Do you wish you could travel more, but feel constrained by your full-time job and budget? Don’t worry; we’ve got you covered with these budget-friendly tips and tricks for fitting more travel into your busy schedule!
Our Story: How We Started Traveling Once A Month Or More
In the summer of 2017, I was tired of Jack and I putting off travel because we could not afford the money or the time away from work and household responsibilities.
Until then, I had this mindset that to call yourself a traveler, you had to travel to the nearest airport and grab a roundtrip flight to somewhere like Paris or Australia during your vacation time.
If you can fit that into your budget, that is great! But if you can’t, you can still be a traveler. There are beautiful and unique things to see no matter where you live and road trips, even if they are just a day long, count as travel.
With the tips I am sharing today, you should be able to squeeze a trip to a faraway destination like Iceland now and again. More importantly, however, you will be able to travel once a month or more to amazing destinations you never knew existed in your corner of the universe.
How To Travel More With A Full-Time Job And A Tight Budget
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1. Make It A Priority
Most people who don’t travel, but want to share the same two excuses: “I don’t have time or “I don’t have the money.” For some, these are not excuses but the truth. For others, the fact is that we make time and money for what matters most to us.
If you want to travel more, figure out why and if that reason is important enough, take the steps in this article to make travel happen.
2. Mark It On The Calendar
We mark down when we will be taking our monthly weekend getaway the moment Jack gets his schedule at work. We are more spontaneous for day trips, letting weather, special events, and side jobs shape when.
For our longer trips that use Jack’s vacation days, we tend to start thinking about those four to six months ahead of time.
I work for myself at jobs that allow me to work whenever I want, wherever there is internet. This makes planning trips much easier as we only have to work around one employee’s schedule.
3. If Your Calendar Is Full
You may have to sacrifice something else from your schedule to prioritize travel or you may have to change your idea of travel from taking several weeks off each year to a day trip to explore a nearby city or state park once a month.
4. Perform A Budget Audit
Lack of money is what kept Jack and me traveling for years. We had the time, but it never seemed like we had the money.
Yes, some of it was being parents of three young kids who we would also have to bring on those trips, but looking back, if I knew what I know now about how to travel inexpensively and how to prioritize it, I think we would have taken many more family trips than we did over our kids’ childhoods.
After catching the travel bug, I went through our budget with a fine-tooth comb and omitted all I could. I even canceled Netflix.
I squeezed our budget and grew our income until we had $100 weekly for a travel fund. Then, I started researching how we could squeeze as much travel as possible out of that $5,200 a year. If you can’t afford $100 per week, no worries; you can still travel even if all you can afford is $20 a week, which equals $1,040 a year. Mindset, creativity, and flexibility will stretch a budget farther than one would think.
5. Give It A Line On The Budget
Financial experts say Christmas isn’t an emergency. It happens on the same day every year, so put it in your budget.
The same is true with travel. It isn’t an emergency; if you want to travel more, it must be a line in your budget. If it isn’t and you take that cheap flight and rent that Instagram-worthy Airbnb anyway, chances are you won’t travel again anytime soon while you clean up the financial mess you have created.
6. Devote A Side Hustle To Travel Expenses
There are so many different types of side hustles out there. If you want to travel more and can’t squeeze it out of your current earnings by reducing your budget, consider finding a side hustle that suits you.
7. Downsize Your Home
If chores and responsibilities take up all your days off, it is time to downsize your home in one or two ways.
Downsize your possessions: Give your home a good declutter. Sell things of high value and put the proceeds in your travel account. The less you own, the less time and money you spend managing it.
Downsize your home: This isn’t a good financial decision for everyone, but if you are single and renting a two-bedroom, how much could you save if you rented a studio apartment? If you have equity in your home and prices are up, could you downsize and save money on your monthly mortgage payment? Think through your housing situation through a lens like this to determine if downsizing may be a good option for you.
8. Keep Your Luggage Packed
The more you can keep in your suitcase between trips, the faster you can get away.
If you travel by RV like we do, try to keep everything you need except clothing, food, and those things that extreme temperatures could damage in your RV at all times.
