Travel hacking after FIRE

[meadow lark]

Has anyone figured out how to travel hack after FIRE?  I used to get lots of free travel, but now between my lower income and already using a lot of the welcome offers, I’m not seeing great offers.

[Greystache]

This is not "Epic Travel Hack!!" but kind of "Slow incremental travel hack". We like to go on extended road trips in which we often stay in motels.  We sign up for a large motel chain and get their affiliate credit card. We got a modest sign up bonus (about $300) and we get member benefits and as the points add up, free stays or reduced cost stays.  The other thing we do is have  many of our regular recurring bills payed by our credit card to rack up points.
I really have not been that aggressive about pursuing sign up bonuses and with my low post FIRE income, the credit card companies don't pursue me very much.

[FIRE 20/20]

I am in a similar position, and now that I'm beginning to get comfortable with travel due to lowered COVID cases and hospitalizations.  I'm doing a few things, none of which will add up to the amazingly cheap travel I did while actively travel hacking.  Nevertheless, here's what I'm doing.  I signed up for Scott's Cheap Flights.  I get a lot (too many actually) good deals on flights along with a comparison of typical prices for those trips.  I'm staying a little longer in places, and I'm renting VRBOs or AirBnBs with kitchens so I can eat some meals in.  Staying longer also reduces the per day cost because some fees are fixed regardless of how long you stay.  I'm going to try to avoid renting cars whenever possible.  I'm also looking at how my local currency is doing against the currency of the places I'm going.  I'm targeting places where the U.S. dollar goes further now than it has in the recent past. 
I hope these things will add up to a reduction in travel costs of 10-25%.  It's not travel hacking levels of savings, but it helps. 

[flyingaway]

I'm retired, so time and places are no longer a constraint. I just look for places with cheap airfares with Googl-flight.

[deborah]

There are usually a lot of cheap rv hires if you are prepared to do a relocation at the beginning and ending of the season. For instance, I relocated a small rv from Seattle to anchorage and paid 25% of the normal price for an 18 day relocation. I then travelled back on the Alaskan marine ferry, stopping where I wanted to for a couple of days each time. It was a wonderful trip. The RVs in Australia tend to be $5 a day if you’re relocating them, plus something reasonable for a couple of extra days. However, most of these don’t have much time that you can spend just wandering around.

There are a lot of travel alternatives, like travel on cargo ships, that are available too.

[FIREeh?]

If the challenge is meeting the minimum spend requirements, you can look into “manufactured spending.” It includes a range of things, some that may be more intimidating than others, but the point is to find ways to “spend” money so that you meet the credit card requirements without actually spending the money. For example, you can fund certain bank accounts when you open them with a credit card, which can count as “spending” a couple hundred or thousand dollars toward your sign up bonus with no fee. The plethora of fintech companies or mobile apps for stock trading can offer similar opportunities. All of this is to say, low spend doesn’t have to prevent one from meeting a lot of credit card sign up bonuses, that can then be used for free and cheap travel. :)

[4tify]

I second Scott's Cheap Flights.

I'm also finding travel a lot more expensive now that I can't piggy back off the corp. USA is definitely costly, as is much of Europe, so I'm planning those trips more carefully and looking into SE Asia and Central/South America more.

Also still maximizing points and with the extra time off researching off-peak options.

[texxan1]

I second Scott's Cheap Flights.

I'm also finding travel a lot more expensive now that I can't piggy back off the corp. USA is definitely costly, as is much of Europe, so I'm planning those trips more carefully and looking into SE Asia and Central/South America more.

Also still maximizing points and with the extra time off researching off-peak options.

When any of you start doing some travel, please do not forget Thailand... Beautiful country of great peope... We are currently here for a month of travel and styaing in some SUPER nice airbnbs for 10 bucks a night in Chiang Mai....

[Rdy2Fire]

I second Scott's Cheap Flights.

I'm also finding travel a lot more expensive now that I can't piggy back off the corp. USA is definitely costly, as is much of Europe, so I'm planning those trips more carefully and looking into SE Asia and Central/South America more.

Also still maximizing points and with the extra time off researching off-peak options.

