Vacation Inflation

[CommonCents]

Chatting with DH over lunch yesterday, and realized life style inflation for our generation is so obvious by looking at a single measure - vacations.  There is a huge disparity between the vacations we had as children, and the vacations we see people taking these days (and even us, we admit). 

Growing up, evey year (except when we lived in Alaska and it was too expensive to get there) my folks would take us to the Jersey Shore, where my grandparents had rented a bungalow.  For years, there was no TV.  One of the final years there, a TV was installed and we decided we were only allowed to watch the summer olympics on it.  No phone - my mom would walk to the pay phone to call dad when he couldn't get away for the full two weeks.  My dad had to give his work his contact information when on vacation in case an issue arose, and my grandmother about had a heart attack when the Coast Guard did as instructed - and sent the police to our door to get ahold of him.  One indoor shower for the ~10 of us (my cousin's family joined too) and an outside shower that all of us kids didn't bat an eye at using.  My grandmother packed up almost her entire kitchen (spices to tools) so we could eat at home every single night.  My folks didn't go out for dinner, so no need to pay for childcare, but if they had wanted to my aunt/uncle or grandparents could have stepped in.  [ETA: Our entertainment was the beach, many evenings playing cutthroat multi-player solitaire, and reading books.]  DH's experience was similar - his mom would alternate between renting a place on the cape with her parents and taking them camping.

In contrast, we have friends that go on frequent cruises, getting the suite so there is more space for them and their childcare provider they brought with them to help with the toddler twins ($35/hr we last heard.  They are required to pay for 18/hrs a day, or $630/day for ~10 days, in addition to her room and airfare).  They are currently at Disney World for the 2nd time with their 3 year old twins, who won't remember either this trip or last years trip.  Other friends brought their nanny with them to Costa Rica for their vacation.  What we found striking was that our childhood vacations, there was no need for things like expensive childcare because our parents didn't go places where they needed or wanted it.

And as I write this, I confess that even we take far more luxurious trips than we did as children, frequently traveling to foreign countries, albeit without the childcare and taking advantage of things such as free lodging (a friend's apartment in London when visiting her, guest houses in India when my friend was getting married there) or free travel (DH's upcoming work conference in Spain).

What were your vacations like as a kid?  What is your typical vacation now?  Have you seen vacation inflation?

[Spudd]

My experience is the same (I'm 42). As a child we would take road trips or rent cottages up north, with the occasional (maybe once every 10 years) trip to England to visit relatives. The first time I went on what would now be considered as a "real vacation" was age 14 when my dad had to attend a conference in Hawaii, and took us with him.

Now, as an adult, I take flying vacations probably about once a year, and rarely ever road trip. We do it as cheap as we can, but we really love seeing new places and wouldn't give it up unless times were really dire.

[Spartana]

My vacations now are pretty much the same as when I was a kid - maybe even more frugal and "rough". What we did as kids, and what I generally do now, are road trips (with my dog).  We (I) tent camp, stay at budget motels, or rent off season vacation houses (much cheaper then in season by far). This allows me to bring my dog also - something very important to me - although it disallows overseas trips. The few "tony" and more pricey vacations I have taken as an adult I haven't really enjoyed much and found I prefer the more grungy backpacker in a hostel type of travels (and this is how I prefer to travel overseas) to luxury hotels type stays. So I'm fortunate that I actually prefer travel/vacationing that way as it is MUCH cheaper on the budget!

ETA: When I go on a trip I generally am going to do a specific thing in a specific place - climb, hike, bike, kayak, etc... rather then just driving and sight seeing. I do that also but I generally have a focus on some activity and that is why I go places.

[Zikoris]

We used to camp a lot when I was a kid, and do road trips to places not too far. It was fun, but I greatly prefer climbing volcanoes in Guatemala and eating fresh bread sticks in Italy.

Road trips are pretty much out of the question now - no car, and limited vacation time that we'd rather put towards international trips.

[Left]

same here but i'm 28. now that i'm working i put aside 1-2k a year for vacation, about a week's pay.

but i disagree on not taking vacations because the kid won't remember it. it's as much for the parents' and family as for the kid. same logic of having a funneral, person is dead but the family/friends aren't. the price tag isn't something for me to judge since i can't decide how important something is. would you feel better not taking a vacation with a child that will die before 1? or do you make the most of it? it's an extreme example but it's why i don't judge how people decide importance of bonding time

[GuitarStv]

I went on two vacations as a child.  At 12 I flew down to Mexico to stay at my grandmother's time share with my mom and sister for a week.  At 15 I drove to Newfoundland with my mom, aunt, and sister for a week.  Both were pretty huge treats.

I have been on two vacations in my adult life . . . one where we drove up to Algonquin National Park to stay at a fancy cabin for our honeymoon for a week (awesome, went canoeing, kayaking, hiking, and mountain biking every day), one where we flew to Las Vegas with my wife's parents (terrible, the wife and parents wanted to waste a large chunk of vacation shopping and wandering around inside smoke filled buildings bursting with horrid money sucking people/machines).

I would love to do a bike tour somewhere in Europe.  I think that will be our next one after several years of planning.

[sheepstache]

I definitely notice a difference but I don't know that it's a trend or just my family being weird. In my family, having a laid-back vacation where you didn't use many resources was the ideal. What was relaxing was just to get away from it all, not spending a bunch on compensatory pleasures. So for example we borrowed a neighbor's vacation house that was a twenty minute drive to the beach and we cooked all our own meals and made one trip to the boardwalk.
 
