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Have you ever looked at someone’s post of their vacation pictures and thought “Man, I wish I could afford to travel!”? The good news is you absolutely can! Saving money can be a challenge, but it doesn’t have to be. There are ways to make saving for your trip easier and maybe even fun!
Set Intentions
The first step you need to take is setting your intentions. Where do you want to go and when do you want to go there? You will need to book in advance for your trip, so make sure you take that into consideration. Look for travel discounts and/or visit in the off season, so that you can get the price lowered.
Here is an example for figuring out how much you will need to save for your trip. You are wanting to book a trip to Costa Rica for 2 people for 7 days. You want to go on this vacation towards the end of 2024, so you plan on having 12 months to save for the trip. The cost of the trip is $4500. This means that you need to save $375 per month. Are you thinking, “I don’t have an extra $375 a month just laying around.”? We often have the money, but we just don’t realize it because it is going out the door without us even thinking about it. Here are some tips on finding ways to save up for your vacation.
Pay Yourself First
This is key for any time you are trying to save money. As soon as you get paid, set aside a percentage of your pay or a set flat amount that you will put into a savings account. Do this before you pay anything else. You should set up an account that isn’t connected to your main banking account. This will make it seem like the money is not as accessible and you will be less tempted to pull money out of the account. I have recently discovered Smarty Pig. It is a high yield savings account that allows you to set savings goals. You can easily track your progress from their dashboard. Also you have the ability to set up recurring deposits, so you don’t even have to think about moving money into the account.
Reduce Expenses
No one likes to budget right? Thankfully with online banking it has gotten a whole heck of a lot easier. Go into your online account and export your previous month’s history. Figure out how much of your money was spent paying your bills. This would include things like your mortgage/rent, utilities, loans, etc. The rest of the money is what you have leftover for spending. Things like gas, groceries, daily coffees, going out to eat, and late nights out with friends. Looking at your previous month’s history, do you see any easy ways to cut back on expenses?
Tip: you can sort alphabetically to see if there are common purchases throughout the month.
Are you ordering out for lunch everyday, spending a lot at the grocery store and then tossing food out because it’s gone bad, purchasing online when you are sitting at home bored? Did you look at your history and say “Nope! I’m Frugal Franny. I don’t have anywhere left to cut back.”? There is still hope for finding a way to save additional money. Here are some ways to save a little bit at a time.
Savings Apps
It may be the nerd in me, but I love apps that help you save money! These apps link to your bank account to help you save. One option is Acorns. Acorns will round up your purchases to the next dollar and deposit them into your account at Acorns. Another app is Qapital. This app will take small amounts of money from your bank account and transfer it to your account at Qapital. There is even an option to turn on low balance protection, so that you do not have to worry about the app taking your balance below whatever threshold you set.
Coupon Apps
Another type of app that you can use to find additional savings is coupon apps. Utilize coupon apps like Ibotta or Rakuten to save money on your everyday purchases. I go back and forth between the two depending on which one will offer the highest amount of cash back. Make sure you deposit the money you earn straight into your savings account to stay free from spending temptation 😉
Rewards Credit Cards
Rewards credit cards are a great way to get free or cheaper flights for your trips. I only recommend using a rewards credit card if you are disciplined enough to pay off your balance each month. Not doing so, could inadvertently put you into debt. We love Chase’s reward card. We earn 5 x points for travel and being the foodies that we are, we love that we earn triple points for dining. We were able to purchase the tickets for our flight for our honeymoon with the points we earned from Chase’s initial sign-up offer.
Saving money doesn’t have to be a chore. Make it a game! See how low you can go with your spending and try to beat it the following month. If you are a visual person, print off a travel fund tracker and hang it up somewhere that you can look at each day. Imagine yourself on the vacation you are saving for and how great it will be once you get there!
