Our friends, family, and colleagues are often surprised at how much we travel, knowing our small incomes and lack of savings! What is your secret??

The biggest secret in life, is that there is no secret!
Oprah Winfrey

The answer is, to quote Oprah, no secret at all! In this post, I dive straight into how we finance multiple trips abroad, as a low – to-middle earning family in the UK.

For information on how much all of our trips cost, I always put how much each trip cost in the intinerary, which can be found in the destination guides.

How do we afford to travel?

Do we have a profitable travel blog? No. Are we digital nomads? No. Do we have an inheritance? No. Do we have rental properties? No. Do we at least have well paid jobs?! Also no!

Travelling on a budget: It took us a long time and to be honest, a bit of a struggle to get on the property ladder here in the UK and we are reluctant to give up the security of a home for our family. At one stage, we did consider selling it to fund travel, but ultimately, we want to have a home base we know we can come back to.

At the moment we make it work for us by travelling as much as time and money will allow in the school holidays. House swapping and house sitting is something we have done in the past pre kids, and we would definitely consider this option in the future to travel for longer periods of time.

Its not perfect; we don’t have great pensions, we don’t have enough in our savings and our house could definitely do with some redecorating! We have chosen to spend money on travel and keep our home, allowing us to repay the mortgage and put a small amount in savings while spending the rest on travel. It’s a compromise we feel gives us the best out of our limited resources- we can’t do it all unfortunately, and we have seen first hand that old age and a leisurely retirement is a privilege denied to many- we may be keeping an eye on the future, but we want to enjoy our lives now, as well. Carpe diem!

It is a dream of ours to take a family gap year with the kids, but we definitely don’t have the money for this right now! However never say never, and at the moment we are working towards taking a longer trip – 6 to 12 weeks – this will still be years away realistically as we will be saving for it while still taking our shorter trips through out the year.

Believe me whenever I say we are an average family, juggling finances, work, and the school run, like many, many other families out there. However, we still make travelling work for us. If you would like to do the same, read on…

It’s all about prioritising, planning, and making the most of the available resources. Read on as I’m going to tell you exactly how we do just that!

Budget

First things first… do a budget. Sit down and see how much you have left after essential bills.

We are a low income family in the UK. My husband works as a carpenter, and I work as a healthcare assistant. Up until 2022, we were bringing in less than the average for a two income household. We now have reached the average, but still you can see that we are not wealthy by any means, and money can get tight, running a household and supporting two small children. Bills, childcare, etc, etc. I’m sure you know what I mean! Life gets expensive, especially with kids.

However. Travel and experience with the kids are a top priority for us (more on this in point 2!)

So, with our budget, after essential bills, we started saving what we could. Even if it wasn’t a lot, we saved a bit each month and had it come out as a direct debit every month like a bill. Even if it’s so small, it seems pointless, start. Because in a few years you might just have enough for a cheap air ticket, or train ride, or hotel deal.

When we started saving, I could only afford to put away £25 per month. Over the months, as our debts went down and salaries went up, we were able to put more by, and soon enough, we had enough to put towards a trip!

Make travel a priority

It goes without saying that we are in a privileged position to save any money at all, that we are able to meet our basic living costs, and to have some left over to decide how to spend.

We make travel a priority by making cutbacks and savings elsewhere. Lots of things friends and colleagues count as essentials, we go without, so we can save that money for travel. Basically, all of our spare money goes on travel. Read some more of our money saving ideas here to see if you, too, can free up some extra cash.

Some people say to us, “I could never afford to travel! “Or, “Are you secretley rich?!” I imagine ( and know for sure in some cases) they have a much higher income than us but they don’t prioritise travel in the same way, and think the cut backs we make in order to save are extreme. In the end, I guess it just comes down to preference!

Making the most out of a bad situation

We financed the whole of our trip to Australia with my husbands redundancy pay-out from January 2022. It was a bit scary to use James’ redundancy money on this, but we thought, to hell with it! And we did it. The modest pay-out was enough to cover the cost of the entire trip, but there wasn’t any left over to put aside for a rainy day, which is obviously a risk.

