Making Disney Affordable with Chelsea from Pixie Point Gals

In this episode of the Lazy Budget Travel Tips podcast, host Genni Franklin dives into the pressing question of whether a trip to Disney can be affordable amidst rising costs. 

Joined by Chelsea Buck from Pixie Point Gals, who is well-versed in saving money on Disney vacations using points and miles, the episode sheds light on various strategies. 

This includes renting Disney Vacation Club (DVC) points to stay at deluxe resorts for a fraction of the cost. 

Chelsea shares her family's deep-rooted Disney obsession and the tricks they use to visit Disney World several times a year. 

The discussion covers the differences between Disney World and Disneyland vacations, tips on using points and miles for flights and hotels, and the value of flexible points programs. 

Additionally, they delve into the advantages of staying at Disney deluxe resorts, on-site dining, and leveraging perks like early morning entries and evening hours.

Tune in to learn how to make your dream Disney trip a reality without breaking the bank!

Timestamps: 

00:00 Introduction to Affordable Disney Travel
00:55 Meet Chelsea Buck: Disney Fanatic and Points Expert
02:14 Disneyland vs. Disney World: A Tale of Two Parks
06:30 Flying to Disney: Points and Miles Strategies
13:53 Using Points for Disney Hotels
33:11 Disney Vacation Club: A Deep Dive
38:20 Exploring Disney Resort Stays
39:25 Maximizing DVC Points
40:12 Renting DVC Points: A Beginner's Guide
41:38 Alternative Ways to Rent DVC Points
43:24 Understanding DVC Point Costs
44:47 Saving Money on Disney Food
49:28 Using Points and Miles for DVC Rentals
50:45 Popular DVC Resorts
56:18 Money-Saving Tips for Disney Trips
01:03:07 Disney Chase Visa and Other Cards
01:05:09 Rapid Fire Disney Questions
01:10:37 Conclusion and Final Thoughts 

 Episode Resources: 

Traveling Franklins blog post: 10 Ways to Save Money on Disney Hotels

Connect with Chelsea and Disney Point Gals on Instagram and their website.

Transcript

How to Save Money on Disney
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[00:00:00] Welcome back to the Lazy Budget Travel Tips podcast. I'm your host Genni Franklin from The Traveling Franklin's blog, and today we're tackling a big question. Can Disney really be affordable for many a trip to Disney feels out of reach with rising prices on tickets, hotels, food, and all the extras that go into having a magical experience?

Well, today I'm joined by Chelsea Buck from Pixie Points Gals, who along with her mom, Kim, knows all the best ways to save money on Disney using points, miles, and more. Plus, we're diving into what may be a lesser known way to stay at Disney Deluxe Resorts for a fraction of the cost renting Disney Vacation Club points.

If you've been dreaming of a Disney trip, but are feeling discouraged by the price tag, then keep listening. Hey Chelsea, thanks for being on the podcast. [00:01:00] Thanks for having me. So tell me a little bit about you and your mom and how you guys got into Disney. Yeah, my parents have always been kind of Disney fanatics.

We live about six and a half hours from Disneyland, actually. So I live on the West coast and we grew up, we got annual passes and we would do the cheapest way possible. We would drive down, stay in like a Motel six and just, hit the parks early and be there all day. And, about when I was, I wanna say a teenager, my parents discovered a little bit more about Disney World and we took a trip out there and they fell in love with Disney World.

So I would say my family has always been into Disney in some way or another. And now we're a Disney obsessed. I have the only grandkids in the whole family. And my parents were trying to find a way to take, 10 to 12 people to Disney, which is a lot of people and a lot of money, right?

And so they found out all these different tricks and just went for it. And since then, we now go like [00:02:00] three to four times a year, and just have fallen in love with Disney, even though we live in southern Utah. We fly out to Disney World and have annual passes out there. So it's just a really fun experience and we just love Disney.

We've always loved it. I think that's so cool because as somebody who was born and raised in Florida, Disney was just like always there. And we could go to Disney whenever we wanted. whenever we wanted, as in it was just a drive away. Like we weren't going like every weekend or anything.

Yeah. But,we went a lot when we were kids and then I didn't really go to Disney again until I was an adult. And then I fell in love with it again, but I never really realized. How many people out there that didn't live in Florida love Disney and have annual passes? I don't know why, but I grew up in this little bubble to where I was like, oh, people only go to Disney if they live in Florida.

Yeah. If people are coming to Disney out of state, it's like a [00:03:00] once in a lifetime trip and then that's like it. Yeah, exactly. It was always Disney World for us. I've only been to Disneyland a couple of times, so when people talk about the comparison between Disneyland and Disney World, I always feel a little bit of tension there.

People have their park and they are very passionate about their park. It's funny when you go on trips with people from Disneyland to Disney World, they're completely thrown off their game and then vice versa, just because they're different vacations, different parks, you approach them differently.

I. Disneyland, I tend to do two to three days Max Disney World, you could go a whole week just because it's so large. So there is different approaches to how you vacation for both of them. And they're not wrong, they're just different. But you'll have people claim, Disneyland's Waltz Park and it's the OG and it's the best.

And people at Disney World would be like, yeah, but your castle's tiny. I don't know. They just fight back and forth about it. I've been to both in the last, year, so I can't, there's pros [00:04:00] and cons to both for sure. That's so funny because I hadn't been to Disneyland since I was a little kid, and I just went a couple years ago and we walked in and I saw the castle and I was like, oh man, that is really teeny.

It's tiny. It's so small. And people from Disney World have no idea until they go just how tiny it is and vice versa. We had some neighbors that were telling me, oh, we're gonna go to Disney World, so we're thinking we're gonna walk from Animal Kingdom to Magic Kingdom, or one of Right. And you would know that it's like a 30 to 40 minute bus ride.

Yeah, they're not close to each other at all. So it's funny when you talk to both groups, how they just aren't familiar about planning either, and they're very home and comfortable in their own park. So venturing out of that is difficult. But yeah, the Disneyland castle is so tiny. It's so small.

Until you see it, you don't know So small. Yeah, but Disneyland has its own magic, [00:05:00] but definitely for me it's Disney World all the way. But just knowing how it was when we were kids going to Disney versus now, how like my parents would say, okay, we are gonna have breakfast and then at the park we are just gonna bring our own sandwiches.

And a lot of people don't think that you can bring your own food and we never really got to eat at any of the cool Disney restaurants and that's because it's just so expensive. I didn't even know that there were Disney resorts, we used to always stay at a Hampton Inn, we didn't even have to worry about plane tickets either.

So I can only imagine families who aren't driving to Disney, What they have to do to be able to afford it, Oh yeah, absolutely. I think I looked up the other day, and it's staying on property at a deluxe resort. if you were to go all out, like it's a once in a lifetime trip, you're gonna fly to Disney World, stay at a deluxe resort, do all the things, I think the package would be like $10,000.

[00:06:00] it's substantial. And that's not including the food, that's not including transportation, that's just the vacation at Disney World. So if you don't find ways to save money and you want it to be this big thing, it can be crazy expensive. Yeah. And that's probably why people feel like there's no way they can make.

A trip like that happened, or for many people that I've spoken to, it's like a once in a lifetime trip for them. Yeah, it's like a one and done. 

I know that you guys, are in Utah, so you are flying to Disney.

Are you driving? Yeah.

Yeah, so I literally can see Arizona from the window outside my house. I live right on the border of Nevada, Arizona, like in that corner. So it takes me about six and a half, seven hours to drive to Disneyland.

So probably similar to you in Florida. it's just easier to drive everybody down and cheaper, frankly, to take my kids down. So we usually fly to Walt Disney World and we'll drive to [00:07:00] Disneyland 

we live right next to our regional home airport.

