We’re heading out on our family vacation soon, so I thought I’d share some tips I’ve found that work well for this scatter-brained-budget-what-budget-we’re-on-vacation! mama.
I’ve mentioned before (fine, many times) that we’re Dave Ramsey fans. We totally see the value of paying cash, especially when we’re combining a finite budget with a mood for fun. Rather than carry around a bag stuffed randomly with bills, here’s the way I came up with last year to manage our cash over the course of a vacation.
Last summer, after working hard and pinching pennies for 18 months, we finally reached our goal of having a fully-funded emergency fund!
We made the goal-reaching-deposit two months before we had planned to take our summer vacation, so we didn’t have much time to save. After shuffling our monthly budget around, looking for the most economical lodging (reserved on our debit card), and planning our gas costs, we had a whopping 500 dollars left over for spending money. 500 dollars to cover food and activities for our family of five . . . for 11 days!
We knew that in our pre-debt-free life, credit cards always got us into trouble, so we decided that using cash was the only way to go.
I divided the money into 11 envelopes. We put sixty dollars in the first three envelopes, and forty in the other eight. Our plan was to add any money not used on one day to the next day’s envelope.
Before we left, I packed a box of picnic staples purchased with money from our regular grocery budget. These lasted for the majority of the trip, with a few small shopping trips added in for milk, bread and fruit . . . also purchased out of our grocery budget. We made the majority of our breakfasts and lunches from these items, making picnics-in-new-places a big part of our kids’ vacation experience.
So, did the $40 a day budget work? It did!
By doing lots of research on our destinations, I was able to find plenty of low-cost activities. We focused on seeing natural wonders, rather than touristy places. For our evening meals, I found lists of kids-eat-free restaurants, and we were able to eat at great restaurants for a fraction of the cost.
This was a fabulous real-life learning experience for our children. They knew how much money was in the envelopes, and were more than willing to help stretch it. Part of our vacation included a short stay in a pricey resort town. The kids found out that there were exciting (but expensive) activities at the top of the mountain. They decided that we should not spend ANY money on the first day, and happily spent their time swimming and exploring the town, eating all meals in our suite. They wanted to save one day’s money to add it to the next day’s envelope, so they could have enough to enjoy the rock-climbing-wall and bungee-trampoline! They learned that saving allows you to do the things you really want to do!
And what was my favorite part of our envelope-a-day system? I loved knowing that with every new day, we had a new envelope with at least as much money as we had on the other days. On our final day (one that included 17 hours of driving), we were able to stop at a restaurant! For a woman who didn’t think she could choke down one more pb&j, this was BIG!
By using cash on our vacation, we were able to fully enjoy our time together, with no nagging worries about an upcoming credit card statement. Although this summer we’re heading on a big vacation that we’ve saved for all year, I fully plan to use our envelope-a-day system!
I’m linking this up over at Frugal Friday at Life as Mom.
Great post! we are working on beefing up our emergency fund, and saving cash for a vacation. I will never charge a vacation! We went to the same area a couple of years ago; so we have a good idea of what to do, and prices. And, thanks to the internet we can research current ticket prices, look for deals, etc. Our last vacation, we went over by only $60…and that was for an 8 day vacation. I put it on my debit card. I was annoyed, but thought we did pretty good, as we’d never been on such a long vacation before.
You wrote a great post. Thanks for sharing. You put it in perspective for me. Right now, we live overseas and we are able to stash a lot of money away because of low expenses. We are saving for a house and new car. When we return to the states, it will be more expensive for us. The kids don’t remember what it is like to pinch pennies and save what you can. It will be good for them.
Another thing you can do is look on Restaurant.com for restaurants in the town were you are vacationing and get some gift certificates for super cheap- sometimes as low as $2. Be sure to read the qualifications on the ones you want to buy, though.
Great post! Vacations are so much more relaxing before and after when you know that you can afford them. We also strive to live debt free and manage to travel frequently. I always seek out free or low cost attractions plus we put our reciprocal memberships to work at botanical gardens, science museums and zoos. We also bought an older conversion van that we’ve been known to sleep in once or twice enroute to or from our destination. Saves us a ton of money!
