Exactly How To Save Your First £1000 To Travel The World. The 6 Step Guide To Catching Flights

Introduction

I expect that you are here because you’ve probably had 100s of dreams of abot exploring the world? You’ve wanted to quit your job or uni, break up with your boss and sack off your lecturer to finally have the freedom to go and explore the plant?

But wait, you don’t have any savings, doesn’t it cost a lot to go and travel the world? Maybe it’s just not for me…

Money! It’s kind of a buzzkill isn’t it?

And now you find yourself back to square one, sitting next to your washing machine door pretending it’s a plane window asking yourself things like, if I don’t travel now will I be able to in the future? Will I be fit and healthy enough to do it when I retire? I’ve never been great with saving so how on earth would I save for something so big? Do I really have to work for the rest of my life to have some freedom at the end? What if I never get to see the world before I die? How will I ever get the money to do this?

Each of these questions should be leading you to a simple conclusion

To see the world you need to master your money. If you can do that, you become the boss of your dreams.

My name is Josh Smith and I worked and travelled for 5 years of my life before I decided to settle in the UK.

I’m not an “expert” or a “guru” or anything like that. I really hate those terms. All that matters to me is being able to travel. And to speak plainly, I have gotten real-world results.

I have travelled, lived and worked in places like Australia, New Zealand, China, India, Thailand and Greece. I have years of experience in the tourism industry across the world and I know it inside out. I have worked in any role you can think of, from a cleaner, bar staff, hostel manager, travel agent, and travel agency manager always with the goal of helping people to make their dreams of travelling the world come to life. I know what it takes to find a good deal and to make your money go further, and most importantly for you I learnt how to make money work for me so that I could travel and that is what we you are going to learnt today.

And don’t worry I am not a trust fund baby, my parents didn’t fund my trips, I also don’t have 100k instagram followers or any sleazy brand deals, I don’t know any secret tricks to earning passive income, or any new formulas to grow money on trees I did all of this on a less than average income of £23,000.

I did exactly what you are probably already doing right now, and I got to see some of the most amazing places in the world and if I can do that then so can you.

The next few steps you are going to read are the exact things that I did to be able to see the world for 5 years, and honestly they are much simpler than you think. I can hand on heart to tell you right now that the years I spent travelling the world were the best of my life and the exciting thing for me is that I get to help you do that now too.

I can’t wait for the moment when you arrive at a place you have dreamed of visiting, with a smile from ear to ear, full of excitement for what is about to happen.

It’s a magical feeling and once you have felt it once, you will chase it for the rest of your life.

The simple truth is that ANYONE can go and travel the world, you’ve just gotta want it enough…

How do I save for my trips?

By far the most common worry I hear from potential travellers is that they do not have enough money to go away on a trip. This is usually the biggest thing that stops people from being able to achieve their dreams. A lot of people think they will wait until they retire so they have the money and time to be able to go and do it. I will show you exactly how I have been able to save and budget for my trips and how you can take some really easy steps to start bringing your adventure to life, TODAY.

To achieve your financial goals so that you can travel as much as you want you to need to be brave. You need to understand your relationship with money and how you use it. If you want to make your dream of travelling the world a reality you have to make a promise to yourself that you will improve your relationship with money, if you can commit yourself to this, you will be literally flying in no time.

As you continue to read you will see the process I went through to be able to budget and fund my travels, these will give you direction on what you can do because they are so simple, however the effort and drive has to come fro you.

Bill and Ben The Flower Pot Men

Ben can’t do anything if his Bills are holding him back. You need to get to grips with your bills and outgoings in order to be able to control them. After this, you can take steps to lower them and reduce any debts that you have. The general rule I follow here is if it is not essential, and it does not get used in my daily life then I ditch it. And I mean CU IT OUT, GONE, SEE YA, BYEEEEEEEEEE.

If you don’t know what bills are coming out for your account, when they are coming out and what they are for then you need to take a good look and find out. You need to log onto your bank account and look at what bills you have going out, make a note of these and see if there are any that you can reduce or get rid of all together.

That might sound like the simplest of instructions but you would be surprised how many people have no idea what they are paying money for. EVeryone always say yeah yeah I know what going out, blah blah blah because they don’t want to look silly or sound like they don’t have any money. Firsty you are here on your own reading this page, and I can’t see your bank account for you. So take some responsibility, login and go through your statement line by line, it might be hard to look at and realise but you have to get this right if you want to leave your own postcode anytime soon.