So my neighborhood is right next to the runway like airport. Oh my goodness. Flights fly over my house, right? So instead of driving the hour and a half, two hours down to Las Vegas, which obviously it's a very large airport, it has a lot of flights coming out of it. I have been trying to find points and miles, ways to fly out of my regional airport.

And when I've been looking at the prices for the last couple years, they've actually been pretty comparable points wise, because I'm just catching a little tiny plane to maybe Dallas or Denver and going from there. So I have been really working on getting points that I can use, either flexible currency or airline specific points to fly outta my little airport, is the way I've been approaching flights lately.

Gotcha. So do you have a specific airline that works well for that? So I've actually been doing a lot with American Airlines in [00:08:00] Alaska just because Alaska's rate is really good.

Out of my home airport, I can fly from my airport down to Orlando using Alaska miles, if you will, for 9,500 points. wow. 9,500 points one way. One way. Yeah. those flights outta my airport are upwards four or $500 round trip. Oh man. That's awesome though. You are getting a really good deal.

Yeah. When by American or Alaska. So I'll do the whole Alaska trick and go that route with some of my points, but. Yeah. Anyway, that's been the way we've been flying a lot into Orlando. I do have a Southwest companion pass, and I do sometimes go down to Vegas to do that, but I might be getting a little cynical, but it feels like it's been really inflated lately and I've had better success just flying outta my little airport.

we can talk about Southwest a little bit because a lot of people are a little salty. I might be with my pitchfork like layman about it a little bit because [00:09:00] I earned companion pass and I was like, but we're gonna fly to Disney World a lot. We have, all this stuff happening for work down there.

I've gotta fly down and it's always double the cost than the flights outta my airport. I might as well just like cash out. Flexible currency points is cheaper outta my airport three minutes away. That's tiny on these rinky dinky planes than going down for Southwest lately. That's been my experience though, and I know other people maybe haven't had that experience.

so I have had to come up with more than one strategy, to fly myself to one of the Disney parks because I can't just do Southwest Hyatt combo and call it a day.

It has, it's a little bit more strategic in how you approach it. that's why I preach a lot about, like you mentioned, flexible points, 

And the reason why those are so great is because you have a ton of options and there's no guarantee that programs aren't going to devalue or change benefits. It's just [00:10:00] the name of the game and instead of being upset about it, you just gotta, keep on keeping on. And then just know that, I'm just gonna have to make some changes.

Disney Orlando especially, has so many different types of opportunities for flights, and you can go budget, frontier Spirit all the way up to if you wanna fly in a comfy business class on Delta.

there's so many different options coming in and out of that airport that if you have a home airport that has a hub with a specific airline, I just encourage you to figure out that program because it will vary for so many different people. My little tiny airport, American is a really common one, but so is United and Delta, so I just dabble in all three of those programs, but I'm not really interested in Frontier because I can't fly it out of my little airport, it just depends on where you live. I would say. And I like that too because I always say you gotta do what works best for you and your specific situation [00:11:00] and there's no right or wrong way, but you do need to just be like open to different opportunities, different options, different programs.

have you been to any of the Disney parks internationally? My daughter, my 9-year-old is obsessed with Tokyo. Disney, like researches it, it's obsessed. So I've started collecting my points to go Japan Airlines this next year. Taking four people is a lot of money in points even.

So that's my big point. Redemption,

For me, my husband and my two daughters, it just takes a little bit longer. We wanna go to Japan. I don't know if we're gonna do Tokyo, Disney, but we wanna go to Japan 2026. So I'm collecting those American airlines miles as well for JAL business class.

'cause my husband as well is like Uhuh. I can't do economy. I feel like we spoiled them. They have no idea. Like my husband, he just, bless his heart, but he doesn't know. He's [00:12:00] just can't you fly us business? I'm like, sure, if you gimme some time, but there's four of us. It's gonna be a lot of points.

my mom and I did Disneyland, Paris. 'cause we were going to Paris anyways. Yes. And I have to say I was disappointed. People get mad at me when I say this because they're like, but what were you expecting it to be like, Disney World? And I'm like, no. But I just was, I didn't love it.

Yeah. That's what I've heard is that, Disneyland, Paris is a hit or miss for people sometimes. That particular park. People have hit and miss ideas about it. Yeah. I would just say for anybody who is used to Disneyland, or Disney World in don't go to Disneyland.

Paris expecting it to be like the same thing, I wasn't even expecting it to be the same thing. I was just like, oh, this is okay. But I think if you're just like checking the boxes off and you wanna be part of that six castle club, then do it.

Yeah. There are some unique [00:13:00] things there that you'll love. But. For me, I don't really think I have to go again. And that's what's hard is that obviously I'm the pixie point gal, so I get asked a lot about some of the international parks, but in my life right now, it just doesn't make quite frankly, a lot of sense because my kids are happy on like a roller coaster on a flight four hours away.

And so I haven't gone into that mode yet. 'cause I have a five-year-old and an 8-year-old. they're just happy to see Princess Tiana on a float. I haven't pushed myself yet to that level, but I do know in the next couple years that might be something I go more into, but yeah. I heard that Disney Sea was really cool.

That's what I've heard too. Yeah. And I would love to do all the theme parks in Japan, like your Mario and all the things. All the kid fun. Fun stuff if we go, but we'll see. 

But speaking of points, so what about hotels? using points for hotels in [00:14:00] Disneyland versus using points for hotels and Disney worlds. Very different, just like very different experiences in general though, because Disneyland is so much smaller than Disney World.

So Disneyland, I tend to do more of a traditional point strategy when I'm approaching Disneyland. When I go down this year,obviously I'm driving, so that helps. But then after I get there, when I'm looking at hotels, I'm usually.

Using, Hyatt points. There's a Hyatt house that's right on the corner. You can literally see the back of California adventure from the hotel. I also think, reward space that for Disneyland is really good is actually Marriott. There are a lot of Marriotts within. Seven to 10 minutes walking from the front gate.

There's even a Marriott that is closer to Disneyland than Disneyland hotels are. Does that make sense? Like their hotels are farther away than some of Marriotts,those like 50 K [00:15:00] certificate type of, when people earn those do really well. At Disneyland, you have a lot of options.

You can get five nights for free, basically getting all of your, vacation hotel paid for. So I usually have people go one of those two routes to start with and then go into Hilton and IHG and some of the other, branded hotels. But those two in particular. Hyatt House used to be really hard to get at Disneyland and recently has not been as hard knock on wood, so I'm hoping that it stays that way.

There is a Hyatt place, maybe a block farther, so that's always the second option I tell people. Disneyland is small. If you're from Florida or go to Disney World frequently, Disneyland fits in Magic Kingdom's parking lot, so like walking sizes. Disneyland is really nice for little tiny kids because you can just walk back and forth between both the parks and you don't have the stress of transportation and the size of it all.

[00:16:00] But I will say the points tend to be easier for Disneyland, because it is very traditional model. You're gonna get points to cover the hotel, then maybe get points to cover your tickets, right? Disney World, on the other hand, is the size of San Francisco. It is huge. So when people say, oh, I'm just gonna stay off property and I'm gonna stay like you talked about, right?

At a Wyndham or Hilton or Maybe at a Hyatt, I have to remind them, first off, you're having to drive quite a bit to even get from where you are. to Magic Kingdom or to Hollywood studios, something like, if you stay at the Grand Cyprus, you're paying for parking offsite, you're paying for parking at Disney World, you're paying for all these extra costs that you don't think about when you're saving money, using points of miles.

