Summer in Mexico—-What’s the Cost?
We are officially less than 3 months away from our big trip to Mexico! If you’re new around here, you can read all about it on this post. We’ve changed our plans a bit to split our month in Mexico between Mexico City and a road trip around the Yucatan Peninsula. One of our favorite families is joining us for the 2nd leg of the trip, so we are extra excited!
One thing I’ve learned about traveling abroad with a family is that the costs are very variable. You can take the same trip and pay half as much as someone else or you can take the same trip and pay 4xs as much. It really just boils down to how much time and effort you want to put into finding the lowest prices on airfare and accommodations, how flexible you can be with dates and layovers, and how important location is for you.
Everyone has their travel style—if I had to describe ours it would be bougie on a budget. We (ahem I) like nice accommodations, but we also like a good deal.
With 3 young kids, we definitely pay more for convenience in this phase of life. If we can have a shorter layover or fly out of a closer airport—even if it costs a bit more—we often will do so.
With that in mind, back to the interesting things…here is a break down of what our costs for Mexico are so far and a few tips.
Airfare:
5 Passengers, with 3 flights each =15 tickets (South Carolina to Mexico City, Mexico City to Cancun, Cancun to South Carolina)
We put all of our purchases on credit cards during the year that give points that can be converted to airline miles. Obviously, be sure to pay it off each month.
JD keeps an eye on credit card sign up offers and every couple of years will sign up for a different card that gives you a big lump of points to sign up (see below!). We had enough points saved from this past year that we were able to cover 8/15 of our flights with points. You still have to pay some of the airport taxes on them, but it was definitely a huge savings!
Tips for saving on airfare:
Scott’s Cheap Flights: We subscribe to the premium subscription of this and have got amazing deals before (ex: $350 roundtrip to tokyo!)
Airline Points: We use American Express Platinum Card and Chase Sapphire. We transferred points to Delta and United. You can use this referral link for 60,000 point sign up offer from Chase Sapphire. This referral link will give you up to 100,000 points for American Express Platinum (the annual fee is $$ on this one, so weigh the pros and cons based on how much you travel).
Timing it Right: Although we may plan our trips 6 months in advance, we always wait on the purchasing the airfare until we can get a good read on what the best price will be. In our experience, buying airfare 2-3 months out seems to have the lowest prices.
Flexible Dates: We use google flights to keep track of the prices. You can set alerts and you can also view the price range of the ticket to see if it is lower or higher than normal prices for that destination.
Check the Luggage Policy: Sometimes the price will look cheaper, but when you research the cost to have a carryon bag or a checked bag it’s suddenly higher than those that include the luggage.
Total Spent: $1,073.60 (without using airline points this would have been closer to $3500)
Accommodations:
Tips for saving on accommodations:
For longer stays, Airbnb usually ends up being a little cheaper because they often offer discounts for weekly stays or monthly stays. Price compare with VRBO.com you can often find the same places on both and one may be cheaper (or in our case, have a more flexible cancellation policy) than the other.
For short stays— 1-2 nights hotels are often cheaper because the cleaning and service fees on airbnb really add up on short stays. I like finding hotels on booking.com then googling the hotel. On the search results screen you can enter the dates for the hotel and it will pull up the hotel listing across many sites so you can book it on the cheapest one.
Traveling with friends also helps. We’re splitting this INCREDIBLE airbnb with views for days of Bacalar. It would be out of our accommodation budget, but since we are staying there with our friends and splitting the costs, it works out perfectly.
Total Spent: $4606 ($2192 for 3 weeks in Mexico City, $2414 for the last 1.5 weeks)
Rental Car:
Tips for saving on Rental Cars:
Honestly, I don’t think we could get much cheaper than this for an 11 day rental! I booked through booking.com and signed up for their free Genius account and it gave us an extra 10% off a car rental since we booked a hotel through their site.
Total: $231.20 (I think we may have to pay some mandatory Mexican insurance when we arrive too)
Budget for Spending Money:
We usually splurge on a few things—-a fancy meal, a food tour, or a cooking class etc. We love seeking out free things to do in different cities. We’ll usually eat out one meal a day and cook the other meals at our airbnb.
Estimate $3,000 (estimating $100/day on average. This is what we have spent on average on international trips in the past)
Estimated Grand Total:
30 Days in Mexico Estimated Grand Total: $8,910.80
Could you do this same trip for half of the price? Certainly! We are paying a premium on many of our accommodations because of location or because they are just “cool”. Could you do this same trip for triple the price? Certainly! Fancier places to stay, better rental car, a bigger spending budget etc.
I’ll be sure to keep you all in the loop on our expenses during the trip. I’ll plan to do a weekly budget update over on IG stories.
Curious about our favorite travel gear? Check out this post.
