Cost of Vacation

[marie1203]

Well it really depends on the vacation we want. We've spend over $5000 in a week for just the 2 of us. We are just coming back from a trip. 5 adults, stayed at ft. Wilderness in a cabin with military discount for 7 nights. Had 4 day hoppers with fun option (military too). As well as 2days at universal $123 pp. We ate a sit down dinner everyday in the parks. Had a few drinks, desserts and appetizers. Alll for less than $4500 for 8 days.

 

[Cin]

Our trip is around $1500 per person that includes everything from airfare to food and drinks. That is for a value or moderate resort though. I won't pay for deluxe. Now if someone else wants to pay, I'd stay....just sayin'.

 

[Eeyore98]

We are 2 adults, always drive, always eat on-site without DDP and spend 6 days in the parks or waterparks, traveling on the weekends.

We have spent as little as $2k when staying off-site, and as much as $4k when staying in a moderate. That includes all costs, including gas to get there, hotels on the way if we stop (it's 18 hours so sometimes we stop and sometimes we drive on through) and kennel costs for the dog if we kennel her, or hotel pet fees if she tags along.

We could have reduced the cost even more on the $2k trip if we'd wanted. We had a kitchen in our (extended stay) hotel but didn't really use it, and we spent more on souvenirs on the $2k trip than the $4k trip.

 

[torinsmom]

What are YES tickets?

They're tickets through Disney's Youth Education dept. They used to only do homeschool or school groups, but certain times of year they do individual enrollment now. Your child(ren) go to a class one morning behind the scenes and those in your group get tickets at about a 40% discount. They offer the classes for individuals in summer, early fall and Jan/Feb. Registration will open for summer classes in the next few weeks. There is a whole thread about the program on the budget board.

 

[Alexander]

That is a tough question...Over the course of a year we spend approximately:

Park Passes $2,000 (4 Premium Annual Passes)
Flights $3,500 (R/T Flights for 4--3 trips)
Food $2,000 (Over three trips)
Souvies $500 (Over three trips)
Rental Car $700 (For three weeks)
Resort.....This is where it gets tricky because we are DVC members and our resort is essential free, well at least prepaid, so I really have no way to figure it. Based on dues alone, $1500 for the year.

Divide all of that by our three annual trips: $3,400/trip

 

[GOOFY4DONALD]

We always travel during value season and use some sort of discount (like free dining or % off room) and we still spend 6K to 6500. We are a family of 5...airfare runs 500 to 600pp...we stay at the cabins (although we tried Poly last time...loved it but not enough space) plus dining plan (for convenience) and park hoppers.

 

[Alexander]

We always travel during value season and use some sort of discount (like free dining or % off room) and we still spend 6K to 6500. We are a family of 5...airfare runs 500 to 600pp...we stay at the cabins (although we tried Poly last time...loved it but not enough space) plus dining plan (for convenience) and park hoppers.

Holy Cow! In value season? OUCH! That is half your budget!

 

[branv]

ITA: This really is so variable! Technically, for us, a "week at Disney" is usually 3-4 nights at Disney followed by a 4-night Disney cruise. And DCL isn't like WDW, where rather good discounts come out. And, of course, sometimes we've gotten just an okay discount, or, like last time, we got the CR for $237/night and 5-day PH tickets for $265/ea...all through a group booking rate one of the big Disney-centered TA's were offering (b/c D23 was going on at that time).

We also probably spend a lot more than other people for a pet sitter. Plus we always rent a car. We also never do the dining plan. But then again, it's just two adults so less cost there.

I'd say our trips have been anywhere from $2000-$6000 for two adults.

Our next trip is in February -- flying from Austin. We are going for 9 days, staying at Beach Club for 5 nights, and WL for 3 nights using the Feb discount. We will have two 8-day PH, are going to a private party one night at WWoHP, and we are paying to flying my mom to our house so she can house/pet sit for us, as well as give her about $200 for food/fun.

Not including food, total out of cost for us will be $1690.

Seriously!

DH is going to WDW for a conference for work His work is paying for his airfare, rental car, his food and hotel except for 2 nights at the WL. Pretty sweet...what can I say, I had to brag on that to SOMEONE!

Of course, thanks to a huge credit card cash reward that arrives at the beginning of February (thanks to reimbursed business expenses), a generous cash xmas gift from DH's dad, and a $100 oil royalty we get once a year, it's really only costing us $400/OOSavings. Suhweet.

 

[diznee25]

My answer was based on our last trip:

Dec. 2010 2 adults 5 night/6 days

AKL standard room/free dining
5 day Park tickets w/hopper
food/drinks (that wasn't covered under free dining)
Pet boarding for 2 dogs
gas/hotel (for driving out and back home)
souvenirs
MVMCP tickets

So total we hit $2900 for 2 adults.

Our other trips to WDW were never that high....usually we hit close to $2000 for everything....just depends on food and hotel.