Disney World, I tend to use a different, even before I owned my, DVC shop right before I became a broker and did all this stuff, that's what we would tend to do. We would rent DVC points from someone our first time [00:17:00] we did it on eBay and then. From there, we've learned all the different ways you can rent points, right?

Even a value resort, which are like the cheapest option at Disney World, in my opinion, it's better to stay at a value or a moderate level resort, than to stay off property with your points just because of all the perks in the convenience, because it's so big and trying to drag a little kid around a huge space is just hard.

So if you have kids, it's just really difficult. If it's not Disneyland, It's just more work. But there's more also to it, right? You have more parks, water, parks, food, lodging. it's just more options. So there's good and bad to both, but I tend to use my points in a different way.

I use the DVC plus covering my tickets. For Disney World, Disneyland, more traditional model of points and miles, I would say. So what I am taking from what you're saying is if you have smaller kids and [00:18:00] it's easier to get to Disneyland, for you, 

overall a much simpler planning process and also easier with points. I would say disneyland's easier with points, easier to plan. I will say it's just not as long of a vacation. So if that's important to you, usually Disneyland is like an add-on, right? You're going to Disneyland for two to three days and maybe you go to Huntington Beach for a couple days or you do something else.

Disney World, you're flying in and you're like gungho for a week and you're staying there and it's just all Disney World the whole time. So just a different vacation. I would have to say, depending on what you wanna do with your kids.

Yeah, I think that's really important to point out to people because I do think that people don't realize how different. It's for sure. In all the ways. 

before going to Disney as an adult, I didn't realize like how many Disney resorts.

There are, and the different levels and perks you get with them. and you were talking about staying at value [00:19:00] resorts, like when my mom and I will look to go to Disney, I'll look at my annual passholder discounts specifically versus staying off property. And it's most of the time much cheaper to stay at pop century on the Skyliner.

Yeah. Than to stay 10 minutes from Disney off property, it's never 10 minutes. 

and then you gotta park and then after you park, you have to park out in the boonies. Yeah.

parking at some of these hotels offsite are pretty expensive. Actually. They're like 30, 40, $50 a night to park at them. and you have the inconvenience of staying offsite. So to me. Looking at all those hidden costs. I do it all the time with people when I'm comparing their DVC room rate to maybe an offsite hotel because they're in points and miles and we start adding up all the additional costs and they're like, this is a no brainer.

I get all these additional perks and I get to stay on property And you're already spending all this money to go, you might as well have a really good experience. So that's what [00:20:00] I usually tell people is look at all the fine print when you are staying off property.

All those extra costs. So what kind of perks are we talking. for Disney Vacation Club specifically, which we can talk about later, but any deluxe resort you get early morning entry. So you get that. You also get those with the moderate values, right? So everybody that's staying on properties getting that perk.

You also get, when you're a deluxe level, you also get evening hours, which are a hidden gem that people don't really talk about. They're on Mondays and Wednesdays usually, and they're late at night, like nine to 11 o'clock at night. You're, so the park closes and only deluxe resort guests get to stay.

So when I've done it with my little girls, we're from Utah, so 11 o'clock at night to my girls feels like nine o'clock at night. So we usually stay for those deluxe hours and then sleep in the next day. My kids have not waited in a line.

During those deluxe evening hours, they'll walk on like Peter Pan, they'll walk onto mind train, they'll [00:21:00] walk onto. All the big ticket rides, frozen, oui, like all the things. So for us, even those nightly perks seem to be worth it. All the resorts in 2025 actually get waterpark tickets for free on their check-in day.

That can be renting DVC, that could be staying at a val. It doesn't matter. You get that when you check in. So that has been something a lot of people that come to my business are really excited about because those tickets add up. And then if you're going in the heat of summer, you do want to go to the waterpark.

It's Hotter than Hades outside. So there's a lot of different perks like that. When I look at on property too, you can charge things back to your room, which people don't talk a lot about this in points and miles, but a perk of that is you can use credit card points to cover any purchase you're charging back to your room.

It goes from coding as food or entertainment or whatever on a card all of a sudden to being a travel [00:22:00] expense. So I've covered like churros, Slurpees, stuffies for my kid, like any sort of expense, sit down dining, character dining, which is really expensive. I've covered that on points because it's coding as travel on my credit card and I'm able to use those points.

So even staying on property for that reason alone, if you're using points and miles, because if you stay off property or you stay at the Marriott, it won't work. You have to be at a Disney owned hotel. Yeah. Those are some of the perks that I've seen. Transportation's all free. Parking's free. It's just one of those, almost feels like when you go on a cruise, right?

And then everything's there. That's the same vibe. Everything's already built into the cost. You know what to expect. There isn't all these hidden things coming at you after. Like I said, like staying at pop century and being on the Skyliner. I just love the skyliner.

Oh, it's so cool. One of my favorite things is when we're at Epcot and I just hop in the Skyliner and go over to the Riviera. 'cause I just love the smell. You walk [00:23:00] into the Riviera and it just smells fresh 

it's fancy. You just smell fancy when you go in there. Floridian. I always feel like I walk in there and feel completely underdressed. Anytime I stay there. Everyone's in there like Ralph Lauren and Polo. And I wanna tell 'em how much I spend on my room comparatively, but I never talk about it because these people are spending cash rate, in these rooms.

So that's always the joke is the Riviera and the Grand Floridian. You walk in and go, oh, the smell. I just wanna bask in the smell. It smells expensive. That's one of my favorite quick service places where you can just go grab a bite to eat is at the Riviera.

So sometimes Hollywood studios, for example, maybe doesn't have the best food options. So going over there on the Skyliner take you a couple minutes, but then you get air conditioning, great food, the smell, the ambiance, things like that tend to be worth it at Disney World. Absolutely. I saw someone say this on Instagram, they were like, Disney's better when you don't care about how much you're [00:24:00] spending.

Yes. That's so true. I'm sure everything is better when you don't care how, what you're spending, but I feel like at Disney that's especially true is when you know that you've already covered your flights, you've already covered your hotel, and if you're using that credit card reimbursement, you're covering a lot of your food and stuff, then you can splurge on getting kids some stuffies or going and sitting down at a, Disney restaurant and getting that kind of experience.

And then you're like, you said, you're already there. You might as well enjoy it. Yeah. And have the best experience you can because if you don't, and you skimped on something and then it ruined things, you're like, Ugh, what did I, what did I do? Yes.

and we've all been there where we cheap out on a vacation and afterwards look back and go, oh, I really should have just, maybe covered a different expense with points and miles or done something different so [00:25:00] that I could do this fun excursion or do this fun activity. So at Disney World, I took my daughter to the Lilo and Stitch breakfast at Ohana at the Polynesian in August, and it's her favorite character.

She's stitched out, she's obsessed. And I realized I'm not stressed about it 'cause I'm just gonna use points of miles to cover the cost. I have that in my head already. I have these points set aside for her to have this experience. So I'm not stressed out in the meal looking at the bill thinking, holy crap, how much is it to meet Stitch?

This is so much money. Yeah. And I know that you said that people don't really talk about the,Credit card reimbursement with the pointsand that's because people think it's not a great redemption.

But here in the lazy budget travel tips world, there's no such thing as a bad redemption. So do what you gotta do, man. No judgment here. And I tell people this all the time, right? They'll message me and say, I could use those points to fly to Europe, my family. And I'm like, do you want to go to Europe or do you wanna go to Disney?

And they're like, I wanna [00:26:00] go to Disney. I'm like, this is how you do it, right? That it's not, that one is not better than the other. It's just different vacations, different ways to approach it. And there's nothing wrong with vacationing the way you wanna vacation. And just building yourself a discount.

