HOW THIS family OF 4 TRAVELED THE world ON $130 A DAY

Posted: 7/28/16 | July 28th, 2016 (Updated prices and links on 7/7/2020)

It’s been a long time since we’ve had a blog post on family travel on this website so today, I’m excited to introduce to you Cliff. His San Francisco based family spent ten months traveling the world on a career break. They homeschooled and enrolled their kids in schools overseas, spent time with family, saw the world, and bonded as a family. And, they did so, on a budget this nomad is impressed with.

Today, Cliff is going to share how his family did it — and advice for other families looking to do a big round the world adventure!

My dream of taking my family on a world tour began in Nicaragua in the summer of 2012 with my two daughters, who were three years old and six months old at the time.

Most people thought my wife and I were crazy to go to central America with two little girls.

But, for three weeks, we relaxed at the beach in San Juan del Sur, rode horses through the countryside, and hung out in the bustling town of Granada.

It was an experience we vowed to repeat.

Over the next couple of years, we traveled together to various destinations, including Puerto Rico, Peru, Argentina, and Guatemala. We enjoyed these short trips but, the more we traveled, the more I wanted to go longer — I wanted a year-long trip around the world.

In 2015, that dream became a reality as we spent 10 months traveling in 10 countries.

But to make that happen we needed to be creative with how we saved and spent our money.

How We saved money and Budgeted for Our Trip

My family lives in one of the most expensive areas in the world: Silicon Valley outside San Francisco, California. housing prices are extremely high and the overall cost of living is higher than most cities in the United States. I worked as a marketing manager in technology companies while my wife took care of our two daughters.

After our trip in Nicaragua, we decided that we would make family travel a priority in our lives. From July 2012 to December 2014, we saved approximately $40,000 USD, which equates to $1,333 USD per month. saving that much money on one salary in one of the most expensive areas in the world was not easy. It took some crafty saving skills, but here is what we did:

I worked freelance jobs. I earned extra money for work on short-term marketing projects, in addition to my full-time job. now with the on-demand gig economy, there are many great options to earn extra money, including Uber and Lyft.

We refinanced our mortgage. With a lower interest rate for our home mortgage, we saved over $500 USD per month.

I reduced my 401(k) and 529 contributions. instead of putting all of my savings into my retirement account and my daughters’ education accounts, I decided to reallocate about $500 USD per month to our travel funds.

We reduced our spending. We cooked most meals, capping our food budget at $1,000 USD per month. We also stopped buying unnecessary electronics, clothing, and toys, limiting our discretionary spending to $500 USD per month.

By earning more, spending less, and reallocating a portion of my savings to travel, our travel budget gradually increased to a point where we felt comfortable enough to take time off to travel the world.

But in order for this trip to really make financial sense, we needed to do something about our house while we were away. We did this by renting our house with a family found through Craigslist.

Thankfully, this area is in demand and after accounting for our mortgage, insurance, and taxes, we were making $500 USD per month profit from the renters, which helped pad our travel fund.

Additionally, we sold our SUV, which ended our $700 USD per month lending payment. We also sold all our furniture and about 80% of our electronics, clothes, shoes, and toys through Craigslist and some local Facebook groups.

In total, we made about $5,000 USD from these sales.

With about $10,000 USD of extra money from rent payments and selling our stuff and the $40,000 USD in savings, we created a budget of $50,000 USD for our trip. We knew we had to make our money stretch as far as possible by being savvy with how we saved and spent on the trip.

How much We Spent

Below is a list of some of the expenses of our trip per country visited. (Later I’ll go into more detail about how we accomplished this.) With this information, I hope you realize that extended family travel around the world can be inexpensive and realistic.

All you need is a curiosity to explore the world, flexibility, and a bit of budgeting skills.

