Driving versus Flying - A REAL Comparison

[mjbaby]

The intangibles in this analysis are going to be different for every family, rendering the whole argument (no matter what side one takes) anecdotal.

For my part, I didn't see the cost of a rental car figured in there in the hard figures- or did I miss it? - since our preferred hotel does not offer shuttle service and, unless I'm willing to pay for a taxi twice each day to our preferred attraction for that day (more often if we're going to be moving around) car-related expenses are a must for inclusion.

And then there's the argument that I LIKE the family time involved in driving. We meander, enjoying each other's company, reading aloud and singing along to the radio and so on. A picnic on each leg of the trip makes things fun and it's generally pleasant to be together. (In other words, as the movie Cars says, we don't drive to MAKE good time, we drive to HAVE a good time!)

But I did have to giggle at the OP since "consultant" sure is immersed in his or her business! From one consultant to another, it's a good thing to remember that the intangibles often sink even the most "iron clad" equation, if may mix a metaphor. There's the old "magic happens here" stuff that so often means that the results aren't quite the sum of their parts.

 

[consultant]

You seem very determined to *convince* everyone to fly vs. drive. Why does it matter so much to you? I'm curious...

For us, we bought our vehicle to drive it. Not have it sitting around, hoping it doesn't depreciate.

We plan our trips for a certain number of days; not driving wouldn't mean we'd add nights to our stay. And as long as our driving is done on weekends, then my husband isn't missing work.

Sometimes we fly to FL, sometimes we drive. It depends on which is cheaper. And yes, sometimes driving IS cheaper.

First you have to ask the question do you want to save money or do you want to drive your car. No one (at least me) is "sitting around, hoping it doesn't depreciate. " If your answer is YES I want to save money, then depreciation is a factor. If the answer is YES I want to save money but don't care about depreciation, then you really don't want to save money, or you just enjoy driving more than you do saving money - which is fine by me.

Everyone's situation is different. I'm not trying to convince anyone to do anything for their situation. They can make their own decisions obviously. I'm just curious about people's specific decision making process regard a major decision in any Disney trip - how do you get there and why do you choose to travel this way over that way, especially from a cost perspective.

 

[stingray65]

If you are staying longer then 2 weeks It ia a lot cheaper to drive, We stayed 5 weeks last year, The cost of renting a car for that long is really expensive, We need a car ,we do a lot of visiting while we are there. We either drive or take the amtrak auto train

 

[crisi]

I think you are making some great points.

We live in the Twin Cities - its two LONG days in the car one way, probably three reasonable days in the car. My husband and I both work, so at three days of driving, thats four extra vacation days x 2 or eight days of vacation. Vacation days are precious to us, but even if we were in a lose it situation, we can sell them back - and selling a day worth of vacation more than pays for my plane ticket. More importantly, both of us have problems taking more than a week off work regularly at a time - once in a while for a special trip, but we can't get away with it yearly. So, for us, the time is the really critical factor at play. Plus there is the frequent flyer factor - time flying means a free ticket in the future - lowering the overall vacation cost. Both of us fly occationally for work, so its work picking up most of the miles towards the ticket.

However, if we were schoolteachers with a few months off each summer, adding two weeks for a leisurely drive down in the car would be an opportunity - not a cost. And if we enjoyed camping, we would be able to camp it all the way down for a lot less than $50 a night. We wouldn't have the frequent flyer factor.

 

[runwad]

15 hours straight in a car? The term 'Road Warrior' comes to mind.

I'm curious how big is the family, how old are the kids, where are you leaving from and what year and model is your car? Just trying to get insight on where you came up with $39.

If you want to go the cheapest route, I don't think you can get any cheaper than driving straight thru with your own food. That's pretty determined.

I'm surprised you are the first to mention about having your own car. If we fly, we rent a car so we can explore the area which is an additional cost. But if Disney is the only purpose of the trip, then it really isn't necessary which is why I didn't include it. That sucks that you get air sick. Car definitely sounds like the best route in your case. Does that mean you won't ever leave the continent?

Kids are 11,8 & 6, we are leaving from NE OH...we have ...ready for this an 85 Chevy Conversion Van,(only used for travel) last trip we drove the van 10/05 when gas was $3/gallon, cost around 400 for gas...we get around 15/mpg (I think?) I just came up w/39 for air fare because that would equal the cost of gas, but now that gas has come down our total gas cost would too. And I guess the thing with having my own car is worrying about some kind of catastrophe (think 911/Katrina) that I might get stuck down there could I not fly back. As far as leaving the continent, well I have cousins in Italy that are always asking us to go there, and I'm sure some day I will and just suffer thru the flight. First trip to Disney we went stayed on site, drove spent $2600 for 7 days. Second time drove, got a condo on SkyAuction for 263 for the week, and spent around 700 for the whole 7 days. Now I'm on a quest to keep my vacations under 1k, it works for us, we have a blast and really is what fits into our budget. I don't think flying will ever work for us. As far as depreciation of the van, it isn't worth anything anyway.hahahaha

 

[mouseketeer_mom]

You need to remove the food costs from the equation for you. M3 personally, I can tell you I won't be bringing grocery store food in the car if I drive, at least not enough for 4-5 meals, and I will be eating at a place more expensive than a Denny's. My example is targeted at the most common scenario. When someone is on a nearly 2-day road trip, I'd contend it is safe to say they will be eating out for most if not all the trip. Not everyone, like yourself, but most will.

