Where to Send Your Vacation Budget for This Year
I don’t know about you, but I started saving money for summer holidays in January. In fact, I have budget lines for two separate trips, one to friends and one to family.
I’m pretty sure none of these trips will take place. Not on schedule, anyway. This means that every time I log into YNAB ( you need a budget , my favorite budgeting app), I see the funds I have set aside for this experience and ask myself if it’s time to reallocate them.
Right now, I have two options. On the one hand, I could leave the money where it is and assume that at some point I will go again. Maybe in December for the holidays? (Even that seems really insecure.) Maybe I’ll go on these trips in the summer of 2021. In any case, the money will be there when I need it.
On the other hand, I could pull cash out of my travel budget and put it into my long-term savings / emergency fund. My emergency fund is pretty solid right now – according to YNAB, I have enough funds to cover my expenses for six months – but adding a couple thousand dollars back to my savings could give me another month of safety.
And we may all need a little extra protection right now.
I’m fortunate to be currently out of debt, and can follow this well-meaning financial advice to put some extra money in a bucket labeled “vacation” and leave it there until summer. Maybe the best option for me is to keep that money in a bucket until it’s safe to travel again. If I find myself in a situation where I need money for something else, well … I’ll just get it out of the bucket.
What about you? If you are saving money for summer vacations, what are you going to do with it? Are you already investing this in the day to day expenses caused by layoffs, cutbacks and layoffs? Are you hoping to spend it on travel this winter or next year? Do you put your vacation savings into your emergency fund? Do you use it to pay off your debt? Spending it on the world’s most luxurious getaway?
Concerning the stay: in June I take a vacation and call it “vacation” and I cannot tell you how much I look forward to it. I would recommend that you do the same if you can, because stress is real and burnout is real, and many of us have experienced more stress than usual for unusually long periods of time.
Maybe when I come back from not going anywhere, I can decide what to do with the money I didn’t spend on summer vacation.