How much do you spend on your vacation?

[circhead]

We drive - airfare out of NYC area airports adds to much for a family of 5. Also I'm not comfortable not having my car. When my kids were little I could have told you where every emergency room in Orlando, LBV and Kissimmee were.

Leave at 10 pm the kids fall asleep - switch drivers - go straight through. Our best time is just over 16 hours for 1130 miles. Our arrival day is always rest and enjoy the resort.

We have been so many times that we don't go to the parks everyday, we take advantage of the other things Disney has to offer. We buy the 10 day non-expiration park hopper with options and usually get 2 or even 3 trips out of them. I also try to spread out the cost by buying 1 or 2 passes at a time every couple of months.

I don't really count food as part of my vacation expense - I have to feed them wherever we are so I only count TS restaurants as part of my vacation expense. We bring a couple of cases of water - freeze them for use in the parks or wherever we are going. We go grocery shopping and have breakfast and lunch/snacks in the room. This is vacation no cooking! My kids are mostly grown but when they hit the teenage years not one of them moved before 4 in the afternoon. (Part vampire no sunlight ). We have had every toy Disney ever made we don't do souveniors anymore - except for the bath shop in DTD.

There is no really cheap way to do Disney but there are ways to stretch your vacation dollar. I always try to carry cash and not my credit cards when I'm down there and that makes me a little more conscious of what I'm spending. If I don't have my plastic on me and I really need something I can charge it to the room - but it makes me ask myself if I really need it or am I just urge shopping.

We love it and still try to get in 2 or 3 trips a year but now it's mostly friends we travel with.

 

[ADP]

We take approximately 3 trips per year. There are 3 of us; 2 adults and 1 child. We usually go 8 or 9 days during each trip.
Average airfare per trip = $500
Annual Pass renewals with DVC discount = $1000 per year or $333 per trip
Hotel accommodations = $0
Transportation = $0
Average Food cost (includes 20% TIW) $500
Souveniers and general discretionary spending budget = $500
Total cost per trip = $1833

 

[pickles]

We take approximately 3 trips per year. There are 3 of us; 2 adults and 1 child. We usually go 8 or 9 days during each trip.
Average airfare per trip = $500
Annual Pass renewals with DVC discount = $1000 per year or $333 per trip
Hotel accommodations = $0
Transportation = $0
Average Food cost (includes 20% TIW) $500
Souveniers and general discretionary spending budget = $500
Total cost per trip = $1833

y'all must starve...I dont think we could pull a 8-9 day trip off and only spend $500 to eat..just using the qsdp costs us $150 a day this trip and that is 5 of us

we are usually pretty modest with souvenirs tho $500 or less would easily do us there.

 

[dianeschlicht]

y'all must starve...I dont think we could pull a 8-9 day trip off and only spend $500 to eat..just using the qsdp costs us $150 a day this trip and that is 5 of us

we are usually pretty modest with souvenirs tho $500 or less would easily do us there.

Exactly, and that is why I don't think ANY of the dining plans are a savings. They are merely a convenience, and if you look at it as such, it's worth it, but for us it's not worth it. We do the TIW and DVC discounts and eat breakfasts and a few snacks from groceries in our room.

 

[HayGan]

Exactly, and that is why I don't think ANY of the dining plans are a savings. They are merely a convenience, and if you look at it as such, it's worth it, but for us it's not worth it. We do the TIW and DVC discounts and eat breakfasts and a few snacks from groceries in our room.

The dining plans used to provide some big savings but Disney caught on to that pretty quickly. I agree with you that they are now more of a convenience than an actual savings. I doubt that we will ever purchase a dining plan again.

 

[Tara]

I actually had printed out the application for the TIW card prior to the price increase, which makes it not such a good deal for us now. Anyway, I still have it & it says the blackout restrictions are: Easter, Mother's Day, 4th of July, Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve & Day and New Years Eve & Day.

Oh crap! I didn't realize when I booked my trip that 5/10 was Mother's Day and that's when I booked my CA Grill ressie for! (and I haven't looked at my trip plan since I realized that's Mother's Day)

Wonder if it's too late to switch...

 

[robinb]

We are a family of 3 (2 adults, 1 child) and we spend approximately $100 per day in restaurants/groceries/drinks/souvenirs in addition to airfare, rental car and park passes. Without a doubt, Disney is expensive.

