What's the Worst Disney Budget Advice You Ever Got?

[kwhite1022]

Its easy to see that for this topic it has more to do with what type of vacation your are after, then good/bad advice. For us, we do the dining plan. We are a family who loves to eat out, and as a SAHM, my vacation does not involve cooking/laundry, or Im not going! For us we do the bus transportation, as hubby drives for a living so having to deal with any kind of driving while on vacation is a no go for him. Do we probably pay more then we should for our vacation vs how cheap we could get it.....oh Im sure! Do I care?? NOPE! For us, Disney is a once every 3-5 years deal, so if we are going we cough up the money for the kind of trip we want. If I cant afford to go the way I want, then I dont go, simple as that.

 

[Disney-Chick]

I love hearing everyone's opinions. That way I get to pick and chose which would work best for my family.

We flew the first year $2500 for 3 of us. Then we decided to drive. 33-36 hours total in 2 days. We have stopped at other places along the way to site see. Plus I love having my car to drive to the parks. I hated getting on the crowded buses when im tired and just want to sit down.

As for laundry, I may do one load when im there but because we drive I usually over pack. DH said I need to cut back when we drive home he can't see out the windows with all the luggage and items we purchased on our trip.

We also do free dining. We always leave with credits but stack up with the water and my daughter takes it to school with her when we return. We thought we would be smart this year and bring back the mugs we bought from Disney last year....well our DDP gave us free mugs so we ended up bringing 6 back with us. But we use them and feel they are not a waste of money.

All I know is that with all the Disney talk im ready to go back. I MISS MICKEY MOUSE!!!!

 

[disneyjunkie]

If I cant afford to go the way I want, then I dont go, simple as that.

In August 2004, my friend invited my son and I on a trip with her and her 2 kids. She wanted to take the train down stay offsite in her aunt's time share. The aunt refused to take any money for the time share. I have no desire to stay off site and the money for an onsite room was not in the budget at the time.

I turned the trip down. My son and I went in April 2005 when I pay for the type of trip I wanted.

 

[bettymae1121]

Again, not "bad" advice because for many people it works fine...but spliting meals doesn't work for DH and I. DH licks his plate clean and on the rare occasion I can't finish my meal, he's happy to help me out! Walking around 10+ hours a day in the fresh air makes us HUNGRY, so spliting a CS or TS meal wouldn't be enough food for either of us.

This May is the 1st trip we'll have the dining plan, I think the TS meals may be too much food, usually we do either an appitizer OR desert, and not both. I think if we can find deserts that won't melt, we'll see if we can take them to-go and enjoy them later in the day. But otherwise I think it will work really well for us. We aren't big breakfast eaters so since on the day we arrive we're going to DTD, I'll stop at a bakery and get some pastries for the room. Then the CS and snacks will get us through the day in the parks and we'll do the TS for dinner as a nice break before enjoying the parks until close.

Also, driving to the parks while onsite at WDW. Again, I'm sure this works great for many, but DH hates driving (he drives 80 round-trip commutte at home) and I hate driving in "new" places in a strange car. Sure it takes longer but taking the busses/boats/monorails is great for us, we can sit and relax and someone else does the driving. Then again, we go during off peak times so we don't have to wait long for busses and can usuall find a seat. If we went during peak times we might feel differently.

 

[crisi]

Worst advice - a grocery stop. We wasted an incredible amount of food. We've gotten better at knowing what we are likely to eat in our room (we are DVCers, so have a kitchen, and yes, do laundry, which works for us). Also, a rental car didn't work for us - we are much better off with no car.

Flying does work for us - its a 24 hour drive straight through - and our vacation time is precious. Hoppers work for us - we usually do two parks in a day. Dining plan does not work for us.

 

[tlbwriter]

This May is the 1st trip we'll have the dining plan, I think the TS meals may be too much food, usually we do either an appitizer OR desert, and not both.

The dining plan no longer includes appetizers. Or were you talking about the deluxe plan? It might, I don't know, but the standard plan doesn't.

 

[3pletprincesses]

To not get the dining plan was a mistake. We now go with the DDP and we ungraded to deluxe this May as it made more sence since we are going out for dinner dh and I and the price difference for 1 extra mels vs deluxe was little less then $500 for our family of 5 plus we get mugs and more snacks.

As for people asking how can staying onsite can be cheaper then off site.

I priced for 7 nights stay in May for 2 adults and 3 children under 9 (kids play free)
POR $1,940.34

offsite $1942 (700 was the cheaper I could find for a decent hotel actually was a 4br home+1242 tickets) + car rental

 

[BeckyKay]

I am a ridiculous WDW fanatic! I have gone each year for the past 20 and sparatically before that. I have found that my needs and trip plans have changed drastically as my life circumstances change.

Young and Single - Road trips are a must. Stay offsite and go to the grocery to keep cost down. I should have said, Young, Single and Without Sufficient Means.

Corporate Go Getter - Convenience is key. Fly, Stay offsite right outside the gates.

