HOW TO BUDGET FOR TRAVELING IN YOUR 30’S

Photo by Daniel Gonzalez on Unsplash

We spend our 20’s jumping from job to job, making barely any money while we figure out what to do with our lives, and before we know it we’re 30 and broke. However we want to travel and explore the world, so how can we do it all?

Let’s be honest. Before we can even plan on going anywhere outside our hometown, we need to be realistic about our financial situation. I can tell you that in the first half of my 20’s I worked non-stop, no vacations away, no long weekend escapes somewhere close because I was making Portuguese minimum wage so living paycheck to paycheck was a lifestyle. Only when I got my job as a flight attendant at age 26 did I manage to travel outside of Portugal after almost 6 years of not traveling. So if this is your situation I’m here to give you a real kick in the pants and say: You need to start saving.

By now you’re probably thinking I’m crazy in saying it but friend, it’s a must. And even on a low-wage job you can still save, the journey may be longer but this is not a sprint, it’s a marathon. First things first, you need to be aware of your income, before and after taxes. Depending on where you live, check how much you’re making gross and net worth so that then you can budget accordingly.

Maybe you’ve heard about the 50/30/20 method, if not here’s how I break it down.

Graphic by Ashley Tavares

50% of your income should go to your needs. These are things that you cannot live without like housing, food, utilities, medical expenses.

30% of your income should go to your wants. These are things that you can live without but that will improve your quality of life. Here we can count for dining out, Netflix subscriptions, hobbies, shopping.

20% of your income should go to your savings. Depending on what you’re trying to save for you can divide it into retirement savings, building an emergency fund, short-term savings.

Now that we understand how it works let me give you an example: let’s say you make around 1 430€ a month/net and now you want to budget this amount for the month.

1430–50% = 715€ (50%)

715–30% = 500,50€ (30%)

500,50–20% = 400,40€ (20%)

Once you have roughly the numbers you can then start putting your money where you want it to go.

How do you budget for traveling?

Within the 20% that we already have set aside for saving purposes, you can categorize traveling savings as well as maintaining your emergency fund and retirement savings.

Usually, if I want to save for a week trip somewhere I’ll put my share within the 20% savings plus whatever I don’t spend from my 30% wants budget I’ll add it into this traveling saving account to either achieve my goal faster or to have extra spending money.

And before you say it… I know how hard it is to do this on a low-wage job but friend don’t get discouraged. Like I said before this is not a sprint, it’s a marathon, and even if you can only set aside 50€ a month it’s better than nothing at all. Consider creating another source of income to achieve your financial goals and create long-term financial wealth.

Keep in mind that having an emergency fund should be your number 1 priority before you even start budgeting for any other savings. Why? Because if something happens like you lose your job, you get a salary cut, your car breaks down, your pet gets sick, you won’t have to worry about how you’re going to pay for those unexpected expenses. Usually, your emergency fund should have a minimum of 3 to 6 months’ worth of income but you can start by saving 1 000€ and building it up from there.

Achieving financial freedom should be on our list of priorities in our 30’s and even though we want to see the world we need to do it in a way that is sustainable and that won’t wreck our future.