Vacations with Debt

[kamik86]

Honestly it would depend. If I knew I didn't need the credit cards to live, or to finance the vacation (IE the credit card debt would be less on the day after I take the vacation then on the day I book due to me making payments in between, not more due to me using the cards) then I may do so.

I don't see how this is any worse then me taking a trip in Sept with about $5000 in a car loan and about $20,000 in student loans. The car will be much less by the time I take the trip the student loans wont since they are in deferment because I'm in grad school (not a financial hardship or anything they just automatically go in deferment since I'm taking classes half time)

 

[Beezle2]

The op asked for opinions. So People should be slammed for giving them? That makes a lot of sense. People post on subjects they feel strongly about. If someone has deal wit cc debt (I did. I was really stupid after college) or were raised where debt is disdained, they are going to feel strongly enough to answer. No biggie. They are merely opinions of strangers.Who truly cares what a stranger thinks

My point exactally. Who cares and why would you ask strangers on a message board what they think you can afford.

The Op sounds good to go to me! Hope you go and have fun OP!

 

[DawnM]

Well, you are going to get a variety of answers and you haven't really stated if you have other funds going.......savings accounts, retirement funding, etc....nor have you said how expensive your vacatin is, so really, there is no way to answer your question well.

We have done the Dave Ramsey approach, BUT, we did go on Disney trips while in the process of going through the steps. We just did Disney much cheaper. We stayed off-site in a condo, ate a lot of our own food, got discount tickets, etc.....Disney was just not something I was willing to give up entirely.

Now that we are actually out of debt and have a healthy savings account we still do Disney on the cheap. We prefer it.

Dawn

 

[GinnyEmma]

The op asked for opinions. So People should be slammed for giving them? That makes a lot of sense. People post on subjects they feel strongly about. If someone has deal wit cc debt (I did. I was really stupid after college) or were raised where debt is disdained, they are going to feel strongly enough to answer. No biggie. They are merely opinions of strangers.Who truly cares what a stranger thinks

My point exactally. Who cares and why would you ask strangers on a message board what they think you can afford.

The Op sounds good to go to me! Hope you go and have fun OP!

Why dies it matter why she asked! Perhaps she is just a curious person. One can be interested in the opinions of others without investing in them. No biggie. If you don't like that she asked don't bother reading.

 

[nunzia]

If the $5000 represents debt you can eliminate in 1 year max, and making monthly payments is not stressing your budget, we would "consider" going. I am total agreement, we prefer to be out of debt but here's the thing, my experience with my kids at WDW will not be the same 2-3 years from now. I don't like debt, but I refuse to miss those special moments with my kids while they are kids.

Most will say no, don't go, but I will tell you that when my kids were little we certainly did this and..if the savings plan for the trip had bumps like it always seems to..like a new air conditioner for the car the week we were leaving..driving across the country..in the summer..we even put some of the trip on a CC oh the horror. I would not have traded the trips with my kids for anything and it was worth actually paying the interest.) Of course being fiscally smart is VERY important and you should never just load up on debt and neglect forward thought of retirement and saving..but you also need a balance of life and, IMO only, take the trip and make the memories..believe me, the kids will gone before you know it.

 

[crisi]

OP, I have learned a few things during my tenure on the DIS....

The DIS population seems to have lots of rich folks with hundreds of thousands of dollars in various types of savings

The DIS population seems to have a lot of wealthy people who never make bad financial choices or splurge

The DIS population seems to be made up primarily of people who never take a vacation if they have any debt

The DIS population seems to be primarily made up of perfect people who never make mistakes, break a rule, or do any wrong

The DIS population seems to consist of many people who feel entitled to everything, including being entitled... to being entitled

Its like everyone who is wealthy, perfect and debt free flocked to the DIS and made their own little community. Therefore....

The DIS population does not represent me or my household.

If you can afford a vacation then YOU know it. Not someone on a message board who may or may not be from the advice giving background they claim. If people waited until they had no debt to take a vacation, travel services and tourist locations would be non-existent because there would be no one to bring in revenue.

Sharing your household finances here will only bring out the Desperate Housewife types who would scold you for going on vacation if you owed $10 on a bill that wasn't even due yet.

Take your vacation and enjoy it while others sit here and bicker back and forth about why you shouldn't.

Of course. This is a board where most of the people take regular Disney vacations. That isn't a hobby that is going to be sustainable by most people with less than average incomes or poor money management habits. Granted, some people will be able to maintain the hobby with one or the other, but its a much easier hobby to maintain with a good income and a fairly high net worth. And if you try and maintain the hobby with neither, things don't work out too well. With those two things, you generally wouldn't carry credit card debt - there aren't a lot of reasons to. If this board skewed to the people who were planning a one time trip to Disney - the demographics would be different.

To the OP, personally, I'm financially conservative. I didn't use to be. But now, I wouldn't go to Disney with debt I couldn't pay off in a month. Its just too hard to dig out. I give up too much. Its like dieting. Its easier to limit my junk food all year, than to spend three months unable to touch it to loose the weight.