Married to the Military - You cannot beat military rates. So, stay onsite, use the meal plan, etc.

Large Group - Onsite only, We do not like to cook on vacation so we dined at Disney and offsite.

With and Infant Toddler - Stay onsite with quick transportation back to the room. Resort with lots of options so we could have fun and experience Disney while not at the parks. Prepurchase discounted Disney gear and avoid the gift shops..

I could add so much more but it just reinforces what others have said. You have to do what is best for your situation at the time.

 

[bettymae1121]

The dining plan no longer includes appetizers. Or were you talking about the deluxe plan? It might, I don't know, but the standard plan doesn't.

No you're right, I don't know why I thought it included appitzers. Wishful thinking? Actually this will work out fine for us then.

 

[teacup princess]

Not bad advice per se, just didn't work for us........(and yes, I realize we are way in the minority here) but our #1 worst advice for our family was...........

COMING BACK TO THE RESORT TO TAKE A NAP IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY!

Tried it the first day and realized real quick that we are definately a commando type of family. Nobody would nap, we all just sat in a dark hotel room with our eyes wide open for an hour and a half waiting to go back to the park. Never tried it again. Now if the kids get tired, they hop in the stoller for a little snooze or we catch a couple of zzzz's on a dark quiet ride like the people mover or the Carrosel of Progress (may favorite place to nap). Rope drop to Fireworks every day- nobody in our family wants to waste precious vacation time sleeping.

 

[tlbwriter]

No you're right, I don't know why I thought it included appitzers. Wishful thinking?

It did when it was first introduced, so maybe that's why you've got it in your head. It also included the gratuity, which was really convenient!

 

[klacey1]

Its easy to see that for this topic it has more to do with what type of vacation your are after, then good/bad advice. For us, we do the dining plan. We are a family who loves to eat out, and as a SAHM, my vacation does not involve cooking/laundry, or Im not going! For us we do the bus transportation, as hubby drives for a living so having to deal with any kind of driving while on vacation is a no go for him. Do we probably pay more then we should for our vacation vs how cheap we could get it.....oh Im sure! Do I care?? NOPE! For us, Disney is a once every 3-5 years deal, so if we are going we cough up the money for the kind of trip we want. If I cant afford to go the way I want, then I dont go, simple as that.

I couldn't agree with this more-- for us, Disney vacation means staying onsite, doing the dining plan (I've never understood how some people think it's way too much food. It's perfect for us), etc. If we can't afford doing it that way, we'll wait until we can!

 

[Arielle22]

I don't think any advice is the worst, just not what my family is looking for.

We go every 2 years and stay onsite. We try to stay Deluxe so the room discount is worth more for us than the dining plan. We get park hoppers and do not eat in our room.

I agree with the other posters who try to carry the minimum into the parks. Now that my daughters are teens, we were only taking my pocketbook into the park. The next trip I may only go with whatever I can carry in my pockets. The "no bags" line is always so much quicker!

I have tried some suggestions, such as staying off site and renting a house. While I enjoyed the house, it was not the same as staying on property for us.

I do not want to do laundry or cook while I am away, that is the point of being on vacation!

DH and I would actually like to drive down but it would cut our vacation time in half so we will save that for our retirement.

 

[bettymae1121]

Worst advice - a grocery stop. We wasted an incredible amount of food. We've gotten better at knowing what we are likely to eat in our room (we are DVCers, so have a kitchen, and yes, do laundry, which works for us). Also, a rental car didn't work for us - we are much better off with no car.

Flying does work for us - its a 24 hour drive straight through - and our vacation time is precious. Hoppers work for us - we usually do two parks in a day. Dining plan does not work for us.

Ah, see...do what we do and use the grocery stop not for food, but for ALCOHOL!!! Drinking at the resort costs $$$ and if enjoying an adult beverage is something you enjoy on vacation, this more than makes up for the time it takes to stop.

DH and I aren't doing it this trip because we only going for 5 nights and frankly, we won't be at the room enough to bother. But on past trips of a longer length, just the savings in beer and wine alone made it worth the effort, the case of water and the few snaks we picked up were just a bonus.

 

[ICF]

No way do I want to spend tons of time traveling to the parks. I have X amount of time to vacation before I need to get back to running things at work so I better make sure I use every minute.

I've stayed at 4 different condos - Windsor Hills/Palms/Silver Lake & Emerald Isle.

In all 4 cases, we could pretty much get from the parks (except for MK due to the TTC) to our condo in 15 minutes tops. From AK to Silver Lake it was more like 4 or 5 mins.

The one time we stayed on site, we could end up waiting 15 mins just for the right bus to come along for the park we were wanting to go to that morning.

It's a great misconception that you ending up wasting lots of time travelling back and forth to the condo when you stay off-site. While I dont doubt that it COULD happen the reverse can be true as well.

 

[gabriellyn]

Not bad advice per se, just didn't work for us........(and yes, I realize we are way in the minority here) but our #1 worst advice for our family was...........

