Our 7 Rules of Travel Spending

After a decade of traveling together, Mrs. Minafi and I have developed a set of travel rules we unofficially follow. These 7 rules have served us well on dozens of trips.
Adam

Written by Adam on 2017-08-10. Blog, Financial Independence. 17 comments. Find out how I make money.

Travel can be one of the largest easily controllable expenses that most people face — myself included. For 2017, travel is set to make up 12% my spending — the largest of any category outside of my home. Over the years as we have traveled more, my approach to how I spend money while traveling has changed a lot. Here’s the approach to travel that’s worked the best for me to get the most out our trips for the least expense.

The Vinoy in St. Pete
Vinoy Hotel St. Pete by By Mrs. Minafi

1. Get a Deal on the Flight

Flights are usually one of the top 2 expenses (hotel being the other) of the trip. We’re fans of Skyscanner, which lets you search for a flight, then get alerts on it as the price changes. For our recent trip to Japan, we watched as fares fluctuated and grabbed tickets when they were at their lowest.

Buying flights with points is amazing when it works. Churning and building up points to get flights for free is a lucrative approach, but it does take a bunch of work. I’ve tried churning cards before, but it didn’t seem worth it. One misstep and I’m paying a yearly fee, or not hitting a required amount – it was too much extra for me to worry about. Instead, I have a handy Fidelity Rewards Visa with 2% cash back and no fee. I love the idea that I’m just getting straight cash and can use it on anything. This card has a foreign transaction fee of 1%, so technically you’ll be paying to use it when traveling abroad, but with 2% back, you’re still positive 1%.

2. We Don’t Take Airline Offers To Be Bumped

One way to make a dollar last the longest is to accept offers to be bumped in exchange for a discount on a future fare. We never take these, and instead like traveling on a schedule that maximizes our vacation time. This only applies on the way out though! On the way back from a trip, bumping is always an option if we have the time to spare before heading back to work.

3. Book a Hotel Using Points if Possible

I’ve found it’s a LOT more beneficial to book a hotel using points than book air travel using it. The net amount of that each point gets you go a lot further. For our recent trip to St. Petersburg for Mrs. Minafi’s birthday, we booked a Marriot hotel, using Starwood points we transferred over to Marriot to use there. The Starwood Preferred Guest American Express card is the best bang for the buck on this, with a free first year and $95 after that. We’ve used this card to book our hotels for free on at least 4 trips, totaling above $5k saved.

4. Do Your Planning Ahead, Not During

Our approach is to front-load research before the trip, then just relax and enjoy things during it. Things like the flight and hotel are the big ones, but aside from that having dinner reservations, plans on top sights to see, places added to Yelp or a custom Google Map. I love this approach since it allows us to get somewhere and know what’s next.

5. Plan Something For the First Day

We don’t plan out every day of our trip, but I like planning out the first day after we get in. This gets us up and out of the hotel with something in mind. It saves that awkward step where you wake up the first day and think “What should we do now?”. I love planning a dinner, or something with a tour guide on this day – a chance to chat with some people and get other recommendations for the trip.

6. We Don’t Worry About Expenses After That

From when we touch down in a place, we don’t worry about expenses of anything at all. All the big things have been taken care of – hotels, airfare, any expensive tours or meals – so now is the time to just relax and enjoy the trip. We don’t buy souvenirs, so that’s one less thing to consider spending money on. Instead, we prefer to kick back and spend (somewhat) recklessly. Daiquiris by the pool? Check! Expensive dinners at the tastiest restaurants around. Check! Lyfting around the city in a drunken stupor? Sure!

Drinks by the pool
Strawberry Daiquiris by the pool

We trust ourselves to not spend money on useless things, so this approach has worked so far for us so far. In all of our trips, I can’t remember a single time when we spent more than $100 in an unexpected way on a trip. We’re not throwing money around left and right in that way, but just not cheapening out on a taxi when we have luggage to save a few bucks, which brings me to the last point.

7. Don’t Cheap Out on Taxi’s

If we’re traveling with suitcases, taxi’s are often worth it. Even if it’s just from a close station to a hotel, it can save a ton of grief after a lot of stress traveling. Ideally, if we’re traveling with just a backpack then public transportation is a non-issue.