 

[miralys]

I would say it's your business. As long as you are not depending on income/loans from other people, no one needs to know or care what is going on with you. (Although, the fact that you ask that here makes me think you might not be entirely comfortable with going while you have the debt).

 

[gracie1]

Most will say no, don't go, but I will tell you that when my kids were little we certainly did this and..if the savings plan for the trip had bumps like it always seems to..like a new air conditioner for the car the week we were leaving..driving across the country..in the summer..we even put some of the trip on a CC oh the horror. I would not have traded the trips with my kids for anything and it was worth actually paying the interest.) Of course being fiscally smart is VERY important and you should never just load up on debt and neglect forward thought of retirement and saving..but you also need a balance of life and, IMO only, take the trip and make the memories..believe me, the kids will gone before you know it.

Well said I have been on vacation where some of it if not all of it has been put on a credit card. Do I regret it?? Absolutely not. Would I do it again?? Absolutely! Everyone is different.

 

[sk!mom]

So my question is do you think it is ok or would you to Disney or any other vacation if you had any credit card debt.

Assuming:

Great retirement plans for both spouses
Some savings
Debt less then $5000 managable payments
Good rates on all debt and well within families means in secure positions with marketable skills and education.

Vacation would be paid in full from cash and would be less then amount to be fully debt free. Vacation is discounted and while it has lots of perks bugeting will limit finaicial impact.

So would you see this as okay or do you think it is foolish?

In the situation that you gave, no, I wouldn't take an expensive vacation. Debt of less than $5000 could be paid off immediately by using the savings and vacation money. Then I would feel free to save for a Disney trip and with no debt and the good jobs that you mention should only take a few months.

If you had student loans or something that was going to take years to pay off then I would say, take a modest vacation and then return to pay off mode but you are so close to debt free that you could be done with the debt and vacationing in months not years.

 

[StitchBuddy]

Oh my, if my mom had waited to go on vacation until she had no credit card debt we wouldn't have ever gone anywhere. She spent from June until Dec paying off vacations and from Jan. until June paying off Christmas. We always had a vacation. I can promise you she never regreted it. We use to do the same until we got older and were more financially secure and yes we have money in all those various places and a house almost paid for. But, we have made huge financial blunders! I think it is best practice to pay off your cc each month, but it is a personal decision. Have fun!

 

[sk!mom]

OP, I have learned a few things during my tenure on the DIS....

The DIS population seems to have lots of rich folks with hundreds of thousands of dollars in various types of savings

The DIS population seems to have a lot of wealthy people who never make bad financial choices or splurge

The DIS population seems to be made up primarily of people who never take a vacation if they have any debt

The DIS population seems to be primarily made up of perfect people who never make mistakes, break a rule, or do any wrong

The DIS population seems to consist of many people who feel entitled to everything, including being entitled... to being entitled

Its like everyone who is wealthy, perfect and debt free flocked to the DIS and made their own little community. Therefore....

The DIS population does not represent me or my household.

If you can afford a vacation then YOU know it. Not someone on a message board who may or may not be from the advice giving background they claim. If people waited until they had no debt to take a vacation, travel services and tourist locations would be non-existent because there would be no one to bring in revenue.

Sharing your household finances here will only bring out the Desperate Housewife types who would scold you for going on vacation if you owed $10 on a bill that wasn't even due yet.

Take your vacation and enjoy it while others sit here and bicker back and forth about why you shouldn't.

Funny that a response about how judgmental Disers are is the most judgmental response in the thread. It's also funny that people cry "judgmental" when others disagree with their pov.

I never understand these types of responses. This a discussion board about budgeting so, of course, financial questions will come up. It's an active board because people are willing to respond.

 

[Beezle2]

Why dies it matter why she asked! Perhaps she is just a curious person. One can be interested in the opinions of others without investing in them. No biggie. If you don't like that she asked don't bother reading.

>>>


If you dont like what I said you could just skip my posts also. My original response was to a post about how fraught with moral judgements, finger wagging, and nastyness these threads can become. It was a good post and I am going to go back and re-read it to remind myself why I read posts but rarely post on threads.

 

[Karenj2]

This seems to come up a lot. And I see all ends of the spectrums from the Dave Ramsey NO DEBT folks to the Disney even if they do not have a job

So my question is do you think it is ok or would you to Disney or any other vacation if you had any credit card debt.

Assuming:

Great retirement plans for both spouses
Some savings
Debt less then $5000 managable payments
Good rates on all debt and well within families means in secure positions with marketable skills and education.

Vacation would be paid in full from cash and would be less then amount to be fully debt free. Vacation is discounted and while it has lots of perks bugeting will limit finaicial impact.

So would you see this as okay or do you think it is foolish?