Luckily, he was able to secure another job straight away, so we viewed it that luck (or bad luck?!) Had presented us with this chance to take a trip of a lifetime with the kids. We are of the philosophy to live for the moment, and we wanted to grab this opportunity with both hands.

Redundancy and voluntary redundancy to fund travel is an audacious step, but it worked out for us.

Earn more

Easier said than done, right?! Especially with childcare costs to take into account, but it is one of the ways we save money for travelling. Boosting your income is the quickest and most efficient way to achieve your travel goals quickly.

We both love our jobs, and although we aim high, a promotion for either of us isn’t on the cards right now.

The options of working more with childcare is a delicate balance to get right, and when we have a big trip in mind, I will pick up extra shifts and my husband will too, and has even got temporary second jobs to meet our savings target.

We try and make sure the kids are getting quality time with us, and we work overtime in small bursts, making sure there is lots of family time scheduled in. One of the reasons we love to travel is to be together as a family; we don’t want to sacrifice all our family time in normal life so we can be together travelling.

We tend to work over time in evenings and weekends during late autumn and winter to save up a pot of savings for the next years travel, leaving spring, summer and early autumn free for adventures as a family at home and abroad.

When working over time, we do opposite shifts, so the kids always have a parent at home, and we aren’t spending money on babysitters or holiday clubs. It is hard work, but we feel it is worth it for the adventures together and the memories we create.

We are budget travellers

Cheap Flights. I spend a lot of time researching cheapest flight deals, using Skyscanner to change things like departure airports, which country to fly from, cheapest days to travel etc. Read my cheap flight hacks here. We also drive alot from the UK to Europe as for 4 of us, it’s way cheaper to drive than to fly a lot of the time, even with the cheaper flights.

We research the cheapest accommodation. We stay in campsites, family hostels, static homes, air b and b, and apartments. We sometimes stay in hotels, but we prefer a self-catering option ( another great way to save ££).

We don’t go spend money on expensive tourist trap attractions or experiences. While we will occasionally splurge for a special attraction, on the whole we look for free or low-cost activities while we are travelling. These tend to be things like walks, viewpoints, swimming locations, bike rides, museums, beaches, parks, and visiting local towns and villages.

We don’t eat out for every meal. This mainly applies to travelling we have done in Europe, Oceania, Japan and the U.S.A. – basically, the expensive countries! When we have visited Southeast Asia and India we eat out lot more because it is very budget friendly to do so.

We mainly stay in self catering accommodation, so that we can eat breakfast at ‘home’, make a packed lunch, and cook at ‘home’ too. Not only does this save money, but it is also way easier with kids to have food you know they will eat. I learnt the hard way that looking for restaurants with hangry little people, trying to find food they will actually eat, is not a fun way to spend a holiday!

We don’t want to miss out on all the food, though, as that is a part of travelling we all really enjoy. We tend to buy things like coffee, ice creams, drinks, snacks, tapas, and some lunches out rather than all of our main meals. We also like to try lots of street food and find this tends to be reasonably priced and delicious!

There are lots of other ways to make travel cheaper and more accessible.

There are families living and working abroad, house sitting (we have done this a lot pre kids and would do it again), or house swapping.

In conclusion, travelling the world with kids is not only possible but also incredibly rewarding, and with proper planning and budgeting is open to more families than people may think. By prioritising experiences over possessions, optimising costs through budget friendly activities and other hacks you can create unforgettable adventures and still have some security too. With creativity and resourcefulness, you can create memories together all over the world that are priceless, and that enriches your families lives for years to come with your little explorers!

If you love to travel and have found a creative way to make travel work for you, we would love to hear about it in the comments!

Hi! I’m Lizzie, a mum of two living in the Cotswolds. Here on Travel Happy Family, I share all of our travels with you, where we’ve been, how we got there, and how much it cost!

If you are looking for ideas on where to travel with your kids, inspiration for new destinations, or just want to follow us on our journey, welcome, and I hope you find what we write helpful.

Happy travels! Xxx