Financial Planning for Vacations

Planning your dream vacation starts now! Here’s a tip: instead of scrambling to pay for your trips last minute, why not save a little each month?

1️⃣ Estimate your yearly travel expenses.
2️⃣ Break it down into a monthly savings goal.
3️⃣ Automate savings into a high-yield savings account.
4️⃣ Enjoy guilt-free vacations knowing it’s all covered!

Even if you don’t have travel plans yet, we recommend still saving ahead. That way, you can pack your bags stress-free when the opportunity arises.

“One fun conversation we have with a lot of clients is financial planning and helping you plan for vacations for the year. Sometimes people will come to us and just say “I booked the vacation and I’m going to pay for it over the next couple months,” and so what we typically recommend is let’s try to first figure out how much are you going to spend in the year on vacation and then once we know that are we able to back up into a monthly savings amount so that we can just automate savings into a high yield savings account.

So we’re putting $300 into the high yield savings account every month that’s earning us 4% to 5% and then when that vacation comes up later in the year, I can just pull that money out and I know it’s taken care of. Or even backing into if I have a big trip this year I’m traveling internationally, how much do I think that’s going to cost? Looking at lodging, airfare, transportation, food and then maybe even adding an extra 1 to 2 thousand on top of that just to give you peace of mind. And then backing into that monthly savings number and saving money that way. And then also it’s powerful if you don’t have travel planned or trip planned still saving so that when it does come up you know the money’s there and you can go guilt-free.

If you don’t want to save every month for travel maybe it’s just: I know all my other goals have been taken care of through monthly savings and when I get a lump sum, maybe through a bonus or other form of lump sums, you just throw that into a travel bucket and you know the money’s there and that it can be taken care of.”