How do you do it? Disney every year?

[JCMHutch]

DH & I go every year now because we have reached the point where we can afford it. I started going to WDW back in 1996 (long before I met my DH!) and now have my DH going every year. Since we both love to go we save up for our trips. This year, I asked everyone for Disney GCs for my birthday and Christmas. This will take a lot off the price of the trip. We also use the Disney Visa to acrue Dream Dollars and will redeem those for the trip.

We also never pay full price for the trips. Last year we did the 4+3 deal and got a $200 GC at check-in. This allowed us to move up to a moderate resort for the first time at a lower cost than the Values at their regular price. We also find the dining plan worth getting because one of the things we love about vacation is trying new restaurants.

I am also lucky that my company has a conference down there every two years so we tie our vacation to the conference. This saves us the cost of my airfare and it allowed us to stay at the Dolphin & Swan for a very good price with discounted park tickets.

This year, we will be using part of our tax return for the trip. Until we book it, that $$ will stay in the bank and earn some interest. We always pay for everything up front and have no bills to pay when we come home. I even bring an envelope with $20 a day in it for dinner tips (since tips are not included on DDP). This works great and usually covers a beer for DH with dinner.

 

[Darcy03231]

For us vacation is a priority like any other bill and we put money away each week for it. It also means doing without other things such as movies, eating out, new clothes (unless its a necessity) and other non-essential spending. Anytime I find myself going to buy something that I "want" not a "need" I ask myself if I really want to take the money out of the vacation fund. Almost always the answer is no. In your case to save $4,000 a year for vacation you need to put $75 a week in vacation savings account. Its up to you to decide where that $75 is coming out of your budget. Some easy ways to trim (if you do these things) are:

No more Dunkin Donuts, Starbucks, etc. each morning. Make you own and get a travel mug. That can save $10/wk

No more eating lunch out. Pack your lunch. This can save up to $5-$7 day.

Don't buy books - use your local library.

We use Redbox to rent DVDs. Its a $1/night vs $4/night from the video rental store.

Check you paper for local free entertainment on the weekends.

Rather than eating out consider take out. You save money by not ordering a drink or having to tip.

Eat breakfast for dinner one night a week and plan a meatless dinner one night a week.

DH and I also don't exchange birthday, anniversary or Christmas gifts. We put that money toward travel.

 

[maedelken]

We make Disney a priority like it was any other bill! We have extra taken out of our taxes and our return is always MORE than enough to cover a trip. We have never paid "rack rate" for a Disney trip yet so that is also a big plus for us. We recently bought a house so the Disney trip is being scaled back this year (POP for only 5 days) but we are still going. I also went for a 4 day trip with DIS friends in February. In exchange, I didn't get any bday/Christmas/mother's Day/valentine's day gifts. Good trade off in my opinion.

Do you do DIS trips a lot? I would love to do a trip like that. My friends of course do not love Disney as much as I do. Would love to meet some people that do. bb

 

[quentina]

We own DVC so that takes care of the lodging side. With this, we do breakfast in the room....nothing big, bagel/danish etc.

The big thing that we do is buy 10 day hopper, no expiration. We commando for a day or 2 (since we go so often, we know what we want to do) and spend some days not going to parks. We can usually get 3-4 trips out of one tic. This is a huge savings. I do buy them one at a time....usually a few months apart so I don't feel the heat of the purchase.

Other idea is if family still buys you Bday/Christmas gifts ask for Disney gift cards. We always got Disney dollars and would have a few hundred when we arrived. Every little big helps.

We go usually 2 times per year. We watch for discounted air (got 24$ flights on Allegiant a few weeks ago) and use car rental codes (I will not use transportation due to car seats being needed).

Good luck..........

 

[nsmith]

This is easy and the same answer for anyone even if you only want to go once. Divide the cost of the trip by 52 = about $60 a week. Look at your expenses and decide what you will do with out to go on this trip, cell phone/cable/lunches or dinners out, presents, mani/pedi's, haircuts etc. If you really want to go doing this for a year isn't hard because you get the payoff in the end. If you can't afford $60 a week you can't afford the trip.

