For the sixth consecutive month Disney’s Riviera Resort led all resorts in direct sales of Disney Vacation Club points in December 2022. After a change in pricing in November, Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort was able to narrow the sales gap between the two resorts.
In December 2022, 124,839 Disney Vacation Club points were sold for the 11 DVC resorts at Walt Disney World. It was the Second fewest points sold in the calendar year, slightly ahead of the 124,479 points sold in January 2022 and well below the 150,989 points DVC point sales had been averaging over the last six months.
Disney’s Riviera Resort continued to lead all DVC resorts with 58,839 points sold in December. It was the fewest number of points sold for the resort since September 2021 (58,294 points) and 27.1% less than the 80,738 points Riviera has averaged over the last six months.
The Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort finished second for December with 51,811 sold for the resort, only 7,028 points less than Riviera. It was its best performance since August 2022 when 71,924 points were sold.
In mid-November, Disney Vacation Club revised its direct purchase incentives to favor Grand Floridian over Riviera. Grand Floridian also benefits from a lower annual dues figure, while Riviera contracts include 6 additional years of ownership and modestly lower nightly point costs when booking at one's Home resort.
The largest deed sold in December, totaling 1,097 points, was for Riviera. The second largest deed, a 900-point deed, was, surprisingly, for Disney’s Polynesian Villas & Bungalows. It is the largest deed sold for the Polynesian since 2017. The largest split purchase was by a new DVC member who bought 1,200 Riviera points in three 400-point deeds.
2022 was not a record-setting year for DVC point sales but the data shows that numbers are continuing to rebound from the affects of the global pandemic. 2,019,796 points were sold in 2022, a 43.2% improvement over 2021. It is also the first time since 2019 and the fourth time in the last 10 years that yearly sales surpassed the two-million point mark.
Sales in 2022 were heavily skewed toward Riviera and Grand Floridian, which combined for 85.9% of the points sold. Sales in 2019, the last year before the pandemic, also showed a heavy reliance on the two resorts Disney was actively marketing at the time. Riviera and Copper Creek Villas & Cabins at Disney's Wilderness Lodge accounted for 82.2% of 2019’s total sales. A notable difference between 2022 and 2019 are the sales for Disney’s Old Key West Resort and Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa. In 2019 these two resorts accounted for 8.7% of sales; in 2022 they accounted for only 3.8%. Disney’s higher prices for these two DVC properties have effectively reduced demand for them.
Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort — Grand Floridian sold 51,811 points in December 2022, the first time since August that it reached the 50,000-point threshold. There was also a 125-point Grand Floridian deed that was reacquired by Disney in December. It was the first deed for Grand Floridian that Disney has taken back since sales started for the villas in the Big Pine Key building.
Disney has now sold 798,394 points, or 44.9% of the 1,779,822 points that have been assigned to the 202 Resort Studios located in the Big Pine Key Building. Disney must retain at least 2% of the Grand Floridian’s total points, which means that it still has about 946,000 Grand Floridian points it can sell to the general public.
Since sales resumed for the Grand Floridian, Disney has only used points drawn from Residential Unit 11. Unit 11 accounts for half of the resort studios in the Big Pine Key Building. Disney has not drawn any points from Unit 12, which is the second half of the Big Pine Key Building and was declared for the DVC inventory on June 10, 2022. It has also not sold any deeds drawn from one of the 36 Residential Units that make up the original Grand Floridian villa building. The last time Disney sold a deed from one of those Units was in August 2021.
One Fixed Week deed for Grand Floridian was sold in December 2022: a Standard View Resort Studio for week #47. So far, Disney has sold 38 Fixed Week deeds for the new Resort Studios. Since sales resumed, Disney has not sold any Fixed Week deeds for the Deluxe Studios or larger accommodations at the original Grand Floridian DVC building.
Since June 10, 2022, all 202 resort studios in the Big Pine Key building have been declared for the DVC inventory and can be booked using DVC points on any given Use Day.
Disney’s Riviera Resort — Riviera continued to sell more points than the other DVC resorts but its lead over the number 2 resort, Grand Floridian, narrowed considerably. In November, Riviera outsold Grand Floridian by more than 40,000 points. In December,58,839 points were sold for Riviera, only 7,428 more points than Grand Floridian.
The 58,839 points were sold for Riviera. Disney has now sold 3,469,746 Riviera points, or 51.5%, of the resort’s 6.7 million points.
No Fixed Week deeds were sold for Riviera in December 2022. Disney has sold 111 Fixed Week deeds for the resort. 93 Fixed Week deeds have been sold for Deluxe Studios, eight for one-bedroom villas, eight for two-bedroom villas, and two for three-bedroom grand villas.
On December 16, 2022, Disney declared 25 more vacation homes for Riviera's DVC inventory, increasing the number of declared vacation homes from 199 to 224. There are still 117 vacation homes that have not yet been declared and are still under the control of Disney. The declared inventory accounts for about 4,458,999 points, or 66.2% of the resort’s total points.
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. 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.”
