What is your travel budget and plan for 2025?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:About $15,000 for a family of 4, less than last year when there was a lot of wedding travel.

- Tag along work trip over a holiday
- Weekend skiing locally
- Europe over spring break
- Week or so at a lake resort in the summer
- Will probably try and plan for a fall something but it's a hard time to travel due to work and also activities and sports

OP here - which lake resort are you looking at? How do you manage Europe with 4 for under 10k?

I am not the poster you quoted, but we did spring break to Paris and London for a week for under 10k. Family of four. Flights were $941 each direct with the chunnel in the middle. Definitely doable.

[Anonymous]

We are going to India for 5 weeks over summer next year to visit family and do touristy stuff. I’m budgeting about $30k for the 3 of us plus a few relatives who will be joining us locally.

[Anonymous]

2 adults one teen
Florida long weekend in February (Universal) $2,000
Visit family out west
$3000
TBD weeklong summer vacation
$4,000
Random beach weekend (family condo) or overnights
$1,000

We use Hilton credit card and chase sapphire so most hotel rooms are free.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:About $15,000 for a family of 4, less than last year when there was a lot of wedding travel.

- Tag along work trip over a holiday
- Weekend skiing locally
- Europe over spring break
- Week or so at a lake resort in the summer
- Will probably try and plan for a fall something but it's a hard time to travel due to work and also activities and sports

OP here - which lake resort are you looking at? How do you manage Europe with 4 for under 10k?

SAS was running a sale and does kids fares so all in on airfare with an island hop flight is just over $4k. There was a direct flight on United which was a little under $1000 each in the fall but I waited too long to pull the trigger. Airbnb in Athens is about $500 for three nights for our portion of 4/6 people and splitting a Marriott resort villa is about $2000 for our portion of the four of us for four nights. Plus another $700 or so for the other two nights of hotels. We'll still need to rent a car in the island and spend money on stuff to do and eat (minus four days of breakfast included) but pretty confident we'll do it all in for about $2500 especially splitting meals. Might be just over.

London we found super cheap flights but the accommodations are so much it balanced out.

Lake resort is in the Midwest where I will say lake culture rules. That will work out to about $1500. Skiing just over $1000. And the work trip is less than $1000 out of pocket with insanely cheap airfares and hotel included.

[Anonymous]

OP, I think your plan is great and you can think about a cheaper trip to Europe (economy seats and an economy hotel or vrbo), which you could do for 10K, or doing something like renting a beach house for a week and combining with maybe a weekend trip to NyC or Hershey or Williamsburg at a doffetnet point.

I think I’m probably 20 years older than you and my kids are teens so travel is more expensive but also we are able to spend more than we did on our 20s and 30s! We are doing:
Spring break to Galapagos (something we’ve been planning for like a decade so this is a splurge!)
Possible 10 days in Spain this summer
Possibly a week in Dewey this summer
Driving trip to midwest for Thanksgiving to see adult kid (driving so pets can come too!—will be pretty low cost)
Christmas cruise to Caribbean (another splurge but it’s the only trip out adult kid can do with us)

One thing I’ve noticed in planning trips to Europe. The “first city” is incredibly expensive, as is any ritzy beach location. But if you look at smaller cities, the hotels are really cheap. And some of those small cities have incredible sites, unesco heritage castles etc. so think York instead of London, Burgos or Toledo instead of Madrid, Avignon instead of Paris, etc. and the trains to get to those smaller cities are often very reasonable priced. And in much of Europe kids and senior citizens get very heavily discounted (or free) admission to many sites.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:About $15,000 for a family of 4, less than last year when there was a lot of wedding travel.

- Tag along work trip over a holiday
- Weekend skiing locally
- Europe over spring break
- Week or so at a lake resort in the summer
- Will probably try and plan for a fall something but it's a hard time to travel due to work and also activities and sports

OP here - which lake resort are you looking at? How do you manage Europe with 4 for under 10k?

I am not the poster you quoted, but we did spring break to Paris and London for a week for under 10k. Family of four. Flights were $941 each direct with the chunnel in the middle. Definitely doable.

We've done this too in and out of London with the Chunnel both ways and flights about $800/each. If you're willing to use London as a base and get flights/trains around it you can get cheap flights from IAD to London.

[Anonymous]

We spend 35k going to bali

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We generally do

2-4 night February trip to Florida or Caribbean

5-7 night spring break trip

2 weeks Europe in summer

A few days to a local beach or to visit friends at end of summer

Quick weekend trip in fall - local mountains or Philly or somewhere else driveable.

