How our "budget" trip is adding up...

[sablair]

This board has saved us a lot of money on our upcoming trip in Jul!! Will be the first time for all of us. We have paid for everything but our food and misc so I thought I would post our costs so others planning can see/use for their trips if they are just starting out.

Costs for 4 people, 8 nights, seven days - two adults, one teenager, and a 7 yr old.

Roundtrip Airfare from B'ham, AL: $125 x 4 = $500
(discount with USair from a tip on this board!.. this is a real LUXURY for us and DD's first time to fly!!)

Rental car (compact) for 8 days: $160 through hotwire.com

Hotel offsite through priceline, 8 nights at $40 a night (Renaissance Maingate and Marriott DD) = $360

4-day hopper passes (3 ADLT, 1 CH) = $564
(MIL discount) We didnt do AP or hopper plus because four park days are enough for us. We are planning to do Kennedy (hopefully shuttle launch! and a day at cocoa beach)

Kennedy Space Center tickets: $80

Total cost so far: $1664.00

Im amazed at the savings we found.. thanks to all of you!! When I think that $660 is for flying and rental car Im even more thrilled because we could do a drive down for $1000 + food and Misc

DH and I will buy Pleasure Island passes. Mary Waring's site says we can probably get an unlimited pass for $26 per person. We are planning on taking a couple hours at night after the kiddies are snoozing
We will eat bfast in the room, take snacks to the park, eat late lunches and counter service meals except for two character meals, a sit down the first and last night.

I think $100 a day for food and $200 for souv. sounds about right, making our total trip estimate $2564... that is less than $100 per person per day. AND! That is $2000 cheaper than the Disney vacation package I was quoted for 5 days, 6 nights when I first started planning and without a DC membership or AP discounts.

Thanks to everyone for your advice and tips! I will let you know the total cost after we return in Jul.

 

[curlyjbs]

These boards sure did save us money!!

Family of 5 (2 adults 3 kids)

airfare: priceline $99 ea. + tx. = $605
Tix: 5 day hoppers w/ DC disc. = $970
Car rental: full size for 9 days w/ National = $173
Hotel: HIFS = $936 + tx
food budget: $800
2 charactor dinners = +- $200 (chef mickeys 1st night & last night)
Sea world = $0 (tix were a gift)

.......we are not big souvenier people. Maybe a t-shirt or hat and the kids each have $100 in disney dollars.

Approx. total: $3684.00 (hopefully car rental will go lower and hotel will offer BOGO like last Oct.)

Not bad for a family of 5! ( we usually spend $3000 for a week at the jersey shore! )

I know that with "codes" we could have stayed on property for less than HIFS but we don't want a small cramped room.

anyone else save a bundle???

 

[merryweather's twin]

Well we saved big this trip too!
We are going in June and are a family of 5 and 1/2!
Air with priceline $620.
Car is full size with Hotewire $167. for 7days.
We are using our AP from a trip last Oct.
Staying at Sheraton Safari for 7 nights for $428.68!
And we will have breakfast in room and about $150. a day in food. The kids have there own spending money and this is our 4th trip in a year so we have all t-shirts we need! We also have enuff moleskin and all the other must haves so my trip to Wal-mart pre trip won't break the bank!

 

[Hygiene99]

MERRYWeathers twin

i think u should upgrade to allstars
stay on site for a much better trip

there is a code for that resort at www.mousesavers.com
forget the car use mears to get to the resort .
if u drive to the parks there is 5 dollars parking
if u use mears it will only cost 100.oo instead of car
at 160.00 u save 60.00 and and u can
use that 60.00 for the upgrade to on site
l odging ... throw the keys away ... then u can go to epcot show and fantasmic at mgm and hop on bus back to resort... much better the cost for allstars is
50.00 per night..... why do u need car ????
mears run 24/7 and have had no probleem with them
i even have coupon for couple of bucks off each
person that disney will send u when u book a room threw them..

peter,,,

 

[cindala]

Boy, do I know what you mean about the Jersey Shore!
The hotels, (decent ones on the ocean) are about $250-$275 per nite in July. Then add the cost of the boardwalk and those expensive dissappointing rides and arcades!

That's why we stopped doing Wildwood, and started with WDW. Now just have to worry about the fires!

