- Travel
- Budget
With young kids, it’s easiest to be beachfront—but it takes some creative planning to be able to afford it.
By
Meg St-Esprit
Welcome toVacation Funds, where we try to figure out how much vacations actually cost by asking people about their travel budgets, and then see how they actually stack up when they return from their getaways.
This month’s edition highlights Meg St-Esprit's eight-day family trip to Florida's Atlantic Coast, where the hotel pool was as big a draw as the Kennedy Space Center. Read on to see how they did with a $6,000 budget.
My husband and I have been traveling with our four kids since before they could walk, and it’s clear they’ve caught our case of wanderlust. We love all trips big and small, from local camping weekends to big swings like Walt Disney World—but the ocean is the one spot that calls to us time and time again.
I grew up swimming along Florida’s Atlantic coast with my grandparents and still have family there, so when my husband and I began planning a spring break beach trip for 2024, we honed in on an area we know and love: Daytona Beach. When we are traveling on a budget, we often have better luck with locations that are familiar. We know which restaurants work for our kids, what activities aren’t worth the cost, and have an easier time planning an itinerary for our big family.
On this trip, we also decided to take along our favorite vacation necessity: the grandparents. My parents joined us for the week to spend time together and help with the kids. Our goal was to keep our portion of the trip under $6,000. While that is no small amount of money, it's still pretty tricky to do with a family of six. We gave it our best shot.
About the traveler
Job: Freelance journalist
Annual salary: $101,000-200,000 per year (combined with spouse)
Location of residence: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Age: 40
Additional travelers: Husband, plus kids ages 12, 10, 10, and five
About the vacation
Where: Daytona Beach, Florida
How long: Eight days
Planned budget: $6,000
Upfront costs
Flights: $560 for the whole family. We flew Spirit for this trip. They run a cheap, early morning flight out of Pittsburgh International Airport that's always packed with families, so our own noisy brood blends right in. Budget airlines take a lot of heat but we find them a great option for our big family. There are no frills—but for a short direct flight, we have no complaints.
Since Spirit charges per bag, we packed one large duffel bag for each of the kids and they each carried a backpack onto the plane. This didn't leave a ton of space for clothing, so we planned to do laundry in the middle of the week. My husband and I both checked a roller carry-on at $50 each. We also chose to fly into Orlando and drive to Daytona, as flights to Daytona were considerably more expensive.
Hotels/Lodging: $2,064. Accommodations were our biggest expense for this trip, coming to a total of $4,128 that my parents insisted on splitting evenly down the middle. The eight of us realistically need at least three standard hotel rooms to stay comfortably, and a full kitchen actually saves us money on trips. We decided to book a four-bedroom, four-bathroom condo at Club Wyndham Ocean Walk through Airbnb. At $510 a night, most wouldn’t consider it budget-friendly. However, we priced several different options for eight people and found it to be the most economical along the coast. This hotel also has a lazy river, kid activities all day long, indoor mini golf, and both indoor and outdoor pools. Staying at a resort like this means we don’t spend as much on outside entertainment while traveling.
Rental car: $487. Along with my parents, we rented two small SUVs from Hertz at the Orlando Airport for $487 each. Having two cars meant we could split up the group when necessary.
Pet sitting: $500. We have two dogs, a cat, and a bearded dragon. Pet sitting is often an overlooked expense for travelers, but it does add up. We paid a local pet sitter $500 to stay at our house for the week, and he took excellent care of our beloved critters.
Day by day
Day 1 - Saturday
Total cost: $448
Our first day was filled with travel. We started with a 5:15 am flight full of excited kids in Mickey ears and touched down in Orlando by breakfast. After gathering our bags and picking up our rental cars, we headed to Orlando’s infamous Denny’s—local lore says it's the busiest Denny’s in America, but the tenured wait staff runs the bustling dining room like a well-oiled machine.
Our total for breakfast was $110, which is fairly average for dining out with our four kids. Upon arriving at the hotel, the kids changed into their bathing suits to hit the lazy river while my husband and I stocked the condo with a pre-scheduled Walmart pickup order totalling $338—the same cost as our weekly grocery order at home. We ate lunch and dinner in the room. The kids were too excited for another sit-down meal, so we grazed before an early bedtime.
Day 2 - Sunday
Total cost: $110
We spent our first full day at the hotel. The kids made friends, swam all day, and ate breakfast and lunch from the Walmart supplies. We ordered some pizza for an early dinner around 4 pm, which totalled $75 and left us with a whole pizza for lunch the next day. After dinner, the kids and two adults wanted ice cream, which cost $35.
Day 3 - Monday
Total cost: $341
On Monday, we made another grocery run to pick up some more beach-friendly snacks and drinks, as well as some sand toys, from a nearby Publix ($215). Our three younger kids went to Publix with my mom and me while my oldest toured the historic Ponce Inlet lighthouse with my husband and my dad at a cost of $7 each. After the shopping trip, my other kids were happy to spend the afternoon swimming with the gaggle of friends they met the first evening. We reconvened for dinner at Big Tuna’s at a cost of $110. My kids were able to pack up their leftovers, which they excitedly ate the next day.
