WDW has become so expensive - what do you let your vacation cost?

[DLgal]

???

If you're locals maybe. DL trips cost us considerably more to stay onsite and higher airfare and rental car costs too. Car for 7 days in Orlando $300, from LAX $900.

Are you renting a luxury car? $900? You can get a car for a week out of LAX for $300/week easy. My parents do it every time they come visit.

 

[5kidsmommy]

My husband is self employed so no vacation time. I’d like to say he can take off whenever but that’s not reality. Most of our vacations are just weekend camping trips because that’s usually as long as we can get away. We do like to do a week vacation once a year if possible. Now we vacation either alone or with our youngest. We try to keep our trips under $5000. In September we are doing WDW and staying at the Poly renting DVC points. I bought discounted hoppers and we will pay for food with discounted gift cards. We do splurge on resorts because we spend a lot of resort time but honestly our resort with rented points is just as much as a moderate through Disney. We save money on food because we generally just eat quick service. We get hoppers because we love the food at Epcot and usually end up there for at least one meal. Airfare is so expensive. We’ll pay about $800 for three of us this year. Our trip will come in just over $5000 for a week.

We don’t go into debt for it. We pay cash for everything and that’s just about at our comfort level. I think it’ll be awhile until we come back because vacationing is just pricey. I’ll just go back to our weekend camping trips.

 

[DisLiss]

So, right now we're looking at about $3500 - $3800 per Person for those 12 days, including flights (flights cost $550).
I'm just curious - do you think this is incredibly high?

No, I don't think it's incredibly high. Because right now, DH & I are at the point where we're still paying for 4 people every time we go to WDW, so our trips feel so, so much more expensive than when it was just the two of us. Both because we're doubling the people and because we're coupling that with ever rising costs in all aspects of a Disney trip. The transportation to Orlando costs us more, the rooms cost more, the tickets cost more, the food costs more---and it's significantly more, too. So right now, our per person amount is less than yours---because it has to be, or we just couldn't go. We have to make choices to keep our budget as low as it can be.

Once the kids are grown and it's just DH & I again, we could spend the same amount you're paying *per person* and still be paying a good deal less overall, so it will feel like a bargain to us, LOL!

But even just looking from the perspective of a two person trip---DH & I have had different experiences and budgets with those as well. Some trips we stayed in value resorts, sometimes moderates. Sometimes we mostly did quick service meals, while other times we has at least one table service meal per day and often two. It all depended on what amount of money we had saved up for that trip. If you've saved enough to cover $3800.00 per person, and you will enjoy what experiences that amount of money gets you in WDW, then why not?

Have a great trip!

 

[SoarinSC]

DW and I are facing the fact Disney is getting more and more expensive by concentrating our funds on what we consider the most important things about our vacation there..namely, the parks and food. We're just two people going for 8 nights usually and total park-commandos so we don't get much out of staying at anything above the value resorts. We rent a car for the 7 hour drive down and board our dog for the week. We're not big into the table-service experience, so all our meals are counter-service, food court, or snack stands..with the exception of one meal at Sci-Fi Dine-In, which is a fave. Some souvenirs were bought, but not too crazy. So all in all we spent roughly $4000 for both of us this past trip. That is no small price for a vacation, even with our modest choices, so we budget and save and use our Disney Reward dollars to help pay for things.

Used to come twice a year, but have scaled it back to once a year since the costs are going up. That all being said, whatever your budget allows for you is just right I say. As long as you've budgeted and saved for it, it's perfectly fine, whatever the cost.

 

[Orionreplay]

Live in the US. Family of 4. We typically average 18 months to 2 years between our trips. Some were a little shorter and some a little longer in between. We went this past November and stayed 7 nights at Art of Animation. I might be old fashioned, but I call the 407 Disney line to discuss options. For this trip, on the phone I was given a bounceback discount, yet hadn't been since 11/2015.

I also purchased the standard DP for the 4 of us. My wife scored our Park tickets elsewhere, but I don't know the cost at this time. This already puts me around $5k before the tickets.

So yes, it can stagger the mind that we are paying so much for a one week slice of time at WDW. We do want to go again in 2021, so I do what I have always done in the past: I start saving. When we get income tax refunds, that goes into the savings pot as well... fingers crossed, I should have two of those before the next trip. Sometimes I have to use a portion of the savings to pay for something for the house, but I try not to but reality can be a kick to the pants sometimes.

It helped this year when my Mastercard announced that any purchases over $499 would be interest free for one year, "same as cash". I steered the bulk of the vacation to that card after we had get the deck fixed on the house last summer.

 

[RamblingMad]

Are you renting a luxury car? $900? You can get a car for a week out of LAX for $300/week easy. My parents do it every time they come visit.

Before or after taxes and fees? You’re number seems way too low to me.

 

[DLgal]

Before or after taxes and fees? You’re number seems way too low to me.

All in. There are always ways to get rental car discounts. I use Hertz exclusively and have never paid more than $300/week anywhere for a car. Ever. I typically get a rate of $25-30/day and taxes and fees bring it to under $300.

 

[Searc]

There is really no reason to stay onsite at DL. And you can take super shuttle from the airport.

Super Shuttle went out of business.

 

[RamblingMad]

Super Shuttle went out of business.

My significant other used them two years ago for a solo trip. I didn’t know.

 

[Searc]

My significant other used them two years ago for a solo trip. I didn’t know.

It was very recent, in the last month. I think a lot of people don't know, yet.

 

[Brett Wyman]

Are you renting a luxury car? $900? You can get a car for a week out of LAX for $300/week easy. My parents do it every time they come visit.

