Budget for a “not a budget trip”

[Jaina]

When we do a bare bones trip for our family of 7, it's $2000-3500. This upcoming trip we are taking advantage of the promotional tickets (3-day non hoppers), staying at the Best Western by the Toy Story Lot, bringing in a lot of our food and snacks, and driving and it will be around $2750 total. That doesn't include any souvenirs, but if the kids want those, they'll have to bring their own money. I'll take lots of pictures and video for my contribution to their memories. ;-) Even with driving, we could spend $5000 easily if we were staying closer/with more room, getting park hoppers, getting some souvenirs, maybe some character dining.

 

[PHXscuba]

If you aren't doing the trip until next year you are most likely getting rack rates as you search. If you have points for flights, then hotel costs will probably be your biggest expense. Having a couple of alternative ideas for where you want to splurge or save is always good. With young kids I'd value paying a little extra for comfort, proximity, etc. but not so much for food they won't appreciate and cheap plastic souvenirs.

PHXscuba

 

[katyringo]

If you aren't doing the trip until next year you are most likely getting rack rates as you search. If you have points for flights, then hotel costs will probably be your biggest expense. Having a couple of alternative ideas for where you want to splurge or save is always good. With young kids I'd value paying a little extra for comfort, proximity, etc. but not so much for food they won't appreciate and cheap plastic souvenirs.

PHXscuba

I was basing it on package prices for get away today for the same time this year. I know it will fluctuate a bit and we might see another ticket price increase before they release 2020 packages..

 

[sherilaine]

We are family of 4 flying from Calgary, staying 7 nights in the kids suites at HOJO and buying the 5 day PH with MP through the Canadian ticket promotion. We are renting a car and will not be doing any character meals or special dining but will eat in the parks as we need and then at some of the offsite restaurants. My DD and I may go to Universal for one day since she's become a crazy Harry Potter fan since our last trip and my DH is going to the KISS concert. Our trip will be around $6000 and that is without the exchange rate being factored in for hotel, car rental and park tickets and all our local spending.

 

[lcp9]

I can't really comment on total price b/c we have a Marriott gig that makes our hotel cost like zero, and we also have 5 billion kids, BUT. I would pay rack rate for the Courtyard. The bunk beds make it killer - we really only have 4 kids, but having the bunk beds to put the two oldest in makes it so we can fit a pack and play, and still have room. There's lots of useful space. We stayed over Halloween, and the waterpark was cold but the kids didn't care. I have been very loyal to the RI convention center on our trips b/c of all the space and the full kitchen, but the bunk bed situation makes me like the Courtyard more I think.

 

[MacMama0930]

Last family trip to DLR in December 2017, we stayed CL at the Grand for 4 nights and booked a VIP Tour...so it was ridiculous. We do like to stay onsite, though, and fell in love with CL, which right now at the Grand runs close to 1k a night.

 

[theluckyrabbit]

We’ve stayed at Hojo and the Anaheim hotel. My son is out growing the little water park at hojo. It really is the water park that grabs our attention at this hotel.

Posters here have commented on an age/height restriction for some of the water slides at the Courtyard, so make sure your little ones are old/tall enough before booking! I remember someone posting that one of his kids wasn't able to use the slides (Woe to him! That was one unhappy kid!) and it never occurred to him to check beforehand.

 

[HannaBelle]

and we also have 5 billion kids...

Thank you for my morning laugh, to read it is only 4 made it even funnier! DH and I stopped at 2, we did not want to be out numbered but looking back I would have loved to have had 4.


As far as "non" budget trip goes, this is my cost guesstimate for our 2 person for a 6 day / 5 night trip:

Flights on Delta using AmEx points $-
Grand Californian Studio Villa Rental $1,800.00 (Renting from David's Vacation Club)
4 Day Park Hopper @ $350.95 each $702.00 (Undercover Tourist)
15 Meals PP at $25 a meal average $- (using our disney dollars from our disney visa)
Ground Transportation $260.00 (Hiring a car service for round trip transportation from LAX to the Grand Cali)
Total Budget $2,502.00

We don't really buy "souvenirs", I am activity getting rid of stuff and don't need more unless it is photographs! We are traveling at Halloween, so I am sure we will have some fun snacks!

If we were not able to fly using points and buy food using points, I think our budget would be closer to $4,200 with $600 for flights and $800 for food.