Don’t be Spenny

Buying stuff to look cool in front of others is not cool. The latest tech and clothes might be tempting but there will always be a better version coming round the corner. Are you going to waste your money chasing that or do you want to spend it chasing waterfalls? There is a balance to find, you don’t want to be rocking a Nokia 3310 just make sure you are getting a good value on any essential items. — which by the way is only your phone.

Next time you are scrolling through amazon buying the latest in “make me look cool” technology just stop before you hit the “buy now” button and ask yourself do I really need this? or do I want another week in paradise?

Psst, the answer is no you don’t need this YES I do want another week in paradise.

In fact I would suggest you delete all shopping app and login off your phone right now, right at this second. How much of your online spending is stopping you from staying in that floating bungalow in Koh Sok National Park? And don’t give me any of this crap about my friend having this, or I need it for this because honestly it’s just not true. If you really want to see the world you don’t need to own 10 pairs of trainers.

Be pragmatic with your spending

Spending £8.99 on a Netflix subscription to reduce the number of times you go out partying every month is a good investment. If it stops you spending £75 on jagerbombs and gin every weekend then it is worth it. Don’t strip things back so much that you have nothing to do with your time, because that will lead to boredom which will lead to you spending money. There is a balance to be found and this is much easier to do once you have worked out your income, bill and saving targets.

You need to learn to say no to things as well. You can not give 100% to lots of different things because you end up with nothing. If you try to buy a new car, go out every weekend, save to travel, and buy new clothes you will quickly find you are not going to hit your targets. You don’t have to become a recluse but you will need to cut out some of your spending so that it can go into your savings.

Work hard, play harder.

You thought this would be all sunshine and Mojitos, didn’t you? I am afraid nothing worth doing comes easy. There are times when you have got to roll up your sleeves and get on with the job at hand.

And if you want to go travelling then you need to have an income, if you can find something that you love doing to help fund your trips even better. You will not be working in this job forever if it is a means to an end then go ahead and get on with it. Sometimes you will have to settle for a job or income that is not your first choice, but that is what you have to do some time to achieve your dreams.

And on the flip side of that, no matter what they tell you when you are in school, university or as you are growing up you do not have to decide what career you want right away. In fact you would be able to make a better decision on that once you spent 5 years travelling the world, because you would have experienced so much more and you will be much more aware of the things you love doing.

My advice to you on days when you are finding it tough and your travel dreams seem so far away is to visualise the moment you are looking forward to the most on your trip. Spend time thinking about it and build your excitement. I like to think about the moment I will lock eyes with a wild Elephant, I still dream about that now. It’s knowing that magical moments like these are going to happen that will help you push through and own the day.

Once you have your bills and spending under control you will need to make sure that you have enough money coming in to be able to save for your trip. If you need more money go and get it. You could

• Sell your old clothes on Depop
• Flip stuff on eBay,
• Ask for more hours at work
• Get a second job.
• As for a pay rise

Just £50 extra a week can get you that ‘windswept I’ve been on a speedboat look’ sooner than you think.

If you want to take this trip, make it happen for yourself.

Stash that Cash.

It’s such a great feeling when that pay hits your account — you’re buzzing, life is good and then you look three days later and it is gone. Sound familiar to you?

This was the cycle I lived in for a long time but one simple change in mindset got me enjoying saving money instead of spending it. I am not kidding you here, this easy step (I can not stress to you how easy this was) changed my relationship with money and allowed me to finally be able to save to go and see the world.

1. Go to your bank or online and open a savings account to run alongside your current account.
2. On the day you get paid, transfer your travel savings into that new savings account.
3. Leave enough in your current account to cover your bills and any pre planned social events for that month.
4. Don’t touch the money in your savings — You can even get some accounts where they are locked until a certain date.

Once you understand that you should ‘spend what is left after saving, not save what is left after spending’ you will take control of your dreams, and not just your travelling ones.

I know it seems very basic and an obvious thing to do but often the answer is right there staring us in the face. Honestly in my entire time as a travel agent maybe only 5 or 6 people have ever said that they had this saving mindset already and I have sent 1000s of people on trips. And once they decided to start doing this they were able to save their way to their dreams sometimes in only a few weeks.

