To ask how you actually afford to go abroad

[lavenderpekins]

Aibu to feel fed up? Not going away again.. nearly everyone I know is going on a family holiday to the med this summer holiday.

Sort of lighthearted I know we're very lucky to live in this country, able to buy good/nhs/school.. I'll get over it too..

We go on a couple of holidays a year - an abroad one and a UK cottage. Never do cottages in the summer holidays in the UK - they are £££!!!! Honestly you could go on Richard Branson's first moon trip for less money than a Cornwall cottage in the first two weeks of August.

We prioritise holidays. No fancy clothes here, and our cars are 10 and 15 years old. Our kitchen is falling apart. We started to look at new kitchens and then agreed we'd rather have a holiday!

We do Cornwall at Easter or half term, cheaper and quieter beaches!!

We pay it off over about 10 months, we wouldn't be able to pay it outright. I agree it's cheaper for us going Spain all inclusive for a week than a week in center parcs.

book cheap in advance - split the cost over 10+ months - save!

I've had fancy AI hols when I've had money from house sales etc of Ex has paid half but this year it's Eurocamps (booked cheap) and a cheap ferry crossing! All booked last Sept

I agree with the poster who mentioned self catering over a resort. We often go to France, and I book accommodation direct through a site like homeaway or ownersdirect. Depending on what you are looking for, you can get some real bargains (in comparison to package holidays or a week in Cornwall!) A private house with pool in high season costs about £1000 per week, but if you go for a shared pool or an apartment on a resort then this goes down to between £600 and £800 (more expensive the further south you go). The ferry will add on about £150 on the Dover to Calais route. We would take about £500 spending money, which would include a meal out one night and day trips as self catering is easy to budget.
You can also use sites such as Brittany ferries, which include the ferry travel, and you get the whole package for well under £1000 if you stay in Normandy or Brittany.
We save £200 pcm but also put in any bonuses from my husbands job, which can be another £1500 per year.

Our joint income is just short of £55k and we holiday three times a year, two adults and one dc - 1 U.K. and 2 abroad. We book early and pay them off gradually. Have one old car between us, shop sensibly,wear cheap clothes and rarely go out - we'd rather spend the money on holidays.

I also agree that overseas is cheaper than UK unless we cook all the meals when we do uk, and if that's the only option I'd rather stay at home tbh.

Hub takes home about 1600 a month, me about the same so we aren't loaded. We don't shop in expensive clothes shops or food shops, when we eat out we don't go all out and have 3 courses, we live by the beach so summer we save money by using it and the back garden, both of us are non smokers, don't buy lottery tickets papers etc. Have only two catalogues that we use for big purchases and pay off within a year which keeps hubby's credit score high and is great for emergencies. Just living within out means really.

Not taking any holidays (or having take-aways or expensive day trips etc) for years to overpay on the mortgage and get our day-to-day living costs low, then we were in a position to save up. Not that we go abroad often, we have just booked our second overseas trip (the last one was 4 years ago) but we have had some lovely UK holidays.

The times I've done long weekends in the UK have been expensive for what we've got out of it tbh.

We go for a week in summer somewhere in Europe every year, somewhere hot We do a long haul every 2 years back to Australia and visit my dh's family in Ireland often.

We are in London and have an incredibly small mortgage (for London! ) and have decided we prefer holidays abroad and visiting family more than the bigger house I dream of

I understand abroad being cheaper than centre Parcs but centre Parcs is extortionate so we'd never go there!!

I don't think for us abroad is any cheaper but would love to be proved wrong! Even flights or ferry would make it nearly as expensive as holiday here!!

If you want it enough you'll do it. I managed to take myself and my three dc abroad for the first time in April. I spent months searching for deals and banshee to book is a week on Spain for £629 for all of us including flights, transfers and apertment.
We then spent 8 months selling everything we didn't use/want anymore on selling sites, I put £10 a week in a jar from my wages which was right as I'm a part time student and work part time and my dc pit every penny they got inc pocket money birthday money xmas money into their own pots.
I cannot tell you how proud I was of all of us the day we opened our jars and found we'd saved over £600 between us! So that was the spending money sorted!

I will never forget flying out and watching my dc faces on the aeroplane and the holiday was fantastic. We wanted it enough so we did it.

