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.

[theleafandnotthetree]

@freakyfridays

I am not sure what's so surprising, most people I know take at least a couple of holidays a year - so more luxurious than others.

Personally I consider holidays as basic, so they are included in my budget.

Other people spend a fortune on cars, on treats, on beauty treatments, on designer goods, on evening out with mates. So what.

And some people - most people - spend their money that they're not spending on holidays on bills, mortgage/rent food. They're not not going on multiple holidays because they bought an Hermes bag FFS. The very fact that you would consider a holiday as basic....what, like heating and indoor plumbing and having enough to eat? I read things like this thread and I realise how truly fucked we are as a species, or more to the point, how fucked the natural world is due to our rapacious appetites.

[freakyfridays]

theleafandnotthetree

At some point you make a choice. Yes it's a basic, and if I don't earn enough to afford a holiday, it means I am not earning enough. So I do something about it. Or I don't bother working.

What's the actual point of wasting 40 hours + a week of my life if I can't even afford to take my kids away a few times a year?

If you were not earning enough to pay your heating, would you just shrug and say "oh well, that's life"?

If my single friends on a term-only job can afford a couple of holidays a year, so can I.

[MyDcAreMarvel]

@brondary How much deposit did you pay that your mortgage is so low? £40k, we then over payed by quite a bit and remortgaged with a decent LTV.

[Undeuxdrei]

Don’t believe some of the posts, also a lot of exaggeration.
Guess some people are happy to take on huge amounts of debt too. I’m surprised how certain people, seemingly intelligent, think that using a credit card is almost free money
You’d be shocked how many self employed people don’t declare their full earnings, it’s rife. So much work done is ‘cash in hand.’
I was listening to a programme about the vast amount of fraud going on regarding benefits paid to small businesses during lockdown. There’s so much money sloshing around at the moment...

[freakyfridays]

Don’t believe some of the posts, also a lot of exaggeration.

If you look at the stats, apparently UK residents took approximately 23.8 million package holiday trips abroad in 2019. The total number of holiday trips taken by residents was nearly 58.7 million that year. 🤷

[QueenPaw]

I don't own a passport
Last holiday was Dublin maybe 14 years ago

[Ivalueloyaltyaboveallelse]

We have 3-4 a year. A cheap camping holiday with friends, one a caravan holiday which we have coming up in the half term, which is my youngest DC favourite holiday and 1-2 abroad. However we are very fortunate as we do most of the time alternate the years between the in-laws villa and places we want to visit and explore.

[DeeCeeCherry]

I usually holiday abroad twice a year. I'm not wealthy. I manage my money well though

[theleafandnotthetree]

@freakyfridays

theleafandnotthetree

At some point you make a choice. Yes it's a basic, and if I don't earn enough to afford a holiday, it means I am not earning enough. So I do something about it. Or I don't bother working.

What's the actual point of wasting 40 hours + a week of my life if I can't even afford to take my kids away a few times a year?

If you were not earning enough to pay your heating, would you just shrug and say "oh well, that's life"?

If my single friends on a term-only job can afford a couple of holidays a year, so can I.

But heating is a basic necessity by most peoples standards, holidays most certainly not. If for example, you had no heating in your house and your children were freezing cold, Social Services might take a view on it... no two weeks in Mexico, not so much. You are not comparing like with like. And actually I would prioritise time with my children 52 weeks of the year than killing myself to earn X which would enable me to go on multiple holidays, I consider that a better choice.

[Whammyyammy]

We holiday (pre covid) 4 times per years. 2 eu City breaks, 2 weeks somewhere exotic and a cheapie package week. Oh travels alot to U.S with work and ill sometimes tag along once or twice per year. We use all our holiday leave on seeing the world. We're not rich, £96k joint income, mortgage, kids grown up, don't waste cash on smoking or drinking
We just love travel.

[theleafandnotthetree]

I really wish posters would stop inplying that everyone who doesnt or can't go on mulriple holidays are wasting their cash on drink, fags, designer gear, makeup, cappachinos etc. I don't smoke or drink, don't wear makeup, shop in Aldi mostly, dont own a single designer item and have never bought a takeaway coffee in my life. As a single parent running a house on one salary, once my bills are paid, and I have put aside a cerrain amount for a rainy day, my absolute maximum holiday budget per year might be 1.5k but that would include things like going to stay with my sister and doing day trips from there. There simply is no 'give'. That's fjne, that's cool, I've had some great trips in the distant past but it just pisses me off that that people think if you can't afford to go on holiday it's because you're not saving/trying hard enough!

[ResIpsaLoquiturInterAlia]

I prioritise expenditure for experiences than pure material goods. Holidays (pre pandemic times) tend to be frequent and include many last minute short haul overseas weekend breaks and tagging on holidays while on international business assignments or meetings etc. Not counted but possibly normally less than double digit number of holidays per year as also later more recent years required accommodating school calendars too. As a normal pre pandemic minimum would aim for a break most months even if just an extended weekend trip. Remote working even prior to pandemic also helps to spread one’s wings but needs to adjust to different time zones and natural body clocks.