What are your financial rules of traveling? Do you prefer to travel on the cheap? Get good deals? Are you a planner or a spur of the moment traveler?

Adam

Hi, I'm Adam! I help millennials invest to reach financial independence sooner than they ever thought possible. Want to see what you could do to reach FI sooner? You're in the right place!

17 Comments

Why not add to the conversation below? Your voice is welcome!

I like the plan ahead idea… we haven’t vacationed much, but when I have embarked without a plan, we often waste time in the hotel trying to figure out our day! Great tips!

Thanks! We were hitting the same thing. Half the time we wish we could sleep in more that first day, but looking back we’ve always been happy we forced ourselves to get moving.

Minafi –

You hit a few on the head – The airfare can be your biggest expense, so if flying – getting that right will save a TON across the entire trip. Saving a few hundred on one flight can open up to more experiences.

Additionally – knowing how much total you are willing to spend – and then adjusting throughout your trip to not go over has helped my girlfriend and I quite a bit. One night we had a nice dinner with a couple of glasses of wine, realizing that took a larger portion out of one of our meal plans, we decided one evening to watch a game and order a pizza for pickup w/ a coupon code when we were very tired, to help “even” it out and stay on the “total” budget goal!

All great points and nice article.

-Lanny

The budget side is a good idea. I have a rough budget in my head, but having a more concrete one would help guide smaller decisions a bit.

Great post! What do you think about Hiltons? I like them because they’re everywhere and constantly running promotions where you get more points per stay.

I haven’t stayed at enough Hiltons actually! It does seem like one of the 3 best rewards out there (Marriot and Starwood being the others). Do you find they’re in good places within cities, and for a decent points to price ratio?

I thinks that it depends on the Hilton brand. I’ve gotten good value out of Hampton Inns, which tend to be close to cities and have lots of money-saving amenities, such as free parking and free breakfast.

Higher-end brands, such as Conrad, do tend to require insane amounts of points per stay.

We travel a lot on points and travel for next to nothing. I would say this is our 2015 revelation! We started collecting rewards and coudn’t imagine traveling without them now.

Nice! It can definitely save a bunch of money. I split between having a rewards card that pays money and using that for travel + anything and travel specific rewards. Do you use cash rewards at all? Or completely travel?

We never go anywhere without searching for a discount. Sometimes we find one, sometimes we don’t. Got a great deal online for Disney tickets a few years ago.

We also use Hilton whenever we can – assuming the price is close to other options – so we can collect the points and use them in future travel. We generally get 3-4 free nights per year from our points.

Speaking of points, we use the Citi double cash back card for 2% cashback. Whenever we get money back, we add it into the vacation budget. Score! 🙂

Nice! Using cash rewards is great. I’m going to have to give Hilton a shot for my next travel rewards card too. Have been sticking to Starwood, but hear good things about Hilton.

I like the idea of making a plan for the first day, that’s something I rarely do and it often just ends in grabbing a quick bite (or room service) and crashing.

Thanks! We’d do the same ourselves. The first time I planned something the first day, Mrs. Minafi was NOT happy waking up early, but it helped get on schedule with time changes (which is never fun).

Great post. Choosing Airbnb instead of hotels is another great way to save money.

Oh yeah good point. Makes the trip more fun if you can get a really slick place.

We have the same philosophy. Once we’re on vacation, we don’t worry about our spending. Like you said, it’s never out of control, especially because we have booked the big expenses already, and it makes the vacation so much more enjoyable not to worry about small expenditures but instead, do whatever we feel like doing!

Enrica21

Enrica21

March 13, 2024

As a traveler, I always appreciate new experiences and opportunities to discover new places. One such place was Guadalajara in Mexico. Renting a car in Guadalajara rental24.co.uk was one of the best decisions I made during my trip. She gave me the freedom to visit different places at my own pace without depending on public transport. It also gave me the opportunity to travel outside the city limits to enjoy the stunning natural scenery and other attractions of the region.

Minafi - The intersection of FI, minimalism & mindfulness.

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