 

[gobraves39560]

We are are young family. I am 29 and DH 33. We have 2 kids and have gone to Orlando the last 3 summers. We are very frugal people. My dh makes a great income, but we choose to invest in our Ira's. Last year we were able to take a 8 night trip to Disney for under $2000. (inc. gas!!) We got the buy 4 get 3 days free and stayed at Pop. We loved this hotel, but Sports is cool too!! We did the counter service dining plan which is AWESOME!!!! More than enough food. We ate at Wolfgang Pucks 4 times, I think. lol
Two years ago, we did the regular dining plan. I recommend doing this if you have small kids for the Charactars. We are considering this for May, but we'll see!!
If I was you, I would wait for discounts. With the economy the way that it is, there should be some good ones to come.
We live our life to be savers and not spenders... making one day I can buy into DVC!!

 

[Rhode Island Quahog]

We bought into Disney Vacation Club at Bay Lake Tower in June. Over time it will save us tons of money and we will be able to stay at deluxe resorts til 2060. It is the best decision we have ever made!

 

[tlh0726]

DH quit smoking beginning of November (only 5 years and 2 months late on his I will quit when DD is born) roughly $350.00 has gone into our Disney fund so far.
DH and I do not exchange birthday or anniversary gifts we put this money into our fund.
We also have started packing lunches and snacks when we go on outings (zoo, aquarium, amusement park, etc) instead of buying food there.
I make calls to the phone, internet, tv service, cell phone companies at least twice a year to see how I can cut my bill down.
Cut out running to the store for just one or two items, unless it is an emergency it goes on the list and picked up the next time we go shopping.
When we do eat out, everyone orders water unless it is included in the price of the meal.

 

[mom2val]

This is easy and the same answer for anyone even if you only want to go once. Divide the cost of the trip by 52 = about $60 a week. Look at your expenses and decide what you will do with out to go on this trip, cell phone/cable/lunches or dinners out, presents, mani/pedi's, haircuts etc. If you really want to go doing this for a year isn't hard because you get the payoff in the end. If you can't afford $60 a week you can't afford the trip.

Well Said!

 

[kristenrice]

These are the ways that I save for our Disney trips. We do not take a trip unless we have every cent saved up for it ahead of time.

1) $50 per paycheck goes directly into an online savings account ($1300/year)
2) Every bill that can be charged to a credit card is put either on the Disney Visa or the AMEX Blue Sky card (approx. $350/year)
3) All of our gasoline is put on our Discover Open Road card (approx. $50/year)
4) I return all of our pop cans/bottles at $0.10 each and deposit that into the travel account (about $150/yr)
5) I use online rewards programs!
a) MyPoints: Earn about $100/year in gift cards to either Rainforest Cafe or Marriott.
b) Sunshine Rewards: Lots of potential here, but I only make about $100/year

So, I accumulate about $2000 a year with very minimal effort and over 25% of that is "freebies".

In June of 2009, we took a family trip using our DVC points and bought AP's. Now, we have a trip planned for April 2010 and my parents are coming with us. My friends are so jealous when I tell them how much I have to pay for the trip....9 nights (4 on the road, 5 at AKV) from April 1-9 (yup, Easter week)....LESS THAN $1000!!

We're driving and spending two nights in a hotel on the way down, then one night at Buena Vista Suites before our DVC stay starts, and then one night on the way home. I have Marriott Rewards points to cover one night and a Marriott gift card that I earned from MyPoints to cover another. The other 2 hotel nights will be paid for with half of my AMEX rewards. We're splitting the cost of gas with my parents since we are all driving together in our car. I have about $150 in Disney Visa Rewards and another $200 in gift cards that I have earned from rewards programs. The other half of my AMEX rewards will go towards anything we charge to the room. Our Disney lodging and tickets are already paid for, thanks to DVC and AP's. Essentially, our only expenses are food and getting there. The actual cost would be about $1600, but I have almost $800 of that earned up in "freebie" rewards that I've earned over the last 10 months.

I'd love to go every year, but the DH does not love WDW like I do so it just isn't going to happen. The bright side is that we often have "extra" money to splurge on some extras when we do go.

