Category — e. What to Budget for Walt Disney World

Hey–the deal I was referring to here is out, see this.

Word is that we may learn more about an upcoming Disney World discount as soon as tomorrow.

Come back tomorrow  to see if the rumors are true!!

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WALT DISNEY WORLD 2017 ADMISSION TICKET PRICES

(This page is sponsored by the Official Ticket Center. Check them out for reliably lower-priced Disney World tickets!)

Three types of Walt Disney World prices are important to think about:

• Walt Disney World theme park admission ticket prices—the tickets that grant you admission to the parks
• Walt Disney World resort hotel prices, and
• Park and hotel food prices

Disney World ticket prices were last updated in late February 2016. This page focuses on Walt Disney World theme park admission ticket prices from now until they go up again.

MORE DETAILS ON WALT DISNEY WORLD ADMISSION TICKET PRICES 2016: HOW THE TICKETS WORK

There are multiple types of Walt Disney World theme park tickets, but the one most relevant to most first time visitors is the Magic Your Way ticket, with or without the Park Hopper option.

You buy one theme park ticket for each person who will be three years old or older at the time of your visit (kids younger than three enter the parks for free.) The tickets have two pricing levels: one for kids who will be younger than ten at the time of your visit (but 3 or older) and the other for people ten or older.

When you buy your tickets, you also say how many “days” you want—from one to ten. Each “day” you buy permits unlimited visits to one theme park on one day. If you also add the Park Hopper option, you can make unlimited visits to any of the theme parks in one day–one theme park, two, three, or all four theme parks.

• For example, if you buy a three day ticket without the park hopper option, you could make two visits to the Magic Kingdom on day one, three visits to Epcot on day two, and two visits to the Animal Kingdom on day 3
• If you have a three day ticket with the park hopper option, you could for example make two visits to the Magic Kingdom and one to Disney’s Hollywood Studios on day one, one visit to Epcot and two to Disney’s Animal Kingdom on day two, and one to Epcot and two to the Magic Kingdom on day three
• What you can’t do without a park hopper ticket is visit more than one theme park on the same day. For example, you can’t, on November 25th, use one day of your three-day ticket to visit the Magic Kingdom, and another day of this same ticket to visit Epcot that same day. More than one theme park in a day requires a park hopper

You do not have to use your days all in a row boom boom boom—e.g. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Once you use your first day, you have 14 days to use all the days on your ticket. So on a three-day ticket you could visit the theme parks Monday, Thursday, and Sunday.

• You can also add days at the same price that you would have paid had you bought all those days at once, but have to do so no later than the day you use the last day of your original ticket (and within 14 days of the first day)
• So if you buy a three-day ticket, and realize a few days later that you need more days, you can add two days and they will cost only the difference between what you paid originally for a three day ticket, and what you would have had to have paid for a five day ticket, so long as you add these days no later than the day you use your third day
• You can also add stuff like the Park Hopper during the same day window at the same price as you would have paid when you first bought your ticket

However, you can’t “subtract” days if you overbuy.

HOW WALT DISNEY WORLD PRICES ITS THEME PARK ADMISSION TICKETS

1. While Disney typically increases ticket prices at least once a year–late February in 2014 through 20165—it changes theme park admission prices based on the seasons of the year only for One Day tickets, which also have other curious characteristics–different prices for the Magic Kingdom vs the other three parks, and expiration. Multi-day tickets–which most people buy–are the same price whenever you plan to visit.

2. Disney sells tickets by the day—one through ten days. The way it prices these days, the first three days are very expensive, while days after the third are comparatively almost free. See the image for exact Disney World prices.

For example, a three day ticket costs (including tax) an adult $309, or an average of $103 a day. A ten day ticket would cost the same adult $426. The added 7 days cost in total around $117 more—or just about $16.70 per day. For a 4-6 day ticket, it costs $16/day/person to add days–and on a after the 7th day, just $10.65/day/person to add days.

3. A park hopper costs (after tax) about $73.50 for all ticket lengths longer than three days..

I have also uploaded an excel spreadsheet with the same data in it as the chart, so that you can multiply by the number of members of your own family.

TIPS AND TRICKS FOR WALT DISNEY WORLD THEME PARK TICKETS

There are other ticket types than the ones discussed above—less relevant for first time visitors. For details on all of them, see this page on MouseSavers.com.

