How much money have you saved?

[CindyZ]

Hello everyone,

Well....yesterday I bought my park tickets from AAA. 5 of us are going for 3 days for ~$420.00. AAA has the buy 2 days get the 3rd day free...plus $10 off the normal 2 day ticket price. I am so excited to have the tickets....but soooo nervous that I'll lose them, or forget them. They're in the safe right now. It's weird that these 5 little cards are worth so much money...and represent so much glee and anticipation!

Anyway....as it get's down to trip time...I've been reflecting on how much time and hard work I've put in to saving money on this trip. And I've realized that if I were to have called a travel agent and said that I wanted 5 people to fly down to Florida for a week, rent a car, stay at the Hard Rock Hotel for 2 nights, and go to Universal Orlando for 3 days (rest of the time with my relatives)....that I think I've saved between $800 and $900 by doing it myself.

Here's my breakdown:
Airfare....$99.00/RT (111.00 with all the added stuff)MY SISTER PAID $230/RT IN JULY...good price too)

Car Rental....$167.00 for 8 days for a full size car (that's with all the stuff added..plus Emerald Club and Emerald Isle) MY SISTER PAID $220 FOR A STANDARD CAR

Hard Rock Hotel....117.00 Garden View with Entertainment Card wheras normal price is 189/night. (ok, here is where I could save more money...but I am sooooo looking forward to FOTL!!...this is one perk I'm willing to pay for!)

Ticket prices....$85/adult and $75/child for 3 day passes through AAA....normal Gate prices are 106/adult and 92/child.

I think that I've done pretty well. And I owe many many thanx to the many posters on this board. 2 years ago I found the DIS board for my first WDW trip...and did very well there too...so when I decided to MAYBE go to Universal Orlando...I remembered there was a section for Universal.....and I was not dissapointed. First thing I learned was about the Entertainment card Discount for the HRH. I am SO very grateful for this board.

As a matter of fact...it looks as if I do need a cheap(ish) hotel for our night before we fly home...and I think that I should patronize the Clarion....as a thank you to this board...hmmm...good idea.

How about anyone else. How much have you saved?....any deals I missed?....

 

[gschmerl]

You said you put in a lot of time and hard work. If you figure your "hourly rate" how much money did you really save?
I guess I'm lazy. We booked a package through AAA. It cost maybe $200 more than we would have spent doing it all on our own. To us, the time and effort we didn't have to put in to it was worth it.

 

[CindyZ]

I have spent hours on this...but not so many to have it not be worth it. $200 for ease and convienience...does seem worth it. But $800-900 savings is worth the time to find the discounts. The time has been spread out over many months. And, in reading these boards and finding out about discounts..I've had the chance to read about practical tips such as the short cut to Dueling Dragons....the fountain..where to eat...what to avoid/what's a must-not-miss etc. I even learned about the cameras to plan a Cybermeet..(if only they get working again!) Plus, I've become so much more knowledgable for future trips. Plus just the reassurance and knowledge in knowing that such trips are possible for us in the future because of the possible discounts.

Also...i enjoyed it! It's like a hobby...a challenge...and it brought me joy to see the savings...so that in itself made it better. It was so great to tell my DH...(who doesn't like to spend ANY money).. "Hey honey...just saved us about $600 on airfare...just saved us $72/night on hotel....just saved us $80.00 on car rental..etc."

I am extremely budgeted...and my practical side knows I shouldn't even be taking this trip..that I should paint the house instead. But I am so excited to give me and my kids joyful vacation memories.

Boy...am I a chatter box today or what?

