Trust me, whether you’re on a trip on your own or part of a lifestyle vacation club, there’s going to be other people around. You’ll have to pay a pretty hefty fee to Cricket the scuba instructor take just you and your companion out for the dive, pretty pricey booking the whale watching boat for just your family exclusively. Unless you pay huge money there’s going to be other people doing the same things as you. So why not change your point of view and look at it as a pro like stated in pro #3. You have a commonality with the people on the outings with you.
Second con of a lifestyle vacation club.
They don’t include flights in the cost of the trip. OK so you got me there. It would be impossible for them to do this. There would be people flying from just a few hours away and people flying from across an ocean. There would be no way to make one price for these when people are coming from all over. But let me ask you this. A family in British Columbia Canada is booking a vacation to Cancun Mexico through some booking agent that “includes” the flight. Now, the same size family happens to be booking the exact same trip, at the exact same time, through the same booking agent, but this family is in the state of Texas in the United States. Do you think that the price of the vacation is going to be the same for each family? The answer is no. The family in Texas is way closer to Cancun than the family in Canada. Though they say the flight is included, it’s really just bundled in with the cost of the stay. As for the con… I’ve looked up the cost of flights to a trip in the lifestyle vacation club and totalled it up. I then looked up vacations to the same place at the same time that included flights. I then had to find the cost it would be to get the same things that the lifestyle vacation club includes in the cost, and add it to the cost of the “flight included” vacation package. Guess what, the lifestyle vacation club end price was hundreds of dollars cheaper every time. That takes us back to pro 1, bang for our buck. I’d rather book a separate flight and save hundreds of dollars then book a vacation that includes a flight. In addition, there’s many of us that have methods of collecting points to apply towards flights when we choose to travel. When booking a vacation where the flight is bundled with the vacation package, you can’t use your points to make the flight portion cheaper. When the flight is separate from the vacation package, you’re free to pay for the flight how you wish, so you can do this using your points, seat sales, etc. In my opinion this turns trips where the flight is “included”, into a con. And the fact that the flight is not “included” in the lifestyle vacation club, into a pro.
Con 3 of a lifestyle vacation club.
The vacations of the lifestyle vacation club are pre-set with the dates. Another thing I hear all the time. “It’s my vacation and I want to go on my time, not a time chosen for me by the livestyle vacation club.” OK, yes, the vacations in a lifestyle vacation club have pre-set dates. They can offer great prices because they buy vacations like Costco buys groceries. They book a huge amount of rooms from a resort at a specific time getting them huge discounts on the cost and they pass those savings on to the club member. I’ve seen ski trips for example, just a couple months apart, to the same place. Trips to Universal Studios in Florida at various times throughout the year. They offer as much options as they can for flexibility. So I offer a different way to look at it to lessen the negativity of it. Wouldn’t you be open to the idea of adjusting your vacation date’s a little, if it means saving hundreds of dollars on your trip? I know I would.
Fourth con of a lifestyle vacation club.
The lifestyle vacation club that I have knowledge of has a membership fee. There is an initial set up fee and a monthly fee after that. It’s a con in a way I guess but this company does something to make it a pro. Costco has a yearly fee. You pay that fee to have access to the great deals within their store. The deals are worth it so you pay the fee. Same idea with the membership fee of a lifestyle vacation club. You pay a fee to get access to the great deals on vacations. But what this company does to turn it into a pro is quite unique. Every dollar you spend, that includes the initial set up fee as well as the monthly fees, gets turned in to “DreamTrip” points, dollar for dollar, one dollar equals one point. The vacations have a point value that can be subtracted from the dollar value you have to pay to book the already deeply discounted trip. So really the membership fee acts like a vacation savings account. So again, looking at it a different way turns this negative into a positive as well.
The importance of living a healthy lifestyle for maintaining general good health and preventing chronic diseases has been well established. A healthy lifestyle is quite simple to achieve – one does not need to do anything “crazy” to adopt a healthy lifestyle. I will say that a certain amount of independent thinking is required to separate truth from fiction in most modern health advice currently being delivered.
The most important thing you can do is eat well. Avoid toxins in your food as much as possible and consume plenty of fresh fruit, veggies and whole grains; exercise moderately a few times per week; avoid smoking, including secondhand smoke; and avoid gaining too much weight (which should come naturally if you eat right and exercise). While it is not always possible to