While it’s hard to find discounts on tickets, it is sometimes possible, especially for longer-stay tickets. Check sponsor the Official Ticket Center, MouseSavers.com, Triple A if you are a member, and if you have military ties, this page and also MilitaryDisneyTips.com.

Since you can add on to your tickets–days, park hoppers, etc.–but can’t subtract, it doesn’t really pay to overbuy. Start with the minimum you think you need (but at least two days) and add on later if needed.  Remember to add no later than the day you use your current last day!

All of this site’s To-Do Lists tell you exactly what ticket type you need for their associated itineraries.

FREE TICKETS ON YOUR BIRTHDAY?

Disney world no longer offers free tickets on your birthday.

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DEALS ON DISNEY WORLD HOTEL ROOMS

My friends at Destinations in Florida let me know that today Disney World released a new room rate deal for stays most nights from March 2 through June 15, 2015.

It’s a somewhat complex deal:

• There’s different discounts for stays before or after April 5, and
• Two different book-by dates–booking by February 16 will get in some cases a better deal than booking in the deal’s second period, February 17th through March 28
• Moreover, as usual some room types are excluded, and others have different discounts than others in their class.

If you are ready to book, contact Kelly, the designated Destinations In Florida agent for yourfirstvisit.net readers, at KellyB@DestinationsInFlorida.com or 980-241-7066.

Kelly offers itinerary planning, dining services, mouse perks….complete professional vacation planning all for FREE!!!  (Don’t forget to mention that I sent you.  All qualified vacation packages also receive a copy of “The Easy Guide to Your First Walt Disney World Visit – 2015” FREE.)

Otherwise, here’s some of the details of the offer.

VALUE RESORTS

At the values, All-Star Movies and standard Little Mermaid rooms at Art of Animation are excluded. Otherwise, here’s the deal:

MODERATE RESORTS

At the moderates, Port Orleans French Quarter is excluded.

DELUXE RESORTS

No deluxes are excluded, but there’s two different discount levels.

 DVC RESORTS

Bay Lake Tower, the Villas at the Grand Floridian and the soon-to-open Polynesian Village villas are the DVC resorts that are not in.

To book one of these deals, contact Kelly, the designated Destinations In Florida agent for yourfirstvisit.net readers, at KellyB@DestinationsInFlorida.com or 980-241-7066.

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Update: This sales goes through 12/1!!!

As co-author Josh notes here, Amazon has a site-wide 30% off sale on any printed book through Sunday.  Just input the discount code HOLIDAY30 in the spot indicated by the red circle:

So it’s the perfect time to get your copy of the brand-new The easy Guide to Your First Walt Disney World Visit 2015!

The easy Guide 2015 is based on the amazing start of the 2014 edition–the best reviewed Disney World Guidebook in history.  For more on The easy Guide, see this!

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Disney World now and then offers a couple of discounts that everyone pretty much understands:

• “Room-only” deals: room rate discounts that lower the cost of rooms compared to whatever standard prices are offered the same dates
• “Free dining” deals: those who buy rooms and tickets at full standard prices get one of Disney’s Dining Plans for free

A third common deal, however, seems to cause a bit of confusion. This is Disney World’s “Play Stay Dine and Save” deal.

Some people call this “free dining.” That’s wrong.  Other say that the savings in it come from people 10 and older paying the dining plan and ticket prices of 3 to 9 year olds.  That’s wrong too.

What Stay Play Dine is is a discount of around 9%-17% off of what the price would otherwise be for a package including hotel nights, tickets, and dining plans. The actual percentage savings varies by the hotel, the number of people booking, and the age structure of the group, and the only way to calculate it is to do test bookings for the same dates and rooms with and without the deal.

Moreover, it’s almost always offered with a “room only” deal also offered the same nights. Smaller, younger groups in more expensive rooms may do better with the room only deal than Stay Play Dine. Here too you need to test to know.

THE CURRENT PLAY STAY DINE AND SAVE DEAL

Last week Disney World released two deals, Play Stay Dine (“PSD”) and room only, for into March 2015.

I tested PSD savings per night for several different hotels and family structures during a late January period and also compared them to the room rate deal (to see which saved more) and to rack rates (to see percentage savings).

Here’s the results:

At value resort Pop Century–where the dining plan is quick service–the room rate discount for a standard room is $21.38/night on the tested nights, and PSD is always better for any family type these nights.