 

[gohogs34]

apply for a Disney Visa one at a time, and sign the other up and you will get $40.00 free $$ there. Now the important part: ONLY use the card to pay for things you already have the $$ for or bills that are to be paid out each month from some other account anyway. We have NEVER had a finance charge and have saved $600.00 from Feb. 08 to Jan. 10 for our upcoming trip Jan 27. Now with that said out 6 day 5 nite stay at pop with tickets cost $980.24, now minus $600.00 (free disney rewards $$) and a free $300.00 gift card it makes our cost $80.00. Now yes I have to pay the $300.00 OP, but I will spend that on food. We flew last time and will fly again for round trip from Tennessee for $452.00. No rent a car needed.
Now if you do wish to sign up for a Disney visa, you can help someone else make $$ for referring and then you do the same for your spouse.

How do you do it??
DH and I are late 20s/early 30s with no kids. We love going to WDW but sometimes the money just gets to me. I guess part of it is because I didn't go on "nice" vacations as a kid - my parents' idea of a vacation was going to Kings Dominion for 2 days....

Because DH uses an electric wheelchair, he prefers the Polynesian/monorail resorts. I don't care for the buses all that much, so I also prefer the Poly. How in the world do you afford $3,500+ each year to go to Disney (approx. cost for 2 people, DxDP, Park Hopper, 7 days/6 nights)? Any suggestions would be much appreciated! We want to go every year, but I just have to figure out how to do it and still save money!

 

[WantToGoNow]

We generally only go every other year but we really only start saving for our trip and year out so technically we could go every year.

But we have never stayed deluxe - if we did, we couldn't go as often. We have stayed value and moderate and honestly, I like the values just as much.
We just came back about a month ago from POR, my kids asked if we could go back to POP next time - guess they weren't too impressed. As for the wheelchair and busses, I don't see the big issue. All the busses are wheelchair accesible - we had a wheelchair in our group this time and if anything it saved us time - we never had to wait for more than 1 bus because we always pre-loaded.

We dropped the hoppers this trip - that saved our family $250 and we probably wouldn't have used them much anyway - we had a group of 11 with 6 little kids. We also didn't get the water park and more feature and since it turned out to be cold, I was glad we didn't pay for it.

We have gone on free dining for the past 2 trips. I don't think we would be able to eat all that is provided with the deluxe dining - the regular is too much but we always do it because the kids like character meals and those are expensive. Once the kids outgrow the "need" for character meals, we will probably go down to the QSDP or just pay OOP for what we want to eat.

It all comes down to priorities - what is important to you. Going more often or doing it deluxe? Our family of 5 (3 adults/2 children) stayed 8 nights/9 days at POR with 9 day base tickets and free dining for less than $3,500.

 

[Purseval]

We go 2-4 times/year. We drive, stay offsite and get our tickets for free or low cost by taking timeshare tours. Our next trip is in March, we'll be in the parks for 2 days and have an option for a water park or Disney Quest for a 3rd day. Normally it is just the 2 of us but this next trip we are taking 4 people with us. All of their WDW tickets we got from timeshare tours. We also bought them 7-day Universal/IOA passes at Kroger for $89 and, as a treat, we will be sending them to Hard Rock Hotel for a night (which will give us 2 days of Front Of The Line access), paying for the hotel with Universal dollars we got from, you guessed it, taking timeshare tours We should also have around $400 in Disney dollars by the time March rolls around because we charge every purchase over $5 to our Disney Visa card.

 

[mybabesuz]

Disney is our one luxury...
We don't smoke or drink...
We don't eat out except maybe Pizza once a month.
We don't buy things we don't need.
If we have the urge to buy something we say, would we rather have that or go to Disney...
Disney always wins!

 

[Douglas Bray]

We go at least once a year. To save money on the passes we use our Air Miles to purchase 7 Day passes and then we upgrade that to an annual pass when we arrive in Disney World. I book a trip one year for the end of September and then the following year in the beginning of September that we I get at least two trips out of one annual pass. I look for air deals from Seattle to Orlando and so far the most we have paid is just under $300.00 each. I have booked during free dining for the last 4 years so the food is included (I have collected quite a few one day park passes that we will eventually use). We stay for 10 - 16 nights at the Pop Century and have only spent an average of $600.00 each year for expenses in the parks (such as tips, souvenirs, etc...).