AHHHHHHH I see, so you're saying for YOU and the way YOU travel, it's cheaper to fly. Gotcha

For us, it's cheaper to drive, all costs considered. Oh, and that includes driving a motorhome from the DC area that gets about 8mpg

 

[mjbaby]

First you have to ask the question do you want to save money or do you want to drive your car. No one (at least me) is "sitting around, hoping it doesn't depreciate. " If your answer is YES I want to save money, then depreciation is a factor.

Isn't depreciation a factor only if one intends to sell the car at some point? My thought on the subject is that depreciation isn't worth the time it took me to type the word if one intends to drive one's car into the ground, rendering it completely inelligble for anything other than a few spare parts (go ahead, ask me about my circa-1990 and -1992 automobiles!).

 

[ICF]

We always stay in Condo's offsite, so flying (4 people @ $200ish a ticket) would also have the additional cost of renting a car for the week.

We can make the drive in about 15 hours (counting stops) and use rewards points to stay overnight in SC for free (hence breaking the trip up into two 7 - 8 hour drives). Flying would be nice, but like others have mentioned when you figure the time to drive to the airport, wait at least an hour there, perhaps have a layover someplace, getting the airport, getting your luggage and rent a car and such and getting to the condo could easily take 7-8 hours.

Driving isn't a big deal for us....we can stop at the ocean if we want on our way home or do other things we can't usually do. The time in the car can be a challenge (especially on the way home when we usually are ready for a break from each other), but I've run the #'s and in our case it is cheaper to drive. If we were a couple of 2 people, I'm sure I'd be flying!!

 

[BillSears]

Isn't depreciation a factor only if one intends to sell the car at some point? My thought on the subject is that depreciation isn't worth the time it took me to type the word if one intends to drive one's car into the ground, rendering it completely inelligble for anything other than a few spare parts (go ahead, ask me about my circa-1990 and -1992 automobiles!).

I do understand that point. So how about considering that you're taking 2,000 miles off of the life of they car. So for me a trip to WDW means I'd have to replace my car about 2 months earlier.

 

[Liberty Belle]

AHHHHHHH I see, so you're saying for YOU and the way YOU travel, it's cheaper to fly. Gotcha

For us, it's cheaper to drive, all costs considered. Oh, and that includes driving a motorhome from the DC area that gets about 8mpg

Yeah, not A REAL comparison for us, either. We bring food to eat for breakfast and lunch and then usually order a pizza at the motel we choose to stay at on the way (and we always stop at a rest area and get the book of coupons. We've stayed in nice places for pretty cheap.). And we're in Kentucky, so we could drive straight through, and have, but it makes for a looooong ride.

 

[Becky2005]

Ah...but then you don't have the hassle of the airline deciding to cancel your flight, change your flight time, etc... plus you can lug everything but the kitchen sink when driving, that is more difficult to do flying!

I just could NOT justify flying when we went, no matter how I sliced it, we could never find cheap airfaires for a family of 6 & it was over $1,000 for flying. I really don't think we spent over $1,000 driving.

Plus, we didn't have to worry about dealing with delays at the airport with 4 kids to corral, arriving several hours before the flight, etc...

If I have a choice, with all the new regulations that show up all the time, since I'm not well versed on them, I would be holding up the lines...I'll drive. I can leave when I want then & have more freedom -- want to stay a couple hours later no problem, want to leave a couple hours earlier, no problem.

 

[consultant]

Here's a couple scenarios at opposite ends of the spectrum, just for kicks. The first is still using DC as the departure city (850 mile drive) as an example. Let's say the airfare is a bit higher, $225, instead of $179. Still a family of 4.

Super budget - Drive straight through, bring your own food.

Gas - $106.5 X 2 (for both ways) = $213
Motel - $0
Meals - $20 (cost of food both ways)
Depreciation of car = $100X2 = $200 (you drive a car that is over 60,000 miles so depreciation is minor).
Opportunity Cost of Free Time spent driving = $0 - you enjoy the road trip, the whining kids don't bother you and you consider it a bonding experience (or don't value the free time spent doing other things than sitting in the car.)
Parking - $0

Total = $433, Savings is about $553 driving versus flying ($225X4 + 2x$43 = $986)

You do a 4-day/4-night stay with 3 days at the parks in a budget hotel and eat fast food or buy your own groceries the whole time. Say $600 for passes, $40/day for meals/snacks, $100/night for motel including taxes = $600, $100 for a few souvenirs = $600 + $160 + $400 + $100 = $1260 + $433 driving costs = $1,693. So in that case, the $553 you save represents a savings up 24% of the total cost of the trip had you flown.