On my own, I like to travel and see a bunch while on vacation but that involves hostels and street food. When I travel with my SO, he doesn't want to go anywhere sketch so it costs a ton more. I don't just mean hotels vs. hostels, entire countries qualify as sketch in his mind.
(I find this is one of those things that gives the lie to living as a couple being cheap. Both of us have things that are really important to us to spend money on... so we end up spending the money on both.)

I was having a hard time navigating this with a beach vacation this year because we were getting some recommendations from a friend and her family obviously did vacations a bit different from mine. I was trying to explain why one might want to rent a house in a quieter area a couple blocks from the beach vs. a hotel right on the beach and why it could actually be less stressful to cook simple meals at home rather than running around picking up lunch or eating out. It was kind of like explaining the concept of love to a robot, but I think she's half sold. The funny thing to me is that her family was poor compared to mine. And while both of us get paid vacations, none of our parents did. To me, that ingrained the idea that you couldn't possibly find spending a bunch more money than usual relaxing particularly when you weren't working!

[CommonCents]

same here but i'm 28. now that i'm working i put aside 1-2k a year for vacation, about a week's pay.

but i disagree on not taking vacations because the kid won't remember it. it's as much for the parents' and family as for the kid. same logic of having a funneral, person is dead but the family/friends aren't. the price tag isn't something for me to judge since i can't decide how important something is. would you feel better not taking a vacation with a child that will die before 1? or do you make the most of it? it's an extreme example but it's why i don't judge how people decide importance of bonding time

Hey, just to be clear, I am not against taking *any* vacations with kids!  I'm really not sure how you took that from my post, particularly when I posted some positive memories from my childhood vacations.  I only said "They are currently at Disney World for the 2nd time with their 3 year old twins, who won't remember either this trip or last years trip."  I stand by that sentiment as I highly doubt any 2 yo will remember a trip to Disney.  Clearly, this trip and the last to Disney were for the parents rather than than kids.  I'd obviously spend my vacation time and money in other ways than on a very kids-oriented vacation location that the kids won't remember.  I know others will disagree - my brother spent his honeymoon (sans kids) there.  But yeah - I'm amazed at spending an additional ~$10k easily, on their cruise to bring along a nanny and just can't see any scenario where it's worth that money, even when FI, unless that's my average daily passive earnings.  If someone posted on here asking about it, I'd call it easily facepunch worthy.  (Our friends, however, didn't ask for our opinions, so we didn't volunteer them.)

[Terrestrial]

I definitely see vacation inflation and am as guilty as the next guy or gal.

When I was a kid, most of our vacations revolved around getting in the car to go and visit family, or vacations were structured around being timed to attend a family reunion/wedding/other event, etc.  My parents would sometimes try and mix in some fun stuff like going to disneyland/six flags for a day along the way, but it was rarely if ever the sole 'point' of the trip.   

Now, my wife and our kids fly to almost every vacation we go on for anything further than about 6 hours away (not exactly 'proud' of this...but it happens), and spend far more than when we were children.  Some of it is probably that we are financially better off than our parents were at that age so more likely to spend.  But alot of it is probably that in general lifestyle has inflated from 30 years ago on most levels.

[Beric01]

I still go with my family every year up to a remote area of the state of Montana where we rent a cabin and go fishing/hiking/kayaking etc. No cell phone coverage, though they now have a wifi router. Cost of renting a cabin to fit 8 people is less than that of a motel. It's peaceful and quiet and lets me collect my thoughts and spend time with family.

At the same time, I'm actively trying to do some international vacation. I've seen hardly any of the world (only other other countries I've been to are Canada and Japan), so my goal is to get some international exposure and perspective. I am trying to start to take 2 weeks a year abroad, which I can do for ~$2-3K. I've done Japan so far, and probably doing Brazil next year. Ultimately my goal is to FIRE and move abroad, so it's important for me to get some international exposure and decide where I ultimately want to go. But that doesn't mean I won't choose Mustachian accommodations.

[Mrs. Frugalwoods]

Oh, interesting. This is great point. Yes, now that you mention it, I do see this. As a kid, we primarily took road-trips to visit family and went camping. We took other trips (to Chicago, Washington, DC, etc) when they coincided with a business trip my dad was taking--he'd get his flight and the hotel room paid for by his company and my mom would tag along with us three kids. A frugal model to be sure!

My husband and I have traveled abroad extensively, but not luxuriously or expensively. We travel for the experience of exposing ourselves to the world and to learn. But, we certainly have inflated our own sense of what a "vacation" is. That being said, we also consider a day spent hiking in the woods to be a "vacation." I think we're just happy to do anything other than go to work :)

[falcondisruptor]

There were a few extravagant trips the first year we were married, but now, with our toddler, we're back to a week at a family cottage, camping, driving to visit family (one trip to the east coast), etc.

There might be a few big trips coming up though.  My parents are going down to Florida for a month in January, so we have been thinking of going down to stay with them and maybe taking the Little Miss to Disney.  My brother in law is planning a destination wedding in Mexico too so that will be happening in the next couple years.  Then the dream of visiting Iceland again, but I think our daughter would need to be much older.

[rocksinmyhead]

Interesting point. We had similar vacations as a kid... every other year we would drive from home in MN to Delaware (where my aunt, uncle, and 3 cousins lived) with my immediate family and another aunt. We would rent the same condo one block off Bethany Beach and stay there for a week. it was badass and probably pretty mustachian. I don't know how much the rental cost, it was in an awesome location but we had 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms (plus an outdoor shower which I LOVED) for 5 adults and 5 kids. I guess we flew a couple times when I was little/before my sister was born (I don't remember it) but otherwise we always drove. One time we drove straight through, in a 2-door F150 with broken AC, in August (remember this is 3 adults and 2 kids). Other times we would stay in hotels and eat in restaurants on the way out and back, but while we were at the condo we would usually only go out to a sit-down restaurant one night and then to the boardwalk at Rehoboth one other night (total highlight of the trip for kids), everything else was basically hanging out on the beach and cooking at home. This whole series of trips was pretty much the highlight of my childhood. Our cousins were pretty close in age to my sister and me and it was SO much fun.

