Happy Ways To Save Money On A Disney Cruise

Perhaps you have your heart set on a Disney cruise with your kids. With a one-week cruise costing $5,300 – $10,000 for a family of four, you could quickly become disheartened. A one-week vacation doesn’t typically cost about $7,000 to $8,000. You could rent a beach house for one-quarter of that.

Still, your little princess has her heart set on dancing with Cinderella, so you start saving. Maybe before she graduates high school you can afford it. You could try a few other ways to reduce the cost first, then keep saving and reach your goal sooner.

Keep in mind that Disney vacation provides everything. You get fabulous family friend accommodations, two ports of call, Disney entertainment, character meet-and-greets, and a ship’s crew hired for friendliness. This increases the cost, but they do provide some discounts and you can find other ways to save money. Here are a few ways that work to save you money. Instead of picking just one method, combine all of these cost-saving methods to provide a Disney vacation for your family at a great deal.

1. Book Your Vacation Early

Since Disney owns a small ship fleet, its vacations sell out quickly. By booking at least a year in advance, you can nab a lower per person rate. When a cruise line opens its bookings for a trip, it happens more than a year before the launch. At this time, many cabins with lower rates exist. You can snap up these cabins and save lots of money.

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2. Take a Shorter Cruise

A two-night cruise takes less time than a one-week cruise, but it also costs a lot less. You experience a weekend getaway instead of a weeklong vacation.

Per person cost for a two-night cruise starts at $600.

You still get the Disney shows and at least one port of call plus the food is included. Disney offers two- to 14-night cruises, so you can choose the length that works for your budget.

3. Book a Guaranteed Cabin

Look for cruises that aren’t selling quickly. Disney will offer a guaranteed cabin rate on these.

It may only be a slight discount, but you still get to choose your cabin type.

4. Look At Disney’s Discounts Page

You can find coupons from Disney for its cruises and vacations. You take advantage of these lower rates to purchase. Typically, these promotions target active-duty military and Florida residents. If you fit into the category for which the promotion is offered, you can purchase it, but if you don’t, keep searching for a coupon or promotion that suits you.

5. Book Off-Peak

Choose a less popular travel time, such as fall. Let the kids take two days out of school and cruise when the rates dip lowest. This lets you experience the same wonderful ship’s cruise at a lower cost.

6. Get a Disney Visa Card

Apply for the Disney Visa card. If you qualify, nab this credit card and put all of your expenses on it.

It is a no-fee credit card that pays you back one percent of your purchases in Disney Rewards Dollars.

With these points, Disney makes available redemption choices including Disney cruises, souvenirs, and cruise activities.

Choose the Disney Premier Visa to earn a two percent cash back on select purchases and one percent on the rest of the purchases. The Premier card charges an annual fee.

7. Buy Discounted Gift Cards

Make your birthday and holiday wish list nothing but Disney gift cards. The same gift cards that you can use in a Disney store, you can also use to pay for a cruise vacation. If every person who would give you a gift gave you a $20 gift card, you could quickly afford a vacation.
By shopping at warehouse stores, like BJ’s, Costco, and Sam’s Club, you can save four percent.
You can purchase gift cards at Target and that counts as a qualifying purchase to earn five percent off using the free Target RED card.

Just by purchasing gift cards, you can save four to five percent on the cruise. You do need to book the cruise through Disney.

8. Use a Travel Agent

Travel agents know the best deals and often have vacation packages that they can resell to you for a discount. They can also negotiate lower rates and provide package extras.

Check the Costco website for links to cruise discounts or travel agency recommendations.

9. Book Your Cruise Onboard

You also save money by purchasing your next Disney vacation while on a Disney vacation. Those already on a vacation get offered discounts that others do not obtain.

10. Book an Inside Cabin

Inside cabins cost the least on any cruise line. You won’t get an ocean view, but you will still experience all of the Disney entertainment on the cruise. On the ships for Disney Dream and Disney Fantasy vacations, the ships provide faux portholes in the inside staterooms, so it feels like an ocean view.

11. Book a Secret Room Or Restricted Guarantee Room

About three months before launch, Disney will list random rooms that have not yet booked.

It may take until about 75 days before ship’s launch, but booking a restricted guarantee, secret, or mystery room can save you up to $400 per person.

You will only receive your stateroom assignment a few days before sailing. You do have to pay the full payment when you book.

12. Buy From a Special Promotion

Find a cruise on which children sail free. These sometimes depart from Galveston, Texas or Miami.
Some cruises offer discounts to Canadians or the US military.
Check with your university’s alumni association since many colleges cut deals with corporations to offer their alumni and sometimes their employees discounts.

13. Stick With the Non-Alcoholic Drinks

Choose soda, lemonade, milk, hot tea, and coffee as your drink package since this costs nothing. Only an alcohol package costs money. Passengers of legal US drinking age (21 years old or older) can bring two small bottles (750 ml or less) of unopened wine or champagne or six 12 ounce beers in their day bag or carryon. Anything else will get confiscated until the end of the trip. If you want to drink your wine in the ship’s dining area, you’ll pay a $25 corking fee.

Combining Savings Options

You can put together multiple savings options to make these vacations more affordable as mentioned. Here is an example of how to do that.

Have friends and family provide you with gift cards as presents for your birthday and holidays. Tally up how much you have and how much you need. Let’s say five people gave your gift cards of $20 each for each holiday. You have $200. You want a to take a four-person vacation and the cheapest staterooms cost $600 each. You need $2,400 total and you have $200, so you need $2,200 more.

It is your first cruise, so you can’t buy on the ship. You call a travel agent, but their rates would only save you $200, so you wait. About 75 days before one of the cruises, you see online that the cruise ship is offering a set of restricted guarantee rooms. It won’t let you choose the room, but you can save $400 on each person buying it this way. That means you’ll save a total of $1,600. You now would only need to have saved up $600 of your own money. You have $1,000 saved in your vacation fund. You go to Target and use your RED Card to purchase Disney gift cards for the amount you need. You save five percent this way. You purchase the restricted rooms using the Disney website and the gift cards you were given as a gift. You do not choose add-ons and stick with the complimentary drinks that have no alcohol.

A few weeks before your cruise’s launch date, Disney sends you your room booking. It is a total surprise, but you got a really nice room for a great rate. You even ended up with a sea view. Once you get on the ship and meet some of the other passengers, you learn that the hallway you are staying on got booked up by a few large families doing a cruise as their family reunion. The one-room left in the hallway is just the one that wasn’t needed by either larger family. You landed a great deal just by saving your money while you watched the Disney website for a great deal.

Finally,

That’s the way it goes in life. You delay gratification to achieve your goals. It doesn’t just apply to saving up for a nice vacation. You can apply these ideas to saving money on your cable bill, cell phone costs, and much more. Visit Goalry to learn about budgeting, saving, reducing your bills, increasing your work hours, and buying a house rather than renting one. Let Goalry help you. Sign up for a free Member Key today.