AboutSuzan Jackson Expertise I am a writer specializing in topics related to family, especially enjoying travel and the outdoors with children. My husband and I have traveled extensively with our own 2 sons - now ages 10 and 14 - since they were infants. I can advise on travel by air or car and on a variety of destinations across the US. We also enjoy many outdoor activities with our sons. For more information, see my websites: www.travelfamily.net and www.outdoorfamily.net.
Experience Traveling with my own 2 boys since they were infants, by air and car, to a wide variety of destinations, both urban and outdoor. Writing about travel with children.
Publications FAMILY FUN magazine
See my website www.travelfamily.net for articles and tips on traveling with kids.
Question There is a group of us 6 families, all friends with children of different ages: 3 families have infants only, 2 families have children ages 6 to 17. One single couple We are going to the beach.
Once we found a house to rent. There was a disagreement as how to charge each family. Some wanted per person (excluding children age 3 and under), others wanted per room...Well, to make a long story short we did it per room. Everyone is fine with that..
My question to you is how do other multi-family's plan and organize their vacations? As far as food, sheet rentals, and any other things that you would have to plan as a group?
We all been on vacation together before but never with kids. Any tips or advice would be appreciated!!! thanks
Answer Dear Kay -
Your question is a difficult one because there are so many different options for splitting costs between multiple families, and different people have very different preferences when it comes to issues of money.
The solution you came up with makes sense, splitting the cost per room. Other costs could then be split evenly.
Food could be another area of contention. One simple approach to splitting food costs is to agree that each family takes care of their own food needs for certain meals (maybe breakfast and lunches), and joint meals are assigned to one family to plan and buy. For example, each family could handle dinner for a different night for the entire group. When it's your turn, you're buying food for everyone, just like the others will do when it's their turn. That not only spreads costs evenly but also the work of food preparation. We've done this for big family vacations and it has worked well.
Another option - especially if money seems to be an emotional issue for some - is to go somewhere where you each have your own space rather than sharing one big house. So, you could get small cottages or cabins. We've also done this on family vacations and found it has many benefits, including giving everyone a bit of down time on their own.
The important thing is that everyone in the group agrees ahead of time to whatever approach you use so that there are no hurt feelings later.