We also drove to Disney World once with some other cousins, which was fun (but I was 14 at the time so it wasn't super amazing). Other than that all our vacations were in MN or Wisconsin and mostly just weekend stuff. Never felt deprived at all.

I don't think we have experienced vacation inflation ourselves, but who knows. We don't have kids yet so there's that... but we don't really take many "vacations." We have driven to Dallas/Fort Worth and Fayetteville and OKC for weekend trips. Other than that we pretty much just visit our families, since we are several states away from both of them right now. I do fly way more than I did as a kid (because vacation time is limited and I like to see my family a couple times a year... bf's family we usually only see once, at either Thanksgiving or Christmas), but when we visit home we spend most nights staying with our families and we borrow a car, so no hotel or car rental costs.

I would be totally thrilled to give my kids the same kind of vacations I had. I hate when people act like international travel is this thing that makes you better than everyone else... I know you can do it relatively cheaply, but flying with a family of 4+ is always gonna be expensive (not saying anyone here is like that, but I had a friend in college who kinda had this attitude and it drove me nuts. I think she was pretty oblivious to the fact that her parents were loaded.)

[Iron Mike Sharpe]

When I was a kid we went on great vacations every year (which I probably didn't fully appreciate as a child).

Each summer (late 70's through late 80's) we would spend 2-4 weeks traveling the US or Canada in a no frills van that had a conversion bed in the back seeing all that was worth seeing.  We camped 99% of the time, our parents in the van and my brother and me in a tent.  By the time I graduated from high school, I had been in 45 of the 50 states plus Ontario, Quebec, Alberta and British Columbia.  Many meals were sandwiches in the van or cooking at the campground.

Seems like people (besides the MMM family) don't do those types of vacations anymore.

[MoneyCat]

As a kid growing up in upstate NY, we spent our summer vacations camping in tents in the Thousand Islands in the St. Lawrence River along the border with Canada.  It was cheap and we'd take day trips into Canada where activities were inexpensive due to the favorable exchange rate at the time.  No TV, although we had a radio, and the campground only had pay phones.  We did a lot of fishing, hiking, and canoeing and it was really nice.

My wife is a city gal and she hates camping in tents, so that is out of the question for us.  Mostly, we stick fairly close to where we live in New Jersey, but that's fine because there is a lot within driving distance.  I have taken advantage of Caesars Entertainment's participation in Social Rewards to rack up credits that I've cashed in for us to have a couple of nearly free beach vacations in Atlantic City.  We also take day trips into NYC to visit free museums and stuff.  We're going to check out the Poconos next month for the first time and stay in a well-furnished cabin on the lake for a very good rate, since most people seem to think they are too good for the Poconos these days.

I agree that most Americans have really inflated their vacations over the past twenty years.  I did some pricing for Disney World for spring break just out of curiosity and their top resorts are renting for $700 a night during Easter week.  That is insane.  Somebody could stay at the Waldorf Astoria for cheaper than that and it would include meals, unlike Disney.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Albert]

Before I was 12-13 vacations invariably involved spending time at our vacation home on the seaside. In fact parents often took their vacations with only a week or two overlap so that me and my sister could spend more time there. Later on there was more money around and parents would take one or both of us on trips abroad. I was in Switzerland and Canada before finishing highschool. My younger sister traveled got to travel even more (+Egypt, Turkey, UAE, Portugal). Had no money or time to travel much while I was a student or a postdoc, but now I do travel extensively. I'm writing this from Barcelona, my 6th (and final) vacation trip this year.

P.S. I'm in my mid 30-ties.

[crazyworld]

We took vacations almost every year, which was unusual in India. I probably got my love of traveling during that time. Friend of mine hardly ever went on any and still does not care to travel much. Car trips was rare, because the highway system was undeveloped and the family car was not very road worthy. Train travel mostly, some air.
It is more air travel for us now, mostly because it is affordable, we want to go to different, far off places and while we are working, vaca days are limited to a few weeks a year.  Also, within the US, all places are far, at least from where we are.  I am not a fan of camping. Way too much work setting up (though that is probably improvable with practice) and being rained on while camping was truly annoying. I also experienced a vaca when I had to cook a lot of meals because we were traveling with my parents, who barely eat anything in the US. Did not enjoy that much. Way too much like normal life. There was also laundry involved 😨   People who enjoy all the above activities on their vacations amaze me. Different strokes I guess.

[Left]

just wanting to throw this out, but calling it "inflation", is it just that? I mean, sure we spend more but due to inflation things cost more too... but are the vacations still proportionally the same as back then though? I mean the cost to fly around the world is a lot cheaper than sailing across the Atlantic on the titanic (and safer...).

[deborah]

just wanting to throw this out, but calling it "inflation", is it just that? I mean, sure we spend more but due to inflation things cost more too... but are the vacations still proportionally the same as back then though? I mean the cost to fly around the world is a lot cheaper than sailing across the Atlantic on the titanic (and safer...).

Not true - going camping on the beach an hour's drive away in 2 man tents is vastly different to going on a cruise or to a hotel with a swimming pool (or one per room).

