When I first saw this thread, we were still trying to figure out our plans - now we've gotten quite a bit firmed up. Some background - I will be going with DH and DDs 8, 5 & 5 in August for 8 days. I've been wanting to rent DVC for a LONG time, and finally had DH ok with doing that. When I was trying to compare pricing with that from WDW, the Disney site didn't have any 1Br DVCs available at Boulder Ridge. Long story short, when we were communicating with the lady we rented from, I showed DH the pricing for the 1br because that's all that was available, and he ok'd it, but he was thinking of a number that I had given him that included dining plan and tickets, not just the room. So, the trip is costing us almost $2k more.
Here are the numbers so far:
Estimate Actual
BRV 1br $ 2,040.00 $ 3,825.00 <- paid $960
Dining Plan $ 1,597.65 $ 1,597.65
Tickets $ 2,198.02 $ 2,228.75
Flight $ 2,000.00 $ 1,534.80 <-- bought already (on CC to be paid off this month)
Souvenirs $ 500.00 $ 500.00
Tips** $ 300.00 $ 300.00
MNSSHP $ 370.00 $ 0.00
Groceries $ 80.00 $ 80.00
Childcare (for Adult Night Out) $ 130.00 $ 130.00
Stroller (OSR) $ 86.00 $ 86.00
Dog Boarding? $ 500.00 $ 383.00
Hotel w points $ 0.00
$ 0.00
Parking long term $ 96.00 $ 96.00
Totals $ 10,077.67
$ 10,761.20
Paid so far (this will change) $ 2,494.80
BRV Estimate was for a Studio, Actual is what it really is. We paid $960 so far for this. The remainder (and the Dining Plan) is due in June.
Dining plan - I don't expect prices to change.
Tickets - we're still not sure if we want to do 6 day parkhopper or 5 day parkhopper. I think the original number was for 5day parkhopper+. I'm hoping to get them through
Undercover Tourist before they run out of the old priced tickets. If not, that number will probably go up.
Flights - Bought! I booked them on SW on Feb. 15th, and they were less than I estimated. YAY! PLUS, with SW we don't pay for luggage.
Souvenirs - I'm estimating $500, which is definitely high, but I include the PhotoPass photos ($169) in there, because that's MY souvenir.
Tips - Just a guess - I'm counting $5/day for mousekeeping, plus TS dinners, plus bellhops, etc.
MNSSHP - I put it in there as an estimate, but I don't really see the NEED to go. So that's a savings of $370 right there!
Groceries - I'm guessing $80 for the breakfast basics. We'll also have the dining plan, which I plan to use for lunch and dinner.
Childcare - this is another thing I can drop if I have to, but I don't want to! We'll be celebrating our anniversary while we're in WDW (21 years), and I'd like to have a nice dinner out.
Stroller - I priced out the cost for a double stroller, which I'm still debating. I posed the question on the Disboards FB site, and it came down pretty strongly on getting a stroller. If we need to, I can cut the cost by either getting a single and/or cutting the number of days.
Dog boarding - that's at home, of course. I estimated a bit high, although I'm still going to try to save up the estimated amount, because something ALWAYS pops up with this dog while he's being boarded. (They are a safe and wonderful place and I trust them completely - I just got "burned" once when we had him neutered at a late stage because he was a rescue, and he reacted badly to the meds, and what should have cost us only $400 was well over $1k!)
Hotel with points - we're going to BWI instead of PHL because we had better choices for flights, AND the parking is MUCH better there. Luckily, I accrue hotel points through my workplace, so I'm hoping we can score a free stay. Worst case, it'll be $180 for the night.
Parking - this is for the parking at BWI.
And this is what we're doing
- We currently have $911 (now $961) in Disney Dollars through our Disney Visa (it's been a LONG time since we've used the points!) I'm guessing that by August we'll be over $1k. I could use that for tips & souvenirs or pay for part of my flights. We're using the $961 to help defray the costs for the flights.
- I earn money through eBates - all of that is going towards our trip. ($117 in February)
- In December, I sold quite a few things on my local FB yardsales. I haven't yet deposited that, but it was a couple hundred dollars. I'm still aggressively cleaning out my house, so I'm hoping to make a couple hundred more. So far haven't made any more.
- We just got our dependent care amount ($2k) and our Federal Tax refund ($2900)
- I'm going to ask that for the girls' birthdays (and mine) that we be given Disney GCs.
- My healthcare through my company offers incentives - I think I have about $25 dollars more (unfortunately I spent the other $175 already).
- Any hotel points that I can transfer to GCs for use elsewhere to free up "cash" for this trip.
- I started Swagbucks on 2/27, and have about 1700SB as of 3/10. I'm hoping that I could get about $50 before we leave?