Now let's do another scenario. Something closer to my actual scenario which is different than the what I tried to make as the 'average' scenario I used at the beginning.

I'm in Seattle so it is whether to drive or fly to Disneyland. I just booked tickets a week ago to LA for $218/person. Figure the same $43 each way for shuttle. The drive is 1162 miles os about 4-5 hours more than DC but I know a lot of people do it. We would drive our 2004 Honda Pilot which gets 24 MPG highway and has 30K miles on it and cost a little over $30K.

Gas - 2 x $121 = $242
Motel = 2 x $110 = $220
Meals (one extra meal than DC due to longer drive) - Breakfast $25, Lunch 2 x 25, Dinner, 2 x 60 (I tip well and we would like a decent sit down dinner for 4) = $195
Depreciation - I'd say the car will depreciate an extra $500 at least by putting the extra 2,200 miles on it

Lost Opportunity Cost/Increased Risk - I like spending a lot of time with my children, although in a pool, at the beach, or in the park. Not in a car. I have almost unlimited vacation time as I work for myself and can work from anywhere in the world - just need an Internet connection (so I can get a few hours of work in while the kids are asleep at night if I need to.) I like driving and am a good driver but know the statistics and prefer to be on a plane. The flight is about 2.5 hours. We get to the airport 1.5 hours ahead of time and the airport is 20 min from my house and 40 min from the park. So we are looking at a total of 8 hours travel time to fly versus about 18x2 = 36 hours of driving = 28 hours of extra time in a car instead of driving to and being at the airport or on a plane. If someone asked me you can either drive down I-5 for 28 hours for free, playing games in the car and singing songs part of the time, and listening to your children (and sometimes your wife) whine and bicker the other part of the time, or you can pay me $x and the drive will take 1 second and you can spend the saved time swimming and riding rides with your kids (or making money) I would say yes to $40/hr or more. So my lost cost of opportunity for me personally is at least $40/hr = $1,120.

Most of the hotels in the Disneyland area cost $10-$15/day for parking and I'm going to be there 4 days.
Parking - $40

So total costs in this scenario are:

Driving = $242+$220+$195+$500+1120+$40 = $2,317 (if you negate the cost of lost opportunity, which I feel is indeed a real cost, and say the 28 hours extra hours spent in the car was extremely enjoyable every minute of the drive, it would still be $1197 in this scenario - but hey, one person put the opportunity or inconvenience cost at $60,000, so my $1120 pales in comparison!

Flying = $218x4 + $43x2 = $958

So driving, TO ME IN MY CASE, is $1,358 more expensive than flying, $239 moe expensive even if I totally disregarded the cost of lost opportunity/inconvience of 28 hours in the car.)

So there you have it. One scenario, probably the best case scenario if you live more than 500 miles from the park, you save $467 or 21% of the total trip cost even if you are a penny pincher by driving instead of flying (for an average 4-person family). It would be more for a larger family, less for a 2 or 3-person family.

The other scenario, you lose $1,358, all things considered. So you see, the initial DC scenario I proposed is sort of an 'average' scenario. If you were driving a Porsche SUV with higher depreciation and ate in the most expensive restaurants and stayed at the most expensive hotel and only drove 6 hours a day instead of 9, then the driving would be even MORE expensive. But that would be an anomoly like driving a Prius 17 hours straight through without stopping at a restaurant.

The big point is, most everyone's particular situation is different but will fall somewhere inbetween these two scenarios (for people that live over 500 miles away from the park). Most of them will NOT be near these two opposite ends of the spectrum. In one case, $500+ is saved, in another $1,300+ is lost. So it is still my initial contention that for the average size 4-person family or smaller, most cases, NOT ALL, driving will not save a SIGNIFICANT amount of money, ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.

This is probably one of the biggest decisions involved in planning your Disney trip. I bring it up because I believe things are not always what they seem, face value. I don't expect a bunch of people to be posting here saying, gee you're right, we are a family of 3, or 4, or even 5 in some cases, and we made a dumb decision and drove. It isn't necessarily a bad decision. I do expect to see a lot of posts with individual scenarios that significantly differ from the one I started the thread with and it is very interesting to read about them and learn from them.

 

[consultant]

Anyone would be hard pressed no matter where they live to finding a scenario where getting a family of 6 to the park was considerably less than flying. As I said, the family size makes a big difference. Your average family visiting Disney isn't a family of 6.

