Every DVC owner has to pay annual maintenance fees, also known colloquially as "dues". Unlike cash rooms, the money you spend to purchase DVC does not cover any of the operating expenses of the resort. Dues are typically made up of the cost of maintaining the resort, employee salaries, transportation, activities, security, utilities and taxes to the state of Florida. For resorts that share amenities with cash resorts, Disney has a formula to determine the portion of resort operation that is paid for by the members. The breakdown of dues are provided each year to every member - we will not place these details here.
It should be noted that owners can write off the tax portion of their annual dues, much like with their home. This is usually a small fraction of the dues and the number is available on the annual statement that is provided to each owner.
Dues are paid on a per point basis - meaning that if your dues are shown as $6.57, this means a 100 point contract would cost $657 in maintenance fees for that year. Below are charts showing the history of DVC dues on a per point basis. Both Vero Beach and Aulani have a second level of dues that certain early owners get to pay that are lower than the common dues. However, this information is not provided in these tables.
The Table below shows the year-over-year percentage rate of increase for each resort. Across the top (in yellow) is the average rate of increase across the history of the resort. The right-most column also shows the average annual increase across all the resorts that were open that year. Note that the average rate of increase is typically between 3 and 5%, with some exceptions of course. For instance, in 2019 - the average dues increased by 7.6% thanks to a minimum wage increase of 30% for all workers at WDW.
Dues are typically announced in November of each year, and are due by January 15th the following year. There are two main payment options:
- Pay the entire dues at the beginning of the year - with final payment after February 15th resulting in penalty fees. In 2020, Disney allowed that this fee could be paid via credit card or direct bank withdrawal.
- Set up a monthly bank withdrawal and pay the dues over 12 months. This must be set up in January, and your payment will be split evenly across twelve months. Disney does not charge your account extra to choose this option.
Late payments of dues can eventually lead to your point usage being suspended.
