Large Family Vacation Suggestions

[MouseDad85]

Long version: My wife and I will be married 10 years in 2018. Our plan is to persuade my wife's large immediate family and my parents to go with us for a week to Disney World in Orlando. The problem is that we usually go on a family vacation each year and have discovered that $1500 is about average for what each family can do for family vacation purposes. So our plan is to lure them in by paying for a room (on property) so that they will come with us. This is where I am running into issues as the costs are spiraling out of control.

Here comes the math problem:
We have 24 people, including ourselves and our children, that we are trying to get down there. The timing is specific (June 23rd check-in through June 30th check-out). We would need 6 rooms at Art of Animation (4 Family and 2 Studio) which appears to run currently at about 14k for a week. We could consolidate down to 4 rooms (3 Two-BR and a One-BR or 4 Two-BR) or 3 rooms (2 Three-BR, and a Two-BR) I don't even want to imagine what Two and Three BRs would run for a week at this point.

My main suggestion for cutting cost is to only front 4 nights (Saturday through Wednesday) for everyone save myself and my wife and kids (we'd stay the full week) which would cut us down to about $8k-$9k but I'm still reaching for a solution so my wife can enjoy a full week with her family.

tl;dr version: I'm trying to put up 24 people on property without taking a second mortgage. We need between 4-6 rooms (possibly as low as 3 rooms) to accommodate everyone.

Just a few questions on my mind:
What are some suggestions for getting discounts on rooms?
Is June 23 - June 30 likely to see the 30% or free dining plan?
Should I reach out to a travel planner?
Or, should we just give up our dream of staying on property for this trip?

Finally, I want to thank you in advance if you've made it through my semi-coherent ramblings above. It's been a long day for me today and this has been on my mind for most of it, and so I'm not certain if it is going to come out the way I think I wrote it.

 

[Spunky946]

My first question is do you need the extra space the suites offer? How many people per party might help answer that question.

Does that include tickets and dining plan? There has been a room discount for those dates the past couple of years, but you won't get 30% off at Aoa.

 

[MouseDad85]

More space would be nice, but IMO a room is just a place to sleep during the night. It would be nice to have the extra space, but the issue is privacy. No, those prices are just the rooms. 4 Rooms for 7 nights @ $450 and 2 Rooms for 7 nights @ $200 come to about 14k. Prices from MouseSavers.com for 2015 year (so it's bound to be more by 2018)

Out of 24 people there are 6 groups. Me and my family (4). My parents (2). Her Mom (1). Her Dad and his wife (2). Her sister (3, likely 4 by 2018). Her step-sister (4). and her Brother (6). Now. The Brother and Sister might have no issue staying together (but will need at least 2 separate bedrooms) the stepmom can stay with us, the brother, or the sister only. My parents can stay with us (2 bedrooms) So the minimum # of separate private bedrooms is going to be at least 7, probably 8 since her brothers' kids are older and would likely need to separate the boy from girls or the teenager from the younger kids.

* And have a great trip!

 

[tabrizia]

Can you do rooms instead of suites? It will save a bit and does it have to be AoA? If you do rooms instead of the suites you will save some since the suites are more then double the cost of 2 rooms (we looked into it for us since we have 5, but 2 rooms was cheaper then a suite).

Also despite the fact I love staying on property, in this case with that many people, off property is likely going to be a lot cheaper and give you a lot more room.

 

[mcjaco]

Have you looked into just renting a house? Maybe the cheaper alternative.

I used to go with a large group 20+ and we'd rent a house, and two 15 seat passenger vans for a week.

 

[MouseDad85]

Can you do rooms instead of suites? It will save a bit and does it have to be AoA? If you do rooms instead of the suites you will save some since the suites are more then double the cost of 2 rooms (we looked into it for us since we have 5, but 2 rooms was cheaper then a suite).

Also despite the fact I love staying on property, in this case with that many people, off property is likely going to be a lot cheaper and give you a lot more room.

Well, we could do rooms, but again we are stuck with the privacy issue which means we would need 7 rooms for each group, and I don't think the group of 6 would be able to stay in a room and would likely need 2 rooms (up to 8) And the age of the children would probably prevent them from having their own room away from their parents anyways. So, using the AoA model, it's ~$200 per night per room x 8 ~1600 per night whereas 4 Suites would be ~$450 per night = ~$1800 per night. Which is $1400 over the course of the week, but more comfortable. And we would have booked an entire room for a single person with the 8 room model.

And as much as we want to stay on property, I have a feeling we will end up looking offsite.