Before or after taxes and fees? You’re number seems way too low to me.

For 7 days its $500-600 for an average car. The $900 was for a minivan in high season.

 

[DLgal]

RE: Rental Cars

The best way to get cheap rental cars is to book them at the last minute. I always make a reservation ahead of time (never pay in full ahead) and keep an eye on the prices. They always go down significantly about a week or less before you need to pick up. I often change my reservation the day before or the DAY OF pickup. You can literally cancel a reservation until midnight on your pickup day without penalty on Hertz. I use that to my advantage all the time.

 

[DLgal]

For 7 days its $500-600 for an average car. The $900 was for a minivan in high season.

I just priced out an SUV from Hertz for a random week in June out of LAX and it was $440 all in. An intermediate car (seats 5) would have been $323. You can do better than the prices you are finding.

 

[loves to dive]

Off topic to the original posters question:

"We’re DVC members so we don’t “pay” for our resort "

You do, just not at the time you go. You either paid cash up front, which is still paying and would need to be averaged out over number of nights total stayed during the lifetime of your contract. Or you financed, which would still be paying and you would add interest on to you average nights.
You also pay yearly owners fees, again need to be averaged out.

Back to original question. When we first started going I was a single mother so we went every other year so I could save to pay for it. During the two years of saving we knew what we were saving for so my son and I (who was young) would not eat out a lot and when we did we would share a happy meal. We would just go on long weekend vacations outside of the Disney one and those would be within driving distance and we would stay in budget type motels. Back then the only option if you wanted to stay on site were the MK resorts so that is where we would stay. If they had had the value resorts, it would have made life easier and we certainly would have stayed there.

Since then, my finances have changed and I have a significant other, so two incomes. We became scuba divers, my son did as well. My SO and I took a lot of expensive diving vacations, my son came along when he could and my son and I still did WDW every other year. My SO wasn't interested in WDW so it works for us. As the years have progressed, the diving slowed down (as did I) and we bought a RV. So my SO and I do camping vacations (he is self employed, I'm semi-retired). My son and I do WDW once a year now.

In all of the above cases, (with the exception of a dive trip to Palau) the vacations are never longer than 7 days, usually 5 nights for WDW, sometimes only 3 or 4 for camping trips. My SO can work anywhere there is internet so I've seen him working on a dive boat in the middle of the ocean. We never spend more than we can pay cash for, we have savings set aside just for such trips. We also paid cash for the RV and the truck to pull it, out of savings, since those were non-essential. We still have other savings for emergencies, house issues and, in my case, retirement.

I don't think they amount you are spending is very high given you are flying from overseas and the amount of time you are staying. My son and I just got back from a 5 night stay, one night in a value and 4 nights at the Dolphin. Drove down and I bought 6 day park hoppers for both of us from Undercover Tourist. I didn't pay rack rate for either resort. We ate at: Tea at GF with added glass of champaigne, food booths at Art Festival (for a total of about $350 give or take) Topolinos, Beaches and Cream, Marakesh. Had drinks and food at LaCava and Nomads Lounge. Had drinks at Ogas. Had a few quick service breakfasts and full service breakfast at Dolphin. I bought a mask at Italy, he a stein at Norway and few T-Shirts, pins, etc. I'm going to guess total for two of us was $3500 to $4000. I paid for it during the course of 3 months so would have to go look at my cc statement to know exactly. I paid for the night at value and one night at Dolphin upon booking. I paid for the tickets the next month. The rest this morning when paying my credit card.

 

[SoarinSC]

So yes, it can stagger the mind that we are paying so much for a one week slice of time at WDW. We do want to go again in 2021, so I do what I have always done in the past: I start saving. When we get income tax refunds, that goes into the savings pot as well... fingers crossed, I should have two of those before the next trip. Sometimes I have to use a portion of the savings to pay for something for the house, but I try not to but reality can be a kick to the pants sometimes.

This was our situation this past trip. Had a decent bank of savings then whammo unexpected house repair came up, then a car thingie..such is life! But yeah tax refunds help a lot!

As far as car rental costs, I go through Hertz for the car, but AAA (Allianz) for the damage waiver fee. Hertz quotes me $33.99 for each day where Allianze is $9. That being said, I paid roughly $530 for 10 days for an intermediate with the waiver added in.

 

[Orionreplay]

This was our situation this past trip. Had a decent bank of savings then whammo unexpected house repair came up, then a car thingie..such is life! But yeah tax refunds help a lot!

For us last summer, just after ADRs were made, our deck needed some fixing. I had put it off for a couple of years, so we went ahead and did it. One year, it was our Toyota Sienna needing a master brake cylinder. I had to dip into my Disney funds for that too. I always try not to, but life happens.

 

[Lvsdisney]

???

If you're locals maybe. DL trips cost us considerably more to stay onsite and higher airfare and rental car costs too. Car for 7 days in Orlando $300, from LAX $900.

Random but we flew into SNA instead of LAX and got a full size car rental for less than $300 for 8 days. LAX rentals are expensive. Next time you go, take Uber to DL and then do a car rental from one of the locations near the park! MUCH cheaper compared to LAX.

 

[wezguycsu]

My wife and I first came to wdw in summer 2014. We stayed at a friend's timeshare in Kissimmee. So our only real expenses were airfare, park tickets and food. Food we saved by eating lunches in the park, breakfast on the go and usually dinner on the way home from the parks. This coming trip we are staying on property so I'm expecting it to cost a good deal more.