Honolulu, Hawaii 

Duration: 1 month

Accommodations: Free, stayed at my mother’s place

Transportation: $800 USD

Flights: $2,400 USD

Total: $6,000 USD

Phuket, Thailand

Duration: 3 months

Accommodations: $2,000 USD ($667 per month for one-bedroom apartment)

Transportation: $400 USD ($133 per month)

Schooling: $2,100 USD ($350 per month per kid)

Visa extensions: $200 USD total

Flight from Phuket to Hangzhou free with star alliance points

Total: $8,000 USD

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Duration: 3 days

Accommodations: $150 USD

Flights: $435 USD

$750 USD total

Hangzhou, China

Duration: approximately 2 months

Accommodations: Free, stayed at my wife’s parents’ place

Schooling: $400 USD total for 2 months ($100 per month per kid)

Total: $2,500 USD

Europe (Italy, Spain, France, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands)

Duration: 2.5 months

Accommodations: about $5,200 USD (average of $71/night) for 73 nights

Food: $3,500 USD (average of $47 per day)

Shopping and leisure activities: $1,500 USD (average of $20 per day)

Schooling: $800 USD for 4 weeks in Barcelona ($400 per month per kid)

Flights and transportation: $5,000 USD

Total: $16,000 USD

Hong Kong

Duration: 3 days

Accommodations: Free, stayed at friends’ place

Flights: free stopover in Hong Kong on the way back to Hangzhou from Europe

Total: $300 USD

Hangzhou, China

Duration: approximately 2 months

Accommodations: Free, stayed at my wife’s parents’ place

Total: $2,500 USD

Flights to Bay Area: $2,000 USD

Breakdown by expense Type

Flights: $9,000 USD

Other Transportation: $2,000 USD

Accommodations: $7,500 USD

Schooling: $3,300 USD

Food, shopping, and leisure activities: $17,750 USD

GRAND TOTAL: $39,550

How We saved money during Our Trip

In order for our travel budget to last 10 months, we had to be efficient with the way we spent our money. We did this in a number of ways:

We used Our frequent Flyer Miles.
Travel hacking was vital to our success. In total, I used 250,000 miles for free airplane tickets on star alliance airlines on this trip: 100,000 of those miles came from signup bonuses for Chase Sapphire preferred credit cards for both my wife and myself.

After $4,000 USD spent on each card, we were awarded the signup reward of 50,000 points, which were converted 1:1 for star alliance miles. It’s our travel credit card of choice because there are no foreign transaction fees. another 100,000 of those miles came from the accumulation of miles through flights flown by all four of us in the previous years.

The remaining 50,000 miles came through spending on the cards over two years. A great site I use is The points guy and Matt has a great book on the subject too.

We purchased cheap Flights
For flights that were paid in full, I used travel comparison sites like Google Flights and Kayak to find the best prices.

In Asia and Europe, there were many budget airlines that made flying economical, so those flights didn’t take a huge chunk of our travel budget.

For example, for all four of us, one-way flights from Venice to Barcelona were $420 USD on Vueling Airlines and round-trip flights from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur were $435 USD.

We Stayed at Our Parents’ Places
For about 45% of our time away from home, we stayed with my mother in Honolulu, Hawaii, and my wife’s folks in Hangzhou, China. Not only did we spend quality time with our extended families, but we also saved a ton of money on accommodations.

While our situation is unique in that we have parents in different parts of the world, there are great options for free housing, including sites like Couchsurfing, Servas, Hospitality Club, and housesitting opportunities.

It’s not as easy as what we had but it still works and is an option families can use!

We Rented Apartments
Airbnb was vital to helping us stay on budget. especially in Europe, where accommodations costs can be expensive, we stayed in furnished apartments ranging from a studio in Paris to a two-bedroom apartment in Barcelona for an average of $71 USD/night.

Our accommodations costs were much cheaper than if we had stayed in hotels. 

We Did free Activities
There are lots of free activities to do with kids while abroad, including going to beaches, parks, markets, shopping malls, churches, and outdoor festivals. even for expensive cities like Rome and Barcelona, there were always free things to do. For example, from having read an article in national Geographic, we went to the Picasso museum in Barcelona on one of its free Sundays, and we walked around the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona to watch the various street performers.

