Following the return to sales for the Villas at Disney's Grand Floridian Resort & Spa, Disney Vacation Club recorded its best month in nearly three years.
In March 2022, 241,490 points were sold for the 11 DVC resorts at Walt Disney World. This was the first time since January 2020 that direct sales exceeded the 200,000-point mark, and the largest number of points in a single month dating back to the April 2019 (267,280.)
The first deeds for the Villas at Disney's Grand Floridian Resort & Spa were not recorded with the Orange County Comptroller until March 15, but it still accounted for 48.0% of all DVC points sold in March. 781 deeds containing 115,999 points were sold for the Grand Floridian, easily surpassing the 404 deeds and 70,789 points sold for Disney’s Riviera Resort.
Additionally, two older resorts had better-than-average sales in March. Bay Lake Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort--for which Disney recently offered special incentive pricing-- sold 17,201 points, the most for that resort since April 2013. Disney’s Animal Kingdom Villas sold 12,443 points, its third consecutive month of sales exceeding the 10,000-point mark. This was the most sold for that resort since October 2014.
Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort — In its first month since resuming sales, 115,999 points were sold for the Grand Floridian, or 6.5% of the 1,779,822 points that have been assigned to the 202 Resort Studios located in the Big Pine Key building.
All of the points sold were drawn from Residential Unit #11, which makes up half of the building. Disney did not sell any deeds which were drawn from residential units located in the original DVC building.
The largest deed sold for the Grand Floridian was a single 1,000-point deed. The most common size deed was 200 points; 165 such deeds were sold. There were also sixty-two 50-point deeds, eight deeds with 26 to 40 points, and eight 25-point deeds.
All sales recorded in March were limited to existing DVC members; sales to new members did not begin until March 31 and those deeds have not yet been recorded. The vast majority of deeds sold are add-ons to DVC members’ existing accounts. However, Disney also sold 46 new master contracts to DVC members who either specified a different Use Year or wished to title the new purchase differently than the deeds in their existing accounts.
Three Fixed Week deeds were sold in March: one for week #38 and two for week #49.
Disney has declared exactly half of the 202 Resort Studios for the DVC inventory. This means that 101 resort studios can currently be booked using DVC points on any given Use Day.
Disney’s Riviera Resort — In March 2022, 70,789 points were sold for Riviera. The March total is 20% less than the 84,996 points sold in February 2022 and 3.8% less than the 73,548 points Riviera has averaged over the previous 12 months. The decline is not entirely unexpected, coming on the heels of a $6 price increase that went into effect in early February, as well as direct competiton from Grand Floridian.
Disney has sold 2,782,300 points, or 41.3%, of Riviera’s 6.7 million points. Since sales began in April 2019, the resort has averaged 77,773 points in monthly sales. This average includes several months in 2020 when sales for all DVC resorts were severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Disney has declared 167 of the Riviera’s 341 vacation homes. In terms of points, the declared inventory accounts for about 3,327,263 points, or 49.4% of the resort’s total points.
Three Fixed Week deeds were sold for Riviera in March, bringing to 10 the number such deeds sold. 62 Fixed Week deeds have been sold for the last six weeks of the year, including 16 deeds for Week #52, which normally falls between Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
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. 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. Dates cited represent the period in which the purchase is recorded by local government, not necessarily the period in which the purchase was initiated. 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.”