Most of the time for Disney vacations, you're just building in a hefty discount using points in miles, and that is in itself worth it so that you are not freaking out at your small children overheated in Magic Kingdom. That is the goal, is that we aren't freaking out at our spouses or significant others or kids because we're stressed about money in the middle of Magic Kingdom.

I just want you to have a good time, and if you don't fly to Europe, it's okay. If that's what your family wants. It's, we're here to tell you. It's okay. You can use your points for Disney if you want to.

I had a friend tell me that the other day they'd just gone into points in miles and they were asking me how to go to Disneyland. 'cause we live close. And so I was walking her through it. She's yeah, but can I get them more doing this? yeah, you could, but you don't wanna do that, so we're [00:27:00] gonna do this.

And she's thank you for letting me just Do it this way. I'm like, you can do it however you want. I'm not letting you, yes, this is good. So don't fall into the stigma of, oh, I'm getting 1 cent per point. I'm terrible at this. You're saving a lot of money no matter which way you do it. And that is the whole damn point, isn't it?

Yes. To save money. Yes, guys, that's the point. So do what you gotta do. But do you guys do Disney cruises, right? Yeah, we do. My mom's on one right now. That's why she couldn't be on the podcast. Oh, that's right. Literally on cruise.

And she did one outta Puerto Rico. Yeah, so she did, is doing a one way from Puerto Rico into Florida actually. that's one of our biggest tips is to look at the different ports. 'cause the ports can make a big difference on an, on any cruise, but especially a Disney cruise. 

And they loved it. They had such a good time. I remember when the Disney cruises first came out and my family loves a good vacation I was in seventh grade and [00:28:00] the first ship had just come out I got to leave school early because we were going on this Disney cruise.

And I felt so cool that we were gonna do that. 'cause no one else had been on a Disney cruise before. Yeah. And I just remember loving the food and loving the fact that we could watch a bunch of movies that hadn't come out yet. Yeah. In the movie theater. Yes. It's so funny too because my kids love the Kids Club of the cruises.

They were obsessed. And I would go pick, try to pick them up to go to the movie and they would just tell me, Nope, we're staying, we're making, they were making slime with Stitch and like being read to from Captain Hook and they were like, we have no interest in you. Goodbye. So we had a really good experience.

And all ages too. We went on a excursion with a boy that was 16 or 17 from Denmark and he, I don't think that kid had a better life than that Disney cruise. He talked about how he loved the teen vibe and how it [00:29:00] was so much fun and he had all these teen, it helped that he was a heartthrob. So he always had a flock of people.

But he just had the best time. And I asked his parents, I'm like, have you gone on another cruise line? And they told me we went on a couple and he didn't have as good of experience. And so we just do Disney cruises now with our 16-year-old. So I think they're really good at cruises.

So yeah, and a lot of the same points and miles strategies apply to cruises, which is really helpful. Like I just taught a class a masterclass on cruises and it's nice because once you get the how to do the parks, it really easily translates to a cruise actually. So there is that too. Okay, that's good.

And I've heard a lot of people, talking about getting the Disney gift cards when they are like, on sale at like Costco or best Buy and stuff, and that's helpful. It helps you save a little bit of money. And you can use those to pay for cruises. You can use those to pay for hotel rooms and [00:30:00] stuff.

I think that's something that helps supplement a little bit, to help people save a little. For sure the Disney gift cards too. If people aren't familiar, there's actually a website that Disney runs where you can combine them. So you don't have 1,000,025, $50 gift cards. 'cause that is a concern I get a lot of, if I just go pick it up at my grocery store so that I get more points or whatever.

Or they're trying to get discount. You can just add 'em all together into one. It's a thousand dollars you can put on one card. So don't panic if you're collecting Disney gift cards from Best Buy or different places and you don't know what to do about it. There are great offers out there where you can get up to 10 to 15% off of a Disney gift card pretty easily.

something to look at for sure. I know that you mentioned park tickets. So if you really want to get your Disney tickets covered, there are a couple of different ways to buy them.

The first is you can buy them directly from Disney site. They will not code as travel if that's important to you. They're [00:31:00] actually considered entertainment when you buy them from Disney. 

the second option is you can buy it what's called a general travel agency. They're basically buying bulk tickets and discounting them. That's someone like Undercover, tourist or Getaway today, their tickets tend to be slightly less because they are buying them a bulk and getting them cheaper.

So that's another option of getting your tickets and that does code as travel on any sort of credit card. if you have a reserve or something, right? It's gonna code to be a travel expense because it is from a travel agent. Now, a weird hiccup is that if you buy it from a Disney travel agent, it won't code as travel.

So if your friend's like I'm a Disney agent, it won't work. They get them from Disney. So it's a weird nuance thing to think about. Another thing is looking into, you can look more into this on your own, but conference tickets or group tickets is actually pretty substantially cheaper.

So there is a whole thing on, you could look on Reddit, you can look on the internet, figure it out. But that will save you quite a bit of money going to [00:32:00] conference. I had no idea. 'cause we usually get like the Florida resident tickets and stuff. Yeah. So I had no clue that this was a thing, the conference tickets and you can just like literally Google Disney conference tickets and then there are options 

You don't have to show that you're going to that conference or say, oh, I'm at the dental conference. You just go like everyone else and it will save you a lot of money. it's crazy how much it saves families.

Right now too, they have a bunch of deals happening for tickets. So if you're gonna go the summer, they're always gonna have things like that. But it's a lot off right now, like 50% off kids tickets and, three days you're getting $89 tickets for adults. I think they're really trying to get people there in the heat of the summer.

So if you don't care. Even just buying them directly through Disney right now for some of those ticket deals is worth it. Disneyland runs some deals too, but Disneyland's I would say typically aren't as good. They tend to do just, tickets at kids' prices. that's $15 cheaper for like multiple [00:33:00] tickets.

it's not that much money, so it's up to you if you wanna look into that. But Disney World has a lot more conference ticket options. Disneyland not as much. There are not as many conferences. Disney World has their own conference area. 

so let's get into the Disney Vacation Club.

a lot of people don't know what this is. I have a cousin, though, who has been a DVC member for many years, and we would stay with her at her resort, but I didn't really know what it was. it's basically a Disney timeshare right.

I should say, I'm not selling you a timeshare, I'm just explaining what this is. I don't work for Disney. 

so it's Disney's version of a timeshare system. It's set up a little differently than maybe some other timeshares. What's a little bit different is, my family owned a timeshare on a houseboat at Lake Powell that we would go to every summer.

We had a specific week we would go there every year at that specific week, and that's how it worked. A lot of people have that with maybe a beach house or Right. They have a specific time that they go for their [00:34:00] timeshare. Disney's is different in the fact that you are buying points, which is hard for points and miles people, because then I have to explain points two different ways.

You buy DVC points at what they call your home resort. So you can use those points at your home resort to make a booking seven to 11 months out. And then you can actually use those points at all the Disney resorts, most of them. Under seven months. So I own multiple places, right? I'm my own at Disney's Alli in Hawaii, but use my points to stay at Disney World because I wanna go to Disney World that year.

So the point structure is a little bit different, than traditional timeshares. But what's nice about it and is what's part of the timeshare contract when people buy these timeshares, is that they can actually rent out their points to a non-owner to use, so that they are keeping the value of their points.

Disney timeshare points in general have very high value. Because Disney will either buy them back if they drop too low because Disney is the biggest owner of their timeshare, right? [00:35:00] Because they own the most of their resort. And also they hold value because you can use them at so many different places.

but it's nice because people listening, you don't have to buy a timeshare. You don't have to buy DVC. You can rent from an owner and it usually saves you about 40 to 50% off a room. The rack rate on Disney site on average, you went from an owner. 

