How this muggle used credit card perks and other hacks to make a Universal theme park trip more affordable

I have never taken my family on a theme park vacation because they’re just too dang expensive.

Other families are going into debt to go to Disney World, but I don’t like the Mouse enough to jeopardize my financial security. And while I’m privileged to have a vacation budget, many of our vacations involve driving to an Airbnb on a beach or in the mountains and doing cheap activities like hiking, swimming and cooking dinners at the vacation rental.

Then my daughter fell in love with Harry Potter. And I knew it would rock her world if we could go to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Orlando Resort.

Now, if I’m budget-conscious, my husband is downright frugal. We were not going on a theme park vacation in Florida unless I could significantly cut costs.

I might be a muggle, but I pulled out all the money-saving magic I know and leaned on my knowledge of credit card perks and points and miles to come up with a more affordable Universal theme park plan.

Here’s what I did to save money — and get my husband on board — for three nights of Florida fun with our favorite Hogwarts wannabes.

I booked our airfare with miles

Remember the famous Southwest Airlines meltdown of Christmas 2022? We got caught in it and our flights to Savannah got canceled at the last minute. We managed to save our vacation with a long road trip to Georgia, but Southwest still apologized with 25,000 Rapid Rewards miles for each of us.

One canceled flight deserves to be redeemed for another, so I used 82,000 miles to fly my family of four from Washington, D.C., to Orlando. The only catch was that Southwest let me put the kids’ miles into my account, but my husband’s had to go into his. So we had to book our flights and then check in separately for the trip, which wasn’t a problem until somehow he ended up in the B boarding group and we were in the C group on the flight home.

I get that most people aren’t getting windfalls of apology miles from airlines, but you have plenty of ways to earn points and miles for a free flight. Beyond saving the miles you earn from other flights, you can apply for an airline-affiliated credit card when it has a significant sign-up bonus that can fast-track your mileage earning.

Similarly, a card that earns transferable points will let you transfer points to a number of different airlines. Make sure you’re earning extra miles for your purchases by using shopping portals or signing up for programs that earn you miles for eating out.

If you can, book your flights early to get the best availability for award seats or look for transfer bonuses and award flight discounts to stretch your points and miles further.

I used credit card perks to cut hotel costs

I probably could have transferred Chase Ultimate Rewards points to a hotel partner like Marriott or Hyatt to get hotel nights for free. But after researching area hotels, I was convinced that we would have a much better experience if we could stay on-site at a Universal hotel and get early admission to the park. A stay at the Loews Royal Pacific Resort would also give us a free Express Unlimited Pass and free transportation to the park, saving us money on the pricey passes and a car rental or Ubers.

Since I wasn’t going to earn miles on a Loews hotel, I booked the stay through the Chase Travel℠ portal, which meant that I could use my Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card‘s $50 hotel credit to save a bit on the stay and earn 5 points per dollar on the remaining amount (for a total of over 6,000 points) that I can use toward free travel on our next trip.

We booked two nights at the Royal Pacific, but to save money on our final night (when we wouldn’t be going to the park the following day), I used the $300 travel credit available on my Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card to book a night at the Homewood Suites by Hilton Orlando-Nearest to Univ Studios through the Capital One Travel portal. We got a two-room suite that included breakfast and didn’t even max out my travel credit.

I saved with a military park pass

My husband is a civilian employee of the U.S. Navy, and his Department of Defense ID gives us access to a variety of travel discounts. It also makes him eligible for Universal’s Military Freedom Pass.

Active-duty members of the military, veterans and other DOD employees can purchase a special pass that gives them unlimited access to the parks from January through mid-December — for roughly the cost of one day at the parks. The more you use this pass, the more you save. We will only visit Universal once this year, but we went to the park on three days during our trip, saving hundreds.

Related: The best military travel discounts and perks for service members

Universal regularly releases special offers that are available to all guests, including hotel and ticket discounts and packages that include dining cards that you can use to cover food costs during your stay.

I had groceries delivered to save on food costs

Everyone knows that theme park food is overpriced, and hotel breakfasts don’t come cheap, either. I wasn’t going to deny my children Butterbeer and pub food at the Leaky Cauldron or ice cream at Florean Fortescue’s Ice-Cream Parlour in Diagon Alley, but we couldn’t eat out for every meal and snack.

I always travel with snacks from home, but this situation required next-level grocery shopping.

That’s when my theme park expert colleague Tarah Chieffi pointed me toward a Shipt offer available to Visa cardholders. If I signed up with an eligible card, I could get a free three-month membership and free delivery on orders over $35.

My Chase Sapphire Preferred Card was indeed eligible, so I signed up (making a calendar reminder immediately to cancel before Shipt started to charge). I downloaded the app, and while we awaited our flight at the airport, I placed an order at Publix supermarket for breakfast staples like Cheerios, pastries and milk and lunch fixings like bread, jam and apples. I set the delivery time for when I knew we’d be at the hotel and left a note for my shopper that we were flying.

The app was easy to use; when it occurred to me that I’d need some utensils, I was able to easily update the order. My shopper was communicative over text; when she couldn’t find the scones I had ordered, I was able to swap for muffins. When she finished at Publix, I met her at the front drive of the hotel, and the handoff was seamless.

In the end, we ate out three times (dinner at the hotel, lunch at the Leaky Cauldron and dinner at Finnegan’s Bar & Grill at Universal Studios) and bought a few snacks and some extra Butterbeer. But we managed to get two breakfasts and three additional meals out of our $60 grocery haul. We could easily have spent the same amount of money on one breakfast for the four of us inside the park.

I borrowed wands from another mom

When we travel someplace special with our kids, we often give them a souvenir budget (often around $20 or $25) for them to spend however they want. This works surprisingly well, and my kids accepted that they would not be buying the $60 animatronic owls we saw on so many kids’ shoulders.

Related: Real-world family travel tips that actually work

Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade both have designated “wand spots” where, if you wave the right wand in the right way, you can make something magical happen. I knew my kids would love this, but the interactive wands cost $65. That’s a lot for a toy we wouldn’t use after this park visit. (If you just want a costume accessory, you can buy noninteractive wands for a lot less money.)

So I put out a call on my local Buy Nothing group, and a mom I know from our school responded. We borrowed a Harry Potter and a Hermione wand from her so each kid could have their own to use. The magic was a bit finicky in one of the wands, so we took it to Ollivanders Wand Shop (there’s one in each park), where they will “re-magick” wands for free.

Bottom line

A vacation to a major theme park like Disney or Universal will never be cheap — but you can find ways to cut costs by leveraging credit cards, redeeming points and miles, and being smart about where you can save.

I could have brought our bottom line down more by staying in a cheap hotel with free breakfast (or redeeming hotel or credit card points for the stay) and not buying an Express Pass, but then I’d have the hassle of getting to and from the park and spending more time waiting in line than enjoying rides.

At the end of the day, my kids adored their first theme park vacation and this muggle mom did not have to take out a loan from Gringotts to cover expenses. That right there is a magical combination.

Planning a trip to Universal Orlando? Start with these stories: