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Traveling to Hawaii can be a once in a lifetime trip. And if you take your whole family there, it can be a trip that you end up paying for many years after you get home. As a matter of fact, a family of 5 (like mine) could easily spend $15,000 or more to go to Hawaii.
I knew that we wouldn’t want to spend this much money to travel anywhere besides space or maybe Antarctica, so I worked hard to save a lot of money on this trip. I even wrote about how we saved $7,264 on the trip, before we even went.
While we were on this trip, we always tried to make sure that money didn’t limit anything that we did. We didn’t throw money around by doing a lot of vacation spending, but we certainly weren’t trying to be as cheap as possible while traveling.
But don’t worry, we still were able to find some savings opportunities! Many of these savings opportunities were unique to Hawaii, but others can be used no matter where you are traveling.
So here is a list of 19 things we saved money on during our Hawaii vacation. I listed these in order and also tried to approximate the savings from each of them. After running the numbers, it looks like we saved approximately $9,300 on our 2 week Hawaiian vacation!
Hopefully you will be able to use some of these savings tips on your Hawaiian vacation or wherever you travel to next!
19 Ways We Saved Money
Way #1: Dinner on our way to the airport
Where do you go right before your trip to Hawaii? Applebee’s of course! Instead of paying full price on our dinner, I purchased a discounted gift card from Cardbear.com, one of many online gift card resellers, while I was stuck in traffic. Total Savings: $7.31
Way #2: Hotel the night before our trip
Our flight to Hawaii left at 6:00 AM. Yikes! Since we wanted to sleep in as long as possible, we decided to get a hotel room near the airport. Fortunately, we were able to use 20,000 IHG hotel points to stay in a suite at a Holiday Inn Express near the airport.
We got these points with our fabulous IHG Rewards Club Premier Credit Card, which currently offers an initial spend bonus of 125,000 points after spending $3,000 as well as 40 points for each dollar spent at an IHG property. Total Savings: $140
Way #3: Parking at the airport
Parking at Detroit Metro Airport costs at least $12 per day. Even parking in one of the off-airport lots costs $10 or more per day. However, staying at the Holiday Inn Express gave us 10 days of free parking! Therefore, instead of spending at least $140 for parking, we only spent $40. Total Savings: $100
Way #4: Water at the airport
I know that we can’t bring liquid through customs, so we are forced to buy bottled water before we fly. Right???
Ummm … not really. Instead of purchasing 5 bottled waters, we just brought our empty water bottles and filled them up at the drinking fountain. Total Savings: $10
Way #5: Our flight
As I mentioned in this article, we only paid $56 total for our flights to and from Hawaii. We were able to do this because we saved thousands of American Airlines points by using reward credit cards such as he Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select World Elite Mastercard. This card also gave us a free checked bag for myself and 4 travel companions. Total Savings: $5,268
Way #6: Our flight from Dallas to Honolulu (and back)
About three days before our trip, I received a call from American Airlines saying that our flight to Hawaii had to be changed. After a moment of panic from me, the representative on the phone explained that we would actually get into Honolulu 2 hours earlier and we would only have one stop instead of two.
Okay, cool! He also explained that we would fly from Dallas instead of San Francisco. The best part of this is that we would each receive a free meal and free drinks on this flight and we wouldn’t have on the other one. Here’s a link to the American Airlines page that shows the meal selection on AA flights. Total Savings: $60
Way #7: Use Wyndham “go fast” points
By using 3,000 Wyndham points per night, we were able to save a little more than $100 per night by using their “go fast” option. Although we didn’t get the rooms for free, we were able to save more than $1,000 at our two Wyndham resorts. I wrote about how we did this in another article. Total Savings: $1,182
Way #8: Buying groceries from a grocery store
Food in Hawaii is definitely expensive. However, you can pay only 20-30% more than mainland United States if you shop in a store like Walmart. The same food will cost you 2-3 times as much if you shop in a store near your hotel or just go out to eat all of the time.
Since we had a kitchen in the places we stayed, we shopped at Foodland and Walmart and made most of our breakfasts, lunches, and even some dinners at our hotel/resort. With 3 kids, this was usually just as exciting and way more practical than eating out. It also made the times that we did eat out even more memorable. Total Savings: $500
Way #9: Bringing snorkels instead of renting them
On the second day that we were on Oahu, we went to Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve. This bay is home to some of the best snorkeling on Oahu, even though the coral reef has been getting destroyed over the past several years. Instead of renting snorkels at $20 each, we bought ours from home. We had to purchase 3 of them before the trip, but they only cost $25 each. Total savings: $25
Way #10: Get free stuff from other guests at the resort
There are millions of tourists in Hawaii, most of whom have flown in with limited space in their suitcases. Therefore, many are looking to get rid of extra food or supplies before they have to leave.
