Harmony 4 BR Villa

[jaullram]

I got excited because I finally found a 4 BR villa suite for September 2022 so I booked. Problem is, how many people do I need to have in the room? I have 5 right now but because of school, I am not sure I can find any more people to come with us.  What is the minimum amount of people required? Help!

[Lovetocruise2002]

My TA told me recently that the magic number is 8. However, I have long wondered if that is case, why would they let you book it with less than that?
 

We were able to book it with 4 only before and it did not state anywhere that we would have to add 4 more to it, but we ended up adding. So basically, I don’t really know, and I have never once heard of someone not being allowed to make final payment because they did not have enough people. I read a blog from the past on HM where they only had 6 in there at the time of sailing. Sorry if this causes more confusion than help. 

[Ferramc]

I booked the symphony suite yesterday on line with rccl - 4 people (normally use a ta but it was 630 in the morning and I didn’t want to lose the room). 

I then called rccl when they opened and added a 5th person. The agent never said anything about needing more people.  

I do have 2 more people who just confirmed they will be coming with us, but no one knew that when I booked.  
 

[dawnelda]

I booked the Harmony 4-bedroom for Oct. 2022 for just 3 people, over the phone with a RCL agent. Hoping to add more family members later if I can get them to commit to the cruise.

Question: the suite is definitely overkill for just 3 people so if we can't get more family to come along, can we move our deposit to a different room (e.g. balcony) on that same cruise? Can we move the deposit to a different cruise? Note that the suite deposits are non-refundable.

Edited November 18, 2020 by dawnelda
Fixed typo

[Lovetocruise2002]

14 minutes ago, dawnelda said:

Question: the suite is definitely overkill for just 3 people so if we can't get more family to come along, can we move our deposit to a different room (e.g. balcony) on that same cruise? Can we move the deposit to a different cruise? Note that the suite deposits are non-refundable.

You can move your deposit to a different room on the same sailing for sure but why you would want to give up star class benefits is beyond me.

If you move your deposit to a different sailing, you will be penalized a change fee of $100pp, under regular, non-covid rules.

[GregD]

10 hours ago, jaullram said:

I am not sure I can find any more people to come with us.  What is the minimum amount of people required? Help!

[WAAAYTOOO]

10 hours ago, dawnelda said:

can we move our deposit to a different room (e.g. balcony) on that same cruise? Can we move the deposit to a different cruise? 

If you downgrade from a full suite to a non-suite (JS or lower) you could well be penalized the $100 PP suite non-refundable deposit fee.  Would they insist on charging this fee ?  Maybe....maybe not, but according to the rules, they would be within their rights to charge you the NRD penalty if you cancel or downgrade a suite.  If you move your booking to a different ship or sail date, the $100 PP NRD penalty would definitely be assessed.

[jaullram]

Thank you for the replies.  We are going to find some more people because I REALLY want to sail in the suite!

[Ferramc]

Definitely find others while the great additional passenger deals are out there. 
We ended up with 7 and are stopping there.  My two adult kids, daughter in law, a niece who’s my age, her husband (really fun people) and my husband and me.  So the 4 bedrooms are gone.  The 3rd -7th passengers are only $960 each.  Now we all just have to wait 18 months. Argh.  

[Jill]

What exactly is this suite called? I’ve gone through several mock bookings on oasis class and don’t see it. Any links to pics, details? 

[Lovetocruise2002]

19 minutes ago, Jill said:

What exactly is this suite called? I’ve gone through several mock bookings on oasis class and don’t see it. Any links to pics, details? 

It’s called the Villa suite, category VS. Only available on HM and SY. You won’t find it because they go so fast! Not exaggerating at all. With the summer 2022 release a few days ago, they were literally gone within 24hrs.

[Yo2slick]

20 hours ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:

It’s called the Villa suite, category VS. Only available on HM and SY. You won’t find it because they go so fast! Not exaggerating at all. With the summer 2022 release a few days ago, they were literally gone within 24hrs.

I believe there is only one of these suites per ship correct?

[Lovetocruise2002]

30 minutes ago, Yo2slick said:

I believe there is only one of these suites per ship correct?

Yes. One per ship. So two in the entire fleet. 
They also have the 4 Bedroom villas on freedom class but it’s not star class. 

[dawnelda]

4 minutes ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:

They also have the 4 Bedroom villas on freedom class but it’s not star class. 

Only the Liberty at this point. It's not Star Class but it's cheaper and the balcony is twice as wide.

[dawnelda]

Oh and on the Liberty it's only 1 deck away from the nearest bar (the R Bar on Deck 5). LOL!

[Lovetocruise2002]

11 minutes ago, dawnelda said:

Only the Liberty at this point. It's not Star Class but it's cheaper and the balcony is twice as wide.

