How much extra spending money do you budget into your trips?

[HollyM7813]

Hey ya'll!! We'll be heading to the World June 6th, 2 adults, 1 Disney adult, and one child, staying 6 nights at CBR with 5 day base tickets and the DxDDP.

I was just curious as to how much you all budget for your extras (souvenirs, tips, misc., etc).

So far I've budgeted $200 in spending money per kid, $250 for tips, and saved about $900 for extras or misc things that may come up.

 

[dpswift]

I think you are low on tip amounts. With 12 TS meals for four people it is really going to add up. There are very few meals at Disney that will be less than $100 for four. I think that unless you want a splurge souvenir or 2 you should have plenty in you extras category.

Have a great time.

 

[JenB1104]

My tip budget is 210.00 - I figured 20% on all meals and used the allears.net to estimate amounts. We are eating breakfast in the room several days and are a family of 3. Our Disney visa rewards card has 300.00 on it for souvenirs and DD has about 120.00 of her own money saved. Don't forget luggage tips too.

 

[Marionnette]

Hey ya'll!! We'll be heading to the World June 6th, 2 adults, 1 Disney adult, and one child, staying 6 nights at CBR with 5 day base tickets and the DxDDP.

I was just curious as to how much you all budget for your extras (souvenirs, tips, misc., etc).

So far I've budgeted $200 in spending money per kid, $250 for tips, and saved about $900 for extras or misc things that may come up.

I agree with PPs. Your tip budget is very light for a family of 4 on the DxDP. Take a look at the menus on allears.net and add an 18%-20% for each restaurant that you have ADRs for. Some dining (like CRT and in-room dining) will include the gratuity in the cost of the meal. But most others do not. Don't forget tips for skycaps at the airport, your DME driver and anyone who handles your baggage at WDW.

Since your "misc." budget is very generous, I think you might want to divert some of that money toward tips.

 

[Judique]

You should at least double the tip area as you have the Disney deluxe dining plan. That is a possible 18 table service meals. Lots of food! The expectation is that you will tip 18 percent on your table services.

You can go to the menus on allears,net and get an idea of what a meal will cost.

 

[mom2AidanAndEli]

Have you ever done the Deluxe dining? Unless you're doing a lot of 2-credit signature meals, that's a TON of food! And a ton of time spent getting to ADRs, waiting for tables, eating, and getting back to parks. Plus a lot of money for tips. Do you have a plan on how which restaurants you're going to? You could save a lot of money with just the regular dining plan and putting the extra to a couple OOP meals if there's really that much you want to do.

 

[HollyM7813]

Thanks for the advice! My tip amount doesn't include mousekeeping or bell services as I've already got those divided out into envelopes, and we're not flying, so no skycaps or DME. I've gone online for all the menus of our ADRs and figured out our bill, based on the most expensive things I thought my family would eat and still came up with about $250. I will budget a bit more towards it though to be on the safe side. We're only doing TS more than once on one day. All other days are CS for Breakfast and lunch and TS for dinners, including CRT where the gratuity is included.

 

[eliza61]

Another vote for diverting some of the miscellaneous cash to the tip jar.

Now as for souvenirs, is this your first visit? The reason why I ask is because first timers can often underestimate the Disney merchandise machine. LOL. Does anyone else notice that just about every Disney attraction dumps you into a gift shop.
Magic Kingdom is the worst, going down main street you run a gauntlet of gift shops.
Whew, our first trip we were out of control.

We've been a few times so we know the things we tend to always like. We love tee-shirts/hoodies so I always budget one for each person. After that generally my sons got 100.00 bucks each for gifts.

I'm probably the worst offender, lol. I enjoy downtown disney especially the kitchen stuff.
So for my family of four (when the kids were small) , usually 500 bucks was more than enough. ~130.00 for tee shirts/hoodies and then each kid got another 100.00.

I don't like "pre buying" clothing, imo the object of a souvenir is to remember the trip so I like to actually get it at disney.

 

[eliza61]

Thanks for the advice! My tip amount doesn't include mousekeeping or bell services as I've already got those divided out into envelopes, and we're not flying, so no skycaps or DME. I've gone online for all the menus of our ADRs and figured out our bill, based on the most expensive things I thought my family would eat and still came up with about $250. I will budget a bit more towards it though to be on the safe side. We're only doing TS more than once on one day. All other days are CS for Breakfast and lunch and TS for dinners, including CRT where the gratuity is included.

Doesn't the deluxe dining plan mean you get 3 table service meals a day? I don't do the dining plan so I'm not sure how the cost stack up but if you know you're only going to do one meal (TS) a day wouldn't it be cheaper to just go with the regular dining plan??

can some one else who does the plan correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[HollyM7813]

Have you ever done the Deluxe dining? Unless you're doing a lot of 2-credit signature meals, that's a TON of food! And a ton of time spent getting to ADRs, waiting for tables, eating, and getting back to parks. Plus a lot of money for tips. Do you have a plan on how which restaurants you're going to? You could save a lot of money with just the regular dining plan and putting the extra to a couple OOP meals if there's really that much you want to do.

No, we've never done the DXDDP since this is our 1st ever stay on property. I have all of our ADRs set already, with 3 character meals, including CRT, and 2 TS in one day. The DH won't budge on which plan we're getting. We're big eaters and it's nice knowing we don't have to feel like we have to choose the least expensive thing on the menu even though it may not be what we want, or being able to do a TS instead of QS for lunch or breakfast if we change our minds. We're not a family to do a ton of rides, Disney has been more about the ambiance, experience, and well, the food for us. We like being able to sit down and relax on our vacations, so doing TS is worth it to us.

