Doing Disney on the cheap

[user1478871196]

Hello all
Just wondered if anyone had managed to go to Disney in Florida on a reasonable budget. Having been pricing it up for me, my husband and three children and it's so expensive.

Any advice please X

Go in term time, the flights are much cheaper.

Hire the smallest car that you can.

Don't eat out, shop at the supermarkets and eat in.

Rent a small condo, instead of a villa or hotel room.

Disney world is never cheap though!

I went with Monarch. Flights cheap but bloody horrendous.

We went out of holidays because we live overseas. I paid just over 2000 for flights, car hire and a villa with a pool for 15 days. Oh and we flew to the cheaper airport - Sanford? It was a short drive outside Orlando.

You can do the free entry tickets for looking at timeshares thing, but we didn't. I just researched a lot into different offers.

Look out for coupon books in the airports too, loads of offers on restaurants and kids eat free etc.

The other thing I did was to register on restaurant sites for email coupons and I told them my birthday was during the holiday, so I got loads more vouchers.

Look for a group on Facebook called 'its Orlando time' they have loads of people who will tell you how to save money, where is good to stay where to avoid etc.

Disney dine-in is a good way to save money. Sure you will eat junk for 2 weeks but for free practically. Stay in a Disney hotel for free transport, they have different levels of "luxury" but alot of the linen, food etc that they use is the same in each hotel.

Fly economy and in termtime if you can. Avoid special occasions such as thanksgiving, halloween and xmas.

Thanks for all of the advice X

I don't know what you consider to be a budget but we did it for less than £5k for 5 people including park tickets in August.

a) Fly indirect, we changed at New York one way and Toronto the other way. You clear customs there so it passes some time and you walk out at the other end without having to go through customs again. Also, fly to Tampa rather than orlando. If you're hiring a car it makes no odds which one you go to. Our flights and carhire were less than £2.5k for 2 weeks for 5 people on American Airways

b) hire a small car, a small car turned out to be a Jeep!

c) Book a condo on owners direct, not through an agent ours was 3 bed / 2 baths on a lovely complex and was about £400 for the week. It was about 10 minutes drive from the parks, this is really fine.

d) Don't eat in disney if you can help it. The food is rubbish and overpriced. We ate in good places all over orlando and also picked up food at supermarkets.

e) Don't buy a 7 or 14 day pass. If you google you will find that you can buy 3/4/5 day tickets plus a day in universal and it's much cheaper that way. You won't want to be in the parks every day anyway.