Total cost for three has been under $3000.00 each year for a two week vacation including Air, Transfers, Accommodation, Food, Park Passes, and Extras. That works out to be putting aside the two extra checks that I get each year as I get paid bi-weekly but we budget everything based on four pay checks a month so my extra two go to our Holidays and my wife’s extra two go to extra item around the house like audio & video equipment.

We are going this year at the end of August and have already paid for the air, and most of the accommodations already so by the time the trip comes everything is paid for and we have cash for the extras, and with luck to book a deposit on next years trip with a bounce back promotion.

It makes it a very painless way to budget for an annual trip.

 

[disneylovin24]

DVC members so we have our room payed for for the next 37 years As for dinning options and park tickets, well we buy our tickets as 10-days so we get the cheapest price perday. Dinning, we save up all summer just by putting money off to the side and not indulging ourselves too often. We rarely dine out when we're not on vacation, so that money saved goes to the few times a year we do dine out at disney We drive down too which saves us $1100 compared to flying!

 

[deerhart]

Like many other's have said, its all about what YOU want to do and how you budget. Some people just have the disposable income in their budgets. Other's have to plan it in.

We all have choices to make in regards to our money. My dh and I are still in our early thirties, our kids are 7 and almost 10. When we were in our mid 20's our lives were falling apart (problems with pregnancies, job losses, going back to school etc..) .

Besides vacation, we have made lots of other choices(renting a townhome we could easily afford in a better neighborhood for the school, versus buying in neighborhoods we didn't like in schools we didn't like but it's the house we could afford, buying used, low cost vehicles.. my car payments are less then $500 a month for both cars).

But I will tell you that the easiest thing to paying towards vacation was losing daycare costs. We got so used to paying for daycare that when it stopped that money easily went to things we wanted/needed (new furniture, vacation, more savings, 529s).

Finally, I don't pay off my student loans quickly (we just couldn't afford it unless we made about 4 times what we make now) BUT my interest rates are at like 3% or less.

We made the choice to do a deluxe resort this year. Since we can afford the increase in price and we want to "treat" ourselves while on vacation we did it. We are focusing on saving more money this year (by eating out less because we eat out a ton) and watching our food budget (which had gotten out of control). Part of this was just wanting to build more savings and part was to do a bigger vacation.

 

[DW2010]

I'm with you. Heck, I live 4 hours away and have only been ONCE in the 16+ years I've lived in Florida. AND I was 21! Dh, who was my boyfriend at the time, and I took a quick weekend trip around 6 years ago. We didn't stay at a DW resort or anything, and we only went to MK and Epcot. It was fun but more time would have been nice...lol. We're taking our DD in September to celebrate her 4th birthday, but we're only going for 3 nights this time and staying at a value resort. We're also really hoping for free dining! All in all, we're hoping to do the entire trip...accomodations, tickets (super $$$), food, gas, etc. for $1K-1200. That includes anything we buy and DD's BBB makeover, etc. It stills seems like a lot of money for a trip that's only 3 nights but we're looking forward to it. And maybe just one day we'll stay at a deluxe resort for 7-10 days .

 

[erin.w]

As others have said, DVC. We go twice a year now. Our resort stay is paid monthly, which makes it easier than saving the money needed to stay in a deluxe resort. We buy AP with the DVC discount and make it so we get three trips out of them. We fly Jetblue and always get rates between $140-$150 roundtrip for each of us. We have no kids. But are planning a Disney Wedding for spring 2011. The only regret I have is having to finance DVC, but for us it works, as it is a scheduled payment and my extra money goes towards paying for food/plane tickets rather than the room. And this way we are able to take my mom with us, and she is able to only have to pay for airfare and food there. It works for us.

 

[Planogirl]

We can't afford the Polynesian any more so you have my sympathy trying to pay the rates there. Flights from our area are also usually quite expensive so that makes it even more difficult.

We've resorted to renting a car and driving and spending at least part of the trip offsite. We also eat offsite much of the time and don't add the hopper/no expiration features to our passes. It still gets pricey but not as much as it could be!