Even the value resorts, I hate that they call them value resorts. 'cause it makes it sound like you're staying at a motel. And they look like motels. They do. They have the outside door. Yes. The vibe of a, motel. But they are so nice guys. They're so nice and they're so cute. The theming is just so freaking adorable.

What's cool about Disney Vacation Club in particular is they only own at the highest level resorts. So when you're renting at a deluxe, which are like the bougie that's where DVC resorts are. 

So, but that's a good point because I've never realized, but it makes sense my cousin's, home resort is [00:36:00] Kidani at Animal Kingdom.

yeah. But then she would use her points at like Saratoga or, I forget some of the other ones that she had stayed at, but she stayed at several of them. Or the contemporary, yes. Yeah, those, and. I didn't know that you would only use them for the deluxe ones. I realize now that she's never used them for any of the moderate or the value ones.

So the fact that you are staying at the high end, which have you ever thought about like why does Disney call them deluxe? doesn't that sound like a fast food meal or something? I always wonder too, where they come up with some of their like marketing words. It's like value moderate deluxe.

It's am I going to a fast food restaurant? Am I going to Disney? But anyways, when you're renting DVC think in your head, you have a moderate budget, you're getting deluxe perks, right? So you might be spending $300 a night on a hotel room, but then you're getting like bougie results out of [00:37:00] that instead of maybe middle of the ground type of hotel.

And some of them, what I like too is the deluxe resorts, they're even fun to just stay at, like if you're from Florida and you just wanna go have a staycation and you don't even wanna go to the park, they're a Disney park in themselves.

A lot of the times, those higher end ones, so you talked about Kidani, right? You have the Savannah where there's all the animals. You have people doing cultural demonstrations where they're teaching you all about different African countries and your kids are doing all these activities. They have a scavenger hunt, they have fine dining, the pools all have splash pads and slides and a whole gamut of things.

So I know sometimes people that reach out to me that are maybe local or driving distance. Will say, I just wanna spend two days, not going to the park. Like I'm just gonna stay at the resort and treat it like an all-inclusive would be where I'm just laying out at the pool, my kids are having a good time, and we're going to do dining with Mickey for lunch and we're calling it a day.

So there where all the character meals are at, usually at [00:38:00] Deluxe, right? everything happening is usually at those fancy resorts, so And you're right, 'cause we've stayed at the Wilderness Lodge 

You can take the boat over to Fort Wilderness these. Resorts have so much to offer in terms of entertainment and amenities. they do movies outside. They'll do s'mores and they have characters come out. One of our favorite places to stay around Christmas time is at a Disney resort.

Andmy husband is like, I just wanna go stay there and just be there. Because ofthe vibe he's like, I don't really care to go to the parks, And that's what for, when you look at saving money, a lot of people will say, we're gonna go to the parks, we're gonna go seven days or six days, but we're going to go to the parks three to four days and then we're gonna just spend two days at the resort because there's so much to do.

We can cut costs there and one of the days we're gonna go to the waterpark 'cause we get that for free. So it does add up a lot of the extra [00:39:00] features of staying at A DVC. There's even DVC at Disneyland actually. So there's a couple there and there's one in Hawaii and there's a couple on the beach in Florida.

So there are multiple DVC locations around the us. And it's just really fun to be able to stay at these fancy resorts and look around and be like, yeah, I only spent, this much a night and these people spent way more than I did. And we're getting the same experience, which is cool.

I heard that you can also use your points for cruises or like adventures by Disney. Yeah, so as a owner of A DVC shop and the other shops would have you trade in your points to get these experiences, I will tell you it's not worth it. Because the cruises, you should just come to a shop like mine, rent out your DVC points and take the cash and run and book the cruises.

'cause you'll get a way better return on your investment than going through the route of using it for a cruise. So I think I looked and they were charging, like for a $3,000 cruise, it was like $6,000 worth of DVC points. [00:40:00] Go to a shop even like mine and I'll, I could get 'em, rent it out in a day or two and you can take the cash and just go on your cruise and maybe two cruises because you have enough cash to do that, 

So let's talk a little bit about the process. Yeah. So you are a DVC owner, but then you also are a broker. So not only do, can you rent out your own points to people, but you also find people to rent out points for renters.

Yes. So there's more than one way to rent DVC points. And I'll be the first one to tell people that, I'm a broker shop. I'm pretty much the easy elementary way of doing it. if you're brand new to it and it overwhelms you,I'm probably the first option. So what I have is, I have owners reach out to me.

For example, I had an owner reach out saying, Hey, I have these points. I'm not using them this year because my daughters want to go to Japan. So we're gonna take the cash. From you renting them out. And we're gonna fly our daughters for their senior trip to Japan.

So what they do is they come to [00:41:00] me, these owners, and then my job is I find a renter. I find the availability on the DVC site. They process the credit card for the renter, the person probably listening to this to rent out that person's points. So I'm a mediator, in the middle to add some protection.

So I have contracts and all the good stuff that goes between both people. But that's the most basic way to rent DVC because you do have credit card protection, you feel pretty safe. I'm basically saying if I don't provide this room, I'm gonna have to find another way to get to the room.

So there is good parts to that. So it's a really good Beginner level to rent DVC. You can also, of course, like you, you could go to your family member and be like, Hey, are you going this year? Can I just pay for your points? So if you know of a DVC owner, that's another good option. There are Facebook groups, and I have,a whole list of Facebook groups that I suggest that people can go to depending on where they're wanting to stay, right?

They wanna go to Alani in Hawaii, they wanna go to Disney World, they wanna go to [00:42:00] Disneyland. There's different groups that actually owners just post their points and there's no like person in the middle. Obviously the issue there is that there's no protection, so you're sending money to a stranger. So keep that in mind.

You just have to do your due diligence, make sure they're actually an owner. There are different ways to find that out. that's another option as well, and I've seen other websites, some of these websites though, look like they haven't been updated since the eighties. I don't know if I'm allowed to talk badly about competitors. I don't know. I'm not gonna, I wasn't gonna say who it was, but Yeah, they're both bad. Like the main one are really bad.

my best friend was going to Disney World and I told her, I'm like, oh, we're opening this brokerage. We're gonna be the first women owned one. It's gonna be this really cool thing. And she's send me, she's in marketing. She's send me your competitors' websites. And I sent them and she wrote me back.

She's like, you're gonna have no problem They're not scammers. They're just really bad at making websites. So don't panic if you see the colors of the website and how clunky they are.

It's just because they need to work on that. They're not scamming [00:43:00] you. That was our goal when we created our website I said, please, we cannot look like that. It's not hard to not look like that. Everyone's gonna Google now and be like, which ones are they talking about?

They've been doing it for a million years. They are legit and they just haven't updated their website and I guess they don't feel like they have to,

but, yeah, so look at, they're gonna charge you just from a process perspective. You get charged per point that we're talking about. Okay. So let's say we talked about Kidani, right? Might start at 10 points a night, right?

So an owner is going to charge you per point based off of how much they feel like their points are worth. Our site for example, is $21.50 a point for that. Other sites for different resorts are gonna be like 24, 25 a point. So it just depends. Make sure you're looking at that because. Some are not as good as others about telling you how much they're actually charging you per point.

There's gonna be cheaper options out there. Facebook groups, depending on the resort, can run you anywhere from 19 $20 a point up to [00:44:00] 28, $30 a point. So it's just gonna depend on the resort, how high a demand it is, that sort of thing, right? but yeah, you're gonna go on one of these groups or you're gonna come to my site and be like, I don't know what she's talking about.

It's per point that they're charging you so you can rent a studio So if you and your husband wanted to go for two people, there's a room that size, right? At certain resorts all the way up to a three bedroom grand villa that's larger than my house. So all of those, I'll give you rented on DVC points.