When any of you start doing some travel, please do not forget Thailand... Beautiful country of great peope... We are currently here for a month of travel and styaing in some SUPER nice airbnbs for 10 bucks a night in Chiang Mai....

AGREED!!! Also Vietnam and Cambodia. If you're willing to share where you're staying in Chiang Mai, feel free to message me. I am looking for a place for my next trip; ideally somewhere between river and old city.

[CurledMoss]

Sleep in a car or tent in free places. Couch surfing. Grocery stores. High MPG car with bike rack or whatever you need. E30 to save on gas and still get around 40mpg with ford focus. There is also workaway.org, pet sitting, house sitting, etc. Befriend someone with flight benefits.

Inexpensive countries can rent a place for a month for like $200-$400. I've stayed in cheap places in Thailand for $3 a night.

[Cerastez]

Learn to love youth hostels.  America does have some hostels in larger cities, but Europe is where you will find innumerable hostels.  Either way they are cheap and you will meet lots of fellow travelers.  And while you are staying in a hostel, learn to use the local public transportation.

[DireWolf]

I put all spending on credit cards, paying off each month, to get miles/points. Every once in a while I’ve got enough to get somewhere cool for free or near free. I’ll be heading to Europe for my second time since FIRE to spend a month bike touring. I’ll camp and be fairly frugal with food/drinks. My daily spend ends up being fairly low for an amazing trip. I’ll spend what I’d spend for a long weekend of travel if I was flying somewhere on my own dine, staying in a $100+/ nt place, and having expensive meals and drinks. Pre-FIRE I’d have done something like that, so it’s built into my spend number, but now I’m gone so much longer and having a blast.

Last year, we did a very frugal road trip. Inspired by a post I saw on MMM, I did a poor man’s “vanlife”. A Chevy Suburban with beds in the back (the link on MMM was to https://www.suboverland.com/). I did an even trade with my existing vehicle for a 7 year old Suburban with 95K miles. Spent 6 weeks on the road. Camped every night but one. A mix of NPS, state park, BLM land, Cracker Barrel parking lots, etc. Mostly cooked on a camp stove (and Jetboil for coffee). Hit lots of great stuff (Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Rocky Mountain NP, etc.). 6 weeks was less than a beach rental.

[Dee_the_third]

@meadow lark , do you follow Doctor of Credit? There's always a new deal. Sometimes they're a bit off the beaten path and more annoying to redeem, but they exist. Income shouldn't be a problem except for the 'high value' ones, I can get most of them even on my grad student stipend.

[sisto]

I just got the Capital One Venture X card. I plan to move my monthly spend over to earn points for travel. It has some nice perks and the Capital One portal seems to have good value from what I'm seeing so far.

[catkins]

We pay bills forward and buy Costco gift cards to shop with and buy gas in order to meet minimums. We also flip our cards more often.

[Padonak]

I think the golden days of travel hacking are over, no matter if you're fired or not, if by "travel hacking" you mean getting a bunch of credit cards with generous bonuses and using them to travel for free. I used to do it a lot and spent very little on air travel and hotels in mid-late 2010's before the pandemic started.

Here's what you can do differently to travel hack when you're FIREd;

-For short leisure trips, go during the week, like Monday to Friday. Hotels and flights are cheaper, though it may depend on where you're going and what kind of business travel demand there is.

-Either move to a cheaper country or slow travel there or both. Travel off-season, look for tickets for different dates and find good deals.

-Take buses or drive instead of flying.

-Check doctor of credit every now and then for good sign up bonuses for credit cards (which still exist) but also have a "daily driver" card with no foreign transaction fees and decent cashback or points.

[MrGreen]

I think you'll find that in general deals are smaller than they used to be because demand. Revenge travel from the pandemic is still going strong. As long as there is record demand for travel products, there's no need to offer deals to entice potential customers.

[Dreamer40]

I agree that the golden days of travel hacking seem to be over. Now I spend less by prioritizing where I really want to go. My one trip might cost more than a bunch of cheap trips, but I get more out of it because it’s what I want to do the most. I also love the planning and daydreaming phases of travel so that time leading up to a trip is also just as much fun. I know people who travel several times a month all summer and never have a chance to look forward to the next one because they’re so busy (and so broke…).