Oh yes, my mistake. I forgot they converted the ones on freedom and Indy to 2BDR GS over dry dock. 

[Floski]

I'm not busy that week.

 

My feet don't stink and I swear I don't snore.  

[Jill]

So out of curiosity, what price tag comes with this villa? Is it star class? Anyone have pics? 
 

[Jill]

Found this video. 
 

 

[Lovetocruise2002]

1 hour ago, Jill said:

So out of curiosity, what price tag comes with this villa? Is it star class? Anyone have pics? 
 

It is Star Class.  The price tag varies.  There are two main factors that play into how much the per person cost will come out to be with that cabin:

1) Time of year

2) Number of people you put in there (holds 14 max)

If you sail during low season, and max out the occupancy, the cost could be less than what you would pay for a balcony cabin.  If you book that cabin over the summer or holidays, even maxed out, it can be quite expensive, especially during Christmas and NY sailings.

We lost our Villa booking due to covid, but we paid just under $14K for 14 people for a December 13th sailing.  That is considered very low.  I don't expect to see that price again.  That was a combination of the right time of year, KSF, and travel agent discounts.

With this past summer 2022 release, I did price out a sailing on SY for end of August for the same 14 people.  The cost was about $32K for all 14 of us.  With just 4 people, it priced out at about $22K. As you can see, it really varies.  I have heard from some friends that holiday sailings are much pricier than what we priced out for summer.

[Ferramc]

We have 7 adults booked for May 2022 on symphony.  I got what I consider an amazing deal.  Approx 15k after a 1k credit. Less than 2,300 per person.  We will get more than our money’s worth.  Passengers 3-7 were about 1k each. Plus my TA has also given a very nice amount in cruise credit. I watched the boards for a couple of weeks and booked at 645 am the morning the bookings opened up.  

[Jill]

2 hours ago, Ferramc said:

We have 7 adults booked for May 2022 on symphony.  I got what I consider an amazing deal.  Approx 15k after a 1k credit. Less than 2,300 per person.  We will get more than our money’s worth.  Passengers 3-7 were about 1k each. Plus my TA has also given a very nice amount in cruise credit. I watched the boards for a couple of weeks and booked at 645 am the morning the bookings opened up.  

That’s a freakin awesome deal! 
 

Did you aim for a particular itinerary or did you just pick “May” and take the first available villa? 
 

May is my favorite time to sail the Caribbean. We’ve got Symphony May 2021. After 2 cancelled, I hope I finally get on her in May. 

[Ferramc]

3 hours ago, Ferramc said:

 

1 hour ago, Jill said:

That’s a freakin awesome deal! 
 

Did you aim for a particular itinerary or did you just pick “May” and take the first available villa? 
 

May is my favorite time to sail the Caribbean. We’ve got Symphony May 2021. After 2 cancelled, I hope I finally get on her in May. 

We like May the best - nice weather, not over crowded with kids since they’re still in school (our kids are adults now  ) and it’s our wedding anniversary month.  I can also usually find great deals.  I typically luck out booking in the same year as the sailing, but knowing I really, really, wanted the villa I knew I had to book as soon as the sailings opened up.  

Since I knew we wanted the Caribbean and a newer ship (our ‘kids’ haven’t been on a cruise in over 10 years and we want to make it special) I picked the May date with the best itinerary for us and when the room showed open, I immediately booked.  You should have seen me running downstairs from bed to go get my credit card!   I could only book 4 of us on line and didn’t believe I really got it until I spoke with a royal rep to add the 5th person as soon as they opened.  I added the 6/7 people a couple of days later when we confirmed that the funnest couple in our extended family could join us! 

This will be first time star class for us and we all can’t wait. We worked our way up from the tiniest interior, lower deck cabins to our first grand suite over a 25 year period.  We also had about a 10 year pause in cruising in that period until 2 years ago - the teen years were difficult and there was no way would we all have survived in one cabin.  Now we’ll have 4 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms. No privacy or space issues as there are 3 couples and 1 single And all the food and drink necessary to keep everyone extremely happy!
 

I hope you get to travel next May. 

[Ferramc]

By the way - we will be happy to host a cabin get together for blog members who book the same cruise (assuming Royal doesn’t cut that offering post Covid). 
 

Just 536 days to go!  Bet you can’t tell I’m excited!  And in desperate need of a cruise! 

[Lovetocruise2002]

Nothing beats your first Star Class experience. Be as excited as you want! Soak it all in, you will not believe how fast the week will go by. 

[AshleyDillo]

15 hours ago, Jill said:

So out of curiosity, what price tag comes with this villa? Is it star class? Anyone have pics? 
 

I locked in one for January 2022 the day the itineraries released last time..for 4 people it's at about $10.5K but the additional person rate is locked in at only $750 more to add up to the total capacity.