5-7 days winter break trip.

Last year this meant Miami in February, Arizona/Utah for Spring break (Tucson, Antelope Canyon, Zion, France, Italy and Spain in Summer, Costa Rica winter break.

3 people, around $30k and a TON of points. Wouldn't be possible without points and credit card free nights like Marriott Bonvoy, Hilton Aspire. Able to fly business and stay at high end places planning way in advance.

OP here - WOW you really know how to stretch the budget, could you share more on how you manage to do 2 weeks in Europe without blowing more than half the budget? Are the Marriot Bonvoy and Hilton Aspire from transferring credit card points?

Np but I'm a travel twin to the person above. We're doing two weeks in Europe this summer and it's already fully booked- flights there and back using points. I jumped on a credit card transfer bonus to get very discounted (points) business class seats for my family of 4. We're flying home economy, about $800 total in fees round trip. We're spending a week in two different places, first at a rental apartment in the alps, second in the Italian lakes. Those will come to about $8k total. I'm budgeting about $1k for other travel costs, mostly public transportation on swiss rail. Staying under $15k all in.

I love to travel and plan trips and I often monitor prices for hotels, cars, flights even after booking. But planning ahead is key too.

[Anonymous]

I’m a single person. My travel budget for this year is $18k to $25k. Comp is $300k. I don’t have any significant expenses other than housing and don’t spend much on eating out/entertainment, clothes, etc. So, I invest a decent amount in travel.

Planning two bigger trips this year:
Portugal for 16 days (Lisbon, Porto, Madeira)—this may end up being solo if schedules don’t align with friends/family; $6k to $7k

Australia for 23 days (Sydney, Melbourne, Whitsunday, possibly another place). Will likely go with family. Budget is $10k to $15k—need to price things out.

I may do 1 or 2 smaller trips like LA or Chicago for a long weekend or week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:About $15,000 for a family of 4, less than last year when there was a lot of wedding travel.

- Tag along work trip over a holiday
- Weekend skiing locally
- Europe over spring break
- Week or so at a lake resort in the summer
- Will probably try and plan for a fall something but it's a hard time to travel due to work and also activities and sports

OP here - which lake resort are you looking at? How do you manage Europe with 4 for under 10k?

SAS was running a sale and does kids fares so all in on airfare with an island hop flight is just over $4k. There was a direct flight on United which was a little under $1000 each in the fall but I waited too long to pull the trigger. Airbnb in Athens is about $500 for three nights for our portion of 4/6 people and splitting a Marriott resort villa is about $2000 for our portion of the four of us for four nights. Plus another $700 or so for the other two nights of hotels. We'll still need to rent a car in the island and spend money on stuff to do and eat (minus four days of breakfast included) but pretty confident we'll do it all in for about $2500 especially splitting meals. Might be just over.

London we found super cheap flights but the accommodations are so much it balanced out.

Lake resort is in the Midwest where I will say lake culture rules. That will work out to about $1500. Skiing just over $1000. And the work trip is less than $1000 out of pocket with insanely cheap airfares and hotel included.

OP here - Thank you for this detail! Do you have any websites or settings you prefer for flights?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I think your plan is great and you can think about a cheaper trip to Europe (economy seats and an economy hotel or vrbo), which you could do for 10K, or doing something like renting a beach house for a week and combining with maybe a weekend trip to NyC or Hershey or Williamsburg at a doffetnet point.

I think I’m probably 20 years older than you and my kids are teens so travel is more expensive but also we are able to spend more than we did on our 20s and 30s! We are doing:
Spring break to Galapagos (something we’ve been planning for like a decade so this is a splurge!)
Possible 10 days in Spain this summer
Possibly a week in Dewey this summer
Driving trip to midwest for Thanksgiving to see adult kid (driving so pets can come too!—will be pretty low cost)
Christmas cruise to Caribbean (another splurge but it’s the only trip out adult kid can do with us)

One thing I’ve noticed in planning trips to Europe. The “first city” is incredibly expensive, as is any ritzy beach location. But if you look at smaller cities, the hotels are really cheap. And some of those small cities have incredible sites, unesco heritage castles etc. so think York instead of London, Burgos or Toledo instead of Madrid, Avignon instead of Paris, etc. and the trains to get to those smaller cities are often very reasonable priced. And in much of Europe kids and senior citizens get very heavily discounted (or free) admission to many sites.

