Disney for Cheapskates # 5: Cheap (er) tickets!

The cheapest ticket is free but that isn't happening unless you have really nice family or friends. Luckily we are getting one of our tickets as a gift from my dad so woohooo!! Adult ticket $324.83 paid 0. Dad didn't do this out of the kindness of his heart..About 5 years ago dad had given me a kitchen hutch. I LOVED my hutch. It was a beast!! It was the only furniture I insisted on bringing with me when we moved into the manfriends house. Well.....the original owners after leaving it for over 10 years decided they wanted it back. I threw a fit, said no but finally gave in on one condition....I get a Disney ticket!! So that is how that came to pass. I still miss my hutch :( Moving on.....

So I finally saved enough in my Disney Vacation account to work my magic on our theme park tickets we need. It was a rough month financially so I had missed a few deposits . 

Lula's 4 day child ticket through Disney = $ 303.53 

What I did: 

The first thing I did was worked on earning free gift cards at SWAGBUCKS . I managed to earn $15 in totally free Target gift cards by filling out some surveys, spamming my email and watching some videos. Part of the points I earned was signing up for a Target Red card. It automatically gives you 5% off your target purchases and free shipping. You link it to your bank account and it is just like another debit card.  $15 bucks is $15 bucks!! I'm working on more now too!! So with those earned and money saved up I moved on to step 2.

I went to Cardpool.com  and bought a face value of $270.69 in gift cards. Cardpool's normal discount for target cards is 6.7% but a new customer receives $5 off their order with the coupon code NewUser5.

Not sure how long that is going to last but it worked for me. I did 3 different transactions using 3 different emails. I didn't do this to cheat really...lol. The first order I did I didn't get enough so I did another. Then the rest of my Disney Vacation Account money was finally deposited to my account so I could purchase the remaining amount of gift cards. Here are the transactions : 

Transaction #1 : $179.99 face value - with coupon code paid - $167.93

Transaction #2 : $10 face value - with coupon code paid - $4.33

Transaction #3 : 80.70 face value - with coupon code paid - $70.29

$270.69 total . Paid $ 242.55

These were emailed to me immediately. Now to step #3 . 

I downloaded the target app on my hone. This allows you to save all your gift cards together. I added my SWAGBUCKS cards and my Cardpool ones for a total of $285.69 .

Then I went online to target and put $300 in Disney gift cards in my cart. This was split up into two transactions because there is a limit on how many you can buy and how many gift cards you can use also. 

Even though the gift cards will cover the total you have to put your target redcard in as payment first. This will give you your 5% off. ($300 in gift cards for $285)  And technically have .69 left. Lol. Then before you submit click on edit payment and apply your gift cards .  

And I was done!! 

Summary : 

Paid $245.39 (if you are doing the math this includes the other $3.53  that I'll have to pay for the ticket online minus the .69 I had left over in Target cards. for $300 in cards!! That is 18.20 % in savings!!! Woot woot. If I EVER go to Disney again I will use this method to pay for the entire thing!! 

Total Spent : $1388.89

Total Saved: $2850.03

Almost a $4200 vacation so far for around $1400!!! (And yes I included the free ticket from daddy)