IMHO, it depends on what the debt is... If it's CC debt, I'd feel better if I paid it off, and took the vacation the following year. If it's car, mortgage, medical or school debt, I'd be more inclined to go on vacation. That being said, DH and I did go on vacation (to WDW) when we were both basically unemployed (he was on Long Term Disability, I was "self-employed" but the business was not doing well). The reason we went was because DH was FINALLY on the road to recovery from depression, and we needed to celebrate. We never went into debt to go, and I got a "real" job the following month.

 

[momtosam]

Go, have fun, try to use cash if you can.

 

[GinnyEmma]

>>>


If you dont like what I said you could just skip my posts also. My original response was to a post about how fraught with moral judgements, finger wagging, and nastyness these threads can become. It was a good post and I am going to go back and re-read it to remind myself why I read posts but rarely post on threads.

Lol, so you just brought the nasty in early because it was inevitable? Weird. No one was being nasty.

 

[luvsJack]

Funny that a response about how judgmental Disers are is the most judgmental response in the thread. It's also funny that people cry "judgmental" when others disagree with their pov.

I never understand these types of responses. This a discussion board about budgeting so, of course, financial questions will come up. It's an active board because people are willing to respond.

It may be judgmental, but she is right. Most threads like this end up in a huge debate because there are those that go by the "beans and rice or rice and beans" theory of paying off debt and those that think you can pay it off and still have a life of some sort (although, admittedly, you may pay it off slower that way).

And she is correct that sometimes it seems to be a contest of who can suffer the most to pay off their debt.

I don't necessarily agree that the larger population of the dis is high income, just the more vocal members on these kinds of threads.

I have a small (much less than $5000) amount of cc debt, a small amount in student loans (in deferment) and a car note in addition to my mortgage. I am going to WDW for 8 days in November and know that we will be going back two years from then too. In November it will just be me, dh and dd. She will be 13. I don't want to wait until she is older. The one in two years will be to take my dgds for the first time, will not miss it for the world. Could we have memories doing other things? Sure. And we do. But we love wdw, and its something special that the three of us enjoy together--so we will go.

I am increasing my income by going to school, I have a retirement plan, and I am paying down debt. AND I am going to WDW!

OP, you would have to decide what is best for you. If you are not bothered by having the cc debt and by going to wdw, GO. There is nothing morally wrong about it and nothing that will affect anyone else. Go and enjoy!

 

[Sinderelly]

We always put our vacations on our Disney Visa and pay everything off before we go. I love those Disney Rewards which allow us to take more vacations I think I would go ahead and plan your trip while paying off the CC debt, then take the vacation to celebrate!

 

[Zhoen]

Happy Good Monday Morning, Everyone!!!

Hi Disneylicious! Never afraid to speak up! I like that about you. I also like everyone else's opinions... I really like the comment about "personal finance is... personal."

But here is my answer... We have debt. And we have good, very secure jobs. We sometimes pay everything off, then life happens, and rather than "tap" the savings, we throw things on a card and "deal with it later." We *DO* deal with it later... right now we're dealing with a game-changer that hit the whole extended family... Our household size temporarily more than doubled... more food, more furniture (bunk beds, etc), higher electric bills, first we drained our "little" emergency fund, then we ran up some cards... and honestly, I'm not sorry. It was necessary at the time, and tapping the "big" fund is necessarily difficult... Plus, there was an accounting error about two months ago at my work and I didn't get paid for 6 weeks... I lived off of our emergency fund while I was waiting for that to get fixed... then I put that money back... then my car needed brakes (at 40k miles... man was I MADDDD!!!) If I'd totally drained our funds, we wouldn't have had that wonderful cushion.

We are simultaneously paying off our cards now and saving for a Disney trip next year. Whether the cards are paid off or not, and certainly without paying off the cars, or the house we're going. My princesses will only be little once. We do sometimes eat beans (I like them! ) I do shop sales and keep a pantry... but we also continue to help our family, which means tough choices. We do cary some debt month-to-month... but we have savings and retirement funds and emergency funds, as well.

So in the end... yes, I would take a big vacation without paying off the cards first, as long as everything else was ticking along alright and I would not be running up new debt or depleting emergency savings to go.

Play nice, kiddies

 

[Beezle2]

Lol, so you just brought the nasty in early because it was inevitable? Weird. No one was being nasty.

Not sure what I said that was nasty? That I agreed with a post? That this place can be judgemental? Did I tell someone if they didn't like what was posted they could just not read it? Just not sure how I was "nasty" but really you are proving my point. I'm willing to give you the last word so you can move on but I'm done.

 

[neatokimmo]

OP - for me it depends on the interest rate. I have some estate and business expenses for about 5K on a CC. The rate is 3% because I work for a bank. That card is being paid off a certain way over a certain period of time.

That being said, we have 4 trips this year (non Disney) that are running about 3K for the year (hooray for points!). Yes I could have put all that money against the card but I didn't because it's not in the plan. My plan covers retirement $, investing $, business $, everyday money....just like how you said your other stuff was in good shape.

Now if my everyday card got ran up for some crazy reason, no way would I book a vacation. My Disney visa is about 12%. My flinch point seems to be about 6%. So 12% would cause me to lose sleep.