I think a lot of us could write the same post as the OP. Disney has just lost its magic over the past decade. The prices, the insane amount of planning - even for someone who loves planning. As any veteran can tell you, the true benefit (and joy) of WDW planning used to be locking in those dining reservations, and then building around it - but the key was, to remain flexible. Have various options depending on how people feel, what's going on in the parks, etc. Having various plans that you can implement on the fly depending on circumstances. Disney has made that literally impossible.
I also don't want to spend all day on my dang phone, afraid I'm going to miss out if I am not refreshing and keeping my head down checking it. The last straw for us FastPass+ - I don't want to book a ride months in advance - and then the nightmare known as park reservations. It's just...insanity to me that I can't buy a ticket and just go where I want all day (especially as a former AP holder).
It's just not worth double the price it used to cost for what would be half the fun, for us. So we have taken a number of years off (even before recent events of the past few years).
And it really is double the price. We just booked our first on site UO vacation - a week at Cabana Bay, with a Volcano view room (which, honestly, unless you are staying at a MK Deluxe for more than a weekly take home paycheck per night, is the best theme park view in Orlando). Using the old "one of us gets an AP" trick, so we get the $200 vacation package discount and plus the resort dining/merch discounts, is going to be a full thousand dollars LESS than staying at even an All-Stars resort for the same week.
The bonus is - although my fiance has never done any Orlando parks, I have a pretty good idea that he is going to love it from everything I have shown him (Cabana Bay is so up his alley, no bowling pun intended). So we are planning on upgrading his ticket to an AP, too, when we get there. Even when factoring in that cost, once we both have AP's, we can spend a
second week there next year - and the entire cost of
both trips is still going to be less than a single week in a moderate at Disney this year.
On top of it all...I think my days of spending rope drop till closing at theme parks is over. If we did spend that kind of money at Disney, I would feel way too much pressure to do so. The idea of spending a week at a fun hotel, with a great view, a water park at the doorstep, and being able to leisurely enjoy IOA and USF as we want sounds like a real vacation to me. With all the money we are saving, we are going to do a
MVMCP so he can have a Magic Kingdom experience. I'll always love Disney - but right now, they just seemed to have drained a lot of the magic out, and I can't wait to recapture some of it at UO.