[Elderwood17]

Perhaps inflation is not the best technical term, but there definitely has been an inflation of expectations as to what an average vacation consists of.  Growing up vacation almost always meant a road trip to relatives.  Now, many of my co-workers don't consider it a "real" vacation unless it involves a nice beach, a cruise or something overseas!   

[CommonCents]

Rocksinmyhead, are you sure you're not my cousin?  Because you're right, it really was identical vacations, down to 3 bedrooms for 10, driving to it in a packed car (as I said, didn't go when we were in Alaska, and Cali too), and sit down restaurant once and Boardwalk night out once.  And yes - it took me until I was in my twenties to realize that my parents didn't *want* to use the outside shower, which is why we+my grandfather used it.  On the inevitable rainy day we'd go crabbing, as my grandparent's neighbor had a house down there we could use their dock for crabbing.  My cousin was in between my sister's age and mine, so despite living far from her we really developed close relationships and loved it.  (On the other hand, we never connected with my dad's side cousins, whom we saw only a day or two each year.)

And yes, I agree that I'd love to give my kids the same vacations.  (Not to mention if we don't, we may not be able to have our future kids get to know DH's brother's kids out on the other coast.)  I would, I admit, also like to show them other countries, but I don't want them to miss out on the simple lazy summer vacations that are about spending time with people important to you.  There's no reason to look down on a vacation that's not "fancy".

[Rural]

Hmm. Our vacations now are definitely a major step down from the ones I went on with my very frugal parents when I was a child. I've only ever flown once for a vacation, and I was a young teenager then; we went out west, saw Yosimite and San Francisco and Montery and redwoods. Rented a cheap car and stayed in cheap hotels, but it was A BFD because we all got on an airplane. Most other childhood vacations involved camping or renting cabins/ houses with relatives, and they all involved driving.


As an adult, the only vacation I've had that was more than a long weekend was our honeymoon, which we spent primitive camping in splendid isolation, actually less than 20 miles from where I'm sitting in my living room now. I guess we knew a good thing when we saw it, huh?


Other adult vacations have been camping for weekends or day trips. We do want to travel more together once we retire, but we'll have to decide if we can reconcile that with our love of large dogs. I've done some traveling for work, and will do more, and his research job before he decided to change careers to teaching required a great deal of extended travel, but no fancy vacations during our married life.

[iwasjustwondering]

My vacations have been, for the most part, cheaper than what we did when I was a kid, even though my mom would cook for days beforehand so we'd have food to eat.  She would actually roast a turkey the day before a big vacation, and bring it in a cooler to stick in the vacation house fridge, so we could make sandwiches/dinners with it.  We do it even cheaper now, because we tend to go away with my extended family.  We all chip in on a big rental house on Cape Cod or Fire Island, one bedroom per family, and the teenage boys camp out in the living room.  One year we did this in Italy.  The five-bedroom villa was $1,000 for the week.  My mom still brings a big something-or-other for us to share -- last year it was a couple plans of lasagna. 

Full disclosure: I am planning to take my kids to England and either Ireland or France next summer, which will be our first international trip in 11 years.  We have gone to California to visit my sister twice, and once to Key West/The Everglades.  The Key West trip was very expensive but truly incredible.  So I guess most of our vacations are super cheap (cooking at home for the whole gang, spending time at the beach or bike riding), with a few luxurious ones thrown in. 

[MayDay]

We have only taken inexpensive trips.  We don't have an issue with inflating the trip itself.  I grew up camping and visiting grandparents, and that is what we do with our kids, with the occasional VRBO house rental for a week within driving distance thrown in.  By the time the kids are 8-10 or so, I think we may budget more for vacations so we can do some educational and/or worldview expanding trips.  But we are saving it until they are old enough to remember.

I can actually totally get behind the childcare thing, though.  When DS was 27 months old, we went on the trip from hell.  HELL.  It was not a VACATION, it was just normal life, except worse, in a different place, with lots of packing and unpacking involved.  By normal life, except worse, I mean that my devil heathen child did not sleep for an entire week straight, spent most of the week screaming and crying, and would.not.fucking.stop trying to break everything in sight.

So after that horrific experience, we just didn't go on trips for about 4 years (because we had a second child, so we had to get her through the trip-hell stage). 

After that experience, if I was the type to throw money around on vacations, I would have either gone on a fancy vacation without the heathens, or I would have hired a nanny to come with. 

[tracylayton]

Our vacations were usually a week at Grandma's house twice a year...all meals home cooked by Grandma. When I was a teenager, my dad and his 4 siblings started renting a huge beach house for a week, and each family took a night to prepare the evening meal. These were some of my best memories as a kid. My mother and my 2 sisters and I started renting a beach house for a week on the Texas coast (5 hr. drive), but the tradition fell apart after 4 years. I got tired of being the one to organize and pay for it in advance every year, and nobody else wanted to take a turn. Kind of sad about that...all of the grand kids loved going. Maybe in 2015! It was really a VERY affordable vacation.

[kpd905]

My fiance and I started signing up for travel credit cards last March.  So far we've redeemed for $10,000 worth of flights, hotel stays and statement credits.  That way we can go on a few vacations a year (mostly National parks) and still invest a bunch of money.

I don't think we've spent over $1000 on a vacation yet.  Meanwhile I have a co-worker who just dropped $7k to go to Cancun for a week with his family.  He came back and was complaining about the food, the weather, just about everything.

