OLCC - West Village 3BR?

Is there a reason we wouldn't want a 3BR in the West Village. I'm not familiar with OLCC - are some areas / units better than others?

If you are looking at 2007 or 2008, a "West Village" 3BR unit could be an end unit in the Tennis Villas near the Main Clubhouse (multi-story buildings), in North Village somewhat close to Splash Lagoon, or in the East Village. The Tennis Villas are the oldest, but recently renovated, the East Village newest. If you need a 3BR, you're much more likely to find West Village than River Island, which are lockoffs, and are just as likely to be deposited as 2 units instead.

If you're looking at 2009, West Village will mean Tennis Villas only. The others will have different resort codes (I think 8882 and 8883, but don't quote me). Each of the areas has is good and bad sides. The advantage to Tennis Villas is the location, walkable to the West Village Clubhouse for most activities. The disadvantage is the noise level. East Village will probably be the quietest, but also not near much except the smaller East Village pool clusters and the Golf Course. East Village might be walkable to River Island, I would drive from West Village, at least with kids, or take the shuttle.

Thanks

This is for Christmas 2008. Apparently RCI decided to confirm this week after I told them to leave it on hold - I haven't called yet to see if I can get it released - still trying to decide... I have never seen OLCC so have no clue - sounds like it's huge.

west villas?

Mel said:

If you are looking at 2007 or 2008, a "West Village" 3BR unit could be an end unit in the Tennis Villas near the Main Clubhouse (multi-story buildings), in North Village somewhat close to Splash Lagoon, or in the East Village. The Tennis Villas are the oldest, but recently renovated, the East Village newest. If you need a 3BR, you're much more likely to find West Village than River Island, which are lockoffs, and are just as likely to be deposited as 2 units instead.

If you're looking at 2009, West Village will mean Tennis Villas only. The others will have different resort codes (I think 8882 and 8883, but don't quote me). Each of the areas has is good and bad sides. The advantage to Tennis Villas is the location, walkable to the West Village Clubhouse for most activities. The disadvantage is the noise level. East Village will probably be the quietest, but also not near much except the smaller East Village pool clusters and the Golf Course. East Village might be walkable to River Island, I would drive from West Village, at least with kids, or take the shuttle.

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I am going to orange lake in june of 07, I will have two ten year olds and their mother. I have three units where is the best place to stay. I also want all of us to be right next to each other and not far from a pool. I am an ower but I last time I was their was 23 years ago. I also dont want a high rise. Help

armrecsys said:

I am going to orange lake in june of 07, I will have two ten year olds and their mother. I have three units where is the best place to stay. I also want all of us to be right next to each other and not far from a pool. I am an ower but I last time I was their was 23 years ago. I also dont want a high rise. Help

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I would contact owners' services to advise them that you have three units and would like to be near a pool. My understanding is that OLCC is very good about putting the units close together. I am assuming that these are 2-bedroom units. I would also request being near a pool. Since you don't want a hires, you should request something other than the East Village as the units are all hires buildings. Likewise, the Tennis Villas and River Island are hires buildings. The North Village consists of 2-story units with 2 2-bedroom units on the upper level and 4 units (2 3-bedroom units and 2 2-bedroom units) on the ground level. The units in the original OLCC are all single story units (golf villas) but the newer units at Magnolia Court are also multi-story buildings. The easier part may be in getting the type of building that you desire and the units close together.

Christmas Week is the #1 week in Orlando, and the week the 3-bdrm units at OL are hardest to get. We were just there and I confirmed that exchange at 23 months out, the week we got back from our FL January trip in 2005. I kept checking and once the 3-bedrooms were gone, which was early on, that was it for them.
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As far as three units together, near a kids pool, with easy parking, and quiet, and not a highrise, I would ask for the North Village, and hope Splash Lagoon is still Splash Lagoon when you get there. You can always venture over to RI when you want. I believe in the OL Pedo Award of Ought-5, it was a little over 1/2 mile from Splash Lagoon to RI.

For me and mine and the same scenario, we would probably opt for the East Village near one of those pool-plexes, since being there is almost like having your own private pool and hot tub. But those buildings are all midrises.

armrecsys said:

I am going to orange lake in june of 07, I will have two ten year olds and their mother. I have three units where is the best place to stay. I also want all of us to be right next to each other and not far from a pool. I am an ower but I last time I was their was 23 years ago. I also dont want a high rise. Help

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I assume you are going with friends?

You can contact owner services to give them a heads up. They do try to put you in units together, if that's what you request p but that will be balanced by what they have as exchange inventory vs. owners returning for their own week. If one of the units is your home week, you can expect to be in that unit.

You don't say who else is going - I would assume for 3 units you're talking about 2 other families. The golf villas would be good - 3 units together would comprise the better part of one building - 4 units side-byside on the original course, or 3 of 6 units in the "newer" parts of West Village. Those units are set up pretty much the same as the North Village units - 4 on the first floor, 2 above the 2 middle units. Obviously , the single story is better- nobody running around above you.

The advantage to the mid-rise buildings is their proximity to either a clubhouse (tennis villas) or a smaller area pool (magnolia and east village).

You are less likely to get all 3 units close to the pools, because everybody would like to be near the pools. However, a nice compromise might be 1 unit near the pools, and 2 on the golf course together. When you all want to gather ina more quiet area, go to those two units, but you have one unit near the pool for swimmers to change and return to the do activities. This of course assume that you will spend much time at the resort - with that age (my oldest is 11), they could either want to spend all their time at the pools, or all at the parks.

