Tips on saving money to take the family Disney vacation you want. With a little planning and help from members of your family, saving for a Disney vacation is possible!
Our house LOVES, LOVES, LOVES all things Disney. If you don’t love Disney we really can’t be friends…. Ok, I’m kidding-we can be friends but if you don’t like a Disney vacation, maybe you’re doing it wrong, or with the wrong people. Because when we go to Disneyworld, it is freaking awesome and we have the time of our lives. All 18 of us! Yep, we have only gone to Disneyland and Disneyworld with my parents, sisters and their families. There are 8 adults and 10 children ranging from ages 15 down to 2. Every time we go it seems like we have more babies joining us. It is a blast and luckily by the end of the trip we still love each other.
We try to go to Disneyworld every other year. If we could afford to go every year, or every six months–believe me, we would. However, Disney vacations ARE.NOT.CHEAP! That is why I am sharing with you some of the things we have done to save for our Disney vacation so we are able to take our family of 7 without breaking the bank.
We are just your average American family. My hubby is a hard working man and I am a stay-at-home mom. We have 5 daughters and we do not have a money tree growing in our backyard. Our family doesn’t have a bunch of extra money laying around to take family vacations,so when we do want to take one, we have to PLAN and SAVE. We work together as a team to get the job done so we can go to our favorite family vacation spot –Disneyworld! 
Check out my daughters Disney Vlog from January 2016…you can see more days on my girls Youtube channel. So much fun I tell ya. You need to get saving NOW!
I seriously just watched that twice before I started writing more and now I am even more determined to get back soon. Here are 3 tips on what we do to save money for Disney.
Disney Jar
This is the best, old fashioned way of saving money. Save your coins or dollars in a jar and cash them out later. It really is as simple as that.
We actually call it our Disney jar. The one that we have now is actually a vase and my girls chose to decorate with Disney stickers. All of our loose change goes into it. Every month I usually clean out our “junk drawers” (yes, we have more than one) and it seems like I always find coins in there…or in my car. Whenever we have any yard sales or sell anything on-line, all of that money goes right into the Disney jar.
We collect all year long and when the time comes, we take it to our bank and cash it in. They don’t charge a fee like some change counters do, so we are able to keep all of the money. All of this money is then split between the girls and it is their souvenir money to buy whatever they want.
You will be surprised on how much money you can save in coins. Just be sure not to touch it, it’s not money to get ice cream or for lunch money, it needs to be strictly for Disney. The past few years we have cashed in, the girls have had $100-$125 EACH to buy whatever they want. That is the only souvenir money they get and they have a blast spending it at the Disney stores. It really is fun to watch them spend it.
Swagbucks
Have you heard about this website? This is where I get a majority of our Disney cash. It is website where you earn cash (swagbucks) by doing things online. Don’t worry, it is a safe site and I have been using it for almost 10 years. You can sign up HERE.
Once you get your account you can see there are all sorts of ways to earn points. Just get yourself acquainted with the site and you will see what you need to do to earn points. One of the biggest way to earn points is by taking the surveys. Each day you will log in for a little bit (or whenever you want to), take your surveys, watch videos or do searches as well.
I don’t have a lot of time to spend all day on there, but I quickly take a few surveys a day and earn what I can. If you go crazy and are in an earning mood, you could easily cash in a lot of money each month. After you earn points, you can then redeem them for cash (Gift cards, etc.). I know there are families who get hundreds a month on Swagbucks. I am happy if I get $50-$100.
When I am ready to cash in my points I purchase a Walmart or Target gift card and then I use those gift cards to purchase Disney gift cards. When you purchase through Target, be sure to use your Redcard and save 5% off your purchase.
*UPDATE: I haven’t purchased gift cards through Target for a couple of months because the Target cards I had, I used for Christmas. I just tried to get a Disney card today and was unable to. That sucks. But it isn’t too bad. I will just use the gift cards and the money I spend I will put towards Disney instead. Also, from now on I think I will purchase the Amazon gift cards or Paypal with my Swagbucks.
I save all of the Disney gift cards and we use them at Disney. You can pay for your room, tickets, food and more with your Disney gift cards. This is such an easy way to earn some extra cash while you are at home with nothing to do and without tapping into your other household budgeted items.
Be sure to sign up for SWAGBUCKS today. It is one of my biggest saving tricks.
Earn Extra Cash
The third thing we do as a family to earn extra cash is an extra job. The past couple of years we have went we have been lucky to have an extra job. Actually, it was my moms job. She got an extra job cleaning offices for us and our families would each take turns every month. All of that cleaning money went into a family savings and it is how we purchased all of our airfare for 18 of us.
Find a little job that can help you out and be sure to only put it towards your trip, you will be surprised on how much you can save. Yard sales, bake sales and selling things that we don’t need on our local classified ads are other ways we make some side cash. Little things like that add up over the year and can help you reach your Disney goals!
My cute sisters and I enjoying Epcot with our families. We love Epcot, it is one of our favorite parks!
These three little tricks have helped us to save money for Disneyworld. Stay tuned and I will be sharing more tips on what we do to save at the parks. Take some of these tips and apply it to your life and see just how much you can save for your Disney dream vacation. Good luck!
