Disney for a week for under 2000 are we crazy?

[brymolmom]

Could you do something for give a day/get a day to get those ticket prices down (get 1st day free then upgrade to # of days you want)? That would make this budget a lot easier and save you from spending that whole $400 cushion too.

I think $70 per day for your family is doable...If you go to the grocery store on day #1 and spend, I would guess around $100 - $125 for the week - you can get all your breakfast, lunches and even a couple dinners for that. Then at the parks - bring one meal with you in soft-sided cooler also bring in ALL your snacks, 'sides' for meals and ALL your drinks. Have sandwiches for one of your meals and then split one CS dinner - get maybe 1 adult and 3 kid meals to split - since you have extra sides and drinks in your cooler - easy to make it go farther. This at most C/S places will cost about $35 or so. If the sandwiches were paid for out of your $100 grocery budget on day 1 - you still have enough in the budget to get Mickey ice cream bars for a snack and/or a souvenier!

Keep in mind - ICE WATER! For snack time, etc - be sure to ask for water - for free!

Get the phone number for a takeout place (pizza, chinese, etc) near where you're staying and call as you're leaving the park. You can get dinners a couple of nights for $25 total for the family - if you do this a couple of nights - you will likely have enough in your budget to 'splurge' on a sit-down place (outside the parks - but maybe inside too if you want to share and are careful with budget).

 

[Ka' eo]

Just checking the budget, I was a little confused. Budget is $2000.00

Airfare, hotel, car $1200
Park Tickets $ 688

so thats already 1888, so $112 leftover for food? Or if you are planning on $70 a day for 6 days then you are planning on using your buffer (plus a little). If you are comfortable using your buffer yes its doable especially if you hit the dollar store at home and buy some gifts so you dont have to while you are there. You said you really don't want to use your buffer, $112 is all you have left with out it, you are going to have to use some of your buffer to eat for 6 days.

Britfish, she expanded later in the thread. Their budget is $70 a day. YOU CAN TOTALLY DO THIS. We have easily with 3 little kids.

 

[punkin]

I am planning a last minute cheap vacation right now during the kids' spring break (most expensive time) for hotels. I am planning on doing it by "self catering" ie, renting a condo with a kitchen and cooking most things myself. We will not have ANY breakfasts out. We will take sandwiches into the parks most days (we will be buying snacks, but these will be limited unless my kids want to spend their own money). I am planning on three dinners out during the week (Boma, Flying Fish, Akershus) and 1 lunch at Kona. these are expensive and if I was on an even tighter budget, I would definitely be able to do without them.

I have $1000 budgeted for hotels and gas driving there and back. I have leftover tickets. Everything else has to fit into my usual at home grocery and dining out budget. We'll see if I can do it. We are planning 8 nights and have 5 days left on our park tickets. The rest of the days we will hit the beach and laze at the hotel pool.

 

[britfish]

Britfish, she expanded later in the thread. Their budget is $70 a day. YOU CAN TOTALLY DO THIS. We have easily with 3 little kids.

oops, thats what I get for not reading all the way through! If you are comfortable using your $70 a day, definitely you could all eat on $70 a day!

 

[Ka' eo]

I am planning a last minute cheap vacation right now during the kids' spring break (most expensive time) for hotels. I am planning on doing it by "self catering" ie, renting a condo with a kitchen and cooking most things myself. We will not have ANY breakfasts out. We will take sandwiches into the parks most days (we will be buying snacks, but these will be limited unless my kids want to spend their own money). I am planning on three dinners out during the week (Boma, Flying Fish, Akershus) and 1 lunch at Kona. these are expensive and if I was on an even tighter budget, I would definitely be able to do without them.

I have $1000 budgeted for hotels and gas driving there and back. I have leftover tickets. Everything else has to fit into my usual at home grocery and dining out budget. We'll see if I can do it. We are planning 8 nights and have 5 days left on our park tickets. The rest of the days we will hit the beach and laze at the hotel pool.

We're doing the same thing. Punkin, we got the Sheraton Safari for $75 a night. We wanted a 2 room suite, or could have gone cheaper. We have 5 of us. We have to fly, and spent $1,000 on airfare. But our total is only $1,600 because we have $500 Disney dollars earned, old tickets and got a rental car for $146. You'll have no problem. Oh yeah, I can add our grocery budget. (it used to be $200 a week, but we are shooting for $100 a week in our new and improved coupon/budget plan)

Britfish, I never read closely enough and have to go edit. My mind is spastic.

 

[punkin]

We're doing the same thing. Punkin, we got the Sheraton Safari for $75 a night. We wanted a 2 room suite, or could have gone cheaper. We have 5 of us. We have to fly, and spent $1,000 on airfare. But our total is only $1,600 because we have $500 Disney dollars earned, old tickets and got a rental car for $146. You'll have no problem. Oh yeah, I can add our grocery budget. (it used to be $200 a week, but we are shooting for $100 a week in our new and improved coupon/budget plan)

Britfish, I never read closely enough and have to go edit. My mind is spastic.

I will comment that my budget at home is a lot higher than what we eat on vacation. My kids don't usually get to eat as much junk food as they want, and I would never serve a meal of canned chef-boy-r-d ravioli at home, but I will on vacation.

 

[apnep]

yes it is 70 a day for meals with 112 for incidentals like trinkets although if we do the 70 then it is only 60 for trinkets. Staying on site even at Pop was 2600

Did I read that you were going for 9 days? Did you mention when you are going? I booked a 5 night stay at POR, with MYW tix for 5 nights and got the $500 gift card. Have you thought about trying to do something like that to pay for your food and souveniers?

Ang

And BTW, when we've gone in previous years, we have also taken in PB&J and snacks for kids. I agree with the PPs that $70/day is totally doable especially if your kids are small. Have fun!

 

[momofsamandeden]

We are going for 7 days although only six in park with a possible morning on day seven before we fly out. I was going to stay on site but just could not do 2600 without air for POP. So I went on Priceline and got Regal Sun. We will see how that goes there as it seems to either be good or bad for people.
Another sandwich idea that just occurred to me when OP was talking sandwiches is that Super Walmart has grinders that feed our entire family for 5 dollars so I guess I can even pick one of those up in the morning and keep it in the cooler. I am going to looking into the give a day offer but not sure if we can give and get our tickets by May 11.
I just have to laugh about how dh said we could not go unless I kept the basics under 1800 haha
What worries me is this is now the only way he will want to do disney.
Also we looked into condos etc but decided to stay close to dtd in case we could not budget the $14 to park a day. It will not be as convenient but we could walk and take the Disney buses to the park to save a little.

 

[jemgumby]

70 dollars a day is completely doable!!! Think about this if you eat a large pizza for lunch/dinner and when we did that is came to 20 bucks from Spoodle's Pizza window then that would leave 50 bucks for a nice sit down dinner at Kona Cafe or Grand Floridian Cafe....The Plaza something like that.....Definitely doable for sure!!!!