Funding Your Travels: How Real People Afford to Travel

Ever caught yourself staring at travel influencers' perfect Instagram feeds, wondering how on earth they afford their seemingly endless adventures? You're not alone. The truth is, most travelers aren't sponsored, wealthy, or living off massive social media revenue – they're regular people, like you and me, who've mastered the art of funding their wanderlust through creativity and planning.

As a solo traveler with a full-time job outside of podcasting, I've developed practical strategies that allow me to explore the world without breaking the bank. From creating dedicated travel savings accounts to strategically using tax returns for bigger adventures like my Camino walk and Iceland exploration, financial intentionality forms the foundation of sustainable travel. The points and rewards system offers another powerful avenue – my Southwest credit card points have funded countless domestic flights, though I learned the hard way about monitoring expiration dates after losing valuable Amtrak points.

Alternative accommodation approaches dramatically reduce travel costs. House sitting provides free lodging while letting you experience destinations like a local. Work exchanges through platforms like Workaway require just a few hours daily, leaving plenty of time for exploration. Teaching English abroad or freelancing using existing skills (like my Pilates instruction) creates income streams while traveling. Even simple lifestyle adjustments make a difference – cutting streaming subscriptions, reducing restaurant meals, brewing coffee at home, or developing side hustles like my dog-sitting business that funnels directly into travel funds. Remember: travel isn't about one extravagant trip but creating a sustainable lifestyle that lets you explore more while spending less.

Ready to transform your travel dreams into reality without influencer sponsorships or extraordinary wealth? Connect with me to learn about my upcoming coaching program for women seeking solo travel experiences focused on healing and transformation, launching May 27th. Book a call through the show notes link to get on the waitlist and discover how travel can become a regular, enriching part of your life.

BOOK A CALL: 

https://calendly.com/solotraveladventures/book-a-call

GOING: Cheap Flight Deals

https://goingwith.me/6gsk6x5d

Earn 60,000 bonus points with either Chase Sapphire® card. I can be rewarded if you apply here and are approved for the card.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19s/D5GQOMAZF4

Instagram @solotraveladventures50

Facebook community: Solo Travel for Women Over 50

https://www.facebook.com/groups/860865768609200


Leave a review:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/solo-travel-adventures-safe-travel-for-women-preparing-for-a-trip-overcoming-fear-travel-tips/id1650161410

Chapters

• 0:00 How Average People Afford Travel
• 3:40 Smart Saving Strategies for Travelers
• 7:10 Points, Rewards, and House Sitting
• 10:40 Work and Volunteer Opportunities Abroad
• 14:20 Reducing Expenses to Travel More
• 19:10 Solo Travel Coaching Program Announcement

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Have you ever watched those travel influencers on Instagram and see them going to all these exotic places and they're seemingly always traveling and wonder, well, how do they pay for that? Well, I'm going to share with you today different ways to pay for your travel as the average person would. Hello, welcome to Solo Travel Adventures. I'm Cheryl Esch, your solo travel coach expert and advocate for women traveling solo. Well, I often get that question because I live a normal life. I actually have a job outside of doing this and coming to you every week and giving you content and resources, but I am just your average person.

Speaker 1: 0:52

I do not have affiliates, like many of those travel influencers may have. Or they get their hotels and their accommodations paid for because of a sponsorship with somebody, um, or they have a vlog that is making them money through their travels, and or they have some sort of product that they're also providing that's related to travel. Maybe they're a travel agent or advisor on the side, and so that's a way that they are able to pay for the travel, but I find that is a small percentage of the people out there and I am just like you. I am just an average person. I am not wealthy. I don't have a sugar daddy as we might call it here. I am not wealthy. I don't have a sugar daddy as we might call it here. In the US I work and that is. I have different ways that I do pay for my travel. That prevents me from going into debt, because I think that is kind of. Sometimes, you know, we get so excited about going someplace, so excited about going someplace, and I have been there where the travel itself, and honestly, iceland, kind of caught me off guard as far as how expensive it was. So if you're on a budget, then sometimes that you might have to, you know, put things on a credit card, which I don't advise, but it has happened, it's happened to me. So I'm going to share some ways that you can get your funds in place to fund your travel, meaning you're going to not have to necessarily use your credit card. Well, the number one thing that I have done in the past is I have set up a savings account that is strictly for travel and so contributing to it monthly or biweekly or maybe depending on how often if you're like me and you have a regular job, definitely you know setting aside a certain amount so that you know thinking about a trip that might cost X right, and trying to save enough each month so that at the time that you do plan to travel, you have enough funds for that trip. That's obviously going to be one of the best ways.

