Travel Savings Account: A Beginner’s Guide to A Travel Savings Fund. How To Really Save For Travel!!

Updated 11/2/2020

It’s been travel season for me lately.  I’ve been to Florida twice, Athens, Georgia and Biloxi, Mississippi. (love the Royal Reds Gulf Shrimp)!!  I had a great time exploring and eating my way through parts of the South.  Why is there so much good food down South?  They know how to do it up right, let me tell you!  I was eating everything from Jambalaya to Crawfish.  It was fabulous.  I gained a few pounds and had a great time. I budgeted for these trips, so I knew about what I would spend, and most of it came from my travel savings fund.

Because I had built up my travel fund, it wasn’t painful to spend that money.  That’s the beauty of having a travel savings account.  If you plan and put money into it regularly, your money will be there for you when you need it on vacation – whether it’s a road trip or a weekend getaway!  It’s a beautiful thing to be able to go and not have to worry about where the money is coming from.

Money wise, I spent quite a bit on airfare.  I live in the Midwest and didn’t want to spend days trapped in the car, so I scoured Monando and Google Flights for good airfare deals.  For lodging, we usually stayed at Marriott or Hyatt properties.    People ask me how I can afford to travel so much.  It’s all about priorities.  I prioritize travel higher than other things in my life.  It’s important to me, so I make it work into my budget and I make sure I put money into my travel savings fund every payday.

What Is A Travel Savings Account?

A travel savings account is money used specifically to travel.  It’s not money that you’ll use for your next Target run.  Nor is it money you’ll use to pay the vet bill.   This is money you’re saving so you can hit the road and go explore those places on your bucket list.

How To Boost Your Travel Savings Account:  the Right Mindset

There’s only a few things you’ll need to get you on the path to saving money for your travels:

• Desire – You’ve been wanting to travel for a while now, but you never seem to have enough money.  Let me tell you a secret.  You’ll never have enough money unless you decide to make saving for travel a priority.  You have to really want to save money to travel more.  It’s not going to happen magically.
• Will power – Just like when you’re trying to lose a few pounds and people keep offering you chocolate cake.  You need to have self-control.  Saving money is hard!  You have to be able to live with delayed gratification.  Even when you have your “why”, it’s hard to save money.  You have to be disciplined.
• Budget- more than just WANTING to save money, you need to figure out HOW you will actually save money.  This is where a budget comes in.  Personally, I make a handwritten budget.  I’m old school,  but it works for me.  I carry my budget in my wallet and every time I get paid, I know exactly what I’m doing with my money.  And I do it on the day I get paid!  That way I don’t blow through a bunch of money before I get my bills paid and transfer money into my savings funds.  (This is on top of what I automatically transfer to savings from each paycheck).

But how do you actually find the money to save for travel?  What if you’re living paycheck to paycheck?  No money tree in your backyard?  Yeah, me either.  Here’s exactly how I save for travel.

Lifestyle Changes To Fund Your Travel

Buy Less House Than You Can Afford

I’ve lived in my house for 20+ years.  When we were looking to buy we wanted an affordable house in a great neighborhood.  We got what we wanted and we haven’t left!  My house is a 1400 square foot,  split-entry.   While not large by any means, it’s big enough.  It also does have some great architectural details including soaring cathedral ceilings, so it feels much bigger than it is.  It is my dream home?  NO!  Is it paid for? YESSSSSSSSS!!!!   Sure, I would love a bigger, newer,  home but I don’t want to pay for it!  I’d rather travel!  It’s all about priorities.  So, if you really want to travel more think about downsizing.  You probably don’t really need 3000 square feet anyway.

Go with A used Vehicle

Cars aren’t my thing.  I want a reliable, fairly well-equipped vehicle to take me from Point A to Point B.  I really don’t care about what kind of car I drive.  When I last had to car shop, which was 9 years ago, I decided on my must-haves and went with the most economical vehicle choice that had all my must haves. My must-haves: good gas mileage, heated seats, and a sun roof.  That’s it.  I’m low maintenance.

I planned ahead and for a couple of years, we used a GM MasterCard to earn cash towards the purchase of a GM vehicle.   We saved $3000 from that GM card to use towards a new car.  We used that plus cash we saved = no car payment!!I

Put Your Credit Cards To Good Use

So I used a GM Mastercard to help fund my car purchase.  And, it was a great way to get free money that I added to my travel savings account!  I would’ve spent what I spent anyway, why not get rewarded for it?  You can do this with any number of credit cards.  It’s called travel hacking and it’s awesome.  Get yourself a few travel credit cards and earn some points for hotels and flights.  Just make sure you pay off in full each month!!

Get A Side Gig

Even if you only do it temporarily a side gig is a gold mind for earning extra money.  Think about what you like to do and what’s available in your area.  I’m working a few different side gigs this year to boost my travel fund.  One is at an outdoor pumpkin patch and after that I’ll be taking orders over the phone for 6 weeks, and I plan to make a couple of thousand with my side gigs this year.

Think Long Term to Add To Your Travel Fund

While a nice new kitchen, vacation home, boat, etc, SOUNDS good now, THINK about using a big chunk of your hard earned savings to pay for it.  Or worse, think about making those payments EVERY. SINGLE. MONTH.  Don’t do it!!  Instead, look at making a compromise.  For instance, forget the entire kitchen remodel and opt for painting the cabinets and installing new countertops.  My sister just did this to update her kitchen and it turned out great.  A handy friend of hers knows how to paint cabinets, so she paid him to re-do hers.  She hired a company to install new counter tops.  All in all, she saved a ton of money and her kitchen looks fabulous.

