'Travel is too expensive right now': Americans are spending less or skipping trips altogether

Travelers may have finally had enough.

With revenge travel over and pandemic savings depleted, travelers say they're planning fewer trips this summer, or skipping their vacations altogether.

"After two straight years of strong gains, the number of Americans planning to take leisure trips is taking a dip," states a summer travel report from Deloitte Insights.

The close of the second-quarter earnings season showed that major companies such as Marriott, Hyatt, Wyndham, Airbnb and Expedia are expecting travel demand to weaken this year as well.  

Americans are planning 2.3 trips this summer, down from 3.1 trips from the summer of 2023, according to Deloitte's survey of more than 4,000 people.  

The number of people who said they're avoiding summer travel altogether increased from 37% to 42%, the report showed. When asked why they're staying home, nearly a third of respondents said "travel is too expensive right now" — a jump of eight percentage points from 2023, according to Deloitte.

Some 14% of respondents who intend to travel said they plan to spend less, with shorter trips cited as the most popular way to do so.

But another 19% said they plan to spend more (down from 25% in 2023). However, this isn't necessarily because they want to, but more so because they feel they must.

"The most cited reason for increased spend is rising prices, not more ambitious trips," the report stated.

Average spending on discretionary goods and services — like travel, clothes and home furnishings — decreased across the board this summer, said Sofia Baig, economist at the data intelligence company Morning Consult.

The biggest cutbacks are in recreational spending among Gen Zs and millennials, a category that includes concerts and sports events, according