After five months of battling head-to-head for Disney Vacation Club direct sales, Disney's Riviera Resort finally outsold Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa.
In July 2022, 169,176 points were sold for the 11 DVC resorts at Walt Disney World. This is a 34.9% gain year-over-year compared to the 125,453 points sold in July 2021. However, it is also 7.6% less than the 183,019 points that DVC sales have averaged in the calendar month of July from 2011 to 2021, not counting July 2020 when sales were significantly depressed by the global pandemic.
Riviera and Grand Floridian accounted for 92.6% of the direct points sold in July. Before the pandemic, Riviera was the primary DVC resort marketed by Disney and it accounted for 77.2% of the points sold from October 2019 to March 2020.
The dominance of Riviera and Grand Floridian in current sales might not be solely due to their popularity. Current sales may be influenced by the higher prices Disney has imposed for the nine other “sold out” resorts, making them far less attractive to buyers. For example, in Summer 2021 Disney's Old Key West Resort could be purchased with incentives for as little as $154 a point. Currently, Old Key West is priced at a flat $200 with no incentives. Not surprisingly, sales for Old Key West have dropped from 24,880 points in July 2021 to only 1,005 points in July 2022.
The largest deed sold in July was a 3,100-point deed for Riviera. The next largest deeds sold were two 1,000-point deeds for Grand Floridian.
Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort — 74,166 points were sold for Grand Floridian in July 2022, slightly more than the 73,886 points sold in June. Disney has now sold 542,048 points, or 30.5% of the 1,779,822 points that have been assigned to the 202 Resort Studios located in the Big Pine Key Building.
Since Grand Floridian sales resumed, all of the points sold have been drawn from Residential Unit #11, which makes up half of Big Pine Key. Disney has not sold any deeds that were drawn from the residential units located in the original DVC building, nor from Residential Unit #12 - the other half of the Big Pine Key building - which was declared in June 2022.
In July, new DVC members accounted for the majority of points sold for the Grand Floridian. 49,872 of the 74,166 points (67.2%) sold were part of new master contracts. This is a higher percentage than in June 2022, when 58.3% of the points sold were part of master contracts.
Only one Fixed Week deed for Grand Floridian was sold in July. Disney has sold 35 Fixed Week deeds for the new Resort Studios. Similar to other resorts offering the Fixed Week option, the last six weeks are the most popular. 20 of the 35 deeds are for the weeks from around Thanksgiving to New Year’s Eve.
On June 10, 2022, Disney declared the remaining 101 Resort Studios for the DVC inventory. All 202 Resort Studios in Big Pine Key are now declared and can be booked using DVC points on any given Use Day.
Disney’s Riviera Resort — In July 2022, 82,420 points were sold for Riviera, a 15.7% increase over the 71,252 points sold in July 2021. It is also slightly more than the 73,756 points the resort has averaged over the last 12 months.
Since sales for Riviera began in April 2019, Disney has sold 3,081,695 points, or 45.7%, of Riviera’s 6.7 million points. The resort has averaged 77,569 points in monthly sales, which includes several months in 2020 when sales for all DVC resorts were severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
New DVC members accounted for the majority of points sold for the Riviera with 47,375 of 82,420 points (57.5%) sold as part of new master contracts. Existing members bought more add-on points for the Riviera in July (35,045 points and 42.5% of resort total) then in June (20,595 points and 30.2%).
No Fixed Week deeds were sold for Riviera in July. Disney has sold 106 Fixed Week deeds for the resorts. 65 Fixed Week deeds have been sold for the last six weeks of the year, including 17 deeds for Week #52, which is the most popular week for Fixed Week deeds.
Disney has declared 180 of Riviera’s 341 vacation homes for DVC members to book using points. The declared inventory accounts for about 3,605,940 points, or 53.5% of the resort’s total points. Disney has sold over 85% of the points it has declared for Riviera; thus, another declaration will likely be made for the resort in the next few weeks.
The sales data includes all 11 DVC resorts at Walt Disney World, as well as Disney's Vero Beach Resort, and Disney's Hilton Head Island Resort. Point sales data is not available for the Villas at Disney's Grand Californian Hotel & Spa. The data is compiled from deeds filed by Disney Vacation Development and recorded with the Orange County (FL) Comptroller, the Indian River County (FL) Clerk of Court, and the Beaufort County (SC) Register of Deeds. Thanks to Chris for assisting in the compilation of the sales data.
Wil Lovato is a contributor to DVCNews.com and has been a Disney Vacation Club owner since 2009. His DVC Home Resorts include Copper Creek Villas, Bay Lake Tower, Animal Kingdom Villas, and Aulani. He can be found posting on many Disney discussion forums under the username of “wdrl.”
