How We Plan International Family Trips on a Budget

How We Decide Where to Travel as a Family Each Year

Inside the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles, one of the many memorable highlights of our family trip to France.

All families decide where to head on vacation differently.

We have a running list of places we’d like to see. It’s our family bucket list. These are places that are a reasonable plane ride away (we’re not doing 17-hour flights with the kids), are safe, have reliable public transportation, and are relatively affordable. So, we have a rough idea of places we’d like to visit someday. It’s a sizable list, so we have plenty of destinations to choose from.

The Three Ways We Choose Our Family Travel Destinations

There are three main ways we plan trips for our family of four:

1. Based on price 

2. Based on award points 

3. Based on a specific place we want to go

Choosing a Travel Destination Based on Price

If we’re paying out of pocket (aka: not using points), cost is definitely a factor.

Because we homeschool, we have the benefit of flexibility with our dates. That helps a lot because pricing for a flight can vary significantly even if you adjust your dates by a day or two. Sometimes the difference can be hundreds of dollars!

If it’s an option for you, flying during “shoulder season” can save you money, too. Shoulder season refers to flying close, but not quite during, peak season. For example, you can save a lot of money by going on a trip in early May compared to that same trip in mid-June.

We typically pick a month we’d like to travel, and then I start playing around with dates and potential destinations on Google Flights. I go more into my strategy for finding deals using Google Flights here.

How We Narrow Down Our Options

Once we know roughly what month we’d like to travel, we consider locations with reasonable temperatures for that time of year.

I’m all for traveling during shoulder seasons, but I personally don’t want to visit a tropical location during peak hurricane season or see Italy in the dead of winter. (I’m sure they’re still lovely, but if I have the option, I’d rather feel safe and comfortable.)

I also check to see if there are any major events or holidays going on in our desired destination during that time. Those may impact roads, public transportation, and dining and attraction options.

At this point, we’ve usually narrowed it down to one or two major contenders. My husband and I will discuss the plan with the kids, and then we will make a final decision.

Choosing a Travel Destination Based on Award Points

This is still a work in progress for us as we continue to wrap our heads around searching for award flights.

We use our Amex Gold card to earn points. We chose it because most of our spending is on groceries, and we get 3x points on grocery spending with that card.

With points, you can either book through the credit card portal or use points to book directly through the airline. 

Using the credit card portal will reduce your flight cost, but won’t save you quite as much as finding a great deal through the actual airline.

Our best international deal so far was snagging four economy seats for a round-trip flight to London for less than 100k points and roughly $1,500 in taxes and fees. Not bad at all, but I’m sure we can do better. 

We don’t play the miles game where you sign up for various cards to get sign-on bonuses. We try very hard to use our credit cards like debit cards and only pay for what we can afford to pay off quickly.

We have played around with sites like PointsYeah, but their Daydream Explorer function, which allows you to search departures from up to three airports to anywhere, only shows one-way trips. 

So far, we’ve been too nervous to find two one-way flights instead of one round-trip flight. The concern is that they could refuse to let us board because we don’t have proof of onward travel. It may not be as big a concern as we worry about, but we haven’t been brave enough to chance it yet.

So, with sites like PointsYeah, sometimes they can steer us to looking at a certain airline’s reward flights, but they don’t always translate to deals for round-trip bookings.

Choosing a Travel Destination Based on a Specific Place We Want to Go

This one’s the simplest. If we know we want to go to Disney World, that’s where we’re heading. If we know we’re going to visit a relative, the destination is set.

If there’s flexibility with our dates, we’ll search around to find the best deal for airfare and hotels. 

These kinds of trips don’t require as much planning and mental effort before you even book anything. And sometimes you just need a straightforward trip! 

Which Method Do We Use Most?

For us, it comes down to price. We figure out what time of year we want to travel, where we want to go, and figure out the most affordable way to get there. If we have enough points, we try to use them. Otherwise, it comes down to the price of flights. Our out-of-pocket costs are our number one priority.