9. Make A Packing List
For things I don’t keep in the RV, I have a printable packing list to follow each time we are about to go on a trip. I also have one for hotels and Airbnbs. This helps me pack faster and prevents forgetting items that might be costly to replace if we need them on the trip.
10. Pack Light
This tip is especially for those who fly. Packing carry-on only will save you time and, in most cases, money. For economy airlines, this could mean carrying only what fits in a small backpack. YouTube is full of great tutorials on how to pack what you need in a bag that small.
One tip I have seen repeatedly is to wear a fishing vest like this one and pack its multiple pockets full of essentials.
11. Seek Free Accommodation When You Can
If you RV camp on BLM or National Forest land for free, you can also use the free Overlander or RV Parky app to find businesses and rest areas that will allow you to stay overnight for free.
If you don’t have an RV and don’t desire to sleep in your vehicle or tent, there are still a few free accommodation options available. You can use the website Couchsurf, sign up to be a house sitter (usually requires pet sitting), or consider doing a house exchange. One last idea is to open your house up to family and friends so that you can also crash at their homes to explore areas.
If you are willing to sleep in your vehicle, here are a few tutorials to help you make it as comfortable as possible.
How to create a DIY truck topper camper with a sink and table
Items you need to create a comfortable minivan camper
How to create a simple DIY truck topper camper in less than a day
12. If You Can’t Stay For Free, Stay For Cheap
This post shares 33 ways to save on accommodations so I won’t go into all the ways to stay for cheap here. I will mention hostels and dorm rooms (in the summer) for those who don’t RV, as we have had luck using both options.
For RVers, I recommend paying for a Boondockers Welcome/Harvest Host membership combo. After the purchase, some minimal nightly costs are still involved, but they are much less than any other type of campground fee. Use my link here to grab your membership and save a bit of cash.
13. Take More Road Trips Than Flights
Even if you use Skyscanner or Google Flights to find an awesome deal on a flight to a cheap destination, you still need to pay for your accommodation, food, and transportation.
And there is the time spent going through security and waiting on delayed or sometimes canceled flights that could be spent adventuring.
When you go on a road trip, you can bring along things that can save you more money, like an instant pot to make meals in your hotel room and a cooler full of food bought on sale at your local grocery store.
You can also save on accommodation by packing a tent, sleeping in your vehicle, or towing an RV.
It is also easier to change your destination at the last minute if the weather is bad where you plan to go.
14. Maximum Of One Meal Out A Day And Make It Lunch
I am more of a foodie than Jack, which means our exploration of an area isn’t complete for me until we have tried out at least one local coffee shop or bakery and had at least one meal out.
We generally make lunch our meal out as it can be several dollars cheaper per person than dinner.
Often, we order an appetizer with our lunch so that we are guaranteed to have leftovers of our entree that we can reheat and eat for dinner. If you don’t like leftovers, swap your entrees at dinner time.
15. Ask The Locals For Food Recommendations
If you like restaurant food that tastes like your grandma made it and you want it reasonably priced, ask a local. We do this regularly and are rarely disappointed.
16. When In A City, Take Public Transportation
If you are flying into a big city, look for a free airport shuttle to take you to your hotel instead of a taxi or Uber. From your hotel, you should be able to walk or take the bus or train to wherever you want to go.
RVing? We don’t like taking our F-250 through huge cities. It is hard to find parking spots that we fit, plus the truck camper on the back makes it extra wide. Instead, we park outside city limits and take transit. This saves us stress and money as downtown parking can be expensive.
17. Sprinkle In A Day Trip Now And Then
I am a big fan of being a tourist in your own town, county, and state. I keep a folder in Google Docs marked “things near us.” Inside it, I have a Google Doc full of attractions, museums, hikes, etc., for places up to two hours away.
18. Use All Your Vacation Days
A quick Google search revealed that 46% of Americans do not use all their paid time off. Even if all you can afford is a staycation, use your paid time off for your mental health and for creating precious memories with those you love.
19. Maximize Your Time Off
There are three ways to maximize your vacation days. One is to start or end your vacation on a long weekend, thus adding another day to your travel time.
