ok - last question before we go

[Grimdogg]

So - we leave next Weds for our once in a life time family trip to Orlando - very excited!

I have but 1 more question for the forum.

We are a family of 4 - 2 adults 2 kids (5 & 8). We are staying off site (Emerald Island) and will be driving a hire car. We are staying for 16 nights and will be doing all parks excl Busch/Lego.

We have $2000 for the duration of our trip - do you think this is enough? (our children also have $300 each of their own money).

How would you budget this money?

Looking forward to your responses.

Mark

[tinytots]

So you have roughly 125 dollars a day. I would set aside any monies needed for parking fees in an envelope for each day as that can start to eat into your budget. Same for tipping and housekeeping etc. Im sure its doable, there are lots of threads on here about the subject and tips for cutting costs. Personally I think it would be a squeeze on that amount. The good thing is your children have their own cash for gift shop stuff souvenirs, which is always a bonus.
Im sure you will all have an amazing time. Like so many of us who started out on a 'once in a lifetime holiday' you will get the Florida bug and Im sure you will go again. Have a brilliant time.

[Lisatink]

Do you have the Disney dining pass, are you planning on buying lots of souviners, are you going clothes shopping?
We are a family of four and we will probably spend approximately $2500
We have been a couple of times before so we won't be buying souviners that we won't look at once home. I have been to the outlets and not really bothered this time. We will eat out most days for breakfast, get the kids to eat as many pancakes as they can handle, skip lunch but will have a snack.
We are meeting friends our there so will have a few nice meals and kids will order from the adult menu.
We will shop in Publix on the first day to get water, wine, lager and a few essentials. We are going to Clearwater for three days and will eat out there. We have tickets for Disney and Kennedy but would like to go swimming/kayaking at Kings landing. I will be taking credit card but if i budget for £200 a day sometimes we will spend more but other days hopefully less. 😉

[Runforthehills]

Its very easy to spend as much as you want around Orlando if you want to eat at the higher priced restaurants, either in Disney or off site, but IMHO your budget seems like a reasonable level say $100 per day restaurant food and $30 sundries (including food for the villa to "eat in" regularly for a meal) Presumably the kids money is all for personal purchases, I am not sure if you will have a massive amount left for "cruising the malls" but I have enjoyed Orlando on a similar budget (but probably worth having a credit card in reserve)

[Edna Cloud]

I would be working that as roughly $100 per day after car parking fee at a park. I think it is do-able, certainly, and you won't be eating dry bread every day, but not enough to go mad on, if that makes sense.

I would do a supermarket shop when you get there for villa essentials and breakfast items and then split the rest of the money into daily targets (remember the car park! ). That will help you to make decisions about meals as you go. If you have a splurge day, no problem, cut back the next day etc. Counter service meals save on tips, but table meals can give a great experience. Don't worry about it too much, but you obviously can't spend $80 a meal, every meal.

The good news is that if the children have $300 a pop to spend, you don't need to budget for treats for them!

Have a fab time

EC

[RickT]

More than enough... Kids same age and jist sat in airport now and we have spent just less than that and never gone without.. If anything wasted a lot of cash on food and drink..

[Wee_Red]

Don't panic about the initial spends. Fortunate enough to have been a number of times and tend to average out my money per day every evening (obsessive? Perhaps ) and every trip I freak out over the amount of money I spend in the first couple of days with food etc for the hotel or villa. However, I've never wanted for anything with regards to souvenirs or snacks.

Parking is $22 a day however worth noting that Disney is transferable and after 6pm Universal Studios is free to park - Disney is full price all day every day. Perhaps put all your parking money and a tank of fuel in a separate envelope?

Buy water bottles from the supermarket and freeze them overnight - they will stay cool in the parks (where water costs around $4). I'm sure you've been through plenty of threads and probably know this already but everywhere that serves food (apart from the carts) will provide you with free cups of iced water. Don't waste your money on bottled water (if you can help it of course)

Have a fantastic holiday

[twogoto]

Whenever I see 'once in a lifetime trip' I chuckle - we approached our first trip as a one time thing too. I'm sure many Dibbers will agree that you're likely to end up thinking about your second once in a lifetime trip when you get back haha.

I think the spends you've got are easily doable. We like to split ours over the duration of our trip - anything we don't spend at the end of day 1 goes into the pot for day 2, and so on. Some days you will spend more than others!

If you haven't already, make sure you sign up to the newsletter/website for any restaurants you plan to visit as you will get coupons via email. America are so huge on coupons - there's something for everything and they can help you make quite a saving over the duration of the trip.

You could also take a look at the online menus so you can see how much your meals are likely to cost. We did this before going for the first time and in most cases budgeted by looking at how much it would cost us to have the most expensive item on the menu - we then knew that regardless of what we chose, we had budgeted enough to cover it.

Theres some fab dining reports by dixonsontour budgeting on $100 per day - might be worth a look.

Have a great holiday!

[DisneyFamily]

As a general guide we take £150 per day as spending money to cover everything including parking/petrol and also anything for the kids. As you're off-site and have a car then it will be far easier to eat more cheaply which can save a ton of money over Disney prices (and is often better food). With your kids spending money as well that gives you about £125 per day which I'd say is absolutely fine if you're a little careful about not buying every expensive Disney souvenir you see.

As has been said previously, don't expect this to be a "once in a lifetime" trip

[Amystefan]

We tend to not eat meals in the parks as these can be expensive so we take sandwiches and fruit and snack foods etc with us. Our son is 4 so we take our pushchair and just load it up with drinks and a bag of things to eat. We still buy littlectreats like cake pops or mickey cookies but that’s cheaper than buying full meals.iced Water is free at the drinks carts too so utilies that and I take the Robinson’s squashed squeezy thing if wanting to give a little flavour. We also tend to eat in our accommodation for breakfast but out in restaurants at night and usually spend less than £50 for 2a 1c. (Butvthis deoends greatly on where you eat, some places are more expensive) I think your budget is doable, but if possible I’d try and keep the parking fee separate from the rest of your spending money then you won’t feel quite so annoyed at handing over the $22 to park. Tip for universal, (not sure if this is still the case but it was last year) if you go to the park after 6pm the parking charge is only $5/$10 yet the park is open til like 10pm.