To be surprised by the number of holidays?

[brondary]

I have been really surprised by the number of holidays some people on MN go on. I would not have the money or the annual leave to go on that many.
Last Summer people were commenting saying how since the first lockdown in March, they had already had to cancel three holidays. Various people talking about how they normally go on five or six holidays a year and are really missing them.
I must mix in different circles as I did not realise any except the super-rich went on this many holidays.

@Wearegoingtoneedabiggerboat

Threads like these reinforce my suspicion that there is a secret stash of cash families are entitled to that I know nothing about. FWIW we earn a decent wage 90k, have one oldish car, average mortgage. My mum also buys my children their clothes. We have one holiday a year, have never been long haul and don’t go away for weekends. I seriously think I must be doing something wrong. Our holiday this year is a couple of days in London, then a cottage in the lakes for a week. I have booked something for everyday so it’s costing around 2.5k then there will be spending money on top so probably about 3.5 in total. We did think about going somewhere on the days between London and the lakes but I just can’t justify any more money being spent.

That’s a lot for a holiday in the Lakes. I don’t think you are doing anything wrong. Our children didn’t go on a plane until the oldest was twelve. We simply couldn’t afford it. We did holiday in U.K. as we had use of a friends cottage on the IOW (that is now ours) and also did a week in the Lakes. That cost us very little apart from accommodation. My husband worked on way up - so we got a hotel stopover for free and same on way back. Usually Telford holiday inn on the way up, with a pool, on demand pancakes for breakfast and the park immediately behind. We did Birmingham city centre on the way back. In the Lakes we did nice things - swimming, walking, one theatre trip, kayaking, fish and chips in Keswick, ‘fishing’ with nets in the river at Grange and a cinder toffee ice cream, the climbing wall. I’m pretty sure it didn’t come anywhere near that amount, but I suppose it was a while ago now.

I think you either have your kids in private school or are spectacularly bad at managing your money.
Our family income is £45k, we have a three-year-old car and manage a holiday every year spending about £2k.

Whereas I think a family on only £45K who buys new cars and spends 5% of their income every year on a foreign holiday is probably prioritising flashing the cash over saving. DH and I earn more than double what you earn and we've never had a car as new as 3yo, that's just not a priority for us. DH has a bike and I drive an old car I bought 7 years ago with cash. Hate spending money on cars. But we have good pensions and lots of savings.

I would be surprised at a family on £90K with children in private education and would assume grandparents with very deep pockets, you'd be spending over half your take home pay on your child's education and compromising more than just holidays for that privilege. But if that family had 3 young DC in childcare that's also easily a small fortune (when our DC were little our childcare bill was 50-100% more than our mortgage) although at least temporary. We didn't prioritise holidays at that stage either, the benefits didn't outweigh the costs at that stage. And that's the crux of the matter for people who earn enough to be able to make choices, everyone has different benefit cost assessments. Some want to save for the future or invest in property or put their kids to private school or have new cars or go on holiday. My priority list (savings>housing>holidays>cars>private school) is different to someone else.

But here's a story. I know someone who in 2019 was self employed as a director of a limited company. Had a senior, interesting job in the arts travelling the world. Their partner was a SAHP and I never quite understood how they had a lifestyle that seemed comparable to ours (holidays, cars, stuff) when we had 2 incomes and they had one. Then the pandemic hit and there was no work. And no furlough because they were the director of a limited company. Turns out they had no savings and had to go on benefits immediately.

We have 3/4 a year. 2 of them are weekends (Friday 5pm-Monday 10am) but we leave on Sunday for school and work. They are cheap as chips sun holidays deals. Cost around £60-£80 each time.
Then we do a longer (4 days) Caravan holiday (usually sun again) for £100-£110 in the summer hols or over Christmas. If it costs more than that we don’t go.
It’s stupidly expensive to go abroad so that’s out.
So come the summer hols we spend 6 days at a rally camping. Costs about £150 for 6 of us (including grandparents) and we have that as our main holiday. This year the rally isn’t going ahead due to covid, so we have decided to take the children for a week caravan holiday so that’s a bit more expensive, but we have saved money from not going away last year and the cheaper holidays this year, so we can afford it. (Around £600 for a week)
We have a combined income of around £36k, so not exactly flush with cash, although I appreciate we probably earn more than some.

I sort of agree op but it isn't about money exactly for me as the effort of getting sorted for a holiday the journey there and back and the unpacking etc when you get back as a ratio of the time spent on holiday.

For.me a holiday is a chance to really chill out and forget about most of the dull and stressful stuff in my life and the best way I have found to achieve that is with 1 or 2 longer breaks ( absolute minimum of a week and preferably 10 + days each time). My ideal break is about 3 weeks though I rarely get it for.many reasons . Lots of short breaks just leave me more stressed at the pfaff of deciding where it to, arranging them getting there and then a day or later having to think about the journey home .I loathe camping because of this.and have given up going even though I do.enjoy it when there

I assume for some the arranging and preparing the the holiday and the actual travelling there is not stressful. . I find that bit anxiety inducing so reduce it it the minimum in a year so that the holidays are actually worth it to.me

I haven't rtft (sorry) but my parents had to cancel 3 holidays last year but really it was just the same holiday that kept being cancelled. I know a few who had the same and they described it in the same way. I think becuase they would get excited then be dissapointed they count it as 3 but it was really only 1.

I find it confusing too particularly when the mortgage threads are always much lower then anything I know. Most people I know earn well, have a decent mortgage but still can't take 6 holidays a yr.

