What do you think a reasonable cost is for a weeks holiday for family of four (excluding spending while away)?

[ellasmum1]

Including flights/car hire/ferry etc.home or abroad.How much do you budget for?
Am just interested,am i just tight?
Am very shocked by some prices when browsing!

I think £1500 is about the most I expected for 1 week.

anyone?

I aim to pay £500 for a week for self catering accomodation, getting across the channel and diesel.

WOW thats good! do you have to drive far? is that using ferry or eurotunnel?

In school holidays - and this is for villa with pool - we're looking at £3k. And it is a lot of money. That is 5 but the youngest is an infant so doesn't cost much.

We spend around £1100 for a fortnight including ferry to the Isle of Mull.

Yes, a lot of driving really. 3 hours to Dover, free Eurotunnel (tesco clubcard) or £50 return on ferry if you shop around for fares.

We've done Holland, Normandy and Germany with about a 3.5 hour on other side. I've just booked for May half term in Brittany. It's a gite with heated pool on 33 acres with loads of things for the DC's. It's £290 for the week and we have enough vouchers for the tunnel. It's a much longer drive on the other side though, about 7 hours, so we might stop for a night on the way.

i was shocked by prices too. Went in to travel agencts and proudly told them I had a budget of £2000 for a family of four for a wekk. Waited for them to roll out the red carpet and pour me a glass of champagne. The woman just looked at me like I was a pauper and said that she didnt think they would have anything for that budget!

Ended up getting all inclusive online for 1 week in spain.

we did want somewhere with branded kids cubs though.. you know first choice holiday village or similar.

Speanding money depands on how old your kids are..

Say lunch out was £5 each = £20. Dinner £15 each = £60. Icecreams maybe a tenner. Thats nearly £100 a day on just food.... Arghhhh

mjinhiding Can I ask you who that is going with?

I was looking for a week during school summer holidays and couldn't find anything with in my budget. Even a week in butlins is out of our league!
Have booked a four night mid-week break in mid Wales in new caravan for £39

Tesco club card paying the other £380. Woop-e-doo!

£1350 for a week in Spain in August for a family of 5 (kids will be 2, 5 and 8) - flights, self-catering villa with shared pool and carhire. So I guess maybe would have been £1100 for 4 people.

Last year £400 for a week in France in August - gite near a lakeside beach, petrol, ferry.

Last year was a lovely lovely holiday, dunno why we're spending the extra £1k this year ... Well I do, dh and the kids are desperate to go "somewhere you have to fly to". Flipping volcano better not go off again, is all I can say.

Northernlurker - where do you stay on Mull? We love Mull. I have the Sealife Surveys on my Facebook and now I really wish we were going there again this summer instead of Orkney.

fruitful did you book everything(gite/flights etc) separately? Sounds good.
How on earth did you do last years for £400 ?
mjinhiding are you not worried now that at that price the food might be awful though?
Always worries me about all inclusive!

foureleven did you get one with a goods kids club then?

traceybath you see I find that extortionate for a week, unless it was in a palace with servants!

WynkenBlynkenandNod where is this gite-thats so cheap? 33 acres?

foureleven agree about spending- we spent that on food per day last year- ridiculous !!

The biggest tip I can give you is to book everything yourself.

We have done this for the past 3 years, have had some amzing holidays, and although have been outwith the school holidays, and only 3 of us, have all come in at around 1k - last years' was all inc at a 5* in Tenerife, inc car hire.

We fly budget airline( as its the only one available from scotland), plus means we can pick our dates rather than having to do Tuesday to Tuesday or whatever. I then spend hours on tripadvisor looking at hotels, looking at reviews etc, narrow it down to 3 usually then spend a night getting the best possible price for hotel - websites like alpharooms, lowcostholidays etc are much cheaper than some of the bigger names, and are ATOL/ABTA protected.

This year, I actually went onto hotels own website, joined their e-club thing which was free, which meant that they would price match +10% - so got 6 nights at a 5* b&b in a suite for the 3 of us for £400. - Some websites were quoting over £800

Use a cashback site too - can get up to £100 back at times.

thanks for the tips geordie!
Maybe I should start shopping at Tesco!- I'm an Asda shopper because it always seems better value for the weekly shop.How many points do you guys use for these hols/eurotunnel etc?

Ellas - It is an extortionate amount. But we had to go at a specific time, flying from our local airport, broadband in holiday location for DH's work etc etc.

I still think I should get a fortnight in greece for £200

Yeah can understand tracey, just wish I could afford that much!!

Tis expensive this year - i think many companies have put prices up due to poor exchange rate. We booked 10 nights with Canvas in Italy in July - £1500. We paid £1300 with Siblu for 14 nights last July. We still have to get there - no ferry crossing needed but still 1400 kms.

Most importantly - WHEN?

If at school holiday time, it can cost so much more than going at term time...

In the past we have driven to a Landal Greenpark (similiar to but a more basic version of Center Parcs) and stayed in a 3-bed cottage nr the border of the Netherlands and Germany for £500 (last minute deal) at the end of August/first week of Sept.

These days we want Kids Clubs or childcare of some sort so thats about £2k in the school holidays in a self-catering villa with Simply Travel in Greece, using their onsite creche and that includes a rental car.

I've just changed up £50 with of clubcard vouchers for the tunnel. Gite is here, there was a special offer for the half term week so was a bit cheaper. I don't always shop at Tesco's but keep eye out for codes throughout the year plus get some for my gas and electric bill.

For food we have a big ice box thing that keeps food frozen for up to 5 days so take frozen stuff to keep food costs down.

Roisin - we mostly have stayed in Tobermory but this year we're staying on the west coast not too far from Dervaig.

Wynken - more details about this big ice box thing please - sounds handy!

we are paying under £3000 for a fortnight in the south of france at a villa with private pool, tunnel and stopovers to go on top of that, so another £400 or so, but not much more than £1500 a week and is school hols as we are both teachers