BTW, we always stay on-site!

diznee25

 

[kchughes]

Ours are close to the 4000-4200 mark. That includes 8 nights at a moderate, deluxe dining (I know, overkill, but my DH loves it and I love having all of our expenses paid before we go), 7-8 day PH, tips for meals and mousekeeping, gas, one night off property on our way down, dog boarding, meals and snacks enroute and souveniers. Also includes a mani/pedi pretrip for me and T's, a journal and miscellaneous goodies purchased before our trip that are just for our Disney trips (new journal for DS, new DS game for the car). Basically, every possible expense related to the trip. We also always go during September, so value season.

 

[GOOFY4DONALD]

Holy Cow! In value season? OUCH! That is half your budget!

We don't have value season as far as airfare just varying degrees of increases. Last trip we stayed at The Poly with the dining plan and park hopper and our airfare was 200 more than our package. Granted we paid about 675pp. This is why we cant go more than every few years. I wish there was a better way to get there from here. There are tons of families that I know that would love to spend thousands at WDW if it didn't cost so much to get there.

 

[eliza61]

I'm probably around the high 3K to low 4K for my family of 4. I don't budget vacation. I'm a frugal gal all year so I can travel luxury style. A few years ago I had to fly oversees in coach and I said never again in life.

 

[pigletto]

We're looking at about 4000 for DDP, Rented points for a studio at AKL, 7 day tickets and flights. I can get that quite a bit lower by going when Y.E.S. tickets are offered, driving, and not doing the dining plan. However, this time we had 9 days in May to work with so no Y.E.S tickets and more points for the room.

Ironically, it cost me about the same as I would have paid with the current room only discount for POR. So I'm happy with that.

 

[Karenj2]

I voted for $2k-$4k, because that's the average of what the trip was priced at, however that's not usually what we end up paying...

For example:
Our current trip (2a, 1c) for 8 days, with free dining at the Pop, is priced at about $2050, but we've got $1500 in Disney GCs (an award at DH's work), and $700+ in DRDs, so other than the original $200 deposit on the package, the Disney portion was free! Unfortunately, the flights cost us about $720, and we'll probably rent a stroller, so we'll be spending OOP about $1k.

 

[Colleen27]

It depends on the trip. Ours have ranged from $2000 to $10,000, with a normal trip falling somewhere around $6000. We don't do frugal when we travel (I'll watch for codes and good airfare, but I'm not cooking or staying offsite to save a buck), so that's including eating in the parks and a lot of other extras but not much shopping because we're just not into "stuff".

 

[debrapagliasotti]

We went a few years ago as a family of 4. Stayed at CBR in a Lakeview room. We stayed 5nts, had 4 day park hoppers, tickets to La Noubla, payed OOP for meals. Including airfare the trip cost around $4500.

We are going in Oct for 3nts, staying at CR in a TPV room. We have the regular dining plan and 2 day park tickets. Kids will be 10, 9, 3 & 2 (no cost for the 2 year old) and then DH & I. Pre-airfare cost $3299 (flying SW). Will also purchase MNSSHP tickets and will do F&W booths. Airfare prob $2500-ish.
So the total will prob be around $6000.

We are also going in Dec for 7nts, staying at BW in a Dlx CL room. Kids will be 11, 9 (but we upped DD age to 10 so she could have better dining choices),
4 and 3 at that time. We have DxDP and 6 day tickets, also purchased the insurance for that trip. Pre-airfare cost $11385. Again, airfare prob $2500-ish (flying SW). We are also purchasing a Christmas tree from Disney florist(cant remember the exact cost for that). Total for that trip will be around $14300.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

We always fly, and that expense varies. If we are buying/renewing APs it's $1200. We own DVC so our room doesn't cost us anything, unless we are out of points. I would guess our 9 night trip in June will be about $4500, buying APs but using points for our villa.

5 nights in October will be about $2500. No ticket cost because we'll have the APs, but paying cash for our room.

If we had to pay for the room and the tickets every time I have no clue how much it would be.

 

[stich1fan]

We are dvc members, so we spend about:

$780 for dining plan
$200 for hotel on the way down to fl
$200 in gas (we drive)

Oh we are annual pass holders so not sure how that falls into place. We are getting 4 trips this time out of our annual pass so that is amazing. I think they are like $1400 for the year, so maybe add $350 per trip?


I guess that's it other then what we buy but we always have tons of Disney dollars for stuff we want.

Not sure what else comes up?

 

[Pigeon]

Dh is a teacher, so we are limited to school vacation weeks when WDW typically has no deals. Now, I've seen that they actually tack on an extra fee at many of the restaurants during these periods, which makes me think we won't be going again.

Airfare is also extremely expensive. For us, we can't do it for under $5K, closer to 6, when all is said and done. And that's eating very few table service meals, using some credit card points to defray some costs, and staying at moderates.

 

[budafam]

Okay, if you don't mind my asking, HOW did you get 4 flights for free? Did I miss an amazing promotion? I also signed up for the SW visa and am supposed to get 25K points for it, but that will only cover one flight of ours (around $400). Is there a tip or trick or something you used to get the cost so low? Because that is awesome.

I got the 50,000 free points promotion when I signed up. We booked the cheapest flights we could find ($98 each way) so it ended up being just less than 50,000 points. We had a bit of a credit from our last flight and used that on the last one to bring the fees down a bit.