Speaker 1: 3:26

I personally people have asked well, how did you? I mean, I did the Camino last year, I just did Iceland and for me, these bigger trips, I have been fortunate in that I have received a tax return here in the US. This is US. I'm not sure how taxes work in any other country, but I've gotten a nice tax return the past few years and so I've used that money strictly, you know. I've allocated it for these trips and, knowing that, you know I've put it aside. For example, last year, even though I got my tax return you know, usually it comes in April I didn't go on that trip till September but I put that money aside. So that is one way that I personally fund and I just know that you know, going into I get this return, it's going to be used for travel, because to me it was money I wasn't banking on right, so it's kind of a nice bonus.

Speaker 1: 4:29

Another way that I do pay for travel and I'm learning more about it. I can't say I'm an expert on it, but there is, of course, some great resources out there and I'm going to provide one that I've been diving into. But credit card points or loyalty rewards with airlines or hotels. I have gotten so many free flights with Southwest. That is a credit card that I have and it strictly gives me points for Southwest travel and so, since I live in Dallas, that is one of their hubs here and it's been a great tool to help me.

Speaker 1: 5:09

You know, take some domestic trips. Actually you might have some hotel loyalty points, depending on how much you travel, and those can add up. Just be careful with any of the hotel or airlines. Or even I used to have Amtrak reward points, but you know, after a certain amount of time where they sit dormant and they're not used or you're not adding to or using them, they will go away, they expire. And so I also had a recent event last year where American Airlines because I hadn't flown American for a while that I had a lot of points that they said were going to expire unless I either use them or flew American to add to that total, and so I actually chose to use them on a trip that I went back to back home with in December. So I didn't lose those points. So just keep an eye on that. I lost all my Amtrak points, unfortunately, because, well, I only did that one trip. So just know that that can happen. But credit card points don't necessarily expire and depending on what credit card you get a lot of for example, chase Sapphire Preferred they work with other loyalty programs, so you could potentially like transfer those points over to something else that you might need it for, over to something else that you might need it for.

Speaker 1: 6:48

If you are wanting to dive a little deeper into understanding points and how to use points for travel, I highly recommend Just get out of town way of travel or J G O O T way. Um. They have a book out Um. It's a publication by Joel McDonald and they have found a way to um, you know, use points and they've gotten so many free flights and even upgrades um utilizing their points they have. So this book has been a great resource for me in helping me understand a little more about the point system. So if you're interested, you may want to just go ahead and um purchase their book. Um, they have other resources as well.

Speaker 1: 7:35

House sitting would be another way to at least reduce your travel cost. We know that accommodations really take up a lot of our finances when we're traveling outside of, maybe, your airfare, and so if you could take that out of the equation, man, there is so much more you could do, and so I've done some local house sitting or pet sitting and what you know, preparing myself for some international. Now, uh, back in episode 83, I had Kate Evans on and she gave us all kinds of information on how to utilize house sitting, and they've been doing it for a long time, her and her husband, and she's even got a book out about it. So if you want to reference back to episode 83, you can hear her suggestions on how to utilize house sitting when you travel. And it's a. I actually got to meet her personally in person and when I was in Portugal she was at a house at a fabulous house that, I might add, incredible when I was visiting her in Portugal, and so they have had some pretty unique and incredible experiences. They have repeat house sitting customers, so it has helped them travel the world.

Speaker 1: 9:07

So that is one way you could dive into possibly saving money to pay for your travel, and there's also volunteering abroad as an option so you could find places that are looking for volunteers. Sometimes they let you stay for free. There's also a work exchange programs like Workaway. Same thing with Workaway or WWOOF. That's where you work on some farms organic farms. They will offer free accommodations in exchange for your work and it's not a full day. I've seen some work away opportunities, and they are all over the world, by the way, so they're only requiring maybe five hours a day, monday through Friday, and so you do have some time to explore and the areas that, wherever you can look and work away and pinpoint.

Speaker 1: 10:09

Maybe you just want to go to a specific country and you can kind of look and do a search of just that country. You could also teach English abroad. You could also freelance abroad, depending on your skills. So if you have some special skills, that might be useful or beneficial. One thing that I think of often is there's a lot of photographers that do freelance works, of course, and if you go to some of these very famous, popular tourist places, there's many of us, solo travelers included, that want to capture some professional pictures. And it's hard as a solo traveler and so I see many people and it's hard as a solo traveler. So I see many people organizing maybe it's in Bali. I saw one lady recently did one in Columbia, so you can hire a photographer to take pictures. So if you are a photographer, that is maybe a skillset you have you could certainly use that abroad in these types of scenarios. I have a skillset of also teaching Pilates and I am working on connecting so that I could use my Pilates in a freelance opportunity abroad, and so that's something I'm working on. I've connected with a group that kind of helps connect you know, pilates instructors with Pilates studios, and so I'm hoping to possibly use my skills abroad in that way. So maybe think about what skills do you have? Do they lend themselves to something that you could do abroad? That would offer you the opportunity, and if you're in the US, it could potentially be a tax write-off. Obviously, please speak to your accountant and your tax specialist about that possibility.