Total discounts range from 9% to 14% and are in the higher end of the range as more of the party is 10 or older. At best, the discounts are 60% of the cost of the dining plan

At moderate resort Caribbean Beach, with the regular dining plan on the same nights in a standard room, nightly savings are below:

Room rate savings per night these nights for the same room are $45.56.  Only a solo traveler does better with the room rate deal than PSD. Discounts range from 11-17%, with the higher percentage savings for families with more people 10 and older.  The savings cover between 59 to 72% of the dining plan costs.

At the expense deluxe resort the Polynesian Village, the room rate deal is better for many families

Nightly savings from the room rate deal for a standard room the nights I modeled are $144.79, and PSD nightly savings vary depending on family size and age structure from around $100 to almost $200.

Many families do better with the room rate deal than PSD (in yellow).  SPD percentage savings range from 13 to 17%. PSD Savings actually exceed free dining savings for some family structures, and at worst savings pay 80% of dining plan costs.

The Wilderness Lodge is the least expensive deluxe resort at Disney World.

Nightly savings for the room rate deal are $97.54 for standard rooms for the nights I tested.

PSD saves less for many family structures (in yellow) and saves more for others.  Percentage savings for PSD are 9 to 15%, showing the same patterns as the other resorts–higher discounts with more people older than 9. The PSD savings in effect pay for 60-75% of dining plan costs.

Compare savings for a similar family–e.g. with two adults and two 3-9 year olds–across the last three resorts and you’ll see the nonsense of the claim “10 and ups pay 3-9 rates.” If that were true, nightly savings would be the same per family type, not varying across resorts as in fact they do!

HOW TO DECIDE IF PLAY STAY DINE IS FOR YOU?

In more expensive rooms, your savings will vary depending on size and the number of people older than 10 in the room.

For such groups, you simply need to test your reservation both ways. Go to Disney’s website, price for your dates, family size and ages, and room based on Play Stay Dine, then hit the radio button on the right next to the Play Stay for the room-rate deal price. Then go into the room rate deal and make sure the tickets and dining plan are set, and compare total prices at the end of your process.

(Note that the packages like PSD initially show with taxes included, but room pricing–rack or discounted–doesn’t add taxes til later in the process.  I dunno why…)

Standard value resort rooms will pretty much always be a better deal under PSD than the room rate deal. Standard moderate rooms ditto except for very small parties (like a blogger on a solo visit to update a room review…). Deluxes should be double checked based on the radio buttons!!

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DISNEY WORLD DEALS INTO MARCH 2015

As expected, two new Walt Disney World deals came out this morning for early 2015.

• One is a “Stay, Play and Dine” package discount with eligible arrival dates of 12/14-12/20/2014 and 1/5-3/7/2015
• Another is a room-only discount applicable most nights from 1/5-3/28/2015

These deals need to be booked by December 29, 2014.

“Stay Play and Dine” savings vary based on family size, ages, length of stay, and hotel. A couple of hotels are excluded from the December dates. Disney’s page on this deal is here.

Room only discounts are as follows:

Value Resorts:

• Little Mermaid rooms at Art of Animation: excluded
• All Star Sports, All Star Music, Pop Century and Family Suites at Art of Animation: 15% off on weekends, 20% off on weekdays
• All Star Movies: 10% off on weekends, 15% off on weekdays

Moderate Resorts:

• Coronado Springs, Caribbean Beach, Port Orleans Riverside, Cabins at Fort Wilderness: 20% off on weekends, 25% off on weekdays
• Port Orleans French Quarter: 10% off on weekends, 15% off on weekdays

Deluxe Resorts:

• Yacht Club, Beach Club, BoardWalk Inn, Polynesian, Contemporary, Grand Floridian, Wilderness Lodge, Animal Kingdom Lodge (except Savanna view): 30% off all nights
• Animal Kingdom Lodge Savanna View: 20% off all nights

DVC Resorts:

• Excluded: Bay Lake Tower, Villas at Grand Floridian, Polynesian Villas, all Grand Villas
• Saratoga Springs, Old Key West, Beach Club, Boardwalk Villas, Wilderness Lodge Villas: 30% off all nights
• Villas at Animal Kingdom Lodge: 20% off all nights

Disney’s page on the room-only deal is here.

My friends at Destinations in Florida can help you with this or any other deal! Call them at 877-918-8941 or request a price online.

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