Thank you.

 

[MouseDad85]

Have you looked into just renting a house? Maybe the cheaper alternative.

I used to go with a large group 20+ and we'd rent a house, and two 15 seat passenger vans for a week.

We already do this when going to Nagshead, but didn't realize there were house options in Orlando like this. I've google searched it a number of times but never found anything previously. Time to hunt.

 

[amylevan]

Out of 24 people there are 6 groups. Me and my family (4). My parents (2). Her Mom (1). Her Dad and his wife (2). Her sister (3, likely 4 by 2018). Her step-sister (4). and her Brother (6). Now. The Brother and Sister might have no issue staying together (but will need at least 2 separate bedrooms) the stepmom can stay with us, the brother, or the sister only. My parents can stay with us (2 bedrooms) So the minimum # of separate private bedrooms is going to be at least 7, probably 8 since her brothers' kids are older and would likely need to separate the boy from girls or the teenager from the younger kids.

If you did regular rooms, I count:
your family (4) = 1 room
your parents (2) = 1 room
her dad & stepmom (2) = 1 room (could 2 of her brother's kids go here as well?)
her sister (3 or 4) = 1 room, but couldn't her mom go here as well? even if family of 4 by then, it would still be a baby
her brother (6) = 1 room if 2 kids could go with her dad & stepmom

So if you did regular hotel rooms, could you get away with 5 rooms this way?

We love Fort Wilderness and the cabins sleep 6. Granted, it would be tight with all those people, but since you have outside (deck) space, I always feel like they are more doable.
Your family & your parents (6) = 1 cabin
brother's family (6) = 1 cabin
sister's family + mom (4 or 5) = 1 cabin
dad & stepmom (2) = 1 cabin or 1 hotel room at a different resort

Of course, having said all that, with that group, we'd be renting a house.

 

[MouseDad85]

If you did regular rooms, I count:
your family (4) = 1 room
your parents (2) = 1 room
her dad & stepmom (2) = 1 room (could 2 of her brother's kids go here as well?)
her sister (3 or 4) = 1 room, but couldn't her mom go here as well? even if family of 4 by then, it would still be a baby
her brother (6) = 1 room if 2 kids could go with her dad & stepmom

So if you did regular hotel rooms, could you get away with 5 rooms this way?

We love Fort Wilderness and the cabins sleep 6. Granted, it would be tight with all those people, but since you have outside (deck) space, I always feel like they are more doable.
Your family & your parents (6) = 1 cabin
brother's family (6) = 1 cabin
sister's family + mom (4 or 5) = 1 cabin
dad & stepmom (2) = 1 cabin or 1 hotel room at a different resort

Of course, having said all that, with that group, we'd be renting a house.

For the most part that would work, except of course unless the rooms have walls dividing the beds up, the mom would still end up with her own room..
We are actually staying at the cabins in May of next year for a smaller family trip of 6, so We could check those out then. But I think you're correct in that we will be looking at houses. So far we're liking the places at ChampionsGate (even though it's a half hour drive) But if anyone has suggestions of places to check that might be closer I'll take them.

 

[mcjaco]

We already do this when going to Nagshead, but didn't realize there were house options in Orlando like this. I've google searched it a number of times but never found anything previously. Time to hunt.

Yeah. Tons of options. Search Orlando Vacation Homes. Many come with private pools, game rooms, etc. I think I'd end up paying $100-150 for the entire week when split amongst everyone.

 

[staceyrhood]

Championsgate is great...not a bad drive, about 10 min to Epcot and mgm, anything off property will take 45 min to an hour to get into MK. We live exactly 8 miles from MK and it took me an hour the other day, but I can be at Epcot in 10 min. The Championsgate houses are all new and very nice. Reunion is also great and has some awesome homes that would sleep a lot, same distance away. Hope this helps. Have a great trip!

 

[mom25kiddos]

First of all, how awesome of you to do this for your family. While I get the wanting to stay on property, I would seriously look at staying off site. We have five children, and often find that staying off-site can be exponentially cheaper for us. We have done large group vacations such as you are describing (with friends not family) and rented massive 8 bedroom houses with all the amenities and a pool in the backyard. We have gone through VRBO and Homeaway many times and had a lot of success. There are many huge homes so the rental prices are really competitive. We have stayed in championsgate and Windsor hills-liked them both for different reasons. Happy to chat with you further if you decide to pursue that angle. I get the appeal of on site, but sometimes it blows the budget. You could do off-site and then use some of the difference for character meals or a special family event.