Florida on the cheap, is it possible?

[foamybananasweets]

Can't really afford it, but desperate to go before dd becomes a teen. Can you do it cheaply? Can anyone give me some money saving tips?

In a word, no. Expenses to consider:
Flights
Accommodation
Transport - either car hire or taxis, although I think there are shuttle buses between the parks depending on where you stay
Meals
Taxes
Park tickets (14 day Disney tickets are £379 each, and Universal tickets are £217 each

The cheapest accommodation would be self catering. You could stock up at Walmart quite cheaply.

Accommodation is pretty cheap if you don't mind basic.

Eating out is pretty cheap, especially the all you can eat buffets

School holiday flights, not so much. And passes are ££££

The Dibb forum is a good place to start.

It's possible not to be hugely extravagant, but that's not the same thing.... I think you need to define what you mean by "cheap".

Park tickets alone are very expensive. Some websites allow you to pay a low deposit and then pay the tickets off over 6 months or more - doesn't make them any cheaper, but helps with budgeting. Yes self-catering is cheaper, but you'd need a car to get to the supermarket, or choose accommodation right next door to a grocery store. There is lots of budget accommodation, but again budget may mean no shuttle buses to the parks and extra costs in taxis / car hire.

The Dibb website has lots of advice on Florida planning.

There are shops that buy unexpired tickets and sell them on - look like beach tahirt shops

Eating out is cheap

Flights etc are cheaper in October as Americans are feeding up for Thanks giving and the parks are empty - better value as you don't que

Weathers still warm and you could buy a weeks tickets ( 3 days relax shopping 7 day parks - 4 days sun bathing

It's possible but not overly cheap - look for self catering or apartments

Eating out isn't cheap in the parks though.

Go out of peak season. Don't stay on site. Buy 14 day park tickets in UK.

I went feb/march. Still warm enough and no huge queues. Some rides may be closed for refurb though and one of the disney watetparks were closed.
Stayed at a motel on Iternational drive and bought a 14 day i-ride ticket for about 15 quid to get to Universal or Sea world, where free disney buses ran from. Most large motels also do free shuttle buses.

The park tickets for both disney and universal ended up costing more than the flights and accommodation!

The biggest problem is that the exchange rate is completely against us at the moment. I went at the end of last year, and i was very shocked at how expensive everything is out there especially within the parks and tourist areas. Do not go during school holidays as it will be super busy and spending two hours in a queue won't be fun!

I can't see how the unexpired ticket thing works - last time we were in Disney the tickets were linked to us individually, we had to use a thumb print to enter each day. And that was 5 years ago, the security will be better now. Wouldn't risk it, personally.

If money is tight, Paris may be a better option.

You can get other non thumb tickets

You can't do it for under £5k for a family of 4.

Security is so tight at the parks these days. I don't see how you can buy unexpired tickets and use them as it is made very clear that they aren't transferable. They took our finger prints at the Magic Kingdom and we needed to use our fingers every time we entered a park.

We stayed at art of animation hotel in Feb, booked 12 months before with virgin. £1140 each, park tickets are expensive and spent around $2000 dollars whilst there.

You can eat cheaply in the hotels, for example 2 slices of toast and a side of scrambled egg was $2.50, we took filtered water bottles and the small squeezy juice things with us instead of buying fizzy drinks all day long. Kids meals at counter restaurants were never more than $7.50 including tax.

"You can eat cheaply in the hotels, for example 2 slices of toast and a side of scrambled egg was $2.50"

It wasn't that cheap where we stayed. In fact we found the food at our hotel expensive and not that good.

foamy - what is your definition of cheap? you certainly can save money by going out of school holidays, self catering etc but its not cheap compared to a weeks camping in Wales for example.

You can also save on flights by going a different route and changing planes.

what is your budget?

We stayed at Art of animation, meal prices are cheap, $6 for a kids meal including drink, most expensive adult meal was $17.. you can also just purchase a side order, as said above, without buying a full meal.

Cheap as chips

Cheap? No.

But there are ways to keep costs down.

If you can go out of the school holidays, flights will be cheaper. Or consider going indirect. Try skyscanner or netflights. Or Norwegian Airlines can be good for direct flights.

Look on Homeaway or Holiday Lettings for self catering accommodation.

Stock up at Walmart and mostly eat in, buy snacks and drinks to take to the parks to avoid paying for meals while in the parks. Most parks will let you take food in, but generally portions should individual size, so no big bags of crisps, party subs etc

If you don't want to cook in the evening, order in takeaway pizza (very cheap compared to here), buy in salads/chicken etc from Walmart, or find buffet-style restaurants (we liked Sweet Tomatoes)

If you prefer a hotel, generally off site is cheaper than on site, some may offer free shuttles to the parks, and if they include breakfast, you can fill up before you go out for the day.

There are shops that buy unexpired tickets and sell them on - look like beach tahirt shops

The tickets will be a major expense, but I wouldn't recommend buying unexpired ones. As far as I'm aware, these are illegal, and are likely to be a scam.

Thanks all, booked!!! Going in November (we can't deal with heat!). Got indirect flights, (a pain but cheap!) and an off site apartment complex which isn't the ritz but is still 4*and has good reviews. Flights (inc taxes) 12 days accommodation (5 mins from Disney entrance) and car hire for all for 2k. Just park tickets and spending money to sort.

I'm over the moon! we spent just that on flights last time.

Dd has autism and can't do the parks for long so we have to come and go. Hopefully it will be quiet in November. She won't eat the food in the parks (makes life cheaper but less convenient) and we do tend to eat a lot of take out pizza 🍕 and not do fancy meals. Denny's is a favourite...

Happy happy happy

Have a great time

Yey! Please don't buy cheap dodgy park tickets. You might not get in.

14 DAY park tickets? Who could visit Disney daily for 14 days?!

I could! Love the water parks would alternate those with the theme parks

foamy

May I ask what route you are taking to Florida as you have indirect flights?. The only reason I ask is that you need time (preferably 3 hours or so) to make the connection from your initial journey from the UK. Presumably you have the same routing for the return journey.