The Official Riviera Owners & Info Thread

[Dicentras]

How many direct points do you own at Riv, and how many would you recommend knowing what you know now? I was thinking of getting 150, but with the current incentives 175 or 200 is tempting. I would like to go week once a year in the winter or early spring most likely with my small family of 3 and also have the ability to sleep the grandparents as well.

Definitely get more than 150 if you are already thinking you want a 2BR for a week.

 

[Arbogast]

Definitely get more than 150 if you are already thinking you want a 2BR for a week.

I am thinking a 2 bedroom every 2 or 3 years, a studio most years or 1 bedroom

 

[Sandisw]

How many direct points do you own at Riv, and how many would you recommend knowing what you know now? I was thinking of getting 150, but with the current incentives 175 or 200 is tempting. I would like to go week once a year in the winter or early spring most likely with my small family of 3 and also have the ability to sleep the grandparents as well.

We have 300 at RIV, with 175 direct and 125 resale. Of course we also have 300 at VGF and 300 at SSR.

But, I’d just go with 200 to start because of the incentives as it gives you a lot of options.

 

[jamesweikamp]

How many direct points do you own at Riv, and how many would you recommend knowing what you know now? I was thinking of getting 150, but with the current incentives 175 or 200 is tempting. I would like to go week once a year in the winter or early spring most likely with my small family of 3 and also have the ability to sleep the grandparents as well.

We started with 150 and then added-on a GW preferred studio (basically another 150). 300 allows us to come down 2X per year with flexibility to choose larger room types or longer stays, if needed.

 

[tpskult]

Anyone who has been recently know if the Gelato cart is still at Riviera?

 

[jamesweikamp]

Anyone who has been recently know if the Gelato cart is still at Riviera?

Yes. It is in the pool area.

 

[BSwest]

Staying July 29- August 8 Deluxe Studio SV - First trip Home

 

[Greyhound22]

We just bought 100 direct Rivera points yesterday. The current promotion was more than I could take. Previously only owned at SSR. Very excited, as we needed mode points. Moved to FL last January and can now go when ever we want. I've been waiting and waiting to make a decision and finally pulled the trigger.

 

[jamesweikamp]

We just bought 100 direct Rivera points yesterday. The current promotion was more than I could take. Previously only owned at SSR. Very excited, as we needed mode points. Moved to FL last January and can now go when ever we want. I've been waiting and waiting to make a decision and finally pulled the trigger.

Congrats!! It’s a great long weekend spot for locals (in addition to a great place generally). I could just hang at the resort/boardwalk all day.

If you don’t mind me asking, where did you move to?

 

[Greyhound22]

Congrats!! It’s a great long weekend spot for locals (in addition to a great place generally). I could just hang at the resort/boardwalk all day.

If you don’t mind me asking, where did you move to?

South of Jacksonville. WDW is about a 2 1/2 hour drive, instead of 14 for us now. We already have been twice and have 5 more 1-4 day trips planned (since we moved to FL)!

 

[DVCsloth]

We just bought 100 direct Rivera points yesterday. The current promotion was more than I could take. Previously only owned at SSR. Very excited, as we needed mode points. Moved to FL last January and can now go when ever we want. I've been waiting and waiting to make a decision and finally pulled the trigger.

Congrats, we did the same. Started with 50 points and they added the incentives, so we changed it to 100 before closing. Same here, about 2.5 hr. drive as well.

 

[Duckbug.Ducktales]

How many direct points do you own at Riv, and how many would you recommend knowing what you know now? I was thinking of getting 150, but with the current incentives 175 or 200 is tempting. I would like to go week once a year in the winter or early spring most likely with my small family of 3 and also have the ability to sleep the grandparents as well.

The incentives are better at 200, as you know, and that's a good number for mixing studios with large rooms year to year. Split it into two 100s or one 150 and one 50 in case you later decide to downsize. But I doubt it, I think 200 is a pretty good balance between dues flexibility.

 

[Arbogast]

The incentives are better at 200, as you know, and that's a good number for mixing studios with large rooms year to year. Split it into two 100s or one 150 and one 50 in case you later decide to downsize. But I doubt it, I think 200 is a pretty good balance between dues flexibility.

Thank you! We just had our little guy this weekend and now I'm ready to give him some amazing memories at Disney World.

 

[ninafeliz]

How many direct points do you own at Riv, and how many would you recommend knowing what you know now? I was thinking of getting 150, but with the current incentives 175 or 200 is tempting. I would like to go week once a year in the winter or early spring most likely with my small family of 3 and also have the ability to sleep the grandparents as well.

I know this is a little old, but wanted to chime in. We bought 250 riviera points, with the intent of banking and going every other year in a 2 BR for just over a week with the 500 points. We have 4 kids, so a 2 BR is necessary and our intent was to also take the 3 grandparents on this big every other year trip. So far it has worked well, we did 9 nights in July 2021 (8 Riviera and the first at the BCV for the pool), and we have 8 nights booked for April 2023 (our points go further in summer than spring break!). We did have to supplement with OTU points for both trips, if I could do it again I would probably buy 300 points. However, if you actually want only a week (7 nights) instead if the 8-9 that I always try to sneak in 250 would be fine. I think 200 would be tough if you want a 2 BR. We recently bought 300 points at VGF, so we plan to bank those points as well and now use them on the alternate years. Just to add - these are all standard views. We wouldn't be able to get nearly as long in a preferred view - so the 11 month booking window is important.

