Vero Beach - Good bang for buck?

If you plan to use VB points at WDW, you have lost the home resort advantage for booking. If you plan to use the points primarily at WDW, buy a WDW resort, not an offsite resort. It is getting harder to book at seven months or less.

presley said:

Vero has extremely high MFs. If it gets hit by a hurricane, you can expect those to go up even more. I think it is a bad purchase if you don't plan on staying there on a regular basis.

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THIS...and Deb's point about the potential difficulties of using VB points at WDW.

The resort is lovely; the MF's are ugly...and they're just as ugly if you use those points at OKW or SSR.

We own at Vero, but we also live 20-25 minutes away and actually like to stay there. That said, it can STILL be tough to get at 11 months depending on what you are looking for It sounds like you aren't really looking for Vero though...don't know that I'd pay the higher fees to own there if I didn't want the 11 month window there.

We own only at Vero. We have stayed at BLT multiple times, OKW, SRR Treehouses, BLT and VWL on our Vero points. I think the only place we have not stayed is Animal Kingdom (I have allergies) and Beach Club. The reason we like owning at Vero s because we always extend our stay and stay at Vero before or after our Trip. A couple of times my husband and I have gone alone and enjoyed. Its wonderful, they have campfires at night, beach is gorgeous, rooms are huge like OKW. At Halloween, when the kids were younger they had a parade with prizes and a DJ party by the pool. We absolutely love it at Vero and so do our kids. .

freediverdude said:

Really, the safe bet, and the people on the disboards and mouseowners seem to agree about this, is if you're looking for just cheap overall points to use anywhere, the best bang for the buck is Saratoga Springs, followed closely by Bay Lake Tower (because of the low member fees there). Although in my opinion the Bay Lake Tower fees are going up quickly and won't be as much of a point in their favor in the future. But that's if you don't ever care about having a home resort advantage for booking any one place.

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Historically as soon as a resort sells out the maintenance fees climb quickly. That's why Disney's Saratoga Springs Resort is still so cheap.. If you look at Disney's Old Key West Resort you'll see that maintenance fees have been consistently stable over the course of ownership there.
Therefore, I do not recommend buying a resort for cheap Maintenance fees. Buy where you want to go and you cannot go wrong.

I extended this out 10 years to give an idea of the cost of 10 years ownership(the final figure per resort is the total per point including the cost to purchase and the maintenance fees over 10 years). It is assumed that the loan is paid off in 10 years and only the maintenance fees per point will from years 11 on. I used a maintenance increase of 3.5% for each of the resorts but this varies with the resorts as well so the results will be slightly different but it gives a general idea of the cost. Formatting this is a minor pain


I'm so impressed. I can do anything on a computer except Excel. I think it's because I'm an Mac aficionado and never really learned Microsoft programs. I really wish I could this kind of whiz bang study you did. Great job.

jojo777 said:

We own only at Vero. We have stayed at BLT multiple times, OKW, SRR Treehouses, BLT and VWL on our Vero points. I think the only place we have not stayed is Animal Kingdom (I have allergies) and Beach Club. The reason we like owning at Vero s because we always extend our stay and stay at Vero before or after our Trip. A couple of times my husband and I have gone alone and enjoyed. Its wonderful, they have campfires at night, beach is gorgeous, rooms are huge like OKW. At Halloween, when the kids were younger they had a parade with prizes and a DJ party by the pool. We absolutely love it at Vero and so do our kids. .

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I think Vero Beach and Hilton Head Island are the unsung heroes of the Disney Vacation Club Resorts. I love VB and Hilton Head. You haven't lived until you've stayed at a Beach Cottage. It's heaven... But a beach cottage can be very, very difficult to get for non VB owners.

It is hard to understand lets say i rent 200 points to pay my fees. i wonder how do people make money and by so many points to rent them out. The maintenance fee are pretty high. Do people really make a living with it. I ve been with DVC 2008 do some rental just to pay my MF. The rest i spoil my family.

You are never going to get rich renting DVC points. But in the days before 2008 I was able to rent my points and pay all my maintenance fees for all my timeshares not just the DVC resorts. Those days are gone. You can expect to get $11 to $13 per point depending on the season and resort.

One thing that no one has mentioned is that DVC has the right to disaffiliate any resort if it wants to, or even end the right of all DVC owners to book at any resort except their home resort. Only staying at one's home resort is guaranteed.

I saw a Vero Beach contract going for $33 dollars a point recently (it was a huge contract, which suppressed the price quite a lot.) I don't have the money to buy a more DVC points now. But even if I did, I would not have bought that contract. If Disney ever decides to disaffiliate Vero Beach, it couldn't be used to stay at WDW.

Also, I find it hard to believe that Boardwalk actually costs $112 a point. I own there and keep an eye on the prices there, and that sounds really high.

I would not buy Vero to solely use at WDW. Like others have said, DVC could disassociate with Vero (unlikely, but possible). Also, if Vero price is this low now, realize your resale price will likely be lower in the future. Everyone needs a possible exit strategy--even if it's 10+ years away. I feel that any DVC @ WDW will always have decent resale value (maybe not 100%, but probably at least 50% of what you paid resale), plus it will be easier to get ride of, as it is onsite at a unique vacation spot. There are tons of timeshares on the beach that people have trouble even giving away. Vero is a nice resort, but not unique. Same for HHI. We love DVC-HHI and bought a very small contract there, but plan to only use at HHI for the next 20+ years. We only bought at HHI b/c you have to have HHI as a home base to get summer reservations. To save $, buy at SSR. Vero also has risk of hurricanes and higher chance of special assessment or increased udes due to damage. I think this happened to HHI about 10 years ago.