* I see you're in Milwaukee. You may want to look into flying from ORD or MDW. We live over in Madison and often fly from MKE or Chicago when airfares at MSN are too high.
* You can also consider driving instead of flying. It takes 2 full days for us to drive to Orlando. We have driven 3 times. It's really not bad but I figure I lose 2 days of vacation by driving as my travel days are usually shot anyway.
* If you fly and rent a car, you can use ME instead. Use one of the online grocery services to deliver.
* Plan on breakfasts in the room and a couple of meals in the villas. Even if you book a studio you can use the gas grills near the pool and the microwave in the room for veggies/pasta/rice.

 

[katmittens]

We are a family of 4, all adults. We drive from Pa. and are always happy when the cost of gas goes down. We have paid from 225.00 to close to 500.00 dollars Tickets depend on which trip. We usually buy AP's and get two to three trips from them. We love to Minature golf and regular golf, so that could run 100.00 to 300.00. I usually limit it to no more than 300.00, so that determines what we do. Hotels on the road for 1 nite down and two nites home depends if I get free rooms. I use a credit card from Choice to get points and always stay in Choice hotels to get more points. Food is usually in our room for breakfast,sometimes we have 1 SD for breakfast or maybe a CS. and we do CS for lunch and SD for dinner. For 8 days 7 nights we spend about 1,300.00. So after extra spending about 400.00,(ice cream, drinks, items we buy, and snacks) the total is close to 4,000.00 or more depending on what money we have available. But if I had to pay for rooms it would be even more. Overall it is not too bad, and some trips we do try to cut back a little on spending.

Last Nov. DH and I went to Newport, RI for the weekend and we spent 800.00 which I still don't know how. If I didn't buy anything when I went away I could cut my costs, but only if I have to will I. We try to stay in a B&B when we go to New England. We love them, but the rooms are quite high.

So overall I don't think Disney is anymore expensive that any where else. My girlfriend just told me she got a price on a cruise for her and her husband and two young boys for $5,000.00 , without air fare. So everything is high.

 

[jco_direwolf]

* If you fly and rent a car, you can use ME instead. Use one of the online grocery services to deliver.

I see people suggesting DME as a way to save money. I have to say every time I've used it's cost more than it's saved.

I know people talk about walking off the plane and onto a DME bus which then immediately leaves and drops them off at there hotel first. THIS HAS NEVER HAPPENED TO ME. We've used the service since May 2005 multiple times, about once every 18month these days.

DME is charging you vacation time. If you take your cost of your vacation, and divide it by the number of hours you are on vacation, that is basically your "hourly rate." Ours is about ($1200/(4*24)) = $12.50 per hour or $6.25 per person-hour.

Now if you factor out the rental car, which I've gotten for less than $100 for the whole trip but which has averaged out to about $160 (about $40 per day, with gas.) That gets us down to $1040/4*24 = $10.83 /hr or $5.42/person-hour.

So the break even point is for us, would be at about 14 hours saved. Sooner once you start to include the savings you get by not buying as much soda/water/snacks ($2.50 for a bottle of Diet coke in the parks, same bottle at Publix is <$1) in the park and if you include being able to go from say DAKV to WL directly (Dinner at artist point, yum.)

My point is you have to figure out where it makes sense to use a less expensive option maybe costing you more. We use to rent off airport, but that costs us more in time than I was willing to pay. Now we use National or Avis because those are the two that are in the airport I get good discounts with.

johno

 

[photobob]

Not as much this year since we are going to Vero. We drive so no airfare. We take lots of groceries and usually eat out 1 meal per day, usually a TS lunch. Bfast usually consists of a snack in room and dinner a sandwich or quick meal in room or CS.

Tickets and food are the main cost for us. We don't buy a lot of souvenirs, a few not much. We got three trips out of our last AP's, so for the $1100 or so we got about 14 park days of use. I'll try to keep this routine going where we can get as many trips as possible within the 1 year AP cycle.

I think the biggest variable to the cost of a trips is how much you spend on dining. For many of us dining experiences are a very big part of our WDW vacation, and that is a big expense. However if I want to take a trip on the cheap I don't mind scaling back on the bigger ticket meals. I'd much rather have a lower cost trip than not go!

