So a lot of you guys have been asking all these questions about
how it is that we managed to travel around the world so much?
Is it some kind of secret Trust Fund?
Or is it some kind of job that just jets us around the world to all of these different locations?!
So if you stick around, I'll let you in on my little secret.
And more importantly, I'll show you how you can do it too!
This video is sponsored by Squarespace.
How we travel is a bit like an Instagram photo.
That is that the reality is not quite as it appears in the picture.
Here's the thing. I have been financially independent since I was 17 or 18 years old.
No, I'm not a trust fund baby. And no, I do not have a high paying job that takes me all over the world.
The fact is, I was working minimum wage jobs until my late 20s.
Yet, despite this,
I still managed to work my way through college.
Travel extensively in Southeast Asia, Africa, and Europe.
So the question is, how did I do it?
I did it with three easy steps.
Step number one is to work and work hard and smart.
Let's face it, if you're not one of these lucky people with a trust fund or have some kind of high paying job that jets you around the world,
you're like the majority of us out there!
So the rest of us in the real world have to find a job.
That's like a job that pays money
so that we can create an income.
I didn't get my first real job until I was in my late 20s.
And what I mean by a real job is a job that paid
more than minimum wage, provided some kind of health insurance, vacation time, and access to a retirement fund.
Prior to this for over a decade, I was working all of these dead end jobs and boy were some of them doozies!
It was like factory work, window cleaning, office cleaning, janitorial work.
I spent most of my 20s working as a coffee barista,
working full time, going to college, and saving money to travel.
So how did I manage to save money to go traveling?
So step one is to work and create an income.
And step two is to live below your means.
And that means you can never spend more per month then you earn per month.
So start with a budget and track all of your expenses and all of your income per month.
And if you cannot do this, you will never be able to get to step three.
Now you need to reduce your monthly expenses and any unnecessary spending has to stop.
Eating out everyday is not essential. Netflix is not essential. Your gym bill is not essential. Your cable TV is not essential.
That thing you saw that you think you have to have is not essential.
So your largest monthly expenses are going to be your housing, your transportation, and your food.
And you can reduce all of these. You can reduce your transportation by dumping your car and taking a bus or bicycling or walking.
If you're renting, you can move to a cheaper part of town and take in some roommates as well.
And then for food, it's like learn to cook!
It's cheaper to go to a grocery store and cook at home instead of eating out every day.
When I worked that minimum wage coffee job in my 20s, I lived in a shared house with four roommates.
The rent, the electric, and the phone line was all split five ways.
We didn't have cable TV. I didn't have a car. I walked and I took the bus everywhere.
I cooked a fixed menu every week for years.
I got my grocery bills down to the equivalent to less than $25 per week in today's dollars.
I was eating the same menu each week for months.
At the beginning of the week, it would start off with some kind of spaghetti sauce and by the end of the week it wound up being a chili sauce.
The budgeting and keeping it up is the hard part. If you are totally unable to do that, you will never get to the fun part, which is saving money.
That's where you take all of your hard earned income throughout the month.
Take away all of your squeezed expenses throughout the month.
And that leaves you with some cash which is your saved money.
The fun part is watching your savings grow over time knowing that at some point in time,
you're going to be able to use that for something you really want to do like travel.
The creative part of this is to constantly be reviewing your budget
to find ways to reduce your monthly expenses to increase your savings.
Of course the other way to increase your savings is to increase your income.
You can do this by starting a side hustle or taking on a second job in the evenings.
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So there we have it! That is how I've always afforded to travel.
I simply worked hard, lived well below my means, and saved every penny.
What started out as an absolute necessity in my teens
just to get by, I just kept doing. And I continue to do today and that is to live below my means.
Over time, your job may change and your income can go up and down.
But as long as you are living below your means, you'll always be able to save some money
to spend on those things in life that have so much more meaning for you personally.
Thanks for watching, and I hope you found this interesting.
Drop a comment below and let me know how you guys save money to do the things that you really enjoy.