AIBU to not want to spend more than £2000 on a family holiday for 4?

[captainfarrell]

To me and DH this is a lot of money. We earn about £50k pa so can pay more but we both feel that no week can be worth much more. We have been on holidays in cottages to Cornwall, Dorset and mobile home holidays in France mainly. A couple of years ago we went on an AI to Spain. We had a great time but spent £2500 and had our DC in the room with us so was not that relaxing as they are teens. We just don't feel we can bring ourselves to spend more and can't go out of school holidays. Any fab ideas?

Four flights Manchester to alicante come in at £800. Ryan air give you 10 kg carry on luggage and five kg hand luggage so you wouldn't need to pay for extra hold bags.

You would have to pay about € 75 ew for a taxi but there may be a coach that does it cheaper.

June half term 5* resort in lanzarote . 2 adults one child aged 4 for 11 nights £1945!!!

We've booked a 2 bed apt in The Algarve for 10 nights for €1800 (about £1400) and flights for 3 for about £800 with RyanAir going the second week of summer holidays. Was the best deal I could find, is self catering though so we'll add more in with food and drink.

Just had a lovely € 10 meal at the beach in altea. Bus was € 3 each round trip from benidorm.

Chicken caesar salad, lovely fresh tuna , vegetable rice, purée potato and chips and apple tart and cream.

Simple but lovely. DH had pork tenderloin with truffle sauce.

Amazing value... £7-69 !

You can't beat that can you?

No worries giraffe, appreciate your explanation

We are a family of four and summer holidays 2014 we did bulgaria for a week half board. It was the cheapest holiday we could find. It was £1800. Very cheap once youre out there though. I met a bloke on the way back who goes for the entire summer, rents an appartment and even hires a cleaner and someone to do his washinng and ironing! This summer we are doing 5 days at disneyland paris full board for the same price, but we do a lot of uk holidays too, so two nights at alton towers in the enchanter village (i gulped at the price of that), a week in a holiday park in scotland and various camping trips, weekend and longer. Id rather have loads of trips / breaks than spend all on one two week block.

Package holidays in school holidays are incredibly expensive booking travel and accommodation independently works out much better if you are prepared to book well in advance and do lots of research.

I can see things from both sides, and as plenty of others have said, it depends what you want.
We live in France and have a gite here. You could easily do a week for under £500 in the May half term - the gite easily sleeps six & is & 350.00 in May and you could do the tunnel and fuel for £150.00.
However, that's all great, but we couldn't get anything apart from driving to campsites on mainland europe for less than that - since we arrived twelve years ago we've had "proper" holidays twice, both times flying from the UK

Depends on your criteria totally.

I certainly wouldn't be happy if I paid 2 grand for a holiday and had to share a room with my DS !
I book flights as soon as they get out then search for villas etc on owners direct or similar.
We do spend a reasonable amount on holidays as we really enjoy them, we don't however spend a huge amount on home improvements say.

A week in a cottage in Yorkshire will cost me that.

£750 for weeks rental good quality cottage

£1000 spending meals out activities etc (three of us)

£300 for fuel and cattery fees for the cat whilst I am away.

Not to mention new clothes and bits for the trip.......

Do Welsh schools give two weeks term time holiday?? That's it I'm moving.

I've managed to take 3 of us away for the last couple of years for less than £1500, including car hire, during school holidays. I do it independently though, booking through massive travel companies is always going to add £100s onto the cost.

We have booked a three bed caravan in Wales for a week for august for under £600.

On the other hand we have also booked an adult only break to Europe all inclusive for a week for £1800 for 2.

So both ends.

I agree with Anna, different priorities. For us we would rather spend the our money on house and cars etc that we use every day than a two week holiday. So ours are always a cottage somewhere in the uk, or Europe. Personally i wouldn't do a centreparcs type thing because the way they hike their prices in the holidays is obscene! So we prefer self catering cottages.

In fact for one of our hols this year we are actually staying at home and doing day trips to all the fab places around us.

However for some that 2 week hols is the thing they live for and look forward to, so they will spend significantly more than I would.

Horses for courses

I've just booked return flights for 2 to USA, the Pacific coast, £1200 for two folk. Exp med insurance but includes existing med conditions.
Staying with friends which costs a bit on shopping and treats.... as never want them to be out of pocket.

The CentreParcs abroad are a little more basic sometimes but their prices are much much better all year around I've found.

Thankyou all for your replies. It's really interesting to hear what others do. I love UK holidays and caravan hols in France and Uk. I suppose our DC being now 13 and 15, we've done this type of holiday a lot and I just can't bring myself to pay thousands for a med holiday that's gone so quickly when I could pay it off my mortgage. Think I've revealed a bit about myself in that last sentence. Priorities someone else said...hmmm. I will look into your suggestions of air bnb etc.

muskateer Are you me?

They do cake. I read it just before we came out here.
Like I said my son took His three out of school in sept for a week . They quoted our wedding ( true,had to provide the Invitation ). We are in England.

Here we go

www.walesonline.co.uk/news/education/parents-can-take-children-holiday-10727130

Mnetters that feel they should be allowed to do the same if they want should get up a petition.

Ha ha.... No Captain ... Just a kindred spirit

What you said about spending more on things you see/use and appreciate every day is more important to us I suppose. We like to keep our house and garden nicely decorated, cars reasonably up to date and are close to reaping mortgage. My dilemma is that we could spend more on a hol. If you have a very tight budget then there is no choice and I find that easier in a way.

repaying

But if you don't need to spend more to get what you want, then why bother? If you and your family will be happy with £700 on a cottage and spends while your there why spend £2000?

For me I prefer little and often so we spend less on holidays but have more of them. We will take long weekends, weeks in a cottage or a week visiting family somewhere, family breaks and breaks as a couple. None of them are stupidly expensive, (I limit cottage spend to approx £500 for the week) and then enjoy ourselves without worrying too much about money whilst we are there.

Any extra money you have left over can then be spent on what's important to you, like paying off the mortgage, or whatever.

It is interesting what other people's priorities are.

Our neighbours don't spend loads on holidays - I thought it was because she recently gave up work, but turns out ( we were thinking of getting our bathroom done so asked to see theirs) they spend 14 thousand getting their bathroom redone.

To her it's worth it as she's a real homebody who hates going away and loves using her fancy new bathroom. To me I'd much rather spend a lot of money on going away - we had an amazing holiday to Canada last year ( nowhere near the cost of the bathroom btw) - and limp on with our tatty old furnishings.

Neither person is right or wrong, just depends what you enjoy more.