Let’s face it, travel can be expensive. All things are relative and some types of travel are more expensive than others, but even if you are frugal, it’s not without cost. How to afford to travel is a question many couples have.
The biggest shift for Jen and I was to prioritize travel as a goal for us. There’s been a lot written about spending money on experiences rather than things and it’s not that you need to live like a monk and have a miserable existence to afford to travel but it does probably mean that you can’t do everything. By prioritizing and creating a plan for the things you want out of life, it’s more likely that you’ll actually get to travel instead of just watching people travel to cool places on the Travel Channel.
We’re Regular Folks
For context, we are a middle-class couple with jobs and regular income. We also have a myriad of responsibilities requiring our financial attention besides travel. We don’t have brand new cars every 36 months like the cute couple in the car commercials. Our cars are a little bit older and we probably won’t be in the market for an upgrade unless there’s a big-ticket maintenance item that crops up. We are regular coffee drinkers but brew it at home so we don’t ‘have’ to spend money at Dunkin’ or Starbucks on the way to work in the morning. As a result of our efforts, we are able to save a little each month for our next trip. When we plan trips, we usually plan for a mix of frugal things and splurge things so we don’t completely outstrip our trip budget.
Unless someone else is giving you a trip somewhere for free (and if that’s the case, please introduce us), there is not one single thing that will magically allow you to afford to take that next vacation. It’s probably a mix of things you can change to set aside the money you’ll need. Some of these tips may not be for you, but others will be easy to fold into your routine if you really do prioritize travel as something worthwhile.
Auto-Recurring Subscriptions
These are easy to have creep up on you. Log in to your banking and/or credit card app and do a quick audit of what’s coming out every month. 84 percent of us spend more on digital subscriptions than we think. Keep the ones you love and pare the ones that aren’t adding any value right now. Is there a clothing service or beauty box that you can pause for a few months? Can you downgrade from the top tier on some subscriptions and still get most of the value? Here’s a quick list to jog your memory.
Coffee in the Morning
I know, I know. Every single article that you’ve ever read about budgeting talks about coffee but hear us out because we have a solution to make it not quite so bad to reduce your spending in this category. A medium coffee at the Dunkin’ near our house is $2.17 with tax. If you and your partner are both grabbing a cup on your way to work in the morning, that easily adds up to $1,100 per year. Mind you, that isn’t the fancy $5 latte or a breakfast sandwich either. We are big coffee drinkers and there was zero chance that we were going to give it up cold turkey or drink that awful instant coffee like our parents did in 1975.
Our Solution?
Our solution was to grab a Bunn Commercial Coffee Maker for our house and a couple of stainless steel Contigo Travel Mugs. We have it hooked to our water supply and could easily run a coffee franchise from our front porch if we wanted to. The link above is to a brand new one on Amazon for about $275 as of February 2022, but we got ours used at a local restaurant supply house for about a hundred bucks. This thing has easily lasted us ten years so far and has brewed a tanker truck full of coffee (only a slight exaggeration). We buy good quality coffee that we like to drink and avoid the line at the drive-through in the morning. Voilà, one answer to the question, how to afford to travel.
It may seem extreme, but at $.25 a cup, we’re all-in with no compromise in our caffeine intake. You don’t necessarily need to go to the lengths we did, but most couples could certainly grab a more modest Mr. Coffee machine for under forty bucks that would pay for itself in a couple of weeks. Not ready to go cold turkey on Starbucks? Maybe compromise by limiting those runs to a day or two a week and you’ll still find a nice chunk of cash to put toward your next trip.
In fact, here’s an even better idea – set your coffee savings aside and plan a tour at a real live Kona Coffee Plantation in Hawai’i instead!
Tobacco
I’m not a doctor but I did take a lot of math in high school and college. I know that if you’re a pack-a-day smoker at $10 a pack, that it is a cool $3,600 per year going up in smoke. Nicorette anyone?
Separate Savings Account for Travel
Open a separate savings account specifically for your travel fund. Our joint checking account has a lot coming and going each month. There’s one thing that’s certain though if the money is in there, it ends up getting spent.
Open up a dedicated account at your bank, credit union, or even one of the online-only options available now. Schedule automatic recurring transfers on payday or some other schedule that makes sense for you. You’ll quickly know how much is available to you and you won’t overspend out of your primary checking because it ‘feels’ like you have extra money there. A separate account is definitely a good strategy on how to afford to travel.
Cook at Home More
Quick quiz. Which is more expensive? Buying a pound of pasta and a jar of halfway decent sauce for $4 at the supermarket or buying Fettuccine Alfredo for $14.99 from Olive Garden? Okay, maybe you don’t eat at Olive Garden, but you get the picture. If you can divert some of your going out to eat money to save more for travel, isn’t that worth it?
Incidentally, if you deprive yourself of dinner out just for the sake of saving money, it’s usually not very fun. If you are clear that skipping the pretend Italian dinner next to the shopping mall to get you a little closer to having a real Italian dinner in Venice, it suddenly becomes a lot more adventurous to eat at home.
Credit Cards
Credit cards are something of a necessary evil in our society. I’m not going to tell you that you shouldn’t have them or that you’re a horrible person for running a balance from time to time. What I am going to say is that the credit card company’s job is to get money out of your pocket and into theirs. Set up automatic payments to avoid their crazy $39 late fees.
Check your interest rate – especially if you run a balance. You probably applied with some sort of teaser rate that’s now long expired. It’s less of a factor if you always pay it off each month but if not, call them and ask for a lower rate or shop for a different card with a better rate for your situation. On a related note, have you checked into the best credit cards for travel? These earn you frequent flyer miles and other travel perks that could potentially save you money. Win-win, right?
This list is evolving but should help get you started. What are you doing to answer the question – how to afford to travel?
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