What is your summer holiday budget versus household income?

Well no, most people are quoting £100/120k which is a considerable difference to £80k.

Anything more than £500 is a real struggle for us!

Why? You must spend money on something? So it’s just different priorities surely.

Just my personal income is just over £100k. I know my colleagues holiday bigger than me, but we barely do £2k on a big year in all our trips! I knew friends are spending much more than me, but had no idea people were comfortable spending such sums. The idea of £5k on a fortnight trip makes me wince .

Household income £120k
Empty-nesters age 60
Total annual holiday budget £15k-ish

Something like this:

February - 9 nights Mexico £6k

June - a week in Greece £5k

September - take 2 adult kids plus their partners to Barcelona for 4 nights - mix of cultural stuff / beach. They’ll pay for their own flights and one meal out per couple. We’ll pay for the accommodation, cultural stuff and all the rest of the food. £4k

For people in their 40s the median income is £42,796.
With two people working that’s a household income roughly in line with many on this thread. There have really only been a handful of high outliers.

Exactly - nearly everyone on this thread with a 3 figure household income! Could also be absolute BS of course as who would know?!

Meanwhile, back in the real world.....

Threads that relate to income generally attract responses from the haves rather the have nots.

This is not a criticism but with the median wage being less than 40k then it is unlikely to be representative.

Hi op. Our income is £105k, but no mortgage, so similar to yours.

We spend about £5-7k on a week AI or cruise in Europe once every 2 years (in hol time) plus 1-2 UK cottage hols and city breaks per annum (again, in hol time) now the kids are late primary. These are not luxury places. Prices have definitely spiralled in recent years.

We have a joint income around £90k and spend about £15k a year on holidays but our mortgage is only £500 a month and no childcare costs (we do have a 7 year old though). Holidays are very important to me so aim to have at least 4 a year (typically one nice one i.e. Florida / Thailand etc) and some UK hols or short week in Europe. I think family of 4 could do it for £5k but wouldn't necessarily be luxury (which wouldn't bother me but I woukd avoid all inclusive as for cheaper places it's the food that let's them down).

I think £5k is a good budget for a holiday in Scottish school holidays. I took 3 of us to Greece last year right at the start of the holidays for a week, £2.5k bed and breakfast, with another £1.5k for meals, treats and activities which included a days scuba diving. I could have got a decent AI for around £3k, but my kids don’t cope well with AI.

If you go at the end of June it’s slightly cheaper because English schools haven’t broken up yet. Sometimes it’s cheaper to fly from one of the northern English airports too.

We probably spend £20-25k annually on holidays and mini breaks, depending on the year.

That’s usually one long hot holiday at Easter or December (using points for flights and staying in lovely hotels), one summer European Ryanair type holiday (a mix of nice hotels and staying with friends) and then one skiing at half term, plus a few weekends away.

Thats about 5% of our income.

Income aside, if you can afford it with savings then go for it but what I have experienced is this:

1 week summer holiday for 4 (two teens) - all inclusive even with Easyjet was £3,500 and then topped up with transport to the airport this end and days out there - quite boring by a pool/beach all day long and no activities (sailing, paddleboarding for example).

DIY holiday 1 week in Europe, flights £1,200; accomodation £800, travel to and from the airport at both ends budget £4-500 (if early morning flight - that changes after you book! - taxi only)
then spending money there - eat in/picnics breakfast and most lunches and meals out in the evenings comes to quite a lot add on top of that acitivities same as above.
I would think max budget £5K was very reasonable. We looked at holidaying in the UK but it's prohibitively expensive and cannot rely on the weather!

I'm retired, no mortgage, no kids. For a week's holiday I would expect to spend £1,200 including spending money but excluding travel insurance, which I tend to buy annually.

That's a nice low-cost hotel abroad, eating out at least once a day, travel there and back.

Family of 4, joint income is £125k, mortgage £1,400 and younger DC is still in paid childcare so that's another big regular cost.

We did a week self catering in Cornwall at Easter. Accommodation was £1,500 and with food and days out it probably came to about £2,000. We were lucky with the weather so most days just went to the beach rather than paying for activities. We did go to the Eden project, and paid for that partly with clubcard points.

We are going to the Netherlands for a week's Eurocamp holiday in August, and have paid £1,900 for accommodation and £600 for the ferry.

About £4-5k a year for all holidays on a £90k household income. Sometimes a little more if we've managed to save elsewhere.
I like to split this between at least 2 breaks a year.

I would say though, for anything extra we earned above what we do now (any payrises etc) I'd expect 50% of that to go into our holiday budget. We'd spend more on holidays if we could, but £4-5k is generally all we have left after all other expenses and savings.

Everyone cuts to their own cloth and has different priorities.

It’s likely (as always on Mumsnet) higher income folk would respond I would think.

Nothing wrong with a bit of camping or what have you, equally as enjoyable and memorable for kids.

our income is similar to yours @GreatWhiteWail and we pay around £5-£6 k on our summer holiday with 2 teen DC

With kids if you want a pool to break but still have the ability to sightsee then you can’t go wrong with a human travel type trip in Italy. Their sites are neatly Avas clean and they often have a mix of chalets, glamping, caravans and tree houses. Out of all the holidays we went on, these were BY FAR the ones the kids enjoyed most and they were amazingly well priced. We hired cars and went to park albatross and did Pisa and Florence and another trip we went to Rome and did the Vatican etc by public transport. The kids loved the pool complexes and it was perfect really. They enjoyed it more than 5*ai and cruises etc.

We save 10% of our income for holidays throughout the year. We’re doing a Cruise this summer, then Disneyworld next year, plus a handful of European city breaks in between. We really like travelling and prioritise it in our budget

Our joint income combined is 80k and we spend around 4k on our annual holiday, 2 adults and 3 children. We just came back from Spain, 7 nights all inclusive was £3,400 and we spent around £700 spending money (couple of meals out, taxi's, jet ski activities ect)

Depends what you want and what ages your children are? It’s very hot in Europe in the Uk school holidays so, if they’re very young then it might be best to stay closer to home or somewhere cooler like the Scandi countries. They’re not that cheap when you get there.

Personally, I don’t really like two weeks AI in Europe and prefer to organise things independently (have done a few). Our really good holidays are scenic places with walking/activities that align with our interests so I guess that can be done a bit more cheaply. With fussy kids and with all the organising done, I can see why people would pay for the AI option though - it makes for an easy holiday with little planning needed. £5K seems about right but you could probably do it cheaper. I wouldn’t want to spend any more than that on a European holiday.

I’d spend more if it was long haul, like Thailand or the Caribbean though as the experience would be more worth it to me. Our income is similar to yours.

Our income and mortgage is about the same as yours. We haven't been abroad since 2022 so this year we've booked a week all-inc for £3.5k, 2 adults, 2 children under 10. We were looking up to £5k at one point but couldn't justify that amount for 1 week. and for the person above who mentioned European campsites, when we looked as these options and added up the site, added basic extras (eg bedding/towels), flights, transfers or travel to the site, plus then factoring in a reasonable budget for food, it was coming in around the same cost as the all inc we booked with added hassle of sorting your own meals or catering.

Household income c300k. No mortgage. One young DC.

We spend about 4k for a week abroad in the summer plus around 1.5k for a UK week.

We also do adhoc trips for big sporting events that can be expensive. 4k for a weekend in Berlin + match ticket for the England v Spain Euro final was the most recent.

Prices have got ridiculous lately. Just before covid DH and I went to watch England play cricket in Barbados and paid around 3k between us for 2 weeks in a decent hotel. You’d be paying at least double if not treble that amount now for the same holiday.