COMING BACK TO THE RESORT TO TAKE A NAP IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY!

Tried it the first day and realized real quick that we are definately a commando type of family. Nobody would nap, we all just sat in a dark hotel room with our eyes wide open for an hour and a half waiting to go back to the park. Never tried it again. Now if the kids get tired, they hop in the stoller for a little snooze or we catch a couple of zzzz's on a dark quiet ride like the people mover or the Carrosel of Progress (may favorite place to nap). Rope drop to Fireworks every day- nobody in our family wants to waste precious vacation time sleeping.

I could have written this reply! Yeah, going back to the room just doesn't work for us, even though we have a young DS4 who has been going since he was a little over 1. We are commando types, at least for now.

 

[aprilfoolwed]

I don't care what kind of advice I get for my Disney vacation - I just want to get there!

We stay offsite, because at the time we are able to go (typically June), and with our family of 5, a house just makes financial sense.

We drive from PA to FL - not because we like to drive, but because it's a whole lot cheaper than flying. And when the kids were younger and they were all in car seats, I couldn't imagine having to rent a car with all those seats!

We cook in the condo/house. We do laundry - a lot. would I like a break from those things? You bet! But would I rather do those things at home or at Disney - Disney for sure!

We do all we can to make the trip affordable for our family (on one meager income). We make it work!

But it is interesting how one piece of advice should be ignored by some, yet work super well for others!

 

[crisi]

Ah, see...do what we do and use the grocery stop not for food, but for ALCOHOL!!! Drinking at the resort costs $$$ and if enjoying an adult beverage is something you enjoy on vacation, this more than makes up for the time it takes to stop.

DH and I aren't doing it this trip because we only going for 5 nights and frankly, we won't be at the room enough to bother. But on past trips of a longer length, just the savings in beer and wine alone made it worth the effort, the case of water and the few snaks we picked up were just a bonus.

We usually get a bottle at the resort. Nowadays, with ME and no car, we pack the stuff we can pack, and pick up the stuff down at the resort store that we can't pack. It isn't much - and although resort prices are high, we seldom get enough to justify the Garden Grocer delivery fee. i.e. we pack cereal, coffee, sugar and a few snacks - and buy half and half and milk, a bottle of something, and Coke as a mixer - though we have done the GG delivery if we decide to get water delivered.

But the real key here - with this or with any advice - is to "know yourself." If you are a grab and go type of eater, a sit down dining plan doesn't make any sense - no matter if 95% of the DisBoards believe its the best thing ever. If you aren't going to ever make a frozen pizza or spaghetti in the room, having Garden Grocer deliver such things makes no sense. If you live in Atlanta - its completely believable that flying is way more trouble than its worth - but those of us in Minneapolis might find flying to be a better option if we have more money than time. Any advice on this board needs to be evaluated twice - "does what this person is saying make sense?" and "Does it make sense FOR ME?"

 

[hipchickie]

I would love to see the math to justify that one. I have tried to do it before and the offsite always came out cheaper. Our trip coming up we are staying at a 2 bedroom condo in windsor hills. Cost is $535 for 7 nights. Staying offsite we also have car rental ($168) for the week and 7 days of parking in the parks at $14 a day ($98). Total cost for the week to stay off site will be $801. That is $114 per day. I would love for someone to show me how I can stay onsite with similar accomodations for less than $114 a day.

Keith

It depends on season too, I am sure. We also stay at POP most often, and go in January. The special then is usually $55 a night.
We stay at POP because we are never in the room, and our kids are young, so size is perfect for the price

Like many things mentioned in this thread, it boils down to what kind of vacation you enjoy to what is a value for you.
Personally we love the bus system - so that is an added bonus....my idea of vacation is not having to drive I would be willing to stay in a smaller room so that I can be onsite and take advantage of the buses

ETA: onsite is also the only way we will go because of EMH, which we always take advantage of

 

[Tina]

Funny both those things worked out for us We bought 2 refillable mugs and our family of 5 shared them. We would fill them in the morning while we ate breakfest at POP and fill them before we went to the parks, after they were empty we put them in the bottom of the stroller so nobody had to carry them around. My kids LOVED the slushy drinks at POP so we got our money worth with those. Then we filled them after we got back to the resort. We definalty saved paying out of pocket for meals. We would often split counter service meals for lunch (some can be huge!) and for about $11-12 we bought a huge pizza for dinner at the POP food court a couple times and we even had leftovers that we brang back to the room. $12 for a dinner for 5 people can't be beat and the pizza was really good! We only did 2-3 sit down meals so for us the dining plan wasn't worth it.

Of course that worked for you and not the previous poster. The PP bought 5 mugs for 5 people, as they are supposed to be used, and found them to be a waste of money. You on the other hand, bought only 2 for a family of 5. Are you actually bragging about money saved by not following the rules? Unless the rules have changed since I wasted money on those mugs...