you can go to disneyworld.com and price it all out for 2007 and factor in some leeway for prices being raised and the proposed restructuring of the rates...I'd say adding 10% would get you close if not over the actual increase but that is really just a guess
How old are your children? over age 9 they are considered adults for tickets and dining, over age 17 they will add to the cost of your room.
What kind of hotel do you want to stay at? do you care about room location?Will a regular room be okay or would you want something like a suite or a cabin?
How long will you want to stay?
Do you want the dining plan?
Base tickets
adult 4 day is 215, 10 day is 230
Child (age 3-9) 4 day is 178.92 10 day is 188
So when looking at 2 adults 2 children you are looking at about 800-840 for base tickets. If you want to do the water parks, you can add that to your ticket for about 45 per person, if you want to be able to go to multiple parks (Mk, Epcot, MGM, Animal Kingdom) add about 40 per person. So fully loaded tickets would cost about 1100. You can score a bit of a discount on tickets through brokers like undercovertourist.com and increase that savings by a few $ by signing up for the newsletter at mousesavers.com, but if you want a package (you must have a package if you want the dining plan) you have to get your tickets with the room so you wouldnt' be able to get discounted tickets.
March in 2007 was peak season, so value resorts were 134 per night for standard, mods were 185 and delux rooms started at 366.
So staying 7 nights at a value resort in march of 2007 would cost about 134*7 (room)= 938 and the cheapest of the delux resorts for 7 nights would be 366*7 = 2562.
So you can see a 7 night stay with 7 day base tickets for 2 adults 2 kids ages 3-9) in 2007 in peak season ran from about 1700value to 3350 and up for deluxes.
If you wanted to make that into a package you get a few extra benefits little things like discounts at putt putt etc but you also have stricter rules for cancellations etc. You also become eligable for the dining plan. In 2007 the dining plan cost 38.99 per adult per day, and 10.99 per child (age 3-9)per day. So for the 7 night stay this would add about another 700. Bringing your package price between 2400 value and 4050 and up for deluxes.
While many find the dining plan not their cup of tea, unless you are planning on doing much food prep in your room and/or really really working on keeping food costs down and only doing cs and sharing and the like as rediculous as 100 per day to actually come close enough to what you would actually spend (check out the menus here at
www.wdwinfo.com) that it is a valid amount to budget for food....yeah probably you will spend less if you are staying to the counter service, esp if you kids are very young but none the less if you are looking for something to budget it works.
As far as
AAA, room only reservations with a aaa discount can be made through either disney or aaa, but aaa discounted packages can only be made through aaa.
In 2007 the deal was that for values and mods in peak season it took off 15% of the hotel portion of your reservation and 10% at the deluxes. So for a value it saved atleast 20 per night, a mod 27/night, a delux 36/night. AAA memberships for 1 are usually something like 50-60 per year. As you can see depending on your reservation your discount pays for your membership in just 2-3 nights and so then you are saving $20+ per night after the 2nd (or 3rd), you have a year of AAA roadside etc, you can get savings on any other hotels you may stay at throughout the year, with a aaa package you get a story time with a disney character, aaa diamond parking (parking similar to handicap lot), a discount at downtown disney, and discounts on tours. A downside to booking aaa is that they control your reservationmeaning you can't call disney to get info on or change anything about your reservation, you must do everything through AAA (ADRs and stuff you can still do on your own. AAA may also charge extra fees (booking, mailing, extra cancellation - not all aaa offices do this and you do NOT have to use your local office so if yours does, call a different one and ask here for a referral). If a better deal comes out through disney the aaa office can replace your aaa discount for the disney one. I booked through aaa this year even though it didn't save me anything due to the code I was using being a better disney deal. We don't mind going through aaa for the reservation and we like the story time and the parking.
)! My dh are planning a trip to DW w/ our 2 children in March. Where do I start? When do I need to book by? Is it worth it to join AAA? What is an estimate for a family of 4 to go for a week?? Sorry for all the questions, but I am truly clueless right now! Thanks so much!~