We have the holiday allowance though, I have 10 wks off & DH 6.

The comments I have read talked about the Caribbean over Christmas, skiing in February, Greece over Easter etc.

You need far more than 100k income for that these days.

. All my essential bills including food amount to less than £1k per month leaving around £1k disposable income.

But how do you stretch 12k for one yrs of annual disposable spends & one long haul, one short haul, a couple of UK breaks and a couple of weekend European city breaks

We usually have 5 a year, twice to see our son and his family, twice to see my dad and one long weekend. Most of these are financed by my in-laws. As for a proper overseas holiday it was Prague in winter.

I assume for some the arranging and preparing the the holiday and the actual travelling there is not stressful. . I find that bit anxiety inducing so reduce it it the minimum in a year so that the holidays are actually worth it to.me

I love all that - the searching and planning, finding the great deals. I live the journey too whether it driving with everyone excited, getting settled at your table on the train or that moment you get your bags checking in at the airport. The only thing I hate is packing but that's only a small part thankfully

@ncgy

. All my essential bills including food amount to less than £1k per month leaving around £1k disposable income.

But how do you stretch 12k for one yrs of annual disposable spends & one long haul, one short haul, a couple of UK breaks and a couple of weekend European city breaks

Because there are only 2 of us. We only go for a week. You can go short haul for a week for less than £1000. Some flights to European countries cost less than £50pp, or they did pre Covid! We are going to Butlins this year for less than £300, a bigger family would need an apartment but we only need a twin room which is much cheaper.

I had to cancel holiday last april, which was then rebooked for october. We then didnt go to france as we usually do in the summer. Then october was cancelled again. Then i crossed fingers and booked france for this May half term which we cancelled as dont want to quarantine.

Im bloody gagging for some sunshine. My mental health is shit at the moment and I just know some sun and relaxation would do me the world of good, but it all looks like such a massive faff even to the green list countries. I do normally try and get away several times a year, but we arent talking expensive holidays in peak times either. Im more about budget places as a base at off peak times, or staying in families holiday homes or searching for bargains.

How do you get so much annual leave from work?

My old job was 27 days + option to purchase up to 10 + BH + flexible around hours so if you left early in a Friday for a flight for example you wouldn’t need to take it as holiday if you were on top of your work.

Current job is only 25 days + BH 😢

I know quite a few people who get 7 weeks which is pretty good.

Because there are only 2 of us. We only go for a week. You can go short haul for a week for less than £1000. Some flights to European countries cost less than £50pp, or they did pre Covid! We are going to Butlins this year for less than £300, a bigger family would need an apartment but we only need a twin room which is much cheaper.

There are 4 of us but we have a much higher income. I'm obviously shit at finding good value holidays. Admittedly I do save & invest money.

I grew up thinking it was normal to have 2 weeks in Florida at Christmas, a week in Portugal in May, 2 weeks camping in the south of France in the summer, various weekends away, centre parcs etc. Plus being able to go on the school ski trips and any other trips eg French exchange, band camp etc.

I think I got to about 14 when I realised that was quite unusual!

Admittedly I do save & invest money
How lovely. I'm sure you are aware that others both do that and enjoy holidays.

I don't know why OP is surprised. It depends on your disposable income. Mn had a diverse posting posting population of those struggling, to those on very high salaries, and the rest of us in between.

Depends on your priorities. We have a caravan in Dorset. We would normally go often. If I plan it right, because I work part time, out bank holiday week may be a good week to 10 days, only using 3 or 3 days holiday.

I also go away with the girls for long weekends to European city. Cost low, one days holiday. Easy. I plan to book again for October.

I'm not surprised that so many people are booking. I'm more surprised at the MN distain and anxiety.

I Don't see the Indian variant as that big a deal, we will get over it, we will continue, we will have other variants this year no doubt. and life needs to start to get back to a bit more normal, we need to start opening up things, businesses trying to recover and holidays booked.

I see that people will go abroad if they can to green places for their summer holidays and there may be tightening of restrictions in the autumn, but I see all this as totally fine. I'm not panicked by it, I don't worry about it. I just see this is all totally normal in the current circumstances.

@choli where did I say people didn't? I was specifically talking about my situation & my budget. 🙄

We go on 5-6 breaks a year but they are usually 1-4 nights long.We stay in the UK and shop about for good deals and tend to mold our holidays around days off so little annual leave is used;for example a 4 night holiday we went on last August we went and stayed in a lovely seaside flat we found online and went weds-sun instead of mon-fri so only 3 days of leave were used.

We've done city breaks with the kids and stayed in a youth hostel and used the self catering facilities there.It was surprising how clean,modern and well laid out these places were.

We also once spent a weeks holiday house sitting for someone on a farm in the cotswolds.That holiday was free aside from the cost of food.

We go a city break, summer holiday abroad and September weekend away. As a family of four the budget is about 8k a year on holidays but some years we don't go any and use the money for other things, dd needs driving lessons and we have big DIY projects this year for example. Dh is self employed and I work part time so time off work isn't too much of an issue.

I get 6 weeks Annual leave a year, which I thought was a lot (it used to be 4 then rise the 5 after many years service then 6 when I got a promotion). We have been on maybe 1 foreign holiday every 2/3 years, and in the in between years might get a week (or 4 days) camping or caravan. I thought that was normal in my world! We prioritised paying down mortgage and saving up for the future (such as a bigger house one day, a better car, spare money in case the washing machine or car breaks etc)