Booking Diliemma

[nickynick]

I will be visting Disneyword in August 2017 for 10 nights.As of right now my quote with no discounts, park hopper tickets, and dinning plan is $9100. (When discounts are released in March, I hope I could get free dinning, like years past, bring it down to maybe $7300)
I reached out to a TA and was able to get room and tickets for $4330. ( I would have to buy 2 additional 1day children park tickets, bring total to close to $4500.)
A price difference of $2700.
So dilemma is, what would be more cost effective, to get the room and tickets for $4500 and budget $2700 for food and spend money for the trip. ( bringing the total back up to $7300). It's our kids first trip so we do plan on doing 5 character meals and other sit down meals. ( 2kids , 2 adults).
Thank you for your time and help.
I understand the discounts that Disney will release aren't gurenteed but, I wil do everything to get it.

 

[Paula Sedley-Burke]

Hi I personally would take the deal without dining. That is a lot of money on food for 4 for 10 days I think cheaper to buy. Plus what if you don't get free dining. With paying your own way I feel you have more options. Share food some days etc. That's just my view though. Some like the DDP and then not having to woery about it. I find it too much food for more than 2 / 3 nights.

 

[mrsR123]

Have you considered buying one AP so you can get room, food, and merchandise discounts?

 

[jmkjr72]

The only way to tell is to sit down with the menus and add up what the food is going to cost vrs what the dinning plan is going to cost

Last 2 trips my fiance and I saved closed to 300 bucks each with the ddp. now the down side is last trip my dad came with and he has had lots of health issues and with his cancer and other issues he didn't get his money's worth out of the plan for him. now our savings and the fact we didn't have any meals to pay OOP for be a use we enjoy plenty of 2 credit meals so our overall savings the last trip was onky 43 bucks compared to our first trip with ddp of 589 bucks. that is just counting meals we didn't add in the snack credits

 

[nickynick]

My wife and I are trying to figure that out now, looking at menus to see what it would add up too. Some of the character meals would eat up a good chunk of the budget for those days. But maybe we could make it on other days by eating at more reasonable places. Thanks for everybody help,

 

[_auroraborealis_]

I think it very possible to eat on $270 per day for 2/2.

 

[scrappinginontario]

Am I reading correctly that you want to do 5 character meals plus additional table service meals? If that is the case I believe it would be worth your while to purchase the DDP.

I quickly priced out a character meal such as Chef Mickey's and dinner and it would be just under $200. Other table service meals are a similar price.

For ourselves, I also enjoy the freedom the DDP offers of not looking at prices.

 

[focusondisney]

What about booking now with the travel agent while what you want is available. Then if free dining come out & the resort you want is available, you can always change to that. Gives you more time to plan your dining & add up meal prices. The agent can book the new promo for you or you can book it yourself & cancel the agent's deal.

 

[nickynick]

Thank you everybody for your time and help.

 

[DisneyWishes14]

I would book the discount and then see if any other promos are released. Might as well lock in something that will save you some money!.

You could try using this calculator to see what your dining might cost you if you pay OOP: http://www.distripplanner.com

We always pay out of pocket (2 adults and 1 child) and there is no way we would spend $2700 on food on a 10-day trip and that is with eating everywhere we would want to go including signatures.

 

[mi*vida*loca]

I would do the discounted package and pay OOP for food.

We did 10 nights with two adults, one Disney adult and one kid. We spent about 3K total for all OOP expenses including souvenirs, tips, dining, drinks, BBB, water, snacks, etc. We did 9 TS meals (two signature), 13 CS meals, a lot of water and snacks. I'm thinking 2500 was our OOP for food.