My family will depart for a huge overseas adventure in less than a month. We’ll start in Australia and stay for nearly two months.
Then, we’ll do a couple of quick hops to Spain via Singapore and Qatar, where we’ll embark on a transatlantic cruise to the United States with a group of world-schooling families.
Once we get to the US, we will figure out a way back home via Melbourne, Australia.
We plan to accumulate more frequent flier points as we go to reduce the cost of transpacific tickets.
It really is a case of around the world in 80 days. This kind of fast travel isn’t our preferred way of travelling, but the opportunity presented itself, and since we’re all about making memories, we jumped at the chance.
This isn’t a travel blog, so I’m not here to share all the itineraries.
What I can share are the tips I’m using to save as much money as possible on our trip.
Spending less on the trip
These are my top three tips for saving money on a huge trip:
Use cashback sites for accommodation bookings.
Cashback sites save you money by offering a portion of the commission they earn from retailers back to you when you make purchases through their links.
When you shop through these sites, they receive a commission from the retailer for referring you. They then share a percentage of this commission with you as cashback.
I predominantly use Booking dot com to book our trips – they are listed with most cashback sites.
I mainly use Cashrewards and Shopback – depending on who has the highest commission on the day.
I try to make my bookings on days they have at least 10% cashback (I’ve seen them go as high as 15% on special event days)
Cashback is paid 75 days after travel is completed, so it’s not an instant saving.
I just keep an eye on the site and cash out as I hit the threshold.
Travel in low season
It’s easier said than done. However, avoiding New Zealand and Australian school holidays makes our trip to Queensland much more affordable.
While we will be in Australia for QLD holidays towards the end of our trip, during that time we will take part in a two-week group tour that has already been paid for.
Low-season travel also means smaller crowds, essential for my youngest son, who cannot cope with large crowds.
Use Wise to maximise currency rates
Wise helps save money on travel in several ways.
Wise offers competitive exchange rates with low, transparent fees compared to traditional banks and currency exchange services. This means you get more for your money when converting currencies.
The Wise debit card allows you to spend money in different currencies without incurring hefty foreign transaction fees.
It automatically converts your money at the real exchange rate when you spend, helping you avoid hidden fees.
I have Wise linked to my Google Pay, and my husband uses it via Apple Pay with no issues.
Wise provides a multi-currency account that lets you hold and manage money in multiple currencies. This is particularly useful for frequent travellers who can avoid multiple conversion fees by holding local currencies (as I do when I earn USD or EUR, for example).
The Wise card allows free ATM withdrawals up to a certain limit each month, which can reduce the costs associated with accessing cash abroad.
We always withdraw the maximum amount in local currency each month to maximise this benefit.
We’re big fans – you can read more about using Wise here.
Even with trying to save where possible, this trip is costing an absolute boatload of money.
Paying for the trip
So, how can we afford to pay for this trip?
The answer is – a combination of savings, investments, rental income, business income and selling our stuff.
We’re not earning huge incomes – we take $900 a week to live on in New Zealand, and that’s it.
We save/invest $250 of that but still, the math ain’t mathing on pure weekly savings.
We have decided to cash in one of our investments. This fund is the result of many hours of overtime, extreme frugality and consistent savings since around 2017, so the decision to cash it in (albeit slowly) has not been easy.
If you go back to my 2021 update – this would be Investment 1, which was $173,000ish at the time.
Since then, we’ve withdrawn over $65,000, put in $18,000 and had returns of around $13,000. Our balance now sits at just under $ 140,000 NZD.
We withdraw from this fund as needed to pay for big expenses like accommodation, flights, and cruises. Most of those costs have already been accounted for in previous withdrawals.
We will continue to take $900 a week from my part-time online business.
We are also renting out our house to long-term tenants, giving us a more regular and steady income than a short-term rental which was our original intention.
Unfortunately, our local council is cracking down on Airbnb and will only allow 60 days per year without an expensive consent process and charging commercial rates.
Our home is a simple, small, low-end property that would have been aimed at budget travellers, so it’s just not worth the hassle.
Lastly, I’ve been selling bits and pieces on Facebook marketplace to boost the cash pot.
Travel Budget
Our goal is to spend a maximum of $300NZD per day on our trip. We’d like to spend less and plan to do as many house sits as we can to achieve that goal.
We’ve signed up with Kiwi Housesitters (use code J69TRA for $10 off your membership) and Aussie Housesitters (use code R9R8NX for $10 off your membership).
We plan to house-sit when we return to New Zealand until we decide what to do next.
We plan to join Truster Housesitters for more international sits in 2025.
We’ll likely spend a big chunk of 2025 in Southeast Asia, where our money goes a lot further and we can live well for $5000NZD per month.
I’m frazzled, stressed out, and crazy busy with all the moving parts required to pack up a life. Doubt is creeping in, but we’re doing it anyway.