Day 4 - Tuesday
Total cost: $299
We ate breakfast and lunch in the room again, with a morning swim in the indoor pool. This day was a bit chilly, so we skipped the pool in favor of doing a few excursions. My oldest toured the Daytona International Speedway with my husband and my dad ($73), while our other kids decided to check out Daytona’s new aquarium instead ($106). A snack break at Wawa cost $20. Upon reconvening at the condo that evening, only a few of our kids wanted to go out to dinner. My mom, husband, and I took two kids to a cute diner across from our hotel, while the other kids chose leftovers and a few quiet hours to recharge. The diner total was $100 and resulted in more leftover food for kid meals.
Day 5 - Wednesday
Total cost: $110
Midway through our week, the kids needed a chill morning to relax due to too much sun and a lot of late-night swimming. We let them be lazy, spent a bit of time on the sand, and ordered food from a beach food truck ($52).
Later, my aunt and uncle, who live near Daytona, came to visit. Together, we made the 45-minute drive to New Smyrna Beach. My grandparents used to live there, and it’s full of memories for us. Since my five-year-old talks incessantly about sea turtles, we made a pilgrimage to the Marine Science Center. The cost of admission was $36 overall (and only $5 per kid), but well worth it. We saw—and even touched—turtles up close!
For dinner, we went to a local favorite, JB’s Fish Camp, just down the street from my grandparents’ former house. We ate seafood along the Indian River and watched dolphins swim at sunset, just like I did as a kid. My parents generously covered this dinner bill in a fit of nostalgia, and for that, we were thankful. JB’s food is incredible but a bit above the price point we usually aim for when eating out with our kids.
At the end of the night, I emerged with a memento: a JB’s tank top to replace the one I bought as a teen and wore until it fell apart ($22, but priceless).
Day 6 - Thursday
Total cost: $192
When we saw that our last full day (Friday) would be rainy and a bit cold, we decided to make Thursday a beach day. Our 10-year-old twins and 12-year-old are mature enough to bop around the hotel themselves with frequent check-ins, so they split time between our beach umbrella, the outdoor pool, and the hotel arcade. We split some meals from the beach food truck for lunch ($42) and mixed in snacks from the condo. At dinnertime, we returned to the greasy spoon across from our hotel, the Starlite Diner, for another great meal. This time everyone joined in and even enjoyed a round of milkshakes, so the bill was $150.
Day 7 - Friday
Total cost: $353
With clouds and temps in the mid-60s, my oldest and my dad decided to take a drive down to Kennedy Space Center. Since admission is $80 a person, we were more than fine with the fact that the other kids decided to sit this one out. The Kennedy Space Center trip took most of the day and included a stop at the Cape Canaveral National Seashore, where they saw over 100 manatees. They ate McDonald’s for lunch on the drive ($22).
The other kids swam in the indoor pool, requested a stop at Buc-ee's for lunch ($44), and played round after round of Uno. We met my dad and son at LandShark Bar and Grill for our last dinner at a cost of $207. We did have a coupon for buy-one-get-one margaritas, though!
Day 8 - Saturday
Total cost: $300
We woke up and ate a hodgepodge of food from the condo before cleaning out and packing up. We donated the sand toys we bought to a collective bin at the hotel, rather than pay to check another bag.
While our flight out of Orlando wasn’t until 6 pm, we decided to squeeze in a fan boat ride in Kissimmee at a cost of $190. It was a splurge we hadn’t accounted for, but all the kids agreed it was one of their favorite parts of the trip. After the ride, we headed to the airport. We ate lunch at Wawa for $45 and snacked on a variety of mediocre food court meals at the airport ($65). If you’re sensing a theme with my kids and gas station food, you’re correct; Pittsburgh has Sheetz, but no Buc-ee’s or Wawa, so they insist on stopping any time we see one.
The kids were famished upon landing after a short flight delay, so we did spend another $50 on McDonald’s at 10 pm. Since that location was just a few blocks from our house, we aren’t counting that as a vacation expense. They ate, fell right asleep, and didn’t wake up until 10 am the next day—the perfect ending to a great trip.
How it all broke down
Upfront and travel costs: $3,611
Costs from the week: $2,153
Final total: $5,764
How much I spent compared to my original budget: $236 under budget
Meg St-Esprit (she/her) is a freelance writer chasing down and covering the most interesting and quirky ideas about parenting, home design, education and travel. She lives with her husband, four kids and way too many pets in Pittsburgh. Her work has appeared in a variety of publications includingThe New York Times,Washington Post,Romper,Fodor's, and more. Meg studied counseling and human development during her higher education journey, and applies that knowledge and expertise to her writing as well. When she's not writing, she's definitely camping.