I've never stayed in a three bedroom grand villa. But you can rent it, or the over water bungalows at the Polynesian, it might run you a couple hundred pounds a night. So if you multiply that by 2150, that should give you an idea how much, yeah. They cost you at a discount 40, 50% off. 

But that's okay. So that's a good point that we should make. Yes. Disney is made for families. They understand that families need space. So these deluxe resorts are going to have a ton of options for that. The rooms are usually bigger. [00:45:00] They're usually gonna have a kitchenette or a full kitchen, depending on which level you get.

So keep that in mind too. When you're comparing prices, you wanna make sure, especially if you're trying to compare for off property, make sure it's apples to apples, and then factor in traveling with your car. Think, just think about it guys. You're at the park all day long, you're hot, you're hungry, you're tired.

Do you wanna get in your car and drive 30 ish minutes or Do you want to get on the skyliner or do you wanna just walk? A few minutes, just think about that. That's something to point out, But the, each of the studios, there's studios which have kitchenettes, right?

Which you were talking about, but then 1, 2, 3 bedrooms have full kitchens and full washers and dryers. So if you have a big family, if I'm going with my mom for example, sometimes the price might be $50 more a night for [00:46:00] us to have a two bedroom together if we split the cost. But then we're getting a full kitchen and we're getting a washer and dryer.

And what's cool about Disney resorts is you can actually have food delivered to the resort and they have full fridges and freezers that they store your food. So a lot of people will, Walmart plus Instacart, we have our favorite like local cast member one that will deliver food. 

And when you get back, you can have bell service, wheel it up to your room and you have food. So Disney food is actually what usually kills people's budget because they're out there snacking, eating meals, and then they don't realize that they just spent $2,000 on food. those kitchens actually, if they're slightly more for a larger party, sometimes are worth it because you can save money even just having, like you joked about, Uncrustables and grapes and chips in the fridge that can save you quite a bit of money.

Yes. And you can bring in your own food to Disney guys. Like they don't want you to bring in like big coolers and sit with a picnic blanket or something. But you can sit [00:47:00] down at a table or at a bench or something with your sandwiches and your chips and your drinks and they just don't want you to bring like beer bottles and stuff like that obviously.

But you can bring food and you can save a lot of money. Yes. That's the thing too, you can bring drinks in. A lot of people don't know you can't bring alcohol, but you can bring

soda, water, Capri sun, whatever you wanna pack. So I always bring a cooler backpack. And I stuff it full of ice and I just fill drinks. 'cause drinks are really like a Coke in the park is $6 you guys. So just put some like Coke, zero and whatever, Powerade. If you are worried about the heat, whatever other drinks.

Florida, water is gross. So a lot of people too, I'll suggest like bringing water with you in these cooler backpacks because you can have 'em frozen, they'll melt because it's Florida. And then you can have your little picnicoutside of Casey's corner on the benches and just call it a day.

But it will save you a lot of money. You don't have [00:48:00] to obviously picnic every day, but those drinks will add up because for a family of four, if I'm buying everyone a coke every couple hours, that just adds up. 

bring your soft drinks and your waters. We will bring some drinks, but then we also will bring our refillable, something that keeps your drinks really cold and they have refill stations or any of the quick service places.

Sometimes they just have trays of water cups already filled. Yes. And yes, go grab those and put them in your cup. Like you don't have to be buying bottles of water. There's also on the app, just as a little trick, you can look it up where the refill stations are. So if you just go search at the top, you can actually search in both Disneyland and Disney World and it will show you all the places you can fill up water.

Oh, I did not know that. Yeah, so you can do like drinking fountains, but it will also have things like, at Disneyland and Avengers campus, there's actually like a full soda machine in one of the quick services that people will walk up to and just fill up their water bottles with like full ice, full water and they'll just fill up [00:49:00] all of 'em.

So there are a couple of those at Walt Disney World too. So just look it up in the app. It's like refillable stations and it will pull up all the drinking fountains, all the places for water bottles, basically. Yeah. So there are options guys, and the Disney's website will tell you what is permitted to be brought in and what is not.

So if you're not sure, they will tell you exactly what you can and cannot bring. But that's a huge thing. Is there anything else about, DVC that you wanted to point out or is that good? I think one question I get asked, especially coming from points and miles, is can I use points and miles for DVC renting?

Do those go together? Do I have to pay cash If I'm going to do this? And if you use a broker site like mine, I know mine code. Correctly. I believe the others now do. So yes, the answer is yes. You can use points. You're going to usually use a 1 cent model, but keep in mind your discount is so high that, I like to use the example and Disney's Aulani, right?

This is a [00:50:00] little bit out there, but very common redemption is maybe the Grand Hyatt, Kauai, right? Or Maui would be very similar hotel experience to Disney's Aulani, right? It's on the beach. And those are now, depending on which one you're looking at, 35 to 40,000 points a night, right? 

But when you rent from me, it takes it from a 800 plus dollars hotel room down to a $350 hotel room. So then it's, 35,000, 40,000 points a night. That's the same, right? So if you wanna go to Disney's Aulani versus Grand Hyatt, Kauai. you're already building in that discount when you're renting DVC and then cashing out your points.

Does that make sense? Yeah. So the numbers are actually very similar, which surprises people. my top DVC rental as a shop, hands down Aulani, I get really, then I get any other hotel Alani, then probably the Polynesian at Disney World is my second one. Okay. I was gonna ask about the Polynesia. I love going to the Polynesian, although I'm gonna [00:51:00] get a lot of hate for this, but I don't love, 

The Ohana Restaurant. Okay. I don't not like Ohana. Yeah. I just don't think it's the best food at Disney. and you can get it like from the bar for cheaper, You can, you totally can. So you don't want the sit down experience, like just go get it there and don't worry about it.

Yeah. But I just, I love the Polynesian for just like the fact that you can walk through the lobby and you're like transported. Yes. And you walk through the lobby and you're on like the lawn and just being there like near sunset with the Doll Whip. They have the music. 

And now you can watch the fireworks from the beach there. So people will just get their dole whip and watch the Magic Kingdom fireworks. It's magical music. So you don't even have to be in the crowd of Magic Kingdom. You can just lay there. I love that Disney does that 

they'll be like, the fireworks are about to start in five minutes. Just like you're at the park.

Yes. And then they play the music and everything and you're like, what is happening? [00:52:00] So yeah, that's probably, Aulani actually that's probably our most popular. And then Polynesian and Grand Floridian are tied at second. 

Kingdom Lodge is probably actually my third most requested. Because it is more budget friendly and there's so much to do at the resort. People just go, I'm gonna do that 'cause it's a budget option. So those are the three, I would say are the most popular. But yeah, you can absolutely use points.

The math makes sense if you write it out and compare it to, some of. Marriotts Hilton's, Hyatt redemptions, it will pretty much even out in the end. And then you're getting all the on property perks. So don't pay cash rate for a Disney hotel if you haven't looked at least to see if you can rent DVC is what I'm trying to say.

'cause it will cut it substantially. The downside is they're not gonna clean your room every day. It's if you rented Airbnb or rented a timeshare, so they're not gonna come in and clean your room or make your bed every day. This doesn't seem to bug most people, but I like to point it out because ever since Covid, I, we don't even have them come into our room anymore.

That's [00:53:00] how I feel. I'm like, don't touch my stuff. But they won't do that. And then, but even things like if you go to Disneyland and Alani, they still charge parking to stay at those hotels. DVC members don't pay that. So Alani, a lot of people will rent from us because it's $40 a day to park there.

