After a record-setting year for leisure travel in 2016, overall vacation spending is expected to be essentially flat in 2017.
The 2017 Portrait of American Travelers study, now in its 27th year, examines more than 2,000 variables and is based on responses from 3,000 U.S. adults who took at least one overnight trip of 75 miles or more from home last year. The survey estimates that roughly 60 million U.S. traveling households could reduce their leisure travel spending by up to $5 billion this year.
Travelers reported spending an average of $4,833 on vacations over the past 12 months — the second-highest average in eight years — but that figure represents a 4 percent decline from 2016. Looking ahead, travelers say they plan to spend an average of $4,815 on vacations in the coming year, a slight decrease compared with the prior year. Taken together, the planned reductions among the 60 million traveling households could amount to as much as $9.2 billion less spent on leisure travel.
Millennials now represent the largest generational cohort in the United States, and they are the only generation that reports intending to increase future travel spending. Millennial families account for about 16 percent of American travelers and took a combined 36.9 million vacations last year, spending $50.4 billion on leisure travel during that period.
While U.S. travelers overall plan to travel about 6 percent more this year, millennial families plan a much larger increase in travel, projecting 35 percent more trips. Millennial families also expect to spend more on vacations: 38 percent more than millennial couples and 88 percent more than millennial singles. International travel is more common among millennial families as well, with roughly 26 percent choosing international destinations compared with fewer than 20 percent of millennial couples or singles.