[bmjohnson35]

Economy is still booming and demand is too high.  Inflation is also contributing to the issue.  If we do enter into a significant recession/depression over the coming year(s), I suspect demand will drop and travel deals will become more available again. 

[Fru-Gal]

I’m looking for ways to get Amtrak deals if anybody has any tips. The Amtrak rewards credit card from Bank of America seems to be closed to new applications.

[Sandi_k]

Physician on Fire had a nice link to a story today about using timeshare spaces:

https://ourwovenjourney.com/save-money-book-redweek-resort-rentals/

[charis]

I think the golden days of travel hacking are over, no matter if you're fired or not, if by "travel hacking" you mean getting a bunch of credit cards with generous bonuses and using them to travel for free. I used to do it a lot and spent very little on air travel and hotels in mid-late 2010's before the pandemic started.

What are you basing this on? In the last 1-2 years, I've gotten great credit card bonus. Heck, I paid for a spring beach vacation, just flew the family across the country and back for free, spent over 1k in points on other tourist activities, and racked up additional miles and points that I have yet to spend (mostly chase and capital one cards). That's not even including the other benefits we've used like vacation rental and hotel credits and global entry fees ($400 total). As a long time hacker, it's as good as it's ever been.

[FIRE 20/20]

I think the golden days of travel hacking are over, no matter if you're fired or not, if by "travel hacking" you mean getting a bunch of credit cards with generous bonuses and using them to travel for free. I used to do it a lot and spent very little on air travel and hotels in mid-late 2010's before the pandemic started.

What are you basing this on? In the last 1-2 years, I've gotten great credit card bonus. Heck, I paid for a spring beach vacation, just flew the family across the country and back for free, spent over 1k in points on other tourist activities, and racked up additional miles and points that I have yet to spend (mostly chase and capital one cards). That's not even including the other benefits we've used like vacation rental and hotel credits and global entry fees ($400 total). As a long time hacker, it's as good as it's ever been.

I'm also curious about the comments about the golden days of travel hacking being over.  I haven't had any trouble getting approved for cards so far, despite my income being 1/6 of what it was at the end of my career.  The bonuses don't seem to be any lower, but I may be missing something. 

[charis]

I think the golden days of travel hacking are over, no matter if you're fired or not, if by "travel hacking" you mean getting a bunch of credit cards with generous bonuses and using them to travel for free. I used to do it a lot and spent very little on air travel and hotels in mid-late 2010's before the pandemic started.

What are you basing this on? In the last 1-2 years, I've gotten great credit card bonus. Heck, I paid for a spring beach vacation, just flew the family across the country and back for free, spent over 1k in points on other tourist activities, and racked up additional miles and points that I have yet to spend (mostly chase and capital one cards). That's not even including the other benefits we've used like vacation rental and hotel credits and global entry fees ($400 total). As a long time hacker, it's as good as it's ever been.

I'm also curious about the comments about the golden days of travel hacking being over.  I haven't had any trouble getting approved for cards so far, despite my income being 1/6 of what it was at the end of my career.  The bonuses don't seem to be any lower, but I may be missing something.

I'm not FIREd so I can't speak to income issues, but I've gotten bonuses that are equal or greater to bonuses I got 10 years ago.

[Fru-Gal]

I have next to no income and my credit has never been higher. It doesn’t really depend on your income as far as I can tell.

[kpd905]

I’m looking for ways to get Amtrak deals if anybody has any tips. The Amtrak rewards credit card from Bank of America seems to be closed to new applications.

Looks like the Amtrak card is switching issuers, you may have to wait until late October to get one: https://www.doctorofcredit.com/fnbo-to-issue-new-amtrak-card/

[HawkeyeNFO]

Amtrak frequently runs some very good sales and promotions, depending on what you're eligible for.  Watch their website for new promotions.

Last week they started a 60% off sale if you had a small group (up to 8).  I jumped on that one for tix from DC to NY and back.

[Fru-Gal]

Thanks for the Amtrak tips!

[tj]

I don't really get approved for new cards anymore - I have too much credit -and the offers now aren't as good as they used to be anyway.

I just find the best deal that I can get. I'll use up whatever miles I've accumulated when I can, but usually i just pay for it.