 

[DLgal]

We did a 10 nighter at WDW last summer and went all out. It was just around $11k all in. To me, $1000/day is about right when you are going all out.

 

[MrsD.Duck]

My husband and I are going down just the two of us in July. Doing one day and a night at the knotts berry farm and their hotel. Then 5 day parkhopper with maxpass and 5 nights at the grand. So 203.00 for knotts, 5 day parkhopper and max pass and 5 night park view at the grand 6100.00 and flight 716.00, woc dessert and fantasmic dinner planned and i can honestly say that this will most likely be our last trip because disney is pricing us out. After 30 years and working our way up to the Grand right after it opened we have decided to explore other vacation spots since it will be just the two of us. We did our honeymoon there and will celebrate our 30th anniversary there, but we have reached our budget on disney.

 

[Winnowill]

Our 8-day trip to WDW in 2014 ran us (family of three) $6,000. We live in AZ, so we drive when we go to DL - my BFF and I with our daughters did five days (four hotel nights) at DL in June/July last year and spent about $2000 each, sharing our hotel room. We did some special things, though - the Afternoon Tea at the DLH, Fantasmic! dining at BB, and some others. We'd have done the WOC Dessert Party, but, alas - no WOC.

 

[Malcon10t]

<closes eyes> I don't like looking at the bills after a trip.

 

[FeistyDisneyMom]

Family of 7, and bringing 2 uncles and a cousin with us on our upcoming Spring Break trip. Rented a house within walking distance for around 2500, and 4-day hoppers look to be around 3k for us (still debating how many days of MP we will get). All in all, the housing and park tickets will be about 5k, we are driving and that'll be about $350 in fuel, and we're planning on 4-5k for food and souvenirs (including some items I am buying in advance to surprise kids with when we get there). Last trip was just our family of 6 at the time, and our youngest didn't need a ticket. We got a packaged deal through Alaska. I believe flights, hotel, tickets, food and souvenirs ended up just over 5k that trip. I priced out GCH just for the heck of it, and it would have been over twice as much for tickets/hotel, even with the current promo so I couldn't justify it this time.

 

[wingednike]

I know this will be highly subjective.

But for those of you who plan big trips and don’t necessarily try to do them on cheap- what does your total cost look like?

When my brother and his family were here for 6 days, my vacation fund easily took a hit of about $3500 and we didn't do half of the stuff you've planned. Sounds like you will have a memorable vacation

Since the waterpark is a draw, have you considered staying at Great Wolf Lodge? They run special rates frequently and there is shuttle service to Disneyland.

 

[theluckyrabbit]

I plan on taking my Mom to Universal on May 27th. We will only be able to visit one day and I want to be certain she has the best experience since this will probably be our one and only time at the park, due to finances and her age. She loves Harry Potter so I plan on purchasing the Park-to-Park tickets so we can visit everything associated with Harry Potter. My question is, since she's older and her legs give out after quite a bit of walking I plan on renting a scooter/ECV. I was also going to buy the express passes but after speaking with a coworker I was advised to save my money (since we are working on a budget) and not buy the express pass since we are renting the ECV. They said since we will have the ECV we will be sent through the express pass lanes? This didn't sound correct to me so that's why I'm reaching out to everyone here. What would you ladies and gentlemen suggest I do? Again, she will need the ECV and we are working on a budget. Any ideas or help you can give will be greatly appreciated. Also, since we are going on a Holiday, May 27th should I expect the park to be extremely crowded? If so we could wait and go on the 28th if that would be better. The resort where we are staying told me not to buy my tickets in advance because they have deals and specials running that could save me up to 40% off per ticket. Is this a scam or is this something most local resorts offer?

I'm moving this to the Southern California Theme Parks forum -- there are a lot of DISers there who have quite a bit of USH knowledge. I'm sure you'll get lots of good help there!

 

[katyringo]

When my brother and his family were here for 6 days, my vacation fund easily took a hit of about $3500 and we didn't do half of the stuff you've planned. Sounds like you will have a memorable vacation

Since the waterpark is a draw, have you considered staying at Great Wolf Lodge? They run special rates frequently and there is shuttle service to Disneyland.

We go to great wolf often as we live close to one.. it’s our vacation home away from Disney lol!

 

[wingednike]

We go to great wolf often as we live close to one.. it’s our vacation home away from Disney lol!

My niece and nephew loved it there. We did a character meal at Storytellers just to get some Disney into the trip, but they couldn't wait to go back afterwards.