OP Galapagos is a dream for us, but our child is too young (under 4), glad it came to fruition for you all after a decade! How do you manage PTO with this much travel (if you have a job with limited PTO) - working from Dewey?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:About $15,000 for a family of 4, less than last year when there was a lot of wedding travel.

- Tag along work trip over a holiday
- Weekend skiing locally
- Europe over spring break
- Week or so at a lake resort in the summer
- Will probably try and plan for a fall something but it's a hard time to travel due to work and also activities and sports

OP here - which lake resort are you looking at? How do you manage Europe with 4 for under 10k?

I am not the poster you quoted, but we did spring break to Paris and London for a week for under 10k. Family of four. Flights were $941 each direct with the chunnel in the middle. Definitely doable.

We've done this too in and out of London with the Chunnel both ways and flights about $800/each. If you're willing to use London as a base and get flights/trains around it you can get cheap flights from IAD to London.

OP here Good tip for Europe! We also haven't been to London with our tot so many that's a good starting trip for us in this new reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We generally do

2-4 night February trip to Florida or Caribbean

5-7 night spring break trip

2 weeks Europe in summer

A few days to a local beach or to visit friends at end of summer

Quick weekend trip in fall - local mountains or Philly or somewhere else driveable.

5-7 days winter break trip.

Last year this meant Miami in February, Arizona/Utah for Spring break (Tucson, Antelope Canyon, Zion, France, Italy and Spain in Summer, Costa Rica winter break.

3 people, around $30k and a TON of points. Wouldn't be possible without points and credit card free nights like Marriott Bonvoy, Hilton Aspire. Able to fly business and stay at high end places planning way in advance.

OP here - WOW you really know how to stretch the budget, could you share more on how you manage to do 2 weeks in Europe without blowing more than half the budget? Are the Marriot Bonvoy and Hilton Aspire from transferring credit card points?

Np but I'm a travel twin to the person above. We're doing two weeks in Europe this summer and it's already fully booked- flights there and back using points. I jumped on a credit card transfer bonus to get very discounted (points) business class seats for my family of 4. We're flying home economy, about $800 total in fees round trip. We're spending a week in two different places, first at a rental apartment in the alps, second in the Italian lakes. Those will come to about $8k total. I'm budgeting about $1k for other travel costs, mostly public transportation on swiss rail. Staying under $15k all in.

I love to travel and plan trips and I often monitor prices for hotels, cars, flights even after booking. But planning ahead is key too.

OP this sounds like an incredible trip - I've seen Swiss Alps as a good trip for a busy toddler. Did you use Airbnb for the rental apartment? Are you using just Google Flights to monitor or another setup?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m a single person. My travel budget for this year is $18k to $25k. Comp is $300k. I don’t have any significant expenses other than housing and don’t spend much on eating out/entertainment, clothes, etc. So, I invest a decent amount in travel.

Planning two bigger trips this year:
Portugal for 16 days (Lisbon, Porto, Madeira)—this may end up being solo if schedules don’t align with friends/family; $6k to $7k

Australia for 23 days (Sydney, Melbourne, Whitsunday, possibly another place). Will likely go with family. Budget is $10k to $15k—need to price things out.

I may do 1 or 2 smaller trips like LA or Chicago for a long weekend or week.

OP here - I love that for you, it is something looking back I wish I took more advantage of as a single person

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:About $15,000 for a family of 4, less than last year when there was a lot of wedding travel.

- Tag along work trip over a holiday
- Weekend skiing locally
- Europe over spring break
- Week or so at a lake resort in the summer
- Will probably try and plan for a fall something but it's a hard time to travel due to work and also activities and sports

OP here - which lake resort are you looking at? How do you manage Europe with 4 for under 10k?

I am not the poster you quoted, but we did spring break to Paris and London for a week for under 10k. Family of four. Flights were $941 each direct with the chunnel in the middle. Definitely doable.

We've done this too in and out of London with the Chunnel both ways and flights about $800/each. If you're willing to use London as a base and get flights/trains around it you can get cheap flights from IAD to London.

OP here Good tip for Europe! We also haven't been to London with our tot so many that's a good starting trip for us in this new reality.

London was fantastic for both of our kids under 5. The accomodations aren't cheap, but it's such an easy city to navigate. Highly recommend the transport museum with littles.