The second idea is to start your travel to your destination the minute you get off work instead of the next day and to end your vacation by getting home at the last possible second you can (allow a few hours for delays if driving and at least a day if flying). Your first day back at work could be sleepy, but the extra time for exploring is precious.
The last idea is available only to those who travel for business. If that is you, see if you can start your vacation at the end of a business trip in the area you traveled to. This will save you travel time and money, as your employer has probably already paid for your mode of transportation there and back.
20. Travel Hack
This is not for people who have trouble keeping track of what they spend on a credit card and, therefore, do not pay it off in full each month. Interest is not cheap!
Jack and I have used our airline credit card to earn numerous flights and we recently started using a hotel credit card to earn free hotel stays.
The newsletter Daily Drop has taught us everything we know about travel hacking. You can sign up for Daily Drop using this link. If you want to fly, stay at hotels, and rent cars for free, this newsletter is for you.
The same company also has a great program that will alert you to super low-priced flight deals called FareDrop.
21. Be Loyal
If you don’t want a credit card, you can earn points through signing up for loyalty programs. The best way to rack up enough points to lead to free flights is to pick one flight carrier and unless there is a significant difference in price, stick to using them as much as possible.
Some programs, like the United Airlines program, offer more ways than one to earn, such as earning points for shopping at retailers through their app or answering surveys.
For hotels, consider signing up for One Key Rewards, which allows you to earn points each time you book through Hotels.com, Expedia, or VRBO.
22. Take Advantage Of All Things Free
There are so many free things to do when you travel that you really can spend zero money exploring an area–we frequently do this.
Here are a few examples. In bigger cities, you can find free walking tours to download to your phone. Large museums sometimes have free entrance days or times. Smaller museums are often free (although it is always nice to leave a donation if you are able).
City parks are free and some have beautiful walkways, sculptures, and trails. In several states, including Tennessee, state parks are free to enter and hike.
These are just a few things we find to do for free when we travel.
23. Join Point Programs That Offer Travel Gift Cards As Rewards
Did you know there are point programs out there that pay you in points for things you already do online, like shopping and surfing the web? You can cash these points in for travel gift cards. You can also buy gift cards through them and get points back to use towards more travel gift cards.
My favorite program is Swagbucks. They offer dozens of different ways to earn points. Their selection of travel gift cards includes Airbnb, Southwest Airlines, Hotels.com, Carnival Cruises, Groupon, and Celebrity Cruises.
Go here to sign up and create your Swagbucks account.
24. Avoid Peak Season
If you have traveled for a while, you know the beauty of the shoulder season. It is a time when the weather is still nice, but not as perfect as it was during peak season. You can usually get off-season deals and enjoy fewer crowds during this time.
25. Use This Web Browser Tool To Save Money On Hotels
Rakuten has a web browser tool that will alert you to cash back deals on hotel sites like Hotel.com and Expedia. Use my referral link to join, and you will receive a bonus of $30 cash back when you make a qualifying $30 purchase within 30 days of joining (the offer could change at any time).
26. Change Your Mindset
Travel is about the adventure more than the destination. When you make travel part of your lifestyle instead of something you do for two weeks every year if you can afford it, you will find yourself traveling without caring much about the destination because you will learn that every place has something worth exploring.
For us, traveling for cheap with a full-time job right now means buying a 20+ year-old pop-up truck camper off Facebook marketplace and switching Jack from five 8-hour shifts a week to three 12-hour shifts. He is an RN so that we can do that, but even before he made the switch, we traveled from Friday evening to Sunday evening once a month and did a day trip every month, too. We also like to take two consecutive weeks off in a row and do longer road trips. However, we could change our travel style as we age or other factors of our life change.
For you, traveling on the cheap with a job can look totally different–and that is okay. Maybe travel looks like earning hotel points with a travel credit card and spending them for a long weekend getaway to a city near you once every 3 to 4 months. Or perhaps you save them up all year and spend them on hotel, flights, and a car rental for a week-long trip and make your other week off a road trip where you camp in a tent each night. The ideas of how to make travel fit into your budget and work life are as endless as your creativity and flexibility.
I hope this article helps you find the time, money, and mindset to make travel happen. Perhaps we will see you out there!
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