We are huge Ramsey fans, too! (Been listening for about 4 years, but just started putting it into place…procrastination at its best/worst!!!) I never would have thought to put the cash into seperate days. Thanks for putting that into a new light for me!
Great post!! We are going on vacation in July, and I have been stressing over money and trying to figure out how we would make sure our money would last the whole trip, and I am definitly going to give this a shot Thanks!!
I love that you pay cash and follow Dave Ramsey. We are in the middle of getting debt-free right now. Woo hoo! Question- I’m loving your blog and reading it backwards (very helpful, since I’m a fellow slob). But I’m just starting November 2009 and once I click on that, I then have to click “Older Posts” like 25 times to get to the beginning of the month. Is there an easier way to do this? Thanks!
What a great idea! My husband and I are currently working Dave Ramsey’s TMMO and we are about 50% through our snow ball plan. I love reading post of people who have succeeded at Dave Ramsey’s plan. 😀
We are pretty good about our vacation budgeting, but our kids have no ideas about saving money for what you really want. I’m glad you pointed out that part of it. I would love to try something like this with my “can I have it, can I have it” crowd.
What a great idea! We hope to go on a vacation sometime this year and I will definitely try this!
Back when I taught full time, I took 5th grade students on a four-day field trip to a major city most of the. Had never visited. I got 4 zip lock bags for each child, and labeled them with the child’s name and day1, day 2, day 3, day 4. When it was time to leave, I a asked parents to help me split the $ into the bags. Then I handed each child their day 1 bag, and handed the other 3 bags to the adult in charge of each group. Some kids had$250, so I knew I needed a way to guarantee they would have money on the whole trip! not just the ferry ride over!
I’m glad someone mentioned reciprocal memberships. If you have a membership at a local museum, zoo, nature center, etc., find out what association it belongs to and look online to see if there is an attraction in the same association where you are vacationing. Often your family can get in free to the vacation attraction using your membership for the local attraction. Be sure to look at the website for where you are going to see if there are any restrictions.
I love the way you include your kiddos in the plan and the adventure of making the money last. One of my kids’ favorite vacations consisted of the goodies that came because their dad and I listened to a 45 minute timeshare spiel. (And NO, we didn’t buy. It was SO out of our league. 😉 ) They each had their own room (!), their own tv (!) to watch one show, swimming, hiking, free food… all in what they thought were positively palatial surroundings. Our part seemed pretty onerous but it was worth every minute!
I enjoyed reading about the envelope system on vacation! Great idea! To fund our vacation, we plant a large patch of okra and pick and sell it all summer. We have three boys, and they have to help. It is a true family project, and they know the goal we have to meet to make it to the beach. They are learning the value of hard work and of setting goals. And I’m sure they won’t ever forget their “okra-powered vacations”!
Oh my word, I love this idea!!!
I love reading your blogs that I recently found. In this one I have one question. I am a single person trying to learn to live below my budget. You mentioned eating out at kid’s eat free locations. However there are still two adults to feed and most kid eat free locations in my off hand experience would cost at least $20 an adult. Did you fully use the days $40 on those meals or can I ask you t clarify where you may have eaten, what menu items you chose and how much it cost? Thank you.
At the time (this is an older post), we would let each child get their own meal IF it was two-kids-eat per adult. If only one per adult was free, we’d split two meals between the three kids. (This would definitely no longer be possible!)
Most of the ones we found averaged about $10 per adult meal. I would usually look for their menu on line to be sure it was affordable.
I love the idea!
love this! thank you for sharing. 🙂
Fantastic vacation!! So neat that the kids realize already that money used one place is no longer available for another item/experience AND that they are able to delay gratification of the immediate desire in order to have the cash to do it!!!
Something you may not have thought of–eating in restaurants can lead to sudden weight gain when a frugal family has leftover portions of “kids meals” and someone feels compelled to see that nothing is wasted. It wasn’t! But the frugal person arrived home weighing almost 20 lbs more than before he left home!!! Taking your own picnic and breakfast food has been a real winner for us through the years!