Is £5000 a realistic budget?

[hjfoau]

I need to ring fence the holiday money but not ready to book, we've never been skiing on a family holiday. It would be 2 adults, 2 teens, we'd likely be looking at a package deal with lessons included, we can go in early March so term time (won't be term time for our school), perhaps just M-F?

Is £5000 realistic to cover everything including food?

£5000 is tight (£6000 is more realistic) but see if you can get a deal with one of the Tour Operators, most of which only offer Saturday to Saturday packages. Approx. prices:
Half-board accommodation - about £3000-£3500
Lift passes for 4 pers. - about £1000
Ski lessons - About £800
Ski rental - About £500

On top of this you'll need to budget for lunch on the mountain (£20 p.p. per day) and drinks. 6 days x £80 is almost another £500.

The deals to look out for are any that include free lift passes, or all inclusive. Lessons are not usually included in a package unless it is a deal aimed solely at beginners, which of course would be ideal for you if you're all beginners. Beware of B&B, as eating out in the evening can be expensive. Half board is usually a better deal.

M-F you would have three days skiiing depending on flights, pretty pointless. i think 5k is tight, I'm assuming you're looking at Europe?

You’ll probably get a deal with a TO if you aren’t especially fussed where you go. Assuming beginners (you said first family holiday but might be misinterpreting) you don’t need a mega resort. You also don’t have to lunch on the mountain and definitely not at £20 a head every day. We take a sandwich with us quite regularly, and we always self cater as we actually enjoy cooking in the evening in own our own kitchen.

Currently you can go self catering just outside Flachau is Austria (5mins bus to the lifts) for £1500 inc flights and a private transfer. €1250 for lift passes, leaves another ~£2.5k for lessons, kit hire, insurance, food and incidentals which should be plenty. Conversely if you want fully catered ski in / ski out in a French mega resort your budget is bust just on accommodation. You’ll probably get every answer imaginable on here because for some skiing is all about luxury food, service and everything else, and at the other end for some they will stay in a shoebox and eat instant noodles to get 2 weeks on the snow instead of 1.

Can you go for £5k. Definitely. Is it how you imagine a ski holiday. Maybe/maybe not.

Thanks all. I'd guessed 5k because I'd played around with Crystal Ski and found something half board a few months ago for £4K and hoped £1k spending money would be enough but wasn't sure about any other hidden costs I hadn't considered. I was hoping March would be our saving grace!

Look at the costs of ski passes. You don’t need a big resort for the first weeks skiing. Puy st Vincent is a lot cheaper than 3 valleys. Also eating on the mountain every day is expensive for 4. Suggest you take sandwiches /chocolate/drink in a rucksack and have a picnic. We managed to do that every day at Christmas (weather unusually good) and hopefully March will be even better.

driving and going independently will be a lot cheaper but you’ll need to do more yourself obviously. You can get an air b&b in a town like Guillestre (20 mins drive from Vars and other resorts) for about 700€ for the week. And do self catering.

it depends what you want!

No. Presumably the price you found didn’t include lift passes, ski hire boot hire helmet hire ski lessons.

if you can all already ski well then you could get a ski holiday for that if you were very careful about where and when.

Try Sunweb. Andorra is more affordable, although the snow can be less reliable that late in the season. Lift passes are included with Sunweb and if you fly to France they also include your ski hire I think. Obvs ski school would be extra if you needed that too.

I am always amazed at how much it costs for lunch and coffees on the slopes, so factor that in. And even if you're going half board, you'll want to eat out a few times for a change.

Most package deals are 6 days skiing.

No. Presumably the price you found didn’t include lift passes, ski hire boot hire helmet hire ski lessons.

It did! Included everything. And it was half board, it might have been M-F though, need to look again.

Just had a another look and it's coming up £4K for everything (half board), this time Norway (Park Hotel Vossevangen) appreciate someone said M-F might be too short though, my thinking was I'm not sure how my youngest would find skiing so thought just a taster would a start. I did a short break whilst in the US a few years ago and found a few days skiing more than enough ha.

That sounds like a good deal - and going to Norway in March is probably the best time of the season to be there (because January and February can be very cold).

If you're keen to find out whether or not skiing is something for you and the family, then a 5-day holiday in Norway is not a bad option, but be aware of just how many days you'll be skiing. If you are only skiing Tues/Wed/Thurs and travelling on Monday and Friday, then you're paying a relatively high price per day for just 3 days skiing. A typical Sat-Sat package to the Alps will mean 6 days of skiing.

@JarvisIsland has done a good job of turning your question around - i.e. how could a family ski for a week for £5000. The answer is to book everything yourself, stay in a self-catering apartment, perhaps stay just outside of the main resorts and drive or bus in every day, eat sandwiches on the mountain etc. Many families do this, but it requires that you know what you're doing and where to book (and where not to go) and that you're happy with this type of holiday.

We are a family of 5 and always go M-F and ski 4 and sometimes even 5 days.

I think we normally pay 6k ish all in but it has been more like 7K sonetimes and if we drive down to 5K. Packages have always been more expensive than self book for us. Things that have made it cheaper have been:

Driving - this is always cheaper than 5 x flights for us even with eurostar, tolls.and petrol (we dont stop though). May be cheaper with 4 but margins will be less.
We have uaed Sunweb with included lift passes for accomodation.
Book ski hire online in advance for online discounts.
Half board hotel in Italy.
Italian resorts instead of French - where food costs are extortionate.
If self catering, cooking pasta or getting takeaway pizza some nights instead of eating out.
Have pizza in the village for lunch not on mountain.