[Goldielocks]

I think we are overlooking a couple of factors:

1) Bulk packaged vacations (Cruises) operate on a volume economy, and were not offered in the 1970's in the same way.
2) Airfare was nearly double the inflation adjusted price as today (pre deregulation)

Therefore, if people did not fly, they tended to drive.   If you drive, you tend to want to rent places with kitchen so you can transport everything you want in the car with you.   The only real kitchen places back then tended to be cabins or beachfront motels catering to the summer crowd.

Didn't north american trends for weeks of vacation start to increase since the 70's too?

My vacations each year as a kid included
a major summer camping / tenting trip.
PLUS, a weekend in February to Florida or Barbados,
PLUS the occasional Disney type week
PLUS when I was a teenager, several 2 week trips to Europe. (one per year for 5 years)

Why?   My dad was a pilot, and the travel benefits were a lot better back then for employees.  Once the flight was paid for, it is possible to do everything else pretty cheaply. 

My parents were quite frugal, last ones to get a colour tv, paid off mortgage by the time they were 40, backyard garden in summer home cooked meals and my mom made us girls a lot of our clothing.  (good thing prairie style was in vogue).  The kids started jobs at or before 16 yrs old, that sort of family.  BUT, We had a lot of 4 day vacations to the other side of the continent as the hotels tended to be too expensive for a full week.   Kinda like the Vegas weekends people go on today.

All of the other kids, including those in subsidized housing in our area went to the LAKE for summer -- in their own family (or grandma) cabin.  I know because I used to count how many kids in my class did not have a cabin, and there was only one other out of 60 kids in my grade.   Cabins take a  lot of extra money, even if not too fancy.

Now, my personal family has paid for a Disney style trip exactly twice, both with heavily discounted fares and VRBO, in off seasons.   It was expensive enough that we have not done this in 8 years, preferring camping.  (We splurged on an expensive car ferry this year, for example.)

I would say that my family vacations have become much, much more simple, compared to those a child.   Due to the comparative cost of airfares.

[Goldielocks]

My fiance and I started signing up for travel credit cards last March.  So far we've redeemed for $10,000 worth of flights, hotel stays and statement credits.  That way we can go on a few vacations a year (mostly National parks) and still invest a bunch of money.

I don't think we've spent over $1000 on a vacation yet.  Meanwhile I have a co-worker who just dropped $7k to go to Cancun for a week with his family.  He came back and was complaining about the food, the weather, just about everything.

My jaw just hit. the. floor.

I'll let others respond?

[sugarsnap]

I vacation about the same as my childhood family. Occasional budget trips to Disneyland but mostly local low key mountain and beach vacations staying with friends or rental cottages.  We also camp and backpack which I did as a child also. I took 3 flying vacations as a child, twice to see relatives cross country and once tagging along with mom on a conference.  My kids have been on a plane once to a wedding. 

We live fairly close to some amazing places so far off travel isn't really necessary for us.

[Albert]

There is certainly a change of how people including many of us here spend our vacations, but I see it as a sign of life becoming better. Makes more sense than spending extra $$$ on some fancy toy...

Also we need to remember that flying is not expensive any more and not just for the upper middle class. My return tickets Basel-Barcelona were just 120 euros. It would cost a lot more to rent a car (I don't own one), drive (gas 7.5 $/gallon) and rent a place somewhere in Switzerland. In addition there are a lot of people myself included in the rich world with very generous amounts of time off which we want to spend in interesting ways.

[seanc0x0]

I'd guess I'm the opposite of most. My vacations have drastically deflated over the years.

My mom is a huge travel fanatic, and strongly believes in taking children along. Thus, I had been to every properly continent except Africa and Antarctica by the time I was 21. However, it was her passion and she made enough money to pay for it (Ob/Gyn), sacrificing the things she didn't care about to afford it. For example, while her partners were driving BMWs and Mercedes, she was driving a Ford Taurus.

As for me, I am not as interested in that. I've always been a home body, so when we do vacations we usually take a small 2-3 day trip somewhere nearby or some day trips out to nearby lakes, and spend the rest of the time bumming around home. My mom still occasionally organizes a huge family trip, and we go along, but if it wasn't her organizing it all I'd not be going.

[Inevitable]

We only went on vacation a few times.  Branson, Missouri would be the big winner :-P  Pretty much any vacation I take is vacation inflation compared to when I was a kid.  My son will get to go to Disney for sure, but not until he's old enough to enjoy it.

[FreeWheel]

What were your vacations like as a kid?

Drive one state over, meet up with extended family, rent cabins or motel rooms and go fishing.

What is your typical vacation now?

Fancypants, all inclusive, 5 star resorts in the Caribbean.

Have you seen vacation inflation?

Not really. W works for a major tour operator so we get to go dirt cheap!

[Eric]

We never went on extravagant vacations as a kid, but my parents didn't camp, so we always stayed in hotels and were visiting major cities.  Somehow I learned to love camping anyway, so as an adult I prefer to camp in the middle of nowhere.  So I guess I'm "suffering" from vacation deflation.

[CommonCents]

My fiance and I started signing up for travel credit cards last March.  So far we've redeemed for $10,000 worth of flights, hotel stays and statement credits.  That way we can go on a few vacations a year (mostly National parks) and still invest a bunch of money.

I don't think we've spent over $1000 on a vacation yet.  Meanwhile I have a co-worker who just dropped $7k to go to Cancun for a week with his family.  He came back and was complaining about the food, the weather, just about everything.

My jaw just hit. the. floor.

I'll let others respond?