A major disadvantage of a golf course unit/building, especially one with a green right outside, is noise. It starts very early, 5-ish. Mower, greens mower, weedeater, sand trap prep.

We were in Building 86500, third floor, and there are two greens behind it!

OK, let me really put it into perspective. You have 11 in your unit. Your MIL's bedroom is the living room. You stayed at Disney last night until past midnight. It was freezing and rainy all day, but you did spend $70 each, so . . .

Now it is 5:30 AM the next morning and those insane 2-cycle engines are droning out at about 8000 RPM.

Get the picture?
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OK, would you rather be sitting on a quiet beach?

We are checking into OLCC next Friday. Can hardly wait!!!!!!

olcc

We just returned. We were told that the pools, restaurants and activities in the registration building (Tennis Villa) area will be closing between now and October for one year for remodeling. One restaurant closed while we were there. The new area sounds like it will be beautiful. A new endless pool overlooking the lake with zero entry. New restaurants, one fast food, one family style and one sit down. My advise would be to stay away from the West Village/Tennis Villa area for the next year or so.

snow1459 said:

We just returned. We were told that the pools, restaurants and activities in the registration building (Tennis Villa) area will be closing between now and October for one year for remodeling. One restaurant closed while we were there. The new area sounds like it will be beautiful. A new endless pool overlooking the lake with zero entry. New restaurants, one fast food, one family style and one sit down. My advise would be to stay away from the West Village/Tennis Villa area for the next year or so.

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Still that is good news as the West Village Clubhouse is in need of renovation. It has been heavily used. I'm a little surprised that the pools would be closing but that may be due to the remodeling of the building.

olcc

We were told that the entire area, including the club house over to the second pool (by the Putt Putt course) will be ripped up, taken away and replaced. The restaurants etc were compared to the ones in River Island. The family style restaurant will be just that. Families will order for example a spaghetti supper and they will receive a large salad, loaf of bread and large order of spaghetti to be passed around. The pool is going to be huge. The area will be out of commisison for a year or more, but it sounds worth it!

snow1459 said:

We were told that the entire area, including the club house over to the second pool (by the Putt Putt course) will be ripped up, taken away and replaced. The restaurants etc were compared to the ones in River Island. The family style restaurant will be just that. Families will order for example a spaghetti supper and they will receive a large salad, loaf of bread and large order of spaghetti to be passed around. The pool is going to be huge. The area will be out of commisison for a year or more, but it sounds worth it!

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Wow! That is a fairly extensive renovation. I hope they keep the Olympic-size pool. I wish they would add one in the River Island complex.

olympic pool will be gone, replaced with an endless pool that will give the illusion of being able to swim out onto the lake. We were lucky enough to bump into the food service director on the last night of the buffet restaurant. When we said how disappointed we were it was closing, he told us all we could look forward to!

Sorry to hear that the Olympic pool is going to be gone; it is my favorite. The only real problem with it was that it wasn't heated. I suspect that the new pool will be like River Island in that it will not be very deep but is good for families with younger children.

Does anyone know if the pool will be open this summer?

we were told the pool would be closed starting in October for one year

I'm not terribly surprised, though it would be nice if they would let the owners know about this in one of the newsletters - maybe that's coming soon, I hope.

With the sales staff moving to their new location, that opens up half the basement, and I had been wondering what they were going to do with that area. Then of course there's the issue of the "studio" units in the clubhouse. I know they were renovated significantly several years ago.

If they demolish the building, and start fresh, perhaps the units that replace those studios will be something nicer. Perhaps something to look forward to - no units that I would be unwilling to stay in. Sounds like they timed things with RCI too. Until 2009, all except River Island units are still listed at West Village. That will give them room to place people wherever they need until they complete the renovation.

The fact that owners have not heard anything about any special assessments is a good thing too - since the coubhouse is owned by Condo I association, I would expect we would be paying for this project, but have not heard anything, so maybe it's covered by our reserves (good planning at a resort? Unheard of!)

the director mentioned a final cost of ten million dollars. Hope you got big reserves!

Yes, we have a large reserve fund, though I don't know if it's that big. I would say we've typically put in $40-50 per year if I recall correctly. Knock off part for things like the roof, and multiply by maybe 15 years, then multiply by all phase I owners, and you get a significant chunk of change.

Of course, I could be wrong, and the Clubhouse could be owned by Wilson Management, in which case we would probably see a small hike in management fees - but again, now you're dividing among 5 associations, with a total of over 100,000 members. 10 million would translate to a cost of $100 per unit week.

Looking back at the original declarations, they show the clubhouse and the olympic pool, and another building on the other side of the pool to become "future studios." I don't know if that wasoriginally meant to be additional studios, or if the studios were meant to eventually be moved over there. Either way, there's another building there now, and no studios. I wouldn't be altogether surprised to learn they would be buying back the studios quietly and eliminating them, or converting them to some other style of unit. Those owners pay the same annual fees as owners of 2BR units, so I wouldn't anticipate any of them complaining about an upgrade. WHile it could result in an increase in property taxes, it wouldn't include an increase in maintenance fees.

we just returned today. The lower level of the clubhouse will be moving the general store and Paizan's to Mulligan's. Paizan will now be carry out only.

Replacing Paizan's, Kemmon's Place and the general store's current location, will be a hair salon, nail salon, and a fitness spa to include massage.

Snow.....OL' has a huge reserve. Owner's need not worry about our reserve. The associations meet quarterly and always have with management.