Did spending cuts force you to change your family vacation plans this year? Is he looking for a family getaway, but he’s surprised when he finds out how much the trip, hotels and food will cost?
The average family of four or five people will spend at least $100 a day on restaurant meals (unless they eat all fast food, but who wants to eat fast food for every meal for a week?)
After reviewing hotels for summer in West Yellowstone, just outside of Yellowstone National Park, rates range from $119 to $185 a night, and that’s for up to four people. If you have five in your family, you should get two rooms, and now their nightly rates are $238 to $370. These rates are for an average room, only two beds and one bathroom.
Your daily cost for food and lodging alone if you have a family of five is between $338 and $470. That makes a five-night vacation cost at least $1,690. If you only have four in your family, the cost is still $1145, not including taxes and other hotel charges.
What are the alternatives? Well, one way to vacation that is often overlooked is through vacation rentals or cabin rentals.
A cabin near Yellowstone will set you back between $150 and $200 a night. Most of these cabins will have multiple bedrooms, a full kitchen (not just a timeshare-style kitchen), and at least two bathrooms.
How much easier would your vacation be if two people could shower at the same time, instead of everyone waiting in line to go to the bathroom? What if you could get the kids a snack from the fridge, instead of paying five times the normal cost to bring them something from the mini-bar fridge?
Vacation rentals in the Yellowstone area can range from $160 to more than $200 a night, and many of these rentals can sleep ten or more people. This means your hosting bill could drop from $470 per night to as little as $160 per night, while providing you with better accommodations.
When you use a vacation rental, you can have the best of both worlds. You can stop by a local grocery store and buy food for your meals, or if you don’t feel like cooking, you can go to a restaurant. Instead of spending $40 or more for the family’s breakfast, you can make eggs, waffles, cereal, or whatever you like for a tenth of the restaurant price. If you want to use the money you saved on a nicer dinner at a restaurant, you can, or you can cook your own dinner and save even more. By preparing some of your own food, your food expenses for the family can drop from $100+ to around $25 per day.
By choosing a vacation rental over a hotel, your five-night vacation could go from $1,690 to just $1,000. Not only will you save money, but you’ll have a lot more room for your family to spread out. Another idea that many people do is find another family to vacation with. Because the vacation rental property is much larger than a hotel room, two families of five can stay in a rental with an occupancy of 10, thus splitting the cost of the rental. Now your $1000 vacation is only about $600.
Be sure to check out my other article on finding the right vacation rental property for you!