Are you surprised about the money the coworker spent? I agree that it is an absurd amount but I can easily see how they *could* spend that just by not being frugal. Let's say it's a family of 4 and they want two hotel rooms (attached). They get the standard room, so it's about $100 per night. That's $1400 for the rooms. We will even assume they get continental breakfast and that is included. The flights, expedia is telling me might be an average of $400 per person, so that's $1,600 right there.  They have no kitchen, so lunch and dinner will be eating out. According to my coworkers (in a recent poll, I am not kidding), the average cost for a family of four to eat dinner out is $150. So they eat dinner out the whole week at $1,050. We will say that lunch is cheaper and they manage to do that for half the price at $525 for the week. Oh but they are on vacation, so the parents want to drink those fancy drinks with umbrellas (or whisky) and the drinks are $10 each. 2 per day per adult? $280. But they're in Cancun!! So they have to zipline ($400), swim with dolphins ($500), and get lots of souvenirs for themselves and their friends back home ($300). I am up to about $6,055 now and I bet this family could easily spend the rest with airport snacks and drinks, movie downloads in the hotel room, and admission to a few local tourist trap attractions throughout the week.

I am being a little tongue in cheek here, but I legitimately know people who vacation exactly like this because when you visit Cancun you just "have to...." (insert expensive activity here).

Even easier than this.  Here's the rack rates for where my parents and sister now both have a timeshare in Cancun, an inclusive resort (food/drinks included):

http://www.karismahotels.com/Portals/0/AZS-RR.pdf

I think you take the double rate per person, plus add on for kids.  Let's go cheap, and get just a junior suite, not separate rooms. The rooms are big.  Upgrade just a little for an ocean view (second lowest rate).  Going in winter (end of Jan-April) is $369 per adult, plus $133 per kid or $1004 per night.  7 nights is $7k, before your flights ($1600 - but I think you'd  be hard pressed to get them for less than $500 p/p) or even one excursion day.   Easy to reach $7k, more likely $9-10k after flights, an excursion and a few upcharges around the resort.

[golden1]

The one tangible mercenary benefit of being the only child of divorced parents: double vacations! 

My father did not have much money so most of our trips were road trips and camping trips.  On the other hand, my mother married a rich lawyer, so those vacations were more lux - trips to Walt Disney World, a trip to London when I was 14.

As an adult, I have pretty much repeated that experience with my family, cheap vacations or day trips mostly with the occasional fancy pants one thrown in every few years.  I can enjoy either one equally. 

[Tai]

When I was a kid it was summers up north at a rented cottage, 4-6 weeks usually. Usually March break, sometimes Christmas instead, we'd all pile in the car and drive to Florida, get a rented house or apartment with a kitchen off the beach in Lake Worth. I remember going one year to Disney, and one year on a Fort Lauderdale river cruise or something like that. It was pretty middle class I think.

My family has no car, so no road trips. We flew to NYC last summer, and were in London a few years ago. I try to look for hostels/cheap hotels and plan out what to see. We also usually go somewhere every other year at most, and skip the winter beach getaway people love to do. I think we enjoy the city/culture/history thing more than the resort thing.

[Bobberth]

I loved my childhood vacations.  My Dad would put the topper on the truck and he installed a bed out of plywood that we put some blankets on and I was able to ride in the back of the truck there and back.  With the sliding glass back window I could squirm from the front to the back as needed.  Looking back, that was about the same volume of space as our minivan except instead of a steel roll cage, booster seats and seat belts protecting our kids, I was protected by a fiberglass shell.  Good times I tell ya.

We took a family trip to Disney World last summer.  Figuring this would be a one-time vacation as we can't stand Disney but figured we 'should' take the girls there, we decided we wanted to do other things and not just DW.  We spent a day on the beach, Sea World, NASA and a day at the Tampa science center.  The order of the kids' favorite were Sea World, beach, NASA, Science Center and Disney World last.  On the drive home the kids were asking, "When are we going to go to that place we did last year?".  It was a local YMCA family lodge an hour out of town where we hiked, canoed and did other camp-like activities.  Disney was a lot of time waiting in lines and even for the princesses, they didn't like that much.  It wasn't enjoyable for the kids-ages 9, 7 & 5.  I felt like we were walking around throwing dollar bills in the air the entire time.  Afterwards we were wondering why we even did the vacation as it was the opposite of enjoyable as there was this over-riding sense of 'rush' the whole time as we had to get here, we had to get there, let's go on that ride, let's do this....

This year we went back to our normal vacations.  Visited some friends on the east coast and then camped and hiked in the Smokey Mountains.  Everybody had a blast and we got to visit with some friends we don't get to see often.  We hadn't spent $500/day for tickets so we were able to switch things around to do fun things that popped up without a sense of rush.  Went for 2 weeks this year instead of 1 last year and spent less money.  Next year I think we're going to head somewhere out west and do the same thing of visiting family/friends and camping as it is superior in enjoyment and lower cost.

[gt7152b]

We ALWAYS camped on vacation except when we visited friends or our one trip to NYC. We did go to Disney World a few times while I was growing up but we drove and camped. My kids aren't even that into Disney so I see no need to pay Disney to blitzkrieg them with advertisements while on "vacation."

[Thegoblinchief]

Growing up we did road trips to visit family, including one particularly epic trip that was at least 5,000 miles over three weeks. We never camped but stayed in cheap motels, ate breakfast and lunch from the grocery store, and focused mainly on hiking and historical destinations.

Despite never doing it growing up and still not having tried it, my wife and I both want to learn camping and have talked about doing thru hikes once we are FI.

