How much money to save to travel for a long period

[nanana13]

If you have a goal to travel Asia, SE Asia, Oceania (e.g., China down to Australia) for a period of between 6-10 months, how much money would you save?

Is this even something MMM'ers are interested in?

[Ricky]

I think the freedom to do anything and go anywhere is definitely something we here are interested in ;) BUT - I think anyone interested in (not yet there) financial freedom would/should try to combine education/work into travel if travel was foremost what one's goal is. Plenty of study abroad and teaching opportunities. Slow travel is the way to go anyway in my opinion. It will be fun to see everything in a short amount of time, but also less impactful than if you were to spend a long period of time learning about a culture rather than just passing through.

But, to directly answer the question: as much or as little as you want. Obviously your largest fixed cost is flying. Food and lodging is highly variable. You could camp, stay in hostels, stay in Airbnb's, stay in hotels, etc. I'd say as little as $1-2k/mo overall including flights would be a reasonable estimate.

Google is your friend. You aren't the first and certainly won't be the last to ask this question. Lots of people have already done it and documented it.

[limeandpepper]

I spent less than $6k in Australian dollars for a 4.5 month trip in Asia. This figure includes flights, visas, vaccinations, travel insurance, local transport, food, accommodation, activities, whatever you can think of.

The answer to your question would depend on which countries you want to visit and how long you want to stay in each of them, your travel style, your requirements in terms of comfort, what sort of activities you like to do, how flexible you are, whether you can score cheap flights, etc.

[lthenderson]

The answer to your question would depend on which countries you want to visit and how long you want to stay in each of them, your travel style, your requirements in terms of comfort, what sort of activities you like to do, how flexible you are, whether you can score cheap flights, etc.

Right on the money! I travel cheaply when I'm in a foreign country because I like to get off the beaten path created by tourists.

[arebelspy]

Earlier thread on this:
http://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/ask-a-mustachian/how-much-cash-to-quit-and-travel-for-1-year/

My answer:

I'd probably say you could spend 12 months spending about 15k, maybe 20k (depending on where you want to travel and what type of activities).  I'd probably want a 10k buffer for when you get back to give time to find a job, get back set up, etc., personally, but that's up to you.

Add on top whatever payments you'll need to be making while you're gone (student loans, for example, if you kept the car any registration or insurance or whatever, etc.).

So I'd personally say 30k + payment totals for bills due back home.

But you could do it on half that, easily, if you're okay coming back broke.

But this is all assuming you're okay traveling like a broke student does, not needing fancy hotels, restaurants, etc.--staying cheap in hostels, airbnb, sometimes couch surfing, eating authentic but cheap street food, etc.--obviously the fancier you go, the more you'd need.  The region(s) you're in also have a great effect--Europe is more expensive than Southeast Asia, obviously.  And how much you move around via planes.  If you hop all over the place, plane tickets get expensive.  If you "slow travel" it's cheaper.

So it's all up to you and how you do it, but the above numbers are what I think are reasonable based on my research.

Given you only want to travel 6-10 months, and a lot of it is in really cheap places (SE Asia), I'd think you can do it even cheaper than what I said there.

[Campanula]

It's worth looking at something like the Lonely Planet website, which suggests daily travel budgets for many cities/destinations (see under survival guide > money and costs, for each location). It provides three budget levels, from basic to spendy, so it's useful for estimating what you might choose to spend on accommodation, food, transport etc. I sometimes discover that my planned budget is below the basic level, though I'd probably budget more amply for a longer trip to avoid running out of money.

[kpd905]

Do you have time to grab some credit cards and get enough miles to cover all the flights?  That would take a nice chunk out.  Could also get a few hotel cards just in case.

[dreams_and_discoveries]

I'm aiming to do a year +, very similar route, when I FIRE in 5 years, if all goes well. Aiming to start in Russia> China > South East Asia > Possibly Australia/New Zealand.

I'd like to spend under £20k per year, which I think will be possible, especially if I slow travel around the cheaper countries for most of that time and have the flexibility to travel cheaply.

[2Birds1Stone]

We want to do this semi full time once we are FIRE'd. So I guess for me it is when the 4% rule would cover our annual costs.

I am budgeting $40k/yr for two people to enjoy a very comfortable FIRE lifestyle.

[hlca]

We are planning on spending $30K to $35K on that same trip for about nine months.  We are spending the first two months in Oz and NZ, which are relatively expensive.  Already spent $5K in the first month.  We'll see how that budget goes as we move to less expensive parts of Asia.  In any event, our spend will be less than what we would have spent at home in the U.S.

[cakie]

As a couple, spent ~$25-28k aud for 5mths travel (Europe) in 2013. But a large amount of that was plane tickets, travel insurance. That's a fixed cost even if we'd travelled for a whole year. We spent way more at the beginning in the expensive countries than we expected, but spent barely anything at the end of the trip (Turkey and Romania were cheap and really awesome!)

Don't underestimate how much you spend while you're learning budget travelling skills 😉

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