Speaker 1: 12:09

Now we're going to get into. You know ways that you could save or earn money before a trip in order to save for a trip. So these are just more. What are things you can do in your life? To one thing, reduce your overall spending in your day to day in order to save for your travel, ie, can you downsize in some way? What do you have? I mean, are you using all those streaming options? Probably not. Do you really need to eat out every day? Probably not. So these are ways you obviously can reduce your overall spending. You don't need that daily Starbucks coffee, sorry to say. You can be saving that $7 and put it into an account. Think about that $7 every day that could add up, or just reducing, maybe where you're living, maybe you want to move further away from an expensive city.

Speaker 1: 13:10

I've known many they are expats or nomads now that have kind of set themselves up so that they can actually use. So they've downsized, maybe earlier in their life so that they can actually use. I forgot to mention this, but you could use your interest from your investments to sort of pay for your travel and hopefully we are all on track in our retirements that maybe this is a possibility, something to consider. Maybe that downsizing is where you need to go. But I've done that. I downsized out of some expensive apartments. I downsized out of some expensive apartments. I have made sure that my car is paid off, by the way, so I don't have that. So that's a huge chunk of money if you live in the US, having those expensive car payments, so things like that big.

Speaker 1: 14:15

I've been talking about big ticket things. How could you reduce those things in your day to day? Is your car insurance, which I know is really expensive? Can you shop around and find a cheaper rate for yourself to save money? Things like that. There's many, many ways in which, if you look at your monthly budget and your overall spending, that I am sure we all can find ways to cut the fat right and that way you can save that money. The trick is, though, if you cut the fat, say, you reduce your monthly spending. Let's just hypothetically say $300,. You have to make sure you're putting that $300 into that travel savings account and not spending it elsewhere just because you have it.

Speaker 1: 15:04

Um, you can sell unwanted items to fund your trip. You got some bigger items, things you aren't using, um and get rid of them right, make a little extra cash. Could you Airbnb your place or even rent out a room? So if you have a big house and maybe it's just you and your spouse right now and you have an empty nest, could you rent out a bedroom? College students, somebody else that could just, you know, and you make several hundred dollars from renting out a room which could go directly to your travel account. And then, finally, could you do another side hustle, a second job I do, and my side hustle is actually I dog sit for paid.

Speaker 1: 15:55

There's some times when I have done it for free as part of a house sit exchange sort of program, but nowadays I have so many clients that I actually I charge for dog sitting and it's nice extra money some months more than others, but it is a great way for me to help fund my travel and that's actually where I often designate that money. I make a little extra dog sitting. I'm putting that money towards my travel typically. So don't equate yourself. Don't look at those travel influencers, those people on Instagram. And I am just like you.

Speaker 1: 16:41

I have to be creative in finding ways to pay for my travel and usually it's, you know, my hard work or my creative way of saving or finding ways to not have to pay with, maybe, points right. So I hope that this information was helpful to you and that you are just thinking of ways now instead of, you know, looking at a trip that you're looking at, let's just say hypothetically, you want to go somewhere and it's going to cost you $2,000 for this trip and you're thinking, oh my gosh, that's so much money. There's just no way I could do that. But if you start to slowly save that money or figure out ways that maybe you can save that say $700 on using points to pay for your airfare, right, then your trip is now $1,300. So things like that getting creative and thinking of ways instead of just handing out that credit card or using your hard earned cash all the time. There are ways around it that you can reduce your cost. Because, for me, I want to travel more and spend less, and so if I'm spending less on a trip, I get to spend it on another one. That's sort of my way of thinking. If I'm going to spend, maybe I have this budget of X and I go overboard and I spend it on one trip. Versus could I have actually gotten two trips out of that money in some way just by being creative? Well, sisters, I hope this encourages you that there is more than one way to pay for your travel out there, and maybe you have thought of some other ways. Maybe you have a little trick up your sleeve that I would love to hear about um different ways to save in your travels and get out there, sisters, and have that adventure.

Speaker 1: 18:48

Now, I've mentioned in previous episodes I am launching a coaching program. I have a coaching program for women that are wanting to travel solo. Maybe they've never traveled solo. It is one-on-one coaching I'm offering. It is launching on May 27th, right around the corner. I'm taking names, getting you on a wait list and would love to also have you book a call with me to understand a little more about the program. I'm focusing on women that need to find healing in their life, whether that's from a past trauma, from grief or just wanting to. You know they've had a very stressful year maybe and they are overwhelmed, and I want to help you get over that and utilize travel in a way that you can potentially find transformation and healing in your life. So please book a call. That link will be in the show notes and I would love to connect with you.