Traveling is expensive, and usually, it’s even more expensive when traveling to another country. Overseas flights are almost always more costly than flying domestically, for example.
If you are traveling to another country for the first time in particular, meaning that your experience with traveling overseas is practically non-existent, it’s vitally important that you be aware of a few mistakes that many new travelers make and that end up proving to be very costly to them in the long run.
Here are the top financial mistakes that you will be wise to avoid when traveling to another country for the first time:
Failing To Budget Yourself
Fundamentally, you need to budget yourself for traveling just like how you need to budget yourself for your day-to-day life.
There are many expenses that are going to add up very quickly when you travel: leaving your car at the airport parking lot, nights in the hotel room, food, and miscellaneous expenses to name a few things.
Fortunately, budgeting yourself for travel is not difficult and can easily be accomplished on a simple spreadsheet. What’s most important is that you know every dollar you bring in and every dollar that goes out.
Booking In The Days Before You Travel
Never book days ahead of your trip. Instead, book weeks if not months ahead. As was noted in the introduction, flights will always be more expensive when traveling overseas, but they will also be much cheaper if you can book them well ahead of time.
The same goes for hotel rooms too. Simply research the hotels and flights in regards to your travel destination and book now rather than later. Depending on the length of your trip and your location, it’s more than possible to save several hundreds if not thousands of dollars by doing so.
Failing To Get A Good Exchange Rate
When you convert from one currency to the next, you will always have to pay a margin of the exchange rate. This exchange rate can vary significantly depending on the service you use, but generally speaking, it will be considerably high at most airports.
Instead of using airport exchange services, you may be better served by using an online remittance service such as Remitly. In just a matter of minutes after creating an account online, you can have the money converted and sent to you at a specified address in your destination country.
Adding Checked Luggage
If it’s at all possible, you should only try to fly with carry-on bags, as flying with checked luggage from one airport to the next and from one airline to the next is going to cost you several hundred dollars as well.
While this may require you to make sacrifices with what you can and cannot bring, the truth is that learning how to fly and travel lightly is a very good skill to learn. If you have two jackets packed, for instance, chances are good that you’ll really only need one.
The same goes for other items as well. Make a list of your needs and wants, and focusing on reducing the amount of ‘wants’ that you pack into your bags as much as travel. Chances are good that you can fit in everything you need into your carry on bag.
Not Making Money While You Travel
Here’s another great tip for reducing the amount of money you have to spend while traveling: simply make money while you travel.
There are a massive number of online freelancing opportunities through websites such as Upwork or Guru, where you can do anything from writing articles to social media marketing to website design to graphic design and so on.
This isn’t mean to add onto the stress that you may already feel from traveling, so only take on a minimal amount of work that you can handle, such as 1-2 hours of work in the hotel room or at a coffee shop. Even if you only make $10 to $30 a day from doing so, that’s money that you can use for eating out and other expenses on your trip.
Top Financial Mistakes To Avoid When Traveling To Another Country
By being aware of these mistakes, you can avoid them on your first trip, and save a lot of money in stark contrast to most other first time travelers.