[Bellaphant]

My parents go away a lot in normal times, but mostly on the cheap. For example, my mum would go around march to France with her girlfriends (she currently doesn't work), but they'll share a car and an easyJet flight and go and stay in a shared house out there . My dad gets the week after Easter off - they go and stay with their best mates at the seaside. Around June me and mum will have a girly weekend from Travelzoo, a few nights in a hotel for £200. My dad might go on a pilgrimage walking holiday - they walk lots of miles a day and sleep on the floor of church halls! They might go back to France together in the early autumn, and then the week between Xmas and new year do the seaside again. It seems very civilised!

[SavingsQuestions]

And there we have it. 96k so not well off. One goole calculator puts that as top 7% (with 2a2c inputted).

Sure lots of people could "prtoritise experiences" on a high household income.

On a low income prioritising rent/mortgage/bills/food may be the order of the day. And as other posters have said saving up for the odd holiday (as one poster described my main holiday as her "extra" 😁).

OP brilliant thread. And can't quite believe how quickly people came to post on mn to prove your point!

[bert3400]

@Eyjafjallajokulldottir.
But working on holiday isn't a holiday is it?

Working a couple of hours a day, at the most is a small price to pay if it means the business is ticking over and we get to enjoy being away.

[cocoloco987]

Sure lots of people could "prtoritise experiences" on a high household income.

To balance that I'm a single parent to 2 dc and earn around 9k a year. I also stated I prioritise holidays and experiences(and am very good at finding amazing deals - post covid obviously, although we did get away a couple of times in 2020

[CeeceeBloomingdale]

@TheMotherlode

I don’t understand it at all OP. Our household income is over 100k and we don’t even manage a holiday every year. No idea how people are affording 3 or 4.

Well it's all relative, our household income is half of yours yet we manage a minimum of 3. One will be a fortnight abroad so adding up everything including spending money it will be about £5k. The others will be UK breaks, I'm really good at finding bargains, use points etc and spend my birthday and christmas money on these. Holidays are my number one priority.

[HarebrightCedarmoon]

We will certainly be having a few holidays when we are allowed to. The first trip is to go 200 miles to see family and friends. We tend to have one week abroad and a week in the UK as a family, then I have a couple of weekends away with friends, a short break away with DH and another one with DM. I don't think that's particularly unusual for middle class professionals. We tend to look for cheap deals, cheap flights, Air BNB, not expensive luxury hotels and packages. I feel like I want to spend more money on holidays and short breaks now though as we haven't been able to have them. Some people have been very lucky to keep working through the pandemic and have actually saved money by not being able to do all their usual activities.

[Waxonwaxoff0]

I am a single parent, working class, one child with a household income of £24k (includes my wages, tax credits as I'm on minimum wage, and child maintenance) and every year we go on one long haul, one short haul, a couple of UK breaks and a couple of weekend European city breaks. We haven't been abroad since 2019 so having 3 holidays abroad next year hopefully! Caribbean, Greece and the Canaries.

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

[garlictwist]

I am a creature of routine and actually find holidays quite disruptive (I realise I am very uptight though ) Love a weekend away though and have a few of them every year.

Plus I am lucky that my parents own a second home in the borders which is a couple of hours drive from where I live so I get to use that a lot.

I'm really not that arsed about going abroad and long trips though.

[Oysterbabe]

We have a household income of about 68k gross and 2 small children. Holidays abroad aren't worth the hassle with very young children imo, they don't enjoy it more than UK holidays and the actual travelling part is a headache. With that and covid, we've shelved the idea of a foreign holiday for a few years. We still go somewhere maybe 3 times a year. We have a week booked in a lodge in Devon for half term for example. We'll do day trips from there and I am looking forward to evenings relaxing in the hot tub once the kids are in bed.
My job is very stressful and I feel like I need a change of environment to clear my head from time to time.

[HarebrightCedarmoon]

Yes, quite Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen and six, result: happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result: misery

But I also quite see how people can't afford holidays. When we were paying for childcare when DDs were younger we certainly didn't have as much disposable income. Our holidays were going to visit my parents (who conveniently lived in a holiday resort in the UK!) and borrowing the inlaws holiday home - again, very lucky to have this, but we didn't spend a lot on holidays then.

Some families do spend hundreds of pounds a week on shopping and takeaways though. What you can save there soon mounts up to the cost of a holiday.

[JackANackAnoreeee]

I do now one family who literally go away every half term and school break. They are reasonably well off but also get good deals and do camping etcwhich is cheaper. The mum works in schools term time only and the dad runs a business which can cope without him if he catches up the work afterwards. Personally I would hate not having ny time at home to just relax and the rushing around would stress me out and their kids have expressed that they'd prefer more time at home on the other hand they've been to some amazing places and had great experiences.

[Halloweenrainbow]

"some people waste a lot of money, but many do not". Depends on priorities and everyone is different. Some might consider 6 holidays a year a waste on money!

[JaninaDuszejko]

There are a high number of people on here with high incomes who live in London (so easy and cheap access to Europe) who talk about their holidays.

We have a 6 figure income but it's only since the DC started school that we stopped spending all our annual leave visiting family and looking after sick DC. And we both have generous annual leave. Even now a typical years holidays would be:
DH takes DC to see his family for 1-2 weeks (stays with family so just travel costs)
I take DC to see my family for 1-2 weeks (stays with family so just the travel costs)
We both take 2 weeks for the school Christmas holidays where we stay ay home (no 'holiday' costs)
We have 1 week away in self catering in the UK and preferably 1 week away in self-catering abroad (costs a bloody fortune because we aren't near an airport with cheap flights) and a trip to a festival. But we don't usually do all three.