by buying ONLY someone else's add-on contracts via reasale) that basically doubles demand for the same availability, doesn't it?

 

[aammtt20]

Does anyone think DVC is worried if they clamped down on commercial renters too hard that they would all try to resell their contracts at once, seeing no more value it in, and thereby causing a big disruption to the resale market by driving prices even lower? With so many trying to offload contracts at once that have lost their value if they were only a commercial renter, DVC may be worried this would further devalue their product. It raises the question of what percentage of points are owned by owners who (1) use them exclusively for personal trips, (2) use them for a mix of personal trips & rent occasionally when they can't make a trip, and (3) exclusively use their points for commercial rental enterprises. If that 3rd bucket is larger than we realize and DVC knows this. they may be scared of what the impact would be of that many points trying to get out of the market all at once.