Make it real…

This is the money shot. If you have no end goal or target what are you even doing? If you have no reason to save the money then you won’t ever be able to.

All the gurus in the world will tell you there is a fine art to setting targets but really it is very simple. Set a long term target with lots of mini-milestones along the way. That’s it. No really, it is.

When we set long term targets it is hard to stay on track with them because the result is so far away. By setting lots of mini-milestones you will have something to celebrate from the start and that will keep you motivated as you get closer every day, week or month.

In the context of saving for a trip, I like to set those milestones as experiences, trips or things that I will be doing while I am on travelling,

For example, my first milestone might be a sailing trip on the Whitsundays in Australia. If the trip is £200 I set that as my first target and I aim for one week. Once I have saved that I go ahead and just book it in so I have something to look forward to that keeps me motivated and excited.

A lot of people like to book a trip on a deposit and pay it off as it gets closer to the departure date. This really gives people something to aim for and usually gives them a kick up the arse. This is exactly what ahd to do with my first trip. I had to make it real, once it was real I had to get my head down and go for it.

If you are anything like me you always have the great ideas, you want to do 100 things but you never really get around to doing them? You might start things and then forget about them and then realise a few months later but by then it is too late.

If you are going to get yourself on the first plane trip, then you’ve got to learn the skills above, and you have to keep the trip at the front of you mind as much as you can. To do this I have a bucket list of places I want to visit and things I want to do. I set the goals as the background to my phone, i’ve even written on my bedroom walls to remind myself everyday that this is what I am aiming for. Whatever way works for you then do it. Find something you can look at everyday to remind you of your goals, and even better write them out as often as you can wherever you can. If you write it enough your mind will already believe that it is happening and you will find hitting your goals so much easier.

Finally I want to answer 2 of the biggest questions I get asked about travelling

1. How do I save money to travel and still see my friend and stay social?

Now I am not saying that you need to become a recluse in order to see the world, humans are social people we need to interact with one another so here are my tips for not losing all your mates so you can see the world.

• Make your dream public
• Tell them that you won’t be hanging out as much because you need to save to achieve your dreams
• Find free or low cost things to do with your mates
• Pre plan social events and set a budget for each on so you don’t overspend
• Don’t beat yourself up if you are not perfect 100% of the time life is about balance but you will need to be on it if you want to save to travel

1. How can I travel for free?

I get asked this question on an hourly basis and the truth is there are a couple of ways to do it, but honestly the best way to go and see the world is to follow the information you have just read. I will however share a couple of these with you now,I’ll be upfront with you unless you are a big name, star or influencer then you are not getting your whole trip for free, but you can get some of it.

If you are going to be travelling a lot then look at what companies have loyalty schemes to get you to come back to them, you can build up points or vouchers over time and use them to get free trips.

If you want free trips without having to spend your money then try and get a job in the industry, travel agents are often sent on trips to make it easier for them to talk to others about. I was lucky to get a few of these over the years and it really helped me to see more of the world. You are also getting paid at the same time so it almost feels like they are paying you to travel.

Finally you can have a crack at becoming a travel influencer online and work with brands to promote their trips. Honestly I’ve never done this but I do know people that have. You just need to have patience, consistency and be yourself, that’s what people love. Posting valuable content that educates and entertains people will get you there. Once you have a strong engaged community around you then travel brands will be falling over each other to try and speak to you.

Now it all comes down to you…

That’s all there is to it. With a little time, a few sacrifices and an hour or so of planning you could be flying away on your first trip around the world in no time.

This is really cliche and 100% cheesy but travelling the world really changed my life, and I get to relive those memories every single day. By adjusting my relationship with money and being really honest with myself about my spending I was able to travel for 5 years. I moved from location to location and worked in different jobs as I went. I worked really hard in the 4 months before my trip to save as much as I could.

I pre booked all the really important landmarks and places I wanted to visit before I went so I knew that I would be 100% sure I could see them. Then when I started to run low on spending money I found a job, worked for a couple of months and then moved on again and that continued on for 5 years.

If you can aim to save your first £1000 and see it in your bank account you will find saving the next £1000 easy and it only gets easier after that. As soon as you can make the trip real by putting down a deposit or booking one small part of it. And write your goals down every single day to remind you why you are doing this.

If you can master this, you can travel forever.

Now go and be free,

Josh Smith