You can be really austere and keep costs right down but its honestly not nuch fun. I like stopping for hot chocolate and eating on the mountain. 5/5.5K should be doable for 4 without being too restrictive I'd have thought..

I’ve done a m-f package ski holiday with Alpine elements a few times to Morzine but they do other, cheaper resorts too. I’d check them out.

Are you sure that included lessons? It is rare for packages to include lessons since everyone is different in terms of what they need.

Also check it includes childcare since lessons won't all finish at the same time. Often a hidden cost.

Obviously the childcare depends on whether it is needed. Apologies I think yours are teens

I’d second sunweb, really good value. Some deals they offer are fully inclusive of passes, ski hire, food and drink etc but not usually lessons. So, I’d pick somewhere where lessons are a bit cheaper.

@user04 yes, lessons, ski hire and lift passes. I would screen shot but don't think we can add images atm.

No need to screen shot. I'd book it, it sounds like a good deal

Thanks all, really useful. We are pretty frugal with food, but admit we do like more than 'budget' for most other things. We'd consider driving though, DH drives abroad a lot for work so that could be an option if it saves money. I just thought package would be the easiest option for first ski holiday, but appreciate that won't be the most cost effective.

I'd like to keep it under £5k if we can so we still have £5k for a decent sun holiday in the summer or October, I'm not sure I'd want skiing to absorb so much of our annual budget without knowing how the teens will find it. But £5k is on the low side for us for the sun holiday as well so I'm worried we will have 2 subpar holidays instead of one great one!

If you want the teens to like it, because you want them and you to continue to ski regularly then I'd discuss with them the better ski holiday this year and make the summer holiday a european city break or something much much cheaper, so their first experience is convenient, (once you are experienced you can cut costs a lot on skiing, you'll have a local favourite resort, know the cheap but easy access accommodation is etc, own some of your own gear to save renting, not need so many lessons etc, and get back to 2 holidays a year). If it's a one off and you'll never go skiing again then the split you are suggesting maybe makes more sense.

Might be biased because we ski twice (Xmas/NY and March) and don't summer sun beach/AI type holiday at all because being anywhere near sand or a pool of splashing kids and sun loungers is my idea of living hell (I know some other's idea of living hell is a chair lift, it's not judging, different strokes for different folks!), but do do a few Euro long weekends a year, Paris, Brugges, Amsterdam etc.

@JarvisIsland that's the problem isn't it, I want to go for a taster but we'll want to go every year 😂 but yes I think having a good go at it and then reducing our summer holiday spend is probably the most sensible way of doing it. I'm not sure we'd feasibly be able to ski every year so maybe our approach should be to do it well to enjoy it rather than trying to cut corners.

Does anyone else feel an overwhelming urge to 'bucket list' holidays when they have teens?! Ever since my eldest turned 13 a couple years ago I have become so acutely aware of how few years we potentially have of them at home and all the things I want us to do as a family before they fly the nest!

Definitely look at sunweb as lift passes are included, and I'd look for an apart'hotel so you can partially self cater (we use MMV a lot in France but they are probably more geared to younger kids).
Ski lessons in France are about €200 pp for mon-fri half days in a group.
There's no need to buy lunch on the mountain, just take a baguette and some snacks in your backpack, buy hot chocolate if you can stand the queues for it.
This year our budget was £3k so we are making it work by self catering, staying further out, and driving, but we can usually comfortably make £5k work even in school holidays.

I don’t have teens, but my parents and grandparents were deputy/headteachers. We were always tied to school hols, no nipping off 2 days early for a cheap flight. (I did miss a lot of school for National level sports, so again not judging those who do this. I’d absolutely have done it it!) and we always did big ‘bucket list’ holiday one year (skiing was one, we also did a week in NY followed by 2 weeks in Florida with a full week of that in the parks one year) and then somewhere in a static caravan/pre-pitched tent in the north of France for a week on a self drive the next to recover the funds when we were older kids, so I do appreciate the challenge. I also wanted to stop going on the boring intermediate year at about 15 (still obviously up for the cool year!) so I feel your pain 😂

We (me) in our 30’s still gladly, happily and under zero duress whatsoever ski with the in-laws but probably wouldn’t do a non-activity holiday with them quite so enthusiastically, so it might be worth putting the work in now if you still want to holiday with your kids 15 years down the line.

Have a look at Heidi for ski holidays as well as Crystal. We also find for the alps, 3 is the break even point for driving if cost is the only factor, so don’t rule out self drive. Plus depending on where you go and how you time it, it can be stunning scenery driving through the mountains.

@JarvisIsland yeah that's a really good point, I like the idea of building something we do as a family for years to come. I know lots of people talk about teenagers not wanting to go on holiday with their parents any more, I really doubt my adrenaline junkie, sun worshipping eldest will ever feel like that though 😂

Try Heidi. They are quite a new operator and getting really good reviews from what I can see. Also aiming for a more flexible approach to ski breaks which might suit!