Ah...but then you don't have the hassle of the airline deciding to cancel your flight, change your flight time, etc... plus you can lug everything but the kitchen sink when driving, that is more difficult to do flying!

I just could NOT justify flying when we went, no matter how I sliced it, we could never find cheap airfaires for a family of 6 & it was over $1,000 for flying. I really don't think we spent over $1,000 driving.

Plus, we didn't have to worry about dealing with delays at the airport with 4 kids to corral, arriving several hours before the flight, etc...

If I have a choice, with all the new regulations that show up all the time, since I'm not well versed on them, I would be holding up the lines...I'll drive. I can leave when I want then & have more freedom -- want to stay a couple hours later no problem, want to leave a couple hours earlier, no problem.

 

[consultant]

I do understand that point. So how about considering that you're taking 2,000 miles off of the life of they car. So for me a trip to WDW means I'd have to replace my car about 2 months earlier.

That's like saying mileage has no bearing on a cars value just because you keep changing cars. It is almost as if you are saying I'm going to eventually put the 2,000 miles on the car anyway whether I drive or fly to Disney. Explain your perpective to a car salesman and see what they say.

 

[consultant]

Good point. Hassles at the airport and with the airline are a big pain. About as big to me as driving in rush hour traffic or dealing with an accident on the road.

Ah...but then you don't have the hassle of the airline deciding to cancel your flight, change your flight time, etc... plus you can lug everything but the kitchen sink when driving, that is more difficult to do flying!

I just could NOT justify flying when we went, no matter how I sliced it, we could never find cheap airfaires for a family of 6 & it was over $1,000 for flying. I really don't think we spent over $1,000 driving.

Plus, we didn't have to worry about dealing with delays at the airport with 4 kids to corral, arriving several hours before the flight, etc...

If I have a choice, with all the new regulations that show up all the time, since I'm not well versed on them, I would be holding up the lines...I'll drive. I can leave when I want then & have more freedom -- want to stay a couple hours later no problem, want to leave a couple hours earlier, no problem.

 

[mouseketeer_mom]

plus you can lug everything but the kitchen sink when driving

But I do bring the kitchen sink! and the bathroom sink too

 

[Caitsmama]

In our case - on our upcoming trip to HHI SC, We tried to check airfare school vacation week - into atlanta and Jacksonville Fl,

Jacksonville Fl was the cheapest - on southwest air, for just about 400.00 (actually their price is about 440.00 pp) per person, and we are 3 people traveling! Now, that would be over 1200.00.. Plus, flying into Jacksonville, then paying about 300.00 for a week or so to rent a car, then drive 3 hrs North to SC...

We decided to take my moms car - a honda accord (4cyl) and just break it up to two days and drive.. There is no way we are going to spend anywhere near what it would cost us to fly.. even staying overnight in a hotel and food.

 

[Nascia]

I still don't see how the food is more expensive driving. If anything it should be less expensive as we would be eating outside the parks. If I flew and was there earlier, I'd be eating more expensive park or airport food. Same thing with the hotel. The hotel on the road is far less expensive than an onsite hotel.

BTW, we are a family of 5, myself 27, Dh 25, DS 10, DS5 and DS1. We have over a month each of vacation time every year and usually take some unpaid time off as well. Our trips average 2 weeks. DS1 has already made 2 trips to WDW, one to Cedar Point and one to Philly. They all travel very well and get along together like nowhere else when they are in the car. Maybe they feel like their in it together, so why not make the best of it, I dunno, but they show their best behavior on road trips. Like someone else mentioned, we love stopping at the beach and South of the Boarder for a few hours on our way home too.

DH and I are flying for our short getaway in March , as there are only 2 of us, and will miss the flexibility having a car provides. In the end it really comes down to family composition, preferences and location. The most cost effective option for my family of 5 may not be the same as my neighbors. It's all in the eye of the beholder.

 

[mjbaby]

I do understand that point. So how about considering that you're taking 2,000 miles off of the life of they car. So for me a trip to WDW means I'd have to replace my car about 2 months earlier.

So everything else being equal, then, if I had to replace my car two months earlier, I should be able to divide the cost of flying by two to get the value per month of the flights in terms of my cars' life. Let's say five RT flights at the best price I've seen from my area is about $1,000 then "saving" those two months of my car's life cost about $500 each.

Not nearly enough to make a persuasive case, in my opinion. But please understand that I'm not really arguing about this, and I'm enoying everyone's perspectives. It's more and more clear to me that the thead title promising a REAL comparison hasn't really delivered on that promise!

 

[mickeyfan2]

If you bought a $30K Ford Explorer, and 4 years later traded it in for $15K, that's a loss of $15K.

I would never buy a $30K car and trade it in 4 years later. Our 1998 vehicle is still running well (just got inspected and pass with no repairs) and took us to WDW last December.