 

[Catd76]

I agree that if you do it yourself, you save alot of money (no matter how long it takes you to find them!!) I think I am the ultimate bargain hunter and love to find awesome deals. I just went to WDW and US/IOA for the first time this past June and loved it so much that I am going back next month with my sister who had never been to either of them. I really didn't have the money to be taking another vacation so soon after the last but I had alot of vacation time left at work and wanted to take full advantage, even though my husband (who has no vaca time left) and 6 year old daughter (who will be in school) weren't thrilled that I was going back without them this time!! I convinced my sister who is coming up on her 30th birthday (and feeling very depressed about it), that we should plan a trip to Orlando since she hasn't been on vaca since our family vacations with my parents more than 10 years ago!!! I said "You're almost 30, what are you waiting for???" She immediately agreed as long as I could find some really great deals to get us there. So my challenge began!! I booked the airfare for $99.00 round trip from Orbitz.com on US Airways from Providence, which is great!!! Got the Universal tickets through AAA for $86.00 per person for a 2 day multipass w/3rd day free, and got the WDW 4 day park hopper for $185.00 per person through the Disney Club. I searched high and low for a decent hotel that wouldn't cost us much money since we plan on spending all our time at the parks anyway and only using the hotel to sleep and store our stuff. I booked the Days Inn Lakeside which is 1 mile from Universal and about 7 miles from WDW. It's right around the corner from International Drive so there is alot of stuff nearby. I got all different prices for the same hotel through all different websites, so I booked the cheapest. Through Travelzoo.com, I got a weeks stay for $21.00 per night ($147.00 for the whole week), thats tough to beat! Also, our dad travels for business all the time and has thousands of points racked up on his Budget Rent a Car card so he got us a certificate for a Full Size rental car for the whole week for free. So, besides all that, we just need spending money for food, etc. Can't wait to go....6 more weeks!!!!

 

[nhrenee]

HATS OFF to Cat and Cindy!! Good job saving major $$!

 

[KimCon]

I just wanted to say congratulations on all of your great prices!!
I absolutely love doing all of my own work, I look at it as a challenge! It kind of justifies all of my time on the net too!! LOL

Kim

 

[Robinrs]

Cindy...WOW!

I love these boards for this reason the most!

I have literally saved THOUSANDS of dollars from the info I've learned here, enough to make me feel like the world's biggest schmoe

for booking my first trip BEFORE finding this place...

I learned about Priceline, The Emerald Aisle, the S/D discounts, the Ga Lottery discount for USF tickets, not to mention the countless things sent to me by posters who could not use them. Those are the things I treasure the most!

 

[CindyZ]

I've added to my savings!!

It has turned out that I need to stay in Orlando longer than planned (not back to Daytona for the last couple of days); so I ended up bidding for a hotel room on priceline and got the Radisson Universal for 25/night!!! I got the biddingfortravel link from these boards...did my homework there...and then got the 25/night on my first try!!

This is exciting!!

Leaving in less than 2 days!!

 

[Robinrs]

My goodness, Cindy, YOU were the one I congratulated on THAT coup! You are the budget goddess!!

 

[CindyZ]

I owe many thanx to the people on this board so willing to share.

 

[Disneydenise]

We are 2 adults and two teens so we had 4 adult 3 day passes from AAA and I just fgured it out with everything we came in at 1300 for 3 nights 4 days. I think we did great. .

 

[h20jag]

Very nice savings everyone's been getting!
And it's not hard work finding them here either, huh? I'm very grateful of all the helpful advice we've put to good use from everyones' sharing here.
All that money being saved must mean one thing...more UO trips!
Jim

 

[NancyIL]

Congratulations, Cindy, on a job well done!

 

[jstmee]

Okay, I don't think I got any savings, but the PBH portion of our trip is now paid for. Woohoo!!! We have 2 adults, 2 juniors and 2 children so we needed two rooms. We have PBH bay view rooms, two of them and the 2 day passes with one extra day complimentary.heee with the prices I can't seem to believe anything is complimentary. But I definately wanted the FOTL access. We go to WDW for the first 8 nights, then we will go over to PBH for remaining 3 nights. The best part for use was that I made the reservation through Universal Vacations, paid it off and now I am DONE with it. I did shop around though.... The package we are on is a buy one room, get one room 1/2 off.

I am still messing with the WDW stuff for better rates, etc. But I also enjoy doing the leg work.