For many Americans, a trip to Disneyland or Walt Disney World is a once-in-a-lifetime experience — because of budget, not desire. Between expensive hotel stays, food, flights, park tickets and souvenirs, a family adventure at a Disney park could easily run into the thousands of dollars.
While you shouldn’t abandon all priceless experiences in your life in the pursuit of riches, the amount of money a Disney vacation costs does beg the question: If you invested the cost of, say, 5 Disney trips in Disney stock 20 years ago, how much money would you have today?
This thought experiment is not meant as a literal choice you should make, but it does highlight in black-and-white just how much in savings runaway discretionary spending can cost.
The Cost of Five Disney Trips
You could ask 10 different families how much they spent on their Disney trips and likely get 10 different answers. Variables like park choice, trip duration, family size, and travel style all play big roles in determining the size of the final bill.
However, a recent post from Disney-focused blog Magic Guides suggests that a typical weeklong trip to Disney World for a family of four in 2025 costs around $6,785. This cost includes:
- Seven nights of accommodations
- Six days of theme park tickets
- Lightning Lane access
- Seven nights of the Disney Quick Service Dining Plan
- Additional food costs of $20 per person per day
Important to note, however, is that this estimate does not include airfare to Orlando, a rental car or fuel. So, depending on your planning, a trip could likely cost somewhere between $5,000 and $10,000. For purposes of this exercise, a $7,500 estimate seems reasonable.
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The Cost of Disney Stock 20 Years Ago
According to Yahoo! Finance, the split-adjusted price of Disney stock was $19.97 on Dec. 5, 2005. If you invested $37,500 — or the approximate cost of five trips to Disney — you could have acquired approximately 1,877 shares of Disney stock.
Disney’s Current Share Price
As of Dec. 5, 2025, Disney closed at $105.30 per share, according to Yahoo! Finance. At that price, your 1,877 shares would now be worth $197,648.
What This Comparison Shows
If you had invested your Disney vacation money into Disney stock instead over the past 20 years, you could have more than quadrupled your original investment. And that’s still not as well as you could have done.
Disney has been something of a stagnant stock over the past 20 years, with an average annual rate of return of about 8.67%, according to Calculator.net computations. If you had invested that original $37,500 in the S&P 500 index instead, for example, you would now have more than $300,000, thanks to the market’s 10.5% average annual return.
Caveats
For the purposes of this example, it’s assumed that you adopted a simple buy-and-hold strategy and continued it for the full 20 years. This is something that many investors struggle with emotionally. It’s human nature to want to take money out when stocks are going down, and Disney is not alone in having had some struggles over the past 20 years.
If you sold your Disney stock during the 2020 pandemic bear market, for example, you missed one of the best periods of recovery the stock has ever had. On the other hand, if you were astute enough to pick up additional shares during that sharp selloff, your overall return would have been much higher.
A Balanced Takeaway
The point of this thought exercise is not to say that Disney vacations are not worthwhile. But it does point out the opportunity cost of spending money on discretionary items instead of investing that money for the long term. While family trips are certainly what most people would consider a “necessary expense,” proper budgeting can help you walk the tightrope of family bonding versus long-term financial security.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: If You Had Invested the Cost of 5 Disney Trips in Disney Stock 20 Years Ago, You’d Have a Six-Figure Return Today