 

[bookwormde]

Above and beyond accommodations we spend about $575 per person (typically 4 of us 2 adult 2 children) for a 10-12 day stay. So total of $2300

We fly out of PHL ($140 on SW), get APs (both WDW and Seaworld) for 2 visits within 12 months, rent a car for 1 week buy groceries and eat mostly in the Villa, except for 2 TS and some park snacks, and keep the souvenir shopping under control.

We can cut another $100PP of that if we drive down

Once both the boys are 9+ it will go up.

Bookwormde

 

[Anal Annie]

I see people suggesting DME as a way to save money. I have to say every time I've used it's cost more than it's saved.

I know people talk about walking off the plane and onto a DME bus which then immediately leaves and drops them off at there hotel first. THIS HAS NEVER HAPPENED TO ME. We've used the service since May 2005 multiple times, about once every 18month these days.

DME is charging you vacation time. If you take your cost of your vacation, and divide it by the number of hours you are on vacation, that is basically your "hourly rate." Ours is about ($1200/(4*24)) = $12.50 per hour or $6.25 per person-hour.

Now if you factor out the rental car, which I've gotten for less than $100 for the whole trip but which has averaged out to about $160 (about $40 per day, with gas.) That gets us down to $1040/4*24 = $10.83 /hr or $5.42/person-hour.

So the break even point is for us, would be at about 14 hours saved. Sooner once you start to include the savings you get by not buying as much soda/water/snacks ($2.50 for a bottle of Diet coke in the parks, same bottle at Publix is <$1) in the park and if you include being able to go from say DAKV to WL directly (Dinner at artist point, yum.)

My point is you have to figure out where it makes sense to use a less expensive option maybe costing you more. We use to rent off airport, but that costs us more in time than I was willing to pay. Now we use National or Avis because those are the two that are in the airport I get good discounts with.

johno

That is some crazy math ya got going on there!!

We almost always use DME and it takes us an average of 1.5 - 2 hours to get to our resort for check-in. Our execption to this was last summer where we hired a car service to pick us up so we could have a grocery stop. We also were going on a DCL so we used them from WDW to the port too. Anyway, we waited AT LEAST 50 min. in baggage claim for our luggage. I had faxed an order in to Albertson's the day before so our grocery order was READY and WAITING for us in a walk-in frig....but it still took us the same amount of time to get to our resort for check-in. I found that it saved us nothing (I think that "leg" of the car service was about $55 + tip). We only do breakfast in our room...the grocery stop was primarily for beer, water & liquor with some cream cheese for good measure! I'll bet we only spent about $40 or so there. I have since discovered thru another thread that we can get a case of water delivered to the resort from Costco for $6.97. I think we will try We Go Shop or Garden Grocer next time... Anyway, there was absolutely no time savings for us over using DME. None. So your math does not apply to us.

Just BTW - the car rental prices are WAY WAY up for this year. I've been scouring the transportation boards for codes etc. I do not think you can find a car rental for a week for $100 these days. If we rent a "standard" or "midsize" car for 10 days this summer the best rate I've found is about $400. We really only NEED a car for the 3 days that we go to Vero at the end of our trip so I think that's what we will do...but even THAT is looking like it's going to run $200 for the 3 days!!!! I believe the car rental "deals" are not to be found any more. The rental car agencies have been hit with the bad economy too and they are apparently also not getting their "deals" from the car manufacturers like they used to since they're in such bad shape. It's turned into a giant snowball that started with the Big 3 automakers...

 

[christa112]

I just did a rough estimate of what is going to cost with park tickets, DDP (10 yr old now considered an adult ), airfare, Sea World tickets.

For a grand total of $4570 (before tax )

I did do some quick math paying OOP for meals the difference is about $92, just for TS meals. I hadn't started factoring in CS meals, I would just take way too long.

Anyone know if I can purchase DDP just 4 of us and pay OPP for my oldest (10), he is not going to eat an adult size portion of food.