Try A No Spend Month Or savings Challenge

There’s so many ways to save a few dollars here and there – and they really add up.  I’ve done a no-spend month where you basically try to spend NO money.  No eating out, no shopping.  It’s not fun, but it does work.   The easier way to save to me is the savings calendar where you save a certain amount each week.  The one I’ve done has you saving more at the beginning of the year and then towards the end of the year,  you save less (probably so you’re not broke at Christmas!).  All in all, I saved about $1100 with the savings challenge I did, and it was fairly painless.

Buy Used – It’s A Great Way to Add to Your Savings Fund

Lots of stuff.  Houses are overflowing with stuff!  I think people are coming to terms with the fact that their houses are crammed with way too much junk, but thanks  in part to the Marie Kondo craze, they are starting to de-clutter.  This is good news for those of us that enjoy saving money by buying USED!

There is such good value in buying used! Whenever I’m in the market for new items I always check used sites first.  I love Face Book Marketplace for furniture and home furnishings. I’ve scored great deals on bedroom furniture, a really cute writing desk, patio furniture, gas grills and tools just to name a few items.  I love consignment stores for clothes.  Most of my tops are from consignment stores.  After I purchase, I take them to the dry cleaners so I know they are clean.  It works great.  I am at the point now where I HATE paying retail for clothes!

Learn How to Cook

Food costs are one the biggest expenses in any budget. Eating out is a definite budget buster.  Cooking at home will save you so much money and it’s far healthier than what you’ll get at most restaurants.  Plus, it’s absolutely better than ANY fast food yuck.  You don’t have to cook at home every night, just do it most nights and watch the savings add up.  Your waistline might even go down.

You also don’t need to cook fancy, gourmet dinners.  Most of my favorite dinners are quick and simple – ground turkey tacos, turkey chili, stuffed sweet potatoes.  I’ve just finished reading 100 Days of Real Food on a Budget, which I highly recommend.  It’s full of simple, wholesome recipes that are, plainly put, REAL FOOD.

Shop Around For Insurance

I recently learned that insurance companies make the most money from their long-term customers!  I was really surprised by this.  I thought I was getting the best deal BECAUSE I was a loyal customer.  After all, I had been with my auto insurance company for 20+ years.

We had a little fender-bender and my rates skyrocketed.  This caused me to take a look at some other insurance companies.  I was shocked at how much money I could save by going with Geico for our auto insurance.  It was mind boggling.

Ditch Cable

If you are still paying for cable TV, just stop.  Go with one of the streaming services.  We use both Nextflix and Amazon Prime.  Believe me, there are plenty of quality programs on streaming services.  You will not miss broadcast television.

get To Know YouTube

YouTube is a great resource to save you money.  You can watch a video on just any any topic and learn how to do things yourself so you don’t have to pay anyone!!   I’ve used youtube to:

• Learn how to fix my dryer door with a shoelace.
• Learn how to input a formula into excel.
• Learn how to change a windshield wiper.
• Watch free yoga videos!
• Learn how to curl my hair with a flat iron.
• Learn how to tie a tie.  This isn’t a money saver, but is one of my fondest memories.  When Blonde Son #1 was in high school, some days were designated as “special dress”, meaning a dress shirt and tie were required.  His Freshman year, the first “special dress” day occurred when Mr. Blonde was out of town. I  had no idea how to tie a dang tie and neither did Blondeson 1.  His buddy was pulling in the driveway to pick him up and he still didn’t have that dang tie tied.  Panic was setting in.  All  of the sudden,  the light came on. YouTube!!  Later he told me the he pulled up YouTube on his phone and got the job done on the way to school.    Use YouTube!

Use Your Local Library

I  love the library.  My local library is a fantastic source of all kinds of information and I use it regularly.  I just picked up a few books earlier this week.

This plus all the free books, movies, audio books and ebooks you could ever want.  It’s a goldmine!  Here’s one of my best library hacks:  I like to research the book I am interested in online first.  A lot of times I’ll go to Amazon or the NY Times to see what’s on the bestseller list.  Then, I then sign into my library account and request to have the book delivered to the library closest to me.

All I have to do is walk in, go to the hold shelf and grab my book.  It’s awesome.  I highly recommend taking advantage of the many programs that your library offers.

Practical Ways To Get Money Into Your Savings Fund

Open A Separate Travel savings Account

I recommend you open a separate account at a different bank for your travel fund.  This is what I did.  Once I had some money saved up from my side gig and ditching cable,  I opened a separate account at a different bank.   I wanted to keep my travel savings totally separate from your regular money.  Keeping  your travel fund completely separate from your money used for bills and regular savings will help make sure the money will really be used for travel.  It’s so easy to dip into for other things if it’s readily available.  So keep your travel money separate!

Set Up Auto Transfers

To get your travel fund built up fast, make regular deposits.  The easiest way to do this is to have money auto transferred from your “regular” checking account every payday.  Or, if you have a side gig auto transfer the money you earn with your gig directly into your travel savings account.

Final Thoughts On Boosting Your Travel Savings fund

I always like to keep my bucket list of travel destinations handy so that I have something in black and white that reminds me WHY it’s important to make the right financial choice.  My list helps me stay strong.  The list helps me stay on course.  It helps me to NOT give in and make the choice that might feel good NOW but I’ll be paying for later.

By thinking long term and trying a few of my tips,  you CAN save a significant amount of money that you can put towards your travel fund.   Keep your eye on the “prize” – your travel goals -and watch your travel savings account grow just in time for your next trip.

What are your favorite tips for saving money for travel?