Other DVC vacation costs

RDP

DIS Veteran
Joined
Mar 31, 2008
How much do you spend on a DVC Vacation? Assuming the DVC side of things is paid for, we typically spend around 4k on flights, car hire, park tickets, pre flight stay etc for two weeks. We are a family of 4 − 2 Adults, 2 Children.
 
Consider that with DVC you can buy a discounted annual pass. If you plan two trips in the same calendar year you can save some $ there. I am not sure what the going rate is right now on AP's, but the DVC rate is $100 less.
 
Are you including spending money? Last November, we felt that the cost of food and drink had increased significantly since our previous stay. It's perhaps not immediately obvious, but whereas we'd normally spend an average of around $100 a day, it was probably closer to $200 this time (admittedly we like to drink!). Even though the cost of eating out is cheaper over there, the fact that you do it twice a day for the duration of your holiday makes it the single most expensive outlay. Even with what we kid ourselves is free accommodation (and clearly it isn't, even though not everyone has a loan), a Florida holiday is a major financial commitment. There are just two of us now, but for a two week trip, we spend at least £6000, not including annual dues.
 


Are you including spending money? Last November, we felt that the cost of food and drink had increased significantly since our previous stay. It's perhaps not immediately obvious, but whereas we'd normally spend an average of around $100 a day, it was probably closer to $200 this time (admittedly we like to drink!). Even though the cost of eating out is cheaper over there, the fact that you do it twice a day for the duration of your holiday makes it the single most expensive outlay. Even with what we kid ourselves is free accommodation (and clearly it isn't, even though not everyone has a loan), a Florida holiday is a major financial commitment. There are just two of us now, but for a two week trip, we spend at least £6000, not including annual dues.


Agree, its around the same for us, all things considered. Love my wine!
 
Ours would be similar.

I find that now we have DVC I do see the accommodation as free and therefore find myself using it to justify my other indulgences. (Cruise, PE flights, upgraded cars, nicer restaurants etc).

At the moment our costs are relatively manageable as both my kids are small (DD will be 3 soon and DS is almost 5months) so we don't tend to do lots of expensive restaurants and spend more time relaxing on the balcony with a glass of wine compared to how much we used to spend at a pool bar.
 
Ours would be similar.

I find that now we have DVC I do see the accommodation as free and therefore find myself using it to justify my other indulgences. (Cruise, PE flights, upgraded cars, nicer restaurants etc).

We've now disregarded our initial cost as if we decide to sell our points then we'll still see a high percentage return of that investment.

So we now look at our accommodation cost as being the cost of the annual maintenance dues so for our 7-night stay in a studio at Bay Lake Towers and 14-nights in a studio at Jambo House AKL this year we've paid less than $95 a night.

For that price where else can you stay in that sort of accommodation and on site with the other benefits such as free parking; parking at the parks for those staying off-site cost $14 a day.

Our DVC Premium Annual tickets was on offer and cost us $425 each so even if we don't use it again over the next 12-months that's still less than $21 a day and very similar in price to the cost of an Ultimate 21-day ticket at £280.

And we have the flexibility to eat relatively cheaply off-site or in the room by buying from supermarkets along with some favorite restaurants both onsite at Sanna, Boma's, the Wave and off site at Gaylord Palms, Villa de Flora.
 


Us too. We purchased our points in 2008 at $2/£1. Taking into account how much we would have spent on accommodation since then the initial investment has paid itself off.

Just a shame that other costs have risen so significantly since.

Fingers crossed the special annual pass price returns :)
 
We got the discounted PAPs in October and since we had a trip booked for New Year we felt we were saving money and now I have booked another trip for August as it seems silly not to get more use out of our PAPs ( do you like my logic?):rotfl:

We are happy to eat cheaply and don't drink so even though there are 4 of us (kids are 18 and 15) we can manage quite cheaply. We usually just snack in the day, eat a good breakfast in the room and then head offsite in the evening. If staying onsite we usually go for places that give DVC discount and since there is no alcohol and we are not dessert eaters our bills aren't too high.

Flights unfortunately are pretty pricey but we do watch them and try to grab a bargain when we can.

We don't like shopping much either so the malls aren't a huge draw so we can still manage the holiday quite cheaply.

We paid for our DVC outright with some money that we had which we wanted to use for something specific, we think that we have now broken even on the cost we paid. Now we only have our annual dues to think about so each break feels like a bargain!
 
Are you including spending money? Last November, we felt that the cost of food and drink had increased significantly since our previous stay. It's perhaps not immediately obvious, but whereas we'd normally spend an average of around $100 a day, it was probably closer to $200 this time (admittedly we like to drink!). Even though the cost of eating out is cheaper over there, the fact that you do it twice a day for the duration of your holiday makes it the single most expensive outlay. Even with what we kid ourselves is free accommodation (and clearly it isn't, even though not everyone has a loan), a Florida holiday is a major financial commitment. There are just two of us now, but for a two week trip, we spend at least £6000, not including annual dues.

We have noticed a run up in food and beverage costs as well. Believe it is how they subsidize the dining plans and free dining offers. The dining decision is more complicated now if price/value is part of the process.
 
Many people staying in DVC accommodations order groceries. If you're in a 1 BR (or larger) villa, you have a full kitchen and fridge.

So you can save $ and order groceries (including wine)
 
where do they order groceries from? I am thinking of doing it without car.

The Garden Grocer is one I have read about. There is another but can't remember the name.

As far as the cost of the holiday goes, I would say we don't spend much more than £3000 for the 2 of us usually, and that includes PE flights and car hire. We no longer go into the parks much, and in any case, I have a 'stash' of old Park hopper plus tickets which do not expire, plus a couple of AP vouchers for when we go with grandchildren.

It's still a costly indulgence though, as we like to go twice a year and of course there's those those pesky dues ;)
 

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