[Mrs. PoP]

Hmmm, we didn't take many vacations as kids, but every one I remember was paid for via some work or volunteer work that someone in the family had done. 
- My parents went on 2 sales incentive trips without us kids
- The kids went with on 1 vacation with parents to a cabin elsewhere in the state provided by dad's employer for a week as a bonus
- other vacations were usually road trips with church or school groups that we had to do a lot of volunteering and fundraising to earn and pay for (So many car washes!).  Usually stayed with host churches/schools at destination. 

There's some similarity in our vacations today, but some vacation inflation, too...  (helps that we out-earn my parents by 3-4x)
- biggest/fanciest trips we take these days are yearly sales incentive trips Mr PoP earns (basically non-cash bonus from job)
- road trips for me to run races (sure feels like I earn those with the miles of training!)
- flights to visit family/friends, stay with them in their homes (as kids everyone had to come to my family)
- biggest indulgence are weekend trips where we don't stay with friends or family at the destination...

[MandalayVA]

My mother had family in Florida and we drove down from New Jersey every year to see them.  As a result, I've been to Disney World a bunch of times.  My family was also part of a camping club and we would camp over Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends.  I don't think I stayed in a hotel until I was an adult.  Mr. Mandalay and I like to hit up cities for our vacations, preferably cities with major sports.  We've done a little more than half the major league baseball stadiums and a few NFL games. This year--next week in fact--we're going to Pittsburgh to see football and hockey.

[rocksinmyhead]

My mother had family in Florida and we drove down from New Jersey every year to see them.  As a result, I've been to Disney World a bunch of times.  My family was also part of a camping club and we would camp over Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends.  I don't think I stayed in a hotel until I was an adult.  Mr. Mandalay and I like to hit up cities for our vacations, preferably cities with major sports.  We've done a little more than half the major league baseball stadiums and a few NFL games. This year--next week in fact--we're going to Pittsburgh to see football and hockey.

oh have fun!!! my boyfriend is from Pgh and we are pretty big Steelers/Penguins fans. (and Pirates, but... :()

[Pigeon]

We very rarely went anywhere on vacation.  My parents did belong to a country club, and mom was a SAHM.  As kids, we spent most of the summer hanging out by the country club pool, and my parents were avid golfers.  They took us to WDW twice, but that's the only real vacation  I recall.

Dh's parents were very similar, and belonged to a different country club.  They had a vacation home that was about a two hour drive away, and would boat there in the summer and ski in the winter.  Both sets of parents had a huge number of kids, and they got their value out of the country clubs and the vacation home.

We aren't big vacationers, either, and no country club or vacation home for us.  We've taken the kids to WDW twice, on nice, onsite, but moderate level (for Disney) vacations.  We rent a vacation home on a lake for a week within driving distance some years.  But many years we just stay home.

I think there is a big difference in quality of life between then and now.   My dad was an engineer and dh's dad was a doctor.  They worked hard, but their employers didn't think that they owned them in quite the way many employers do now.  Vacation time was more generous and you weren't expected to be reachable at every single minute and work a million hours a week and just be Thankful to Have a Job.  So people may feel a need to be more extravagant with what little time off they get.

[2ndTimer]

Mine are deflating whereas the Hub's are inflating.  That's because our typical vacation is a camping road trip to a nearby state.  When I was growing up my parents and I did most of the U.S. and stayed in motels.  When he was growing up they went to Maine and camped in a home made tent. 

[Goldielocks]

My fiance and I started signing up for travel credit cards last March.  So far we've redeemed for $10,000 worth of flights, hotel stays and statement credits.  That way we can go on a few vacations a year (mostly National parks) and still invest a bunch of money.

I don't think we've spent over $1000 on a vacation yet.  Meanwhile I have a co-worker who just dropped $7k to go to Cancun for a week with his family.  He came back and was complaining about the food, the weather, just about everything.

My jaw just hit. the. floor.

Hi KPD905, your post left me speechless, and it took until now to think through why.
  MMM's latest post so shortly after was great to fine tune my thoughts.   I am of two minds about this -- hugely positive, and hugely negative, and still don't have an opinion on which side.

First, is holy moly, wow, how do I get into that, why haven't I managed to get real benefits the last time I tried, is that $10k for real.  I read a few of the linked blogs on the MMM responses, so I can see that this is indeed, for real.  A lot of work to plan, but true benefits.

Second thought was that every time I tried to book using points, it seems that I end up with a 50% off or 75% off "coupon"... not free travel..  e.g., I always seem to have charges for $150 on a $600 "free" travel (flights).   Hotels and car rentals were partially doable with planning.  BUT, I usually end up paying for meals or when we get a kitchen (VRBO type), I usually don't MMM the grocery purchases while travelling by air, but buy small quantities at non-sale prices.  So even after the hotel / car / flight / entry tickets are on points, I do spend quite a bit on food for the vacation.   The blogs that show how they used their cash back reward cards make sense; today I count that as money in my pocket, not money for travel, but it is the same thing.

Note,  I travel a ton for work, so earn a lot of "free one night stays", "free one day car rentals" and accumulate air miles the "hard" way without bonuses.  Even so, it has been hard to use the points without spending additional money somehow.  I always need three nights but have rewards for 2, or having a family of 4 to book travel for makes it more difficult (because of the vast number of miles needed and difficulty finding 4 seats on a given flight).   

A second technical problem is that most of the cards available in Canada seem to only give 15,000 miles as bonus, and / or do not waive the $79 to $99 annual fee when they do give the bonus.    A third problem is when you need to SPEND those miles in the same year you earned them, in order to cancel before the annual fee kicks in.