Holy crap. And so they're paying 800 plus dollars a night hotel, plus having to pay $40 per vehicle to park. So people will go, wow, you're $400, three, 400 and I don't have to pay for parking for seven days. That's a big cost saver. So Disneyland hotel also charges for parking, and you don't have to pay it when you rent DVC because you're renting a timeshare owner who pays for that property.

You don't have to pay for it. And there's no resort fees, no other fees on top of renting DVC. Another common question I get. Yeah. So you're not paying additional, if you stay at the Marriott, at Disney World, you're gonna have to pay for parking. You're paying for resort fees on top of your free night certificates.

You're not gonna have that when you rent DVC. yeah. Hopefully that [00:54:00] makes sense. I know it's a complicated thing to explain, but that hopefully makes sense. It's complicated because it's something that's completely different than anything that you know.

'cause when you, first of all, you say timeshare and people immediately think, Ugh, they're trying to sell me a timeshare. Yes. And then the next thing is, okay, I'm using points, but I'm also paying cash. What do you mean? Sort of thing. Yeah. But after you explain it, it does make sense.

So basically what you're doing is somebody is paying for points for a specific resort. Now you can buy those points and in buying those points, you are getting that hotel or that resort at a discount. Yeah. Than if you would pay cash. And it's important to know you'll just buy what dates you want and the owner will book it for [00:55:00] you.

So you don't even have to understand the DVC side of things, really. Or like the site. You're not me. You're not living on that timeshare site, right? You're just going to reach out and say, I wanna stay at the Polynesian in October. How do I make that happen? And the owner goes, there's this available, do you want it?

And that's how it works. So you don't even have to buy the points and then figure it out all on your own. The owner's gonna do all of that. So you basically just say, this is what I want. These are the dates, this is the resort I want, can you make it happen?

And then you just pay. And that's it. Thanks. The easy part. That sounds A really good deal, man. Yeah, it's good. And the owner will book it for you and figure out availability, maybe message you back depending on how you do it, or I would message you and say, those dates aren't available, but this is right.

So that's the one hard thing about DVC is you have to be flexible on both location and timeframe. You're not going to get a really high demand resort for really cheap. It's not going to be maybe like points and miles where if you [00:56:00] plan really far ahead, you can get Christmas, 

For cheap at a certain resort, it's harder to do that. So that's just a caveat. Be a planner. Usually seven month and 11 month is when I tell people, reach out to me from your vacation. If it's not that, then it's harder, but not impossible. All right. What are some other money saving tips

One thing to note, anyone can order a kid's meal. You don't have to be a kid to order a kid's meal. When you mobile order, don't tell them.

But usually you get like a meal and a drink, like a little drink that sometimes are refillable. So that's a funny money saving thing. But if you're the type that would rather snack your way around the world and you just need some food in between. Getting a kid's meal is actually really not that bad and it'll be quite a bit cheaper than an adult meal.

The second thing is don't feel like you have to sit for food specifically down for meals all the time. There are quick, what they call quick service where you walk up to a counter and grab food. But some of those food [00:57:00] offerings that are right outside the parks are better value, they're cheaper and they're better food.

So all of those things. Something like the contemporary that has Steakhouse 71, that sit down meal cost is comparable to a Casey's chicken nugget inside or corn dog nugget inside the park. Very similar prices, but you're getting a better quality food experience when you just walk seven minutes. 

I tell people, eat at the resorts. Eat right outside the parks and walk. It might feel weird. But the food quality and prices are better at those resorts, in my opinion. eat a kid's meal. We talked about it, but you can walk up to any food station and ask them for ice water and they'll give it to you.

So any quick service they'll give you ice water. This is very important in the summer. So walk up, get your ice water. You can even ask for cups of ice and they will give you that. So those are some of the food things you can charge. Sit down meals and snacks from your magic band back to your room so you can take with that, [00:58:00] that would make it code as a travel expense.

So I have used the card that allows you to cover travel expenses. A lot at Disney for that. I'll just cover, that my dull whip like you talked about. And that only works if you're staying at a Disney resort though. Yeah. You can't stay at one of the Swan Dolphin Reserve Marriotts, you have to stay at a Disney owned one for it to work.

A lot of people will open actually some cash back cards for Disney. US Bank has their triple cash card, some things like that where they're getting $750 or a bank bonus, and they'll use that towards food. Those are really good options for food costs. Lightning Lane is the same idea.

A lot of people for their individual lightning lanes or lightning lanes will open a card. Or open a bank account with the intention of this is covering those costs, right? I have to spend X amount on a lightning lane, so I'm just gonna open this bank bonus to cover that. I would say that's how I've approached lightning lanes.

You don't have to buy one for every park. [00:59:00] Don't feel like you have to always have lightning lanes. I would say it depends on the park, but don't feel like you have to spend individual and lightning lane, you don't have to do it all. Budget it out a little bit and see what that looks like, for your family.

When you stay on property, you get to pick those before anybody else. Another perk, which if you go at a really busy time or even a non-busy time and you really want to. Go on these high ticket rides. It's so nice if you can plan them out seven days before your trip and you're just good to go.

Like you don't have to worry about it. You also get to do your dining before everyone else. there's just some perks like that, that are worth it. But yeah, saving money on food is a huge deal. You can bring your food in, those lightning lanes, I always buy it. A little trick is if you have Park Hopper, you can buy it for one park and it carries with you to another park.

for example, animal Kingdom is a lot cheaper to buy Lightning Lane than it is at Magic Kingdom. So if you [01:00:00] bought Lightning Lane and started your day at Animal Kingdom and then took the bus over to Magic, you still have Lightning Lane for about half the cost. If you're the Park Hopper type, then that's worth it too.

Yeah, that's, another thing to keep in mind too, is that we're talking about saving money and the quantifiable ways to save, but you also wanna think about buying things like lightning lane,Is that gonna be more worth it to me in the long run

Is it gonna make your day better? Yes. I tell people Disneyland particular has, two rides that get really long lines. One of them is Radiator Springs, which is like a super popular kids ride, right? With cars land. And this is a trick to save money.

But so a lot of those rides that are high ticket, like Radiator Springs has single rider, where if you're eight or older, you can go in single rider. So eight years old, my daughter can go through single rider. And then you don't have to pay for [01:01:00] the 20 15, 20 $5 per person Lightning lane, because the line, if it's a couple hour long line will only be 30 minutes in single rider, 

so if you don't have to ride it all together. But my motto is, I've already saved enough. I'm just gonna buy the lightning lane. That's just me though. I don't wanna wait two hours in line to ride radiator springs. I'm just gonna pay the money so that I'm not stressed and we can enjoy ourselves.

That's my motto. And I know that's not everyone's, I'm right there with you. I totally agree. in my family budget. I go, this is how much we're gonna spend on lightning lanes. This is just what I'm expecting.

And yeah, go from there. If you have little kids and you're not very familiar with Disney, that's a really good money saving for those individual lightning lanes or lightning lanes is that if you have a baby or a kid that cannot ride the ride, you can actually walk up to someone with a little tablet and they'll let you ride the ride, with the older kid and then you swap out and then that kid gets to ride the ride twice.

That's a good [01:02:00] money saving tip. Don't buy the individual lightning line for the baby that can't ride the ride. if you do it and you made a mistake, go to the people with the tablet. They will refund you. I promise.

Surpris so many people do that. They're like, what do I do? Because they just click everybody and panic buy it, and they're like, oh my gosh, guardian, what do I do? I'm like, no, it's fine.they'll give you your money back or they'll give you something extra or something.

They'll figure it out. Trust me. yeah, there's a lot of ways to, I like there's positives to lightning lanes right now and Disneyland's and Disney World's lightning lanes run differently. So just as a PSA look it up before you go, you buy them at different times. The strategy's slightly different.