At our hotel in Oahu, many people left various food items, books, and randomness by the elevator in the spirit of communal giving before flying. I was lucky enough to score a 6-pack of Skinny Jeans IPA (yummy) from this process. Total Savings: $10
Way #11: Forgo the guided tour
Some people love a good guided tour. Even I do, at times. However, my kids are decidedly against listening to someone talk for hours at a time. Because of this, we experienced Hawaii mainly on our own, without the benefit of someone else taking us to various places. Instead of going on various buses and guided tours, we rented a car on both islands and traveled to a lot of these places on our own. I don’t know if this was the best way to travel in Hawaii, but it worked out well for our family and probably saved us some money. Total Savings: ?
Way #12: Use VRBO or AirBNB
After we flew from Oahu to the island of Hawaii, we stayed in a cool yurt that we found on VRBO. We stayed there for two nights so that we would be close to Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park on the eastern side of Hawaii. We found that we were able to save a bit of money by using VRBO. We also got to experience staying in a yurt, in a rainforest, in a hurricane. How cool! Check out the place that we stayed by clicking here. We definitely recommend it if you want to get away from the usual. Total Savings: $100
Way #13: Get a free national park visit if you have a 4th grader
When we went to Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park, we took advantage of the Every Kid in a Park initiative to get into the park for free. If you have a 4th grader, all that you have to do is have your child go to their website and print out a pass. Then, your family will get free admittance to every national park in the United States. You may also be able to ask at the gate (like we did) if you forget to print out the pass. Total Savings: $25
Way #14: Sign up for a timeshare presentation
I definitely wouldn’t recommend for everyone to do this because timeshare sales agents are extremely good at their jobs and timeshares are an extremely bad investment.
Seriously, don’t buy a timeshare! They are horribly overpriced and an impulse purchase that many people have done. Honestly, you can get the same benefits of a timeshare by doing a little bit of travel hacking (way less than I do). And you won’t have to pay the dreadful annual maintenance cost. Yikes!
But … if you are absolutely sure that you won’t buy a timeshare, then you may want to sign up for a timeshare presentation. Our timeshare presentation gave us 30,000 points (valued at $600+). It also gave us discounts to a variety of activities that we could book through our resort. This allowed us to save $121 on the luau we were already planning to do. Total Savings: $721
Way #15: Go on a free coffee tour
Near Kailua-Kona on the Big Island, there are over 600 coffee farms that grow and harvest the world-famous Kona Coffee. We took a tour of Greenwell Farms and were able to hear about the history of both the farm and Kona Coffee. We also saw the whole coffee process, from planting to roasting and sampled some great-tasting coffee! Total Savings: $5
Way #16: Hiking the Captain Cook Trail to Kealakekua Bay
My absolute favorite spot to snorkel in Hawaii was Kealakekua Bay. The fish were incredible and it was deep enough that we didn’t have to worry about stepping on any of the coral. However, to get there, you either have to hike a 3.8 mile round-trip hike or get there by sea.
Most people choose to access this bay with a boat tour, but this can be pricey costing $60 or more per person. We decided to do the hike. The hike was absolutely awesome and worth it even without the snorkeling reward, but it also was extremely difficult as there is over 1,000 feet of elevation loss on the way back. Make sure that you are prepared with plenty of water if you decide to do this hike! Total Savings: $300
Way #17: Hiking to Waipi’o Valley
One of my favorite places in Hawaii is Waipi’o Valley. This lush, beautiful valley used to be home to over 10,000 people including Hawaiian royal families. Now, it is home to less than 100 people, many of whom practice taro farming. To access the valley, there is a short, but incredibly steep road. Only cars that have 4-wheel drive or hikers are allowed on this road.
Of course, we decided to hike down this road. After we completed this hike, we were rewarded with some great swimming and exploring, as well as some of the coolest scenery in Hawaii. Total Savings: ?
Way #18: Buying boogie boards
Instead of renting pool or beach toys, we went to Walmart and purchased 3 boogie boards. Although we never went surfing, the boogie boards allowed our kids to experience the thrill of riding the waves to shore. They also only cost us $35 total instead of $20 or more per hour. After using these boards, we were able to pass them on to people that we met at our resort. Total Savings: $25
Way #19: Putting travel expenses on a travel rewards card
Even though we almost got our flight to Hawaii for free and saved a lot of money on our lodging, we still had some travel expenses including car rental and an interisland flight. To save money on this, we signed up for fixed value travel card like the Capital One Venture. This card allowed us to accrue points and use these them to pay for miscellaneous travel expenses. So far, we have accrued 81,400 points, or $814 in value. You can find out more about this card by clicking here. Total Savings: $814
Total savings on our trip to Hawaii
If I add up all of our savings, it looks like we saved approximately $9,300 on our Hawaiian Vacation!
$9,300!!!
Of course, we have all of this money just piled up on our kitchen table and don’t know what we can spend it on.
Ha ha … just joking! Instead the savings allowed us to spend more time in Hawaii and plan for lots of other travel in the future.
How are you planning to save money on your Hawaiian vacation … or any travel that you have planned? Let us know in the comments below.
And, as always, thanks for reading!
~Nathan
Let’s keep living a great life … with the help of money. So what’s next?
- You can travel for free by using rewards credit cards.
- You can get motivated and get out of debt.
- You can check out the next post or the previous post and continue to learn.
But no matter what you decide to do, let’s leave the ordinary behind and take action today!