Which led to the true negative...  unless a person has planned travel several times a year (e.g., a  vacation, then to see family or rejoin a spouse), travelling that much is generally not a MMM move for a simple lifestyle.    What would my life look like if I needed to aggressively plan and scheme to get free travel?  How would I ever SPEND $10k worth in a year for travel?  Okay, joining my sister on her african safari last year might have done it, but that vacation would have been very hard to book with 95% travel points....   Is it even MMM to spend that much in VALUE in vacations in one year?  (even if free)

My MMM journey has brought the realization that pleasure in simple things, and doing simple things for yourself (including riding your own bike to the nearby store, waiting and saving to buy home upgrade, etc) is where the life value, as well as savings, lies.   The CC miles accumulation, to make it work, is more like a "what do you play" puzzle challenge driven to excess.

Giving a group of MMM newbies advice on how to make life more complicated (the calculations and planning gymnastics) while building a taste for luxury items  (like expensive travel) or even the impression that luxury travel is something that is mustachian, is not a great MMM forum thing to do.     Giving me a gentle slap in the face to wake me up to missed savings, even if only for the easiest bonuses, however, is.

After thinking about this, I think the answer for me lies in the middle:
1) When I have a planned vacation in the next year or two -- I should actively look for and apply to bonus offers, when the annual card fee is waived.   Do not assume that travel fees will be high, just because they were last time.  Be careful to ensure the benefit will outweigh the cash back reward cards I already have.
2) This includes stopping and talking nicely to the credit card pushers at the airports, when I have time.  ( I avoid them like the perfume pushers at department stores)
3) Improve my research on how to claim free travel, that works with my plans, while not spending a lot on airport fees and taxes.
4) Book AHEAD.  For Christmas of 2015, (a planned extended family week away) I should be looking and researching NOW.

Thanks for the wake up call!

[kpd905]

Second thought was that every time I tried to book using points, it seems that I end up with a 50% off or 75% off "coupon"... not free travel..  e.g., I always seem to have charges for $150 on a $600 "free" travel (flights).   

Certain airlines charge high fees, you have to find out which ones don't.  For example, I have 90,000 British Airways miles.  If I use them to fly from the US to London, I'd pay $200+ in fuel fees.  However, British Airways miles can be used for domestic flights on both American Airlines and US Airways.  You will pay about $10 in fees for these flights. 

The British Airways chart is distance based, so you can get a roundtrip flight of 650 miles or less each way for only 9,000 miles.  This means my 90,000 sign up bonus can get me 10 flights.

TL;DR: Whenever you think you'll be paying a high fee, check with other airline partners in the same alliance.

Here is a post talking a bit about alliances, it hurts my brain: http://thepointsguy.com/2014/02/shifting-airline-alliances-which-is-best-oneworld-skyteam-or-star-alliance/


There is a lot to learn, but a lot to gain if you are flexible with dates.  It allows us to go on a few trips a year and still max out a 401k, an IRA and pay a crapload toward my student loans. 

If you look into manufactured spend, that is a whole different game.  Since we don't spend much money, we used manufactured spending to hit sign up bonuses.  This included sending $1000/month to each other with Amazon payments (this just ended), loading $2000 per month to two different Amex Serve accounts, and sending $500 to my student loans with Evolve Money.  A few months ago you could buy Vanilla Reload cards at CVS with a credit card, which I used to send about $2000/month to my student loans for a while.

The only thing holding us back right now is that we each only get 2 weeks vacation.  We have well over 500,000 miles/points in different programs right now, and not enough vacation to use them all.

[partgypsy]

Definitely had some vacation inflation, but not complaining! When growing up my family would take day trips to Warren beach in Michigan, or stay at relative's pretty spartan cabin near Lake superior(and have fun stopping at the various tourist traps on the way there and back). When we got older we got to go to six flags once each summer.
Now married with kids, we go for a week each year to his family's cabin, and also 2-3 day trips to the NC beach (but we stay in a hotel over a motel). We have also with husband's family gone on some fancy trips that were mostly but not completely paid by parents in law. Even with the fancy trips (most expensive year has been 2500 that year in expenses) travel expenses is always one of our smallest expenses, around 1-1.5K a year, and I'm totally comfortable with that. We know that FIL uses a cc with some kind of rewards that prorates the costs, as they always stay at the same hotel chain, and the plane ticket purchases needed to go through him.   
When I read the MMM article about cc used for funding trips I was definitely intrigued. Thinking about it, realize the kind of card we are more likely to use is the card that gives discounts on grocery and gas. If we ever know we are planning a translatic trip, then I could see getting a card for that.
 

[Albert]

I was counting how exactly I spent my vacation this year and here is my list plus/minus a day or two (excluding Saturdays/Sundays, but including state holidays):

Visiting family: 20 days
Vacation in UAE/Oman: 8 days
Visiting friends in London: 1 day
Vacation in Northern Spain: 2 days
Vacation in Barcelona: 5 days
Vacation in Lithuania: 2 days
Traveling in Switzerland: 1 day
Staying at home: 4 days

Anyone else? Item two was fairly expensive, the rest was cheap individually but of course it does add up...

[shelivesthedream]

I'm in my twenties and when I was little, my family alternated between a week somewhere in Europe (eg. Rome, Barcelona) where we would museum in the morning and then swim all afternoon, and renting a cottage somewhere in England for a week. I preferred the cottages. Anyway, it means that I've never been outside Europe - I mentioned that to a colleague in conversation once (who has recently had to move back in with her parents) and she looked at me like I'd just crawled out from under her shoe. We also live opposite someone who thinks that her travel in Africa makes her supreme authority on all issues.

Edited to add: I haven't been on holiday since university, but I got my husband to promise we could go camping because I never went as a child (my mother hates the outdoors) and it seems really exciting to me!