 

[merryweather's twin]

I guess I should have been clearer we have suite with a living room and pull out sofa and a bedroom with 2 queen beds and a pool with a waterslide that looks like a snake so we are happy with that for the money. We stayed at the all-stars last year but we decided aginst it this time becouse we have 3 kids and I wiil be 6-7 mo pregnant with #4 and Dh and I wanted some private time... And no busses! Being smushed with a bunch of people on a bus holding a 20mo 7mo pregnant did not sound fun to me. Plus we wanted to have a car in case we needed to go see a OBGYN.... We had DS 5 weeks early. We have AP's so we don't pay parking at all. Thank you for replying to my post ! We hope to be back on WDW soil for our trip in Oct!inkbounc

 

[Mic]

Hello, Merryweather's twin,
I thought your budget looked great! We, too, have 4 kids(you are about to join the ranks of us true fools!)and AP's...it was the only way to go...that expire in October. I, too, would rent a car...Mears, for a family of 5,in one word...NO! We usually stay on-site(could not do that without DVC)but have stayed off-site, too, to stretch our points, taking advantage of AP holders free parking perk. I just have one question...How did you get such a great rate on your hotel?

 

[FlounderFish]

I admit it...I am a LURKER. But, this lurker owes you all a big THANK YOU for all the helpful hints that resulted in the following July vacation:

Dolphin for 10 nights @$115 a night (Military rate from Shades of Green overflow)
Airfare from San Antonio for four people @$100 + 75 candy bars per person (remember that Hershey/Southwest promo?)
Ibex to and from the airport=$75 (I'm not driving, no way)
Passes: free this 10-day trip! We went last December and bought Annual Passes! Going for a total of 20 days for the price of about 8!

No way I would of made these smart moves on my own...thanks to all of you!

Flounder

 

[woody62798]

A family of 7; 2 adults and DK, 14, 13, 11,10,8. We are still in some of the planning and "early procurement" stages. We are going to WDW at the end of Aug, 8 days, 7 nights.
Thanks to Mary's site, we got a great rate at the wilderness cabins; 148/nite = 1046. Airfare 150 x7 = 1050. Our first Hoop De Doo review dinner $262.

What I'm still trying to resolve is... rental car or Tiffinay Towne car.. Reason..we want to spenp one day at sea world, and on sat we don't depart until 6 pm, so flexibility for last day is issue. 2nd.. what type of pass to buy and from who ( 5 day, 5day+, etc from SOG or home military base or via DC) my first est. for a 5 day+ and one day at SW for all 7 of us comes to @$1800

The tickets and the rental car are the big ones...
we will do a character meal, but at least breakfast and one other meal in the cabin every day. Still looking at @4-4.5K.. kind of pricy!

Anyone with more "money saving" suggestions please feel free to "contribute" your 2 cents worth!

Thanks

 

[Loan]

OK, OK....I have to share my budget joy! This is our first trip EVER, and I needed to do it as cheaply as possible and I think I did pretty well thanks to everyone here at the boards!
Me, DH, DD(10) and DS(7)
Airfare-808.00
Passes-4 day park hopper 790.00 (DC discount)....maybe could have done better, but too late now !
6 nights at ASMu -450.00
Tiffany Town Car 100.00 (grocery stop ...will buy snacks,breakfast food,water etc approx 100.00 worth, will save tons on snacks and breakfasts)

2248.00 total plus 1,000 spending and food=$ 3248 !

 

[RweTHEREyet]

Woody, regarding your car rental dilemma. If it would help any, you can rent right from the National desk at the Dolphin. You can get a one-day rental for a lot less than then weekly or for several days. Last trip I picked up at the airport and used for 2 days and then returned to the Dolphin with no problems. It worked well.

 

[mainey-mouse]

We saved $700 CDN on airfair for 4 by flying out of Buffalo on Southwestern, rather than flying out of Toronto. This is thanks tip tips on this board. This was our biggest board-related savings. But besides the $$$ saved, it really was worth the drive to go through Buffalo - handled the boarder crossing independantly of an airport, and the Buffalo airport was so much easier to navigate than Pearson. I'd definitely do this again, even with less substantial savings.

With the discount codes discovered through this board, we also factored in 2 nights at PO-RS just to try out a Disney Resort. It was definitely worth it at $89 US /night. The going rate was I beleive $149 US/night. I was curious enough about the DRs that I think I'd have tried one regardless - and it would probably have been at rack rate. Having been to one - no, I'd never pay rack rate for a DR. But now that I know where to find the deals, I might try another some day. And most importantly, I don't feel that I wasted any money trying one.

We rented a full size car for $21 US /day through priceline - again priceline was something we found out about through these boards. Previous quotes were $30 US/day and above. We also went to St Petes beach, so we did enough driving that we appreciated not being crammed into an small car.

I don't think we actually SAVED any money - we just spent it on other vacation things - buying what we wanted, eating what where and when we wanted. We had an extra $1000 CDN to spend on whatever, that otherwise would not have been there. Being me, worrying about money is not relaxing while on vacation, so I'm really glad I was able to arrange all my savings beforehand - and then just really enjoy the vacation.