Finding The Right Hotel
After setting a budget your next step should be finding lodging that you like. There is many hotels in the Orlando area. You will need to decide if you are going to stay on Disney Property or stay off property. I have developed a list below to show you what staying on property offers and staying off property offers.
Staying off Property
No Disney Dining Plan
Disney Parks Magic Hours are not offered
Most hotels charge resort fees
Can only making Disney Dining reservation in advance on the 180 day mark
No Magical Express
Some hotels offer park transplantation the times are not the best
The packages you buy in the parks you can not have them shipped back to your hotel.
Hotels off property might not take payments before the vacation
Some hotels don’t have a good selection of food on property
You drive to the magic
The First Steps of Planning a Disney Vacation
BudgetPlanning a Disney Vacation can be very overwhelming. Some people go thru travel agents, travel websites and some people go directly thru Disney’s travel agents. First and foremost before booking your vacation a budget needs to be set. A Disney vacation can be very expensive if you don’t set a budget. You can add food, airline tickets, rental car, lodging, tickets and souvenirs to your budget. Setting a budget will set the tone for the type of lodging, ticket perks and how many days / nights for your vacation.
Some families give the greatest amount of their budget for lodging, other families activities and so on. However you plan your budget remember it is your vacation and it is your magical memories being made.
You will find below a chart that I use to start building my vacation. Please note we this is for driving.
Item Money Allotted
_______________________________________________________________________________
Gas _________________________
Car Rental _________________________
Hotel on the way down to Florida _________________________
Hotel first night when we arrive in Orlando _________________________
Supper the first night in Orlando _________________________
Breakfast 2nd day in Orlando _________________________
Hotel on Disney Property _________________________
Tips (Dining and Mouse Keeping) _________________________
Park Tickets _________________________
Dining for the week (Dining Plan) _________________________ Souvenirs _________________________
Last official night in Orlando (off property hotel) _________________________
Breakfast for the morning going home _________________________
Hotel (just incase we decided to break the
driving up within 2 days) __________________________
Grand Total: __________________________
As you can see we drive and we usually break our driving up between two days. This is easier for our family. The reason why we do not stay on Disney property for the first night we get into Orlando, is that we usually get into Orlando so late that is not worth the money and the benefits of staying on property that night. I usually try to get a hotel near Downtown Disney so we can have supper there and able to stretch our legs a little bit. We usually stay in a Disney Deluxe hotel from Sunday - Friday, then due to the rates going up for the weekend and I am never ready to go home on Friday, we stay in another hotel close to Disney. On our last day we check out f our Disney hotel, load the car, go for a character meal then go to one of the parks all day and then around 5pm we go to our new hotel. This works for our family and it has saved me several hundreds of dollars not staying on Disney property for the weekend rates.
I would love to hear about your budget list.
