RCI Resorts Available to DVC Members Expands to 4,359 Resorts

[MouseRight]

I hope this is not a repeat thread. I searched and couldn't find one.

RCI Resorts available to DVC Members for trade used to be restricted to approximately 500. As of Monday, March 10, 2014 this has been expanded to 4,359 resorts.

This is a significant addition to DVC Vacation trip options. For example, Italy went from a few resorts to 138. However, it could require much more time to analyze and pick a resort. This could be tough for those of us who have trouble picking an entrée at a restaurant.

We have been DVC Members since 1993 but have never traded outside of Disney options. Would love to hear both good and bad stories of those who have traded to RCI. Thanks.

 

[GoofGoof]

Good to hear. I have never traded in my DVC points through RCI, but I have traded in another timeshare several times. In my experience if you stick with RCI Gold Crown resorts you should be in good shape. There is an option right on the RCI site to only search gold crown. No guarantees, but I haven't stayed at one that wasn't nice. You don't get great trade in value for DVC points but for a once in a while option it's OK. By opening up additional options you probably have to be more careful that the resorts are on par with DVC standards. I think the reason they limited the exchange to 500 or so resorts is they were hand picked as being up to standard. Now they are leaving it up to the members to decide.

 

[MouseRight]

Thanks GoofGoof for the info. The DVC Cast Member I spoke to recommended the same thing you did - Look for the Gold Crown resorts. She also said if you do go to any RCI resort and there is something wrong, we should contact DVC immediately and not after we return home.

I am confused by what you said that we don't get great value for the trade. I have always understood that we were supposed to get great value since DVC and the Disney brand is the gold standard in the industry and "everyone" wants to come to WDW or Disneyland.

Thanks again.

 

[GoofGoof]

Thanks GoofGoof for the info. The DVC Cast Member I spoke to recommended the same thing you did - Look for the Gold Crown resorts. She also said if you do go to any RCI resort and there is something wrong, we should contact DVC immediately and not after we return home.

I am confused by what you said that we don't get great value for the trade. I have always understood that we were supposed to get great value since DVC and the Disney brand is the gold standard in the industry and "everyone" wants to come to WDW or Disneyland.

Thanks again.

This is true. If you want to trade another timeshare in through RCI and book a DVC room it's incredibly expensive (in terms of points or weeks traded in). Why I said it's not a great value for us is that the room you are getting for your trade-in would most likely cost a lot less to rent than a DVC room. As a simple example, let's say you trade in 140 points for a week at a beachfront condo in Florida. If you were to pay cash instead to stay at the beachfront resort lets say you would pay $200 a night so $1,400 for the week. The same 140 points gets you a lake view studio room at BLT at the end of August which has a rack rate of $3,700.

At the end of the day if you want to go to the beach and not WDW then it works out and who really cares, but in pure economic terms you are trading in a higher priced room for a less expensive one.

 

[Nemo14]

We have friends who have RCI points and they often invite us to stay with them at various resorts. In fact we stayed at Disney's Hilton Head in January in a 2 bedroom suite which they rented through RCI for $199 for the week and 5 points.

 

[Paginney]

I just joined this forum tonight to ask a question I have not really seen (although there is ALOT of information and good advice to get through I may have missed it) I see a lot of RCI trading for local travel but have not seen much info about international trading and my question is how easy is it to trade to places like Europe or Australia for example. So many other companies promise you these luxurious opportunities but it is impossible to ever get there because of wait listing or not having availability for years. Any thoughts or experiences? Thanks

 

[Rob562]

I just joined this forum tonight to ask a question I have not really seen (although there is ALOT of information and good advice to get through I may have missed it) I see a lot of RCI trading for local travel but have not seen much info about international trading and my question is how easy is it to trade to places like Europe or Australia for example. So many other companies promise you these luxurious opportunities but it is impossible to ever get there because of wait listing or not having availability for years. Any thoughts or experiences? Thanks

I've never traded to international resorts, but logging into the RCI portal I see:
Of the 114 potential resorts in France, there are 198 weeks available across 16 resorts right now.
Australia has 185 possible resorts with 1216 weeks across 50 resorts.

DVC should have the trading power to grab any of those weeks from the RCI system

If you want to narrow your selections, you can start an "Ongoing Search" where you can specify a range of check-in dates that you would accept, unit size, and either an entire region or down to only accepting specific resorts.

I'm actually going in the other direction. I have an Ongoing Search running now, trading our summer timeshare on Cape Cod for a week in a 2-bedroom unit at any WDW DVC property between mid-October and early-November. Hoping to get a match in the next few weeks now that we've reached the 7-month point for DVC units to drop into the RCI system.

-Rob

 

[Texas84]

We've had zero luck with it but that was long ago. I even tried Tokyo once. Not a chance.

 

[dsnyfan71]

I have traded before when we had Interval and LOVED it. Interval has quality resorts. Sheraton, Marriott that are comparable to Disney. Tried RCI and can never anything that looks somewhat decent. A lot of the resorts look dated and when you read the reviews, they are not very good. I would love to see Interval back