 

[dpswift]

Doesn't the deluxe dining plan mean you get 3 table service meals a day? I don't do the dining plan so I'm not sure how the cost stack up but if you know you're only going to do one meal (TS) a day wouldn't it be cheaper to just go with the regular dining plan??

can some one else who does the plan correct me if I'm wrong.

I agree that OP might be better off with the regular dining plan. Deluxe is very expensive. Also Disney is not a 3 square meal a day place. Even counter service it would be hard to eat 3 full meals.

OP how about adding breakfasts at the other resorts? Ihave heard great things about Kona, Whispering Canyon, The Wave, Grand Floridian Cafe, Boma and there are others. You could also add Hoop De Do or the Luau. If you have the deluxe plan I would make the most of it.

 

[Marionnette]

Doesn't the deluxe dining plan mean you get 3 table service meals a day? I don't do the dining plan so I'm not sure how the cost stack up but if you know you're only going to do one meal (TS) a day wouldn't it be cheaper to just go with the regular dining plan??

can some one else who does the plan correct me if I'm wrong.

The DxDP includes 3 meal credits per person per night. They don't distinguish between TS and CS. I agree that if you're only doing one TS meal per day, the DxDP is probably overkill unless you're doing signature dining each evening and in-room dining.

Have you ever done the Deluxe dining? Unless you're doing a lot of 2-credit signature meals, that's a TON of food! And a ton of time spent getting to ADRs, waiting for tables, eating, and getting back to parks. Plus a lot of money for tips. Do you have a plan on how which restaurants you're going to? You could save a lot of money with just the regular dining plan and putting the extra to a couple OOP meals if there's really that much you want to do.

The OP is already inside the 45-day window for making changes without a penalty, so she can't switch to the DDP without it costing her $50 per person. It might not be worth it to make the change now. Plus, I'm guessing that she has already figured out her ADRs and where the credits will be spent? She probably decided that the DxDP is still a more economical way for her family to dine. Or she may feel that the added cost is worth it for the freedom it provides from worrying about food money during her stay.

 

[dpswift]

OP you can also make ADRs on the app while you are in a park. I agree that I like to be able to sit and relax. That is why I like TS. I would be open to trying more of the TS restaurants in your case.

 

[HollyM7813]

I just wanted to add...when deciding on the dining plan, we also looked at the cost per day, per person of the dining plan, what each meal would be OOP, and restaurants & menus to see what we would enjoy. That being said, the DxDDP is $360 per day for the 4 of us. Adding up our first day with a ADR at BOG for breakfast (did the online ordering, came to $72), doing a QS for lunch, plus 2 snacks and ADR for dinner at TTS (probably the cheapest TS we have planned), we are close to what we're paying for the day on the DxDDP. For us it's more about not having to worry over the cost of food since it's all paid for up front.

 

[dpswift]

I just wanted to add...when deciding on the dining plan, we also looked at the cost per day, per person of the dining plan, what each meal would be OOP, and restaurants & menus to see what we would enjoy. That being said, the DxDDP is $360 per day for the 4 of us. Adding up our first day with a ADR at BOG for breakfast (did the online ordering, came to $72), doing a QS for lunch, plus 2 snacks and ADR for dinner at TTS (probably the cheapest TS we have planned), we are close to what we're paying for the day on the DxDDP. For us it's more about not having to worry over the cost of food since it's all paid for up front.

I agree with your thinking. I always cheap out when paying out of pocket. We are going at the end of the week paying out of pocket and I keep looking at appetizers that I can have as meals. DH is going to freak. It is a last minute trip to dropped DD off for the college program.

Table services are nice because you know that no matter how long the line you will have a place to sit. The app is so nice because if you want TS as the last minute you can check for availability.

 

[msmama]

For my "extras" budget. I come up with what I think I'll need and then double it (granted I don't do dining plan so food is included in my extras). Usually I come home not spending too much over my doubled budget.

 

[angierae]

For my nine day 2016 trip, I have budgeted: (this is for me and DD21)

$300 for souvenirs at Disney (this is probably high. I've actually never spent that much but I want the $ available if I fall in love with something)
$300 for souvenirs at Universal (this might be high. We've never been so I might spend more there.)
$120 for tips (again, there's only two of us)
$300 for extra snacks/alcohol/whatever.

 

[AmberHeartsDisney]

Two adults we normally spend $2,000-$3,000 per trip including food and souvenirs.

 

[scrapquitler]

We just came back a couple weeks ago. We had no dining plan, we went with a $1200-$1500 budget in mind for spending money, tips and meals. Me, DH and DS12, 6 days. We spent a little less than $900 total. We ate all counter service, we had lots of snacks and drinks, 3 refillable mugs, a few adult beverages in Epcot and at the hotel bar, and we bought just a few small souvenirs (Disney water bottle, some Starbucks You are Here Mugs, a hat for DS, some decorations for our magic bands)

 

[PrncessA]

I think your budget for tips is okay, you know how you are going to order and eat and it looks like you have put a lot of thought into the amount. I budgeted the same way for tips on our trip on the DxDDP and it turned out I budgeted a bit too much considering we ended up canceling a couple meals and eating lighter on a few. I know I am in the minority here going against those who say you can never budget enough for tips, but we tipped 20% and a bit more on an occasion or two, and we were fine on budget.

I have DH like yours who wanted the DxDDP because we are big eaters... but after a few days of eating all the food on the plan we were so stuffed we were sick ( and we like to eat three meals a day and enjoy appetizers). That being said I think it is a great way to do the parks at least once. It is freeing in a sense that you can eat where you want and get what you want without worrying about cost, since you are prepaying.

We spent about $150 per child on souvenirs and about $800 on extras, and we didn't say the word no a lot...

Hope this helps!!!