My DH earns very good money, I earn reasonably well. We have no mortgage and no debts. Holidays are important to us, so although our kitchen and bathrooms need doing we have just booked another trip abroad. When the DC are gone we will hopefully book even more. Won't be tied to school holidays so will be cheaper and can venture even further afield? I've lost too many family members too young and unexpectedly to live any differently.

Ok BertAndKhloe so what are you spending your money on? (You don't have to tell me, just ask yourself).

I literally can't understand how someone with two full time incomes can't afford to go on holiday. You can't understand how people do afford to go on holiday. It comes down to household spending. If your mortgage is £300 a month more than mine, well there's £3600 a year that you could spend on holidays.

We bought a small house 20 years ago when property was cheap. We saved a good deposit and had a small mortgage. We overpaid it and then sold the house for 3 times what we paid, enabling us to buy a slightly bigger house for the same payments, so our housing costs are low. We could have afforded a bigger, fancier house but that would have been at the expense of holidays.

These days, you can either prioritise housing or fun stuff. It seems to be increasingly difficult to afford both.

We're DINKies. It's great.

Camping for us this summer. A week in the Bordeaux region was €400 for 3 of us. We'll use the beach, DS can body board to his heart's content. There's a pool, coastal walks, markets for cheaper food.

Doesn't the crossing to France, petrol and tolls cost you anything?

I think it's important to be realistic about the true costs of a holiday, and to save for it rather than put it on credit. I save every month into accounts for holidays alone and with the kids. I put all costs related to these holidays on a separate credit card and pay it off in full at the end of the month using those savings. It's always surprising how much the incidental costs add up, but holidays are really important to me and my kids so we economise elsewhere to afford them.

I know we're lucky we have enough money to do that, and I know my ex-husband (whose maintenance helps enormously) probably raises his eyebrows at our priorities.

Aibu to feel fed up? Not going away again

Maybe you are being unreasonable. What have you done to enable yourself to go away? You clearly have an expectation you should be able to, so have you cut back, saved up?

Always self catering and though 'cheap' websites too!

I don't get these threads. People can afford more because they have more money. We're only doing a week in Devon this year. If I went back to work full time we'd be able to afford a foreign holiday every year easily, rather than a cheapish one once every couple of years. But tbh we'd rather have a more pleasant, stress-free life every week of the year than sacrifice that for a couple of weeks un the sun more regularly. I'm not a big fan of work hard play hard. I'm more keen on work enough, chill out as much as you can!

I have to take kids out of school to afford to go abroad!

We spread the cost, for example we booked next years holiday last month. £75 deposit with a holiday company, then direct debit payments each month until May next year. We start putting aside spending money about 4-5 months before we go too.

Step away from the mentality that holiday= all-inclusive tropical setting in some touristy area that can only be booked at your high street holiday shop. You can be creative and shop around for budget flights, inexpensive hotels, or city breaks with loads of free or cheap entertainment, cheap local food, etc. Most of Europe is a wealth of opportunities like this.

I'm not working at the moment , Eolian and that's very true, thanks for the reminder!!

I agree that some cheap holidays abroad (like Spain) used to be cheaper than actually staying in the U.K.
An example of what happened when we did stay in the uk
Went away camping for a week - rain for about 4 days.
Children unhappy, can't go do as much walking/outdoor stuff as planned
Look for more 'indoors' activities so we go to the cinema, swimming pool, museums. All of which have a cost.
Also went to have lunch somewhere more often than planned (again eating lunch under the rain isn't great to do for 4 days in a row)
Total cost = same than when we go away camping in France (all included, sominlcuidng cost of the ferry and petrol)
= actually same than than one week all inclusive in Spain
The reason why we haven't done the all inclusive is because we don't like it at all. But it would be quite similar.

Fwiw two week away 'abroad' cost us about £2k for two weeks.

We earn well and have a lot of disposable income.

It helps that DH's work pay for his car and petrol so if we stay in this country (not UK) we only pay accomodation and food.

Trips back to the UK to see family are bloody expensive cos we have to hire a car and cottage and pay for lots of indoor activities cos it always bloody rains

Affording holidays is one of the reasons we're stopping at 2 DC. I want to be able to fly all over the world with them when they're older and an extra person will be expensive.

They earn more than me!

We're saving for a holiday for next year. Should have been this year but ss moved in with us so that's literally doubled the cost and lowered what we can save.

We also have a giant nursery bill and will be much better off once ds is 3. (2 years!)

We went to a holiday cottage at the coast last year which was lovely but we had fantastic weather. It would have been an entirely different experience if it had rained all week!