Do you think financial security is going to become more important than holidays?

[mrsbenny]

Yes of course I do but I tend to book holidays quite far in advance and pay a deposit. I won’t have all the money at that point for holiday but it comes out of a different savings pot for holidays if that makes sense. We are lucky and have a low mortgage and live in the north east where living is quite cheap compared to other places. We are both full time and put a set amount away for holidays and any emergencies.

[TheHughesCrew]

I think our holiday plans may change in the future, but we will still try to get a 2 week break somewhere. But maybe a cheap apartment in Spain, or a caravan in France etc. We do try and pay for our holidays up front, and rarely put anything on a credit card that isn't paid off immediately. Our family downtime is so important to us. We also very often have 2 foreign holidays a year, and make use of my brother's house in Portugal, but going forwards perhaps we may 'only' have 1 holiday. Who knows though. At the moment, I'm still working, as is my husband. Our outgoings are relatively low compared to our income so we should be able to ride the storm. But the future is quite uncertain at the moment.

[choccielover]

We are in a very fortunate position financially and I’ve always been very sensible with our saving. Yes we have historically spent a lot of money on holidays but as a % of our disposable income it wasn’t that much really.
We have 2 holidays booked this year and had another 2 planned. I suspect the July holiday won’t go ahead - and I’m fine with that, people are dying so me not going on holiday isn’t something I’m going to moan or even care about - and I’m not sure about Florida in oct. We won’t book any others either in these uncertain times.

At this time I believe/hope our jobs are secure but as with most high income families we have a not insubstantial lifestyle. Again we’ve always been sensible to not even live up to our means and we can easily make significant cuts to discretionary spend and live very well.
So I’m answer to your question, I’m not making changes yet but I’m fully prepared to should I feel it’s necessary and I think taking holidays will be taken out of our hands for a while regardless.

[disney_l81]

We have been very fortunate that we were able to pay our mortgage off last year so we just have bills to pay, we also dont have anything on finance. I'm worried about all the people who are going to suffer financial hardship, some losing their jobs. Weve always put financial security high on our list of priorities, we have substantial savings.

Our jobs are likely to be secure, I work in healthcare and hubby in technology. I dont think there is anything we arent already doing to save money. At this time I'm giving more of my money to supporting local businesses in the hope they can weather this storm.

I do think the current situation will be a wake up call for many with regards to their finances though.

[LizzyBear]

Originally Posted by munmun

It's interesting that none of the replies are from people who put their holidays on a credit card without the funds to pay it off.

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I think partly because this forum has a lot of people who are very secure financially, other Disney groups I'm on ie facebook I've read a few comments from people who have remortgaged (yikes!), got loans or otherwise really stretched themselves financially to afford a holiday to Florida. My OH's sister used a loan to take their daughter to DLP, crazy thing is they could have saved up but didnt want to sacrifice the rest of their lifestyle! I wonder if that sort of thinking will end though and people will still go on holiday but be more inclined to save for it first.

[Neil & Stella]

Originally Posted by rasmus

Yes we run the family pub.
Most things have been ordered to close apart from the essentials, supermarkets, pharmacies etc.

We have no savings, no money coming in till may at the very, very earliest.
I'm terrified at how we are going to cope-I dont see it ending well

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Now that sounds scary. Stella is already looking at making cutbacks to our trip in May if it does go ahead, no hire car, spending more time at the hotel, fewer day trips, etc, because we don't know how our work is going to be affected. If we do come we will still come to spend a bit in your establishment

We're also booked for Krakow in July and Prague in December. Flights and accomodation are all booked and paid for, but unlike Corfu they're not all-inclusive, so food, drink and the like are all out of pocket. If there was a cut off date for this Coronavirus we would be able to able to make plans and budget accordingly, but everything is so fluid at the moment.

Stellas work is already looking at lay-offs and short time, DD has had her hours cut to her contracted hours of 20 per week down from upwards of 45, my work is ok so far, but it's not guaranteed to stay that way as we send parts mainly to Europe and get at least 2 containers a month from the US and China. If we can't get stuff in, we can't send it out.

We can survive this thing IF it can be brought under control sharpish. If it drags on for months we will be struggling, both financially and mentally.

[tspill]

This is quite a good flowchart.
flowchart.ukpersonal.finance

[Bootrip2]

Originally Posted by tspill

This is quite a good flowchart.
flowchart.ukpersonal.finance

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Interesting, will work my way through thoroughly if i get spare time over the next 12 weeks!

[klr15]

My mum brought me up on her own, she worked 60 hours a week and we still struggled at times, I was always very worried about money as a child and I didn’t ask for much.

As a result I’ve always placed financial security over holidays, I have anxiety about losing my job, some nights I don’t sleep because I’m worried I might lose my job, it’s crazy but true.

Both my other half and I both have our savings built up in our separate accounts and we have a joint account with savings in too. We don’t have a credit card, have a small mortgage and we don’t book a holiday until we’ve already got the money in the bank for it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m no saint, and I do sometimes feel massive guilt at spending 5k on one disney holiday, but there’s a part of me that wants to enjoy my money while I can because
It’s a novelty to me.

People live how they live I guess, my mum always lived hand to mouth until very recently, but she didn’t have the money to put into savings and it wasn’t possible for her to have financial security, but we didn’t have holidays either (except the ones in caravans which my nan and grandad paid and took us on).

[tspill]

Originally Posted by LizzyBear

I think partly because this forum has a lot of people who are very secure financially, other Disney groups I'm on ie facebook I've read a few comments from people who have remortgaged (yikes!), got loans or otherwise really stretched themselves financially to afford a holiday to Florida. My OH's sister used a loan to take their daughter to DLP, crazy thing is they could have saved up but didnt want to sacrifice the rest of their lifestyle! I wonder if that sort of thinking will end though and people will still go on holiday but be more inclined to save for it first.

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To be quite honest, anyone who does this deserves all they get. People have to live with their choices.