 

[patsal]

Family of four we drive if I don't find airfare I am willing to pay. The past two years airfare has been pretty inexpensive: at or less than $800.
Next we decide on a car or no car--then I hunt down prices and keep looking right up until the night before. Usually I take ME and then pick up a car a day or two after we arrive and return the car a day or two before we leave. I like to have one, as I like to do my own grocery shopping, some dining offsite and visit places other than WDW. Never more than $300.
A WDW PAP gives me greatest flexibility and allows for two to five trips in that year. I do not renew, them, I buy an outright new one the next year again planning my vacations around them. I save my Disney Visa rewards for this and usually pay for two and get two free. So $1000 there OOP divided by the number of trips we take minimum 2 so $500 for PAPs or 5 trips $200 for PAP's
Groceries are about the same as home--the cost of living is pretty close between Orlando and Buffalo. The big exception here is milk--FL is much more expensive. $85-$100 per week (dont' get if on DDP)
I decide how we are going to tour, then decide if we want a dining plan or not--more often it is not.
So best case $1500 and worse case $4340 for two weeks each summer.

 

[dianeschlicht]

I just did a rough estimate of what is going to cost with park tickets, DDP (10 yr old now considered an adult ), airfare, Sea World tickets.

For a grand total of $4570 (before tax )

I did do some quick math paying OOP for meals the difference is about $92, just for TS meals. I hadn't started factoring in CS meals, I would just take way too long.

Anyone know if I can purchase DDP just 4 of us and pay OPP for my oldest (10), he is not going to eat an adult size portion of food.

No, all people on the reservation must be on the dining plan. We tracked what we paid for all of our TS and CS meals on two trips and compared it to the DDP price. We even put in the 18% gratuity added on both with TIW and DDP. We came out more than $200 less for just the two of us paying OOP with the TIW discount!!! That's how I KNOW the DDP doesn't really save us any money, but actually costs us more.

 

[robinb]

Anyone know if I can purchase DDP just 4 of us and pay OPP for my oldest (10), he is not going to eat an adult size portion of food.

We are in the same boat . My DD turns 10 before our next trip but there is NO WAY she will eat adult food at WDW. She's a fussy vegetarian who would not touch most of the adult vegetarian meals at WDW with a 10-foot pole. The difference in park passes is fairly minimal from 9 to 10 but there is no reason for us to pay $40 per day for her on the DDP when she's still going to eat kid's meals! Thank goodness for the TiW card.

 

[MARY-IN-OH]

I think if you really have to budget, you gotta make the park tickets work for you. Either by getting in two or more trips in a one year period, or maybe trying the 10 day non expiring ticket, with water park/disney quest on them. "Year One" on an expiring ticket will cost a "bunch", but the next 2-3 years won't cost ya "nuthin"!

Then, when your theme park days start running out, you have a couple of trips with water park plus still on them, and just go to Universal or Seaworld/Discovery Cove or even do the extra things like mini golf etc. There is soooo much to do at Disney without being in the parks every day!

As a family grows, you may find that your family members are up for different & new things and you won't have to buy park passes every single year. That's why I think DVC is very special. You can go down and stay in your DVC without going to any parks (or just one or two) and still have a wonderful and relaxing vacation, making meals together in the villa to save costs and hangin out at the pool! And we all know how much our kids love the pools!
JMHO
-mary

 

[casper]

I'm single and go twice a year. Airline tickets cost about $230 each time. After that, my only expense is food and suvs. I eat "fancy" two or three of my 8 nights there. The rest is what I fix (breakfast) and over the counter service. I budget $100/month which translates to $1,300 a year which, so far, has been enough.

Sometimes being single isn't so bad.

 

[hellerjw]

My kids are still young and we have spent several hours on more than one occasion just hanging out on various Disney transportation. My kids used to be obsessed with the monorail and we would ride that thing 5 or 6 times continuously around the MK loop just so they could get their fix. Cheap entertainment for them and a time for mom and dad to rest our feet. Sometimes even the simplest things are the most memorable. Our kids often talk about the time we got to sit in the front of the monorail and they got to "drive" but they can't remember which rides they rode last year (a consequence of our going so often I guess).

Same can be said for the various resort boats going to/from various parks. On a nice day with low crowds it can be very enjoyable just riding the boats around without getting off for a hour or so. The kids consider it a ride like any other attraction and we get to enjoy the slower pace they provide.

Kind of reminds me of the days when our kids would rather play with the box a gift came in more than the gift itself. There are a lot of things to do at WDW that don't require you entering a park.

 

[tink'smom2B]

I love the monorail ride! My kids were totally disappointed that they couldn't ride it the last trip. My Dh didn't see any reason to go out of his way to get on it, but that's something that my girls really missed! Lots of great ideas on this thread! Thanks to all!!