3 Ways to Travel Cheaper

Travel is probably my favorite hobby- and it’s also my most expensive hobby. If you live in the US and are wanting to travel abroad, you can easily expect to drop at least $1,000 on a flight. That’s just to leave the country- you can expect to pay an additional $200 a night for accommodation. Money is typically the #1 obstacle to traveling. You can make travel cheaper though. Here are a few of my favorite tips to travel cheaper (and as a result, more often!):

• Book in the off season (or shoulder season)

Booking your trip when a destination is at its least busy can save you a lot of money- so try booking in the off season or shoulder season. For places like Europe, this time period will usually be from October- May. The weather is colder and the rainy season starts, and less people are available to travel after their summer vacation ends. Planes and hotels won’t be able to book as many flights and stays as normal, so prices should drop much lower than usual, making for unusually cheap travel. I used this trick for my next trip (I’m going to Scotland! So stay tuned for itineraries, reviews, and some amazing sights and stories) and managed to score a week stay and roundtrip flights for 2 for a great, affordable price. 

• Plan Trips Backwards 

I totally understand wanting to travel to a specific destination, but if you’re looking to save money, try choosing your next destination according to the price. This is essentially planning a trip backwards. Instead of choosing a destination and then booking flights + accommodation, try finding the cheapest flights and then picking your destination. How to find cheap flights? Services like Going (formerly Scott’s Cheap Flights) will track them for you. They’ll even alert you when there’s a good flight deal.

You can also get flight prices for certain destinations sent to your email via Google Flights- if you track multiple destinations, it’s easy to gather data on which trip would be the cheapest according to flight prices. Another thing that helps is going to Google Flights, setting your home airport, and then clicking on the map. This will show you flight prices worldwide, helping you to narrow down your cheap travel destination faster.

 

• Use a GOOD Travel Credit Card

Disclaimer: This tip will ONLY help if you are good with managing credit cards- if not, then don’t get one. But if you are good with money management, this tip will help you travel cheaper! One of the biggest hassles of traveling is definitely money- figuring out what currency you’ll need, exchange rates, pesky foreign transaction fees, and even ensuring that you can use your credit card overseas. My motivation for getting a travel credit card was primarily for the latter two reasons.

Not every credit or debit card works abroad. Additionally, if you only have a debit card I would highly advise against using it more than you have to abroad. You’d have a slim chance of getting your money back if your card was lost or stolen, so I’d opt for using a credit card. Credit cards are more secure since the money isn’t coming directly out of your bank account. So, use a credit card- but ensure that it is actually accepted wherever it is you’re traveling. For example, before I went on my first trip abroad to Greece, I only had a Discover card. Discover is accepted in Europe, but it is not widely used and probably isn’t the most reliable (always double check!). 

You also want to make sure that the credit card you use doesn’t have any foreign transaction fees (these are very common- normally an additional 1-3% fee added to any foreign purchases). These can add up A LOT and can cost you much more money than what you’d regularly pay without them. A lot of travel credit cards offer zero foreign transaction fees, so make sure to choose one with this benefit! 

I did some research on what the best travel credit cards were and decided on the Chase Sapphire Preferred. Here’s what I love about it:

• Zero foreign transaction fees
• Visa is widely accepted
• Excellent points system to use towards travel
• Travel protection

I started using this credit card as my primary card for making purchases on things I would already be buying- everything on my Europe trip in April, groceries, gas, etc. I had enough points recently to book 2 roundtrip flights from the Midwest to Scotland for just over $800 (flights were clocking in at right about $700, so I essentially bagged a free roundtrip flight using Chase’s rewards points). The verdict? Having a travel credit card can make travel cheaper- by hundreds of dollars, sometimes.

You can read more about the Chase Sapphire Preferred here

 

Traveling can obviously be very expensive- but it doesn’t have to be. If you have done your research, have a plan, and have the correct tools, you can make travel and vacations much more affordable. To recap, here are some of the ways I’ve made travel more affordable:

•  Planning a trip backwards- go for cheap travel destinations first.
• Traveling during off-season- it’s easier to travel for cheap.
• Using a GOOD travel credit card

Would you use any of these tips for cheap travel? Let me know! If you have any tips for cheaper travel, I’d love to hear about it in the comments! If you’re looking for more travel hacks, check out this post.