There are plenty of Disney influencers out there that will tell you what to do when it comes to stacking them and getting cost efficiency out of 'em and all that good stuff. But the biggest thing is don't skimp on it. When you look at it, it's worth the money to buy Lightning Lane, in my opinion, especially at both Disneyland.

That's really important to buy, in my opinion. Disney World, at most [01:03:00] of the parks, I would say it's important to buy it. Okay, cool. And then a lot of people bring this up. How do you feel about the Disney Chase visas? Oh yeah. 

So this is my takeI would open a Chase Bank account, get the bank bonus, and actually get the Chase debit card. It comes with almost the exact same things without impacting your, credit card opening stuff that you're trying to do with points and miles.

And it's a debit card attached to the bank bonus. So if you want the perks, I would say the debit card is worth it. You get like the discounts and all the good stuff. Plus you get the bank bonus, and you get like discounts on cruise lines and all that kind of stuff.

If you're a Disney fanatic and you want a Disney card, it's not a bad option. There are elevated offers on them on the Visa cards, and I do find them worth it if you're trying to do some of those redemptions, like a ticket, something like that. They can be useful, but in my opinion, there are cards that get you bigger sign-on [01:04:00] bonuses, so they're not like my top card as a Disney person, I don't have that card.

We talked about the one card that has flexible currency that covers, that's the Swiss Army knife of Disney. That's gonna be a lot better and it's gonna give you. Double, if not triple what the Disney gives you in a signup bonus.

So yeah, that's why I take, chase Sapphire, one of the Ink cash card, something like that is a lot better option for Disney people unless you're just trying to get a discount out of it. So I think it has its place, but I do the debit card. I agree there's definitely way better options out there.

And then you get all the perks of, the character meet and greet that you get and the dining discount, like all that stuff still comes with the debit card. So to me that makes the most sense. And then you can tie it to a Chase checking account and get that bonus instead. 

And then doing something like a US Bank card where you can get those unlimited and it's $750 sign up, that's a better option than the Disney Visa, which is usually like [01:05:00] two to 400, right? So just, yeah, value there, The debit card is genius. I never even, I didn't think about that.

All right, cool. All right, so let's do some rapid fire questions. Hey, I'm ready. Disney edition. You ready? Hopefully I'm not gonna offend my entire audience with this. We'll see how I do. Favorite Disney Park? Magic Kingdom. Okay. World. I'd say Disney World's my favorite. Best ride in all of Disney. Cosmic Rewind. I'm with you. It's the best. It's literally the best I've got. I don't care how many times I've been on it, I think I'm only one song away from all the songs that happen in that ride. 

Gloria Stefan. I'm from Florida. She is like the queen of Miami. Yeah. I, when we first did that ride, I was so excited to get Conga. But then every single time after Conga, no. Conga, conga, conga. [01:06:00] Six times in a row. I have to look at the list now to see which songs I've gotten, but I just remember like getting Conga for six times in a row and I was pissed, but I was like, and I love the song, but no, but I've, since I've gotten other ones, but I don't know, how many, but anyways.

All right. So I agree. Cosmic Rewind, one Most expensive rollercoaster, by the way, to have made. It's that one. Oh, I think that it was worth the money. Yeah. Worth a. Okay. What's your go-to Disney snack?

Depends on where I am. So if I'm at Disney World, it's a dull whip and I like to get pineapple coconut together. So like mixed sw? Yeah. Or one of their floats. If I'm at Disneyland, it's a churro churros at Disney World Terrible. Disneyland churros are where it's at. So depends. And I love churros. Got it.

And I won't get them at Disney because they're crap. Disney World, Disneyland, churros are freshly made. I guess DCA has some good, they [01:07:00] have a creme brulee treat right now that I've sent a bunch of people to and it's really good.

It's like a croissant creme brulee, so it's super good. Ooh, that just sounds amazing. Okay. Anyways, so next one, one underrated Disney experience. Something most people skip, but they shouldn't. I would say the shows at Disney World, if we're gonna do both Parks, lion King especially to me, is so much fun and a lot of people skip it, but I think it is worth it to go to that area.

And then at Disneyland, I would say probably, and this is at both parks, but I love Turtle Talk with Crush, I think it's so funny, especially with little kids, some of the things that kids say, I just think it entertains adults. So I'm excited for there to be more shows coming to both parks right now.

I'm hoping Disneyland actually gets something in their theater. But Disney World's getting more shows and I just love, I think the shows make it more magical. I agree. I love those shows. Yes. We did the Indiana Jones [01:08:00] show for the first time in a million years, the last time we went.

And I was like, why do we not do this every time? I love this stuff. I was gonna say, we found a hack from one of the like tricks was that if you go on the last showing, you can walk up to the bar and the cast will take pictures and talk to you like the stunt people. Really? So you walk up. Yeah, and I didn't think it would work, but one of the Disney cast members told me with my two girls and we had two little boys with us from a family friend and they were like, go up to right where the sound booth is at after the show ends and stand there and the cast will come out and they'll take pictures with you and chat.

My girls loved it. They gotta talk to the female stunt lady. They gotta ask her a bunch of questions about how she got her job. The male stunt guy, that's Indiana, like Indiana Jones', evil nemesis dude, he's 60 years old and like 3% body fat. I don't know who this guy is. But looking up close, I had no idea.

He is jacked. My husband was like, he's six three and was like shriveling, so yeah, hack for you [01:09:00] walk up after Indiana Jones. 'cause they'll take pictures and talk with your kids and interact and they are so nice. The stunt people, all of them. That's awesome. Good to know. So yeah, a good tip.

All right. So Deluxe Resort you'd pick if money were no object, I would pick, the Riviera, the Polynesian, depending on what I was doing. And then one thing you'd never spend money on at Disney. I, some of the dining, depending on which dining, for example, I would not buy like a super expensive sit down at Magic Kingdom, like the castle or maybe Bell area, you know what I'm saying?

One of those. They're really expensive in the food is subpar. And I would say at Disneyland, something I wouldn't pay for is any sit down. I just, I would just snack my way around Disneyland, yeah, I agree. And then, oh, genie [01:10:00] Plus or Old School Fast Pass. What's better? I like FastPass. I feel like it's the nostalgia in me of having to run up to the little thing and get the card, like running around and being like, ah, this is our time of our card.

So I would say FastPass, okay. Favorite Disney character. I'm a nineties girly, so I'm gonna have to pick a nineties character. If I'm picking a princess, I'm gonna have to go with Mulan.

Mulan was one of my favorites. Oh. I like it a lot. She just kicks butt, she does. That's such a good one. Okay, cool. That was fun. So thank you Chelsea so much for being here with us today and just dropping those knowledge bombs about saving money at Disney and especially with DVC

I hope there's a lot of people here who have learned a lot about that and that they will be hitting you up trying to get some reservations for those deluxe resorts. 'cause you [01:11:00] know what? You guys deserve it. You deserve to stay at those for half the price on a budget. Yes. So let everybody know where can they find you?

Yeah, so we have Pixie Point gals and then we have pixiepointgals.com, which is our website. So you can go look and even Deep Dive. We have a bunch of free resort guides and free different. How to rent guides and all the things on there.

So if you're interested in that, those are the two main places we're at as of right now, all right, cool. So for those listening, if Disney felt out of reach for you, I hope this episode helped you learn that there are ways to make it happen without sacrificing the magic or your wallet. And if you love this episode, please subscribe and leave us a review.

It really helps people find the podcast. And remember, keep it simple, keep it fun, and keep exploring and we'll catch you in the next episode.