 

[polynor]

We bought 360, thinking the 1 BR mostly and sometimes the 2BR with banking depending on the resort. We go summer and spring break.
In reality, nothing like we thought. We did a 2BR BLT and then a 2BR RIV and then we just got back from a 2BR+1BR BLT with my sister.

Not enough points.
The current incentives are tempting to add on but our initial thought would be build in a break from disney every so often -- every 5th year or 3rd year (with AP's covering 2 years of trips). So I think this still works out.

 

[Arbogast]

I know this is a little old, but wanted to chime in. We bought 250 riviera points, with the intent of banking and going every other year in a 2 BR for just over a week with the 500 points. We have 4 kids, so a 2 BR is necessary and our intent was to also take the 3 grandparents on this big every other year trip. So far it has worked well, we did 9 nights in July 2021 (8 Riviera and the first at the BCV for the pool), and we have 8 nights booked for April 2023 (our points go further in summer than spring break!). We did have to supplement with OTU points for both trips, if I could do it again I would probably buy 300 points. However, if you actually want only a week (7 nights) instead if the 8-9 that I always try to sneak in 250 would be fine. I think 200 would be tough if you want a 2 BR. We recently bought 300 points at VGF, so we plan to bank those points as well and now use them on the alternate years. Just to add - these are all standard views. We wouldn't be able to get nearly as long in a preferred view - so the 11 month booking window is important.

Thanks. I think I would only want a 2 bedroom every 3 years, generally a studio or 1 bedroom would be fine. Also a 2 bedroom is not necessary, could always put the parents at Carribean.

 

[pianomanzano]

Thinking about adding on 250 more to the 150 we bought in November. The incentives right now are really good, so much so that we want to trade in our SSR resale for more RIV direct to have more points to book there (Tempted to add 50 more points and make it an even 300, but have to get my boss' approval (my wife). We're thinking about splitting it up into two contracts, with one being a guaranteed week at a standard studio in November for my daughter's birthday and the remainder in a sub-100pt contract. Not sure what these resale restrictions will do to availability at 11 months going forward with more resale owners being locked in to only RIV and since the fall is already competitive, figure it's better to have something guaranteed for now even though we will most likely cancel it most years to pool together points and book a bigger room type.

 

[ninafeliz]

Thanks. I think I would only want a 2 bedroom every 3 years, generally a studio or 1 bedroom would be fine. Also a 2 bedroom is not necessary, could always put the parents at Carribean.

Staying at the CBR is a good option, depends on if you prefer them right there or some space. For us sharing a single room doesn’t work well, but a 2 BR gives us enough space to make it work and it makes the room free for them, since we need a 2 BR anyway! My brother and his kids did come once and stayed at the CBR for a couple of nights and it worked out wonderfully. They spent almost the entire time with us, and slept in their room. They also did YC while we did BCV (can you tell he planned his trip last minute lol).

 

[Royal Consort]

We're thinking about splitting it up into two contracts, with one being a guaranteed week at a standard studio in November for my daughter's birthday and the remainder in a sub-100pt contract.

We have a FW around this time. It's great because it costs us fewer points than if we booked it now! But since DVC fiddled with the FW charts, it's not nearly a good deal. You have to consider if the premium is worth it as you're likely always spending more points for that week vs booking it yourself.

 

[pianomanzano]

We have a FW around this time. It's great because it costs us fewer points than if we booked it now! But since DVC fiddled with the FW charts, it's not nearly a good deal. You have to consider if the premium is worth it as you're likely always spending more points for that week vs booking it yourself.

I was looking at the guaranteed week charts from 2020 and the week I'm interested in was only 130 points, It's 153 now! That particular week also costs 130 and 139 points for 2022 and 2023, respectively. Our thought process on getting the guaranteed week is two-fold. First, we'd like to have a guaranteed studio as a means of future proofing if it becomes a copper creek like situation where it's hard to get in at 11 months in November. Second, we also want to an exit strategy and see a guaranteed week contract as being more marketable (although not sure how marketable it'd be in the future if there's that big of a point gap between the guaranteed week and the point cost for that week). But in reality, we'll most likely cancel the reservation most years and use our total pool of points to book a 1BRs or higher for the space. I could see us downgrading to a studio for a couple years when our kids are 4-10 and then again when they won't want to come down with us.

Does any of this make sense? We plan on adding 250 points total so the higher point requirement for the fixed week won't really matter if we cancel the guaranteed reservation and book something else. I'm just wondering if we'll be cancelling it every year to book a different room type (and sometimes rebooking that studio if the point cost is lower than 153 pts), is it even worth getting?