We cut Our transportation Costs
In Phuket, we rented a moped (for all four of us!) for $133 USD per month. In China, we took cheap taxis or rode the bus. In Europe, we rode the subways or the buses, which were not expensive (e.g., $1 USD per bus ride in Florence and Barcelona). By taking public transportation or walking whenever possible, we kept our daily transportation costs low.

We cooked most Meals
With a kitchen at our parents’ places or our Airbnb apartments, we ate a majority of our meals at home, especially in Europe. When we ate at restaurants, we ate simply or at inexpensive lunch buffets (e.g., $10 USD for a Japanese lunch buffet in Florence).

In Asia, eating at restaurants was fairly cheap, so we didn’t need to cook at home as much.

FaMilytravel: Slutliga tankar

Familjresor kan vara stressande, med all planering, rörelse, logistik, nya tidszoner, nya språk, olika livsmedel och ta hand om barnen. Det är aldrig riktigt en semester med barn, för majoriteten av din tid och energi kommer att användas för att ta hand om dem.

Men familjeresor är också mycket givande.

När du reser tillsammans samlar du minnen och bygger bindningarna i din familj genom de delade upplevelserna av att vara i olika länder, interagera med olika människor, tala olika språk och äta olika livsmedel. Genom att komma ut ur dina komfortzoner och resa i världen tillåter du din familj att lära sig och växa på sätt som aldrig kunde hända hemma.

Ett av mina varmaste minnen (och det finns många) kommer när vi bodde i Spanien. Vi hittade en trespråkig förskola (engelska, spanska och tyska) som gjorde det möjligt för våra döttrar att registrera sig för hela vår vistelse i Barcelona.

De blev nedsänkta i den spanska kulturen och språket, fick lokala vänner och gick på många fältresor. Det var otroligt att se dem lära sig att interagera med lokalbefolkningen, lära sig en kultur och växa som människor.

De utvecklade en kulturell förståelse som bara inte hade varit möjlig om vi hade stannat hemma. Jag vet att detta är en positiv upplevelse som kommer att leva med dem för alltid.

Oavsett om det är tre veckor under en vinterpaus, tre månader på sommaren, eller ett helt år, är budgetfamiljresor möjligt. Att resa genom tio länder på tio månader med min familj var en stor inlärningsupplevelse och en dröm.

Trots all huvudvärk, feber, upprörda magar, varma dagar, förlorade föremål, frustrerande situationer och allt annat som vi gick igenom under vår resa, var det värt det och vi växte närmare varandra som en familj.

Och det finns ingen bättre känsla än det som förälder.

Boka din resa: Logistiska tips och tricks
Boka din flygning
Hitta en billig flygning genom att använda Skyscanner. Det är min favorit sökmotor eftersom den söker på webbplatser och flygbolag runt om i världen så att du alltid vet att ingen sten lämnas omvänd.

Boka ditt boende
Du kan boka ditt vandrarhem med Hostelworld. Om du vill stanna någon annanstans än ett vandrarhem, använd Booking.com eftersom de konsekvent returnerar de billigaste priserna för pensionat och hotell.

Glöm inte reseförsäkring
Reseförsäkring kommer att skydda dig mot sjukdom, skada, stöld och avbokningar. Det är ett omfattande skydd om något går fel. Jag åker aldrig på en resa utan den eftersom jag har varit tvungen att använda den många gånger tidigare. Mina favoritföretag som erbjuder bästa service och värde är:

SafetyWing (bäst för alla)

Försäkra min resa (för de över 70)

Medjet (för ytterligare evakueringstäckning)

Redo att boka din resa?
Kolla in min resurssida för de bästa företagen att använda när du reser. Jag listar alla de jag använder när jag reser. De är de bästa i klassen och du kan inte gå fel med att använda dem på din resa.