For most of my life, I hated saving money. Actually, that’s still the case, but I found a way. You probably need to bank some cash as well, so here are a few tested-and-proven ways from the guy who used to suck at this.
First, set up an online savings account. ING Direct was mine for a long time, but there are lots. Do not link that account to your regular accounts. This is a piggy bank. What goes in has to be hard to get out.
With that set up, start funneling money in. There are countless ways to do this, but there are three I really like, because they’re automatic and you don’t even notice.
Wages: Set up direct deposits into that account each payday. Start slow with an amount you won’t notice, like $50 per pay check or 5-percent of your wages, then increase every few months. Every time you get a raise, redirect half of the increase or all of it if you can.
Windfalls: If your company pays out bonuses, immediately deposit that money into your piggy bank.
Tax refunds: Tax withholding is a great self-imposed savings plan. On your W2 form, set your allowances to zero to maximize the your refund the following year, and then have that refund directed to your piggy bank. True, you lose the time-value of that money for a few months, but if you’re someone who spend their money when their balance allows, this is money safely locked away.
Stop calling it “saving” and instead call it “spending on my future.” Semantic backbends are so much easier than regular ones.
Also, start to contextualize dollars with the things they’ll buy later. A $15 deposit into savings is a dull abstraction, but two nights in an Ecuadorian hostel isn’t. A $300 deposit isn’t just numbers on a screen; it’s a plane ticket from Istanbul to Mumbai. A $3 deposit is an egg coffee and croissant at a café Saigon. You get the idea.
Ultimately, you’re trading a little austerity in present for a lot of awesomeness in the future, which sounds like mental trickery because that’s what it literally is.
The great mystery of my thirties was the hole in the bottom of my bank account. The moment money went in, it vanished. Every month, I’d look at my statements, justify the charges and lament the cost of living in New York.
Then two months before I departed, I sat down to cancel the automatic charges. “This won’t take long,” I thought. How naïve. Canceling them became the song that never ends.
The number of drafts was so overwhelming, I thought it was 1968. There were the New York Times, Netflix, HBO, Hulu and magazine subscriptions. There were charitable and political donations. There was the gym membership I no longer had time to use, Amazon Prime, Grindr, Spotify, Scruff, Nest home monitoring unemployment insurance and a partridge in a pear tree. I’d even subscribed to vitamins. What?!
There was also the home internet, cell phone, gas and power, which had to wait but had become surprisingly costly when I wasn’t looking.
Even just canceling the optional ones though suddenly left me with a lot of extra cash at the end of that first month. I sent it straight into my piggy bank feeling regretful I hadn’t done it sooner.
These are not easy times to be a miser, but there’s a lot you can cancel now. Do it and create a monthly wire transfer into your piggy bank in the exact amount you would have spent.
Here are a few more things you can eliminate to pocket the savings:
It’s sickening how easily companies and peer pressure convince us to upgrade to premium products and services when we’d be served just as well by something basic.
If you work out at Equinox, for example, and switch to Crunch, you can save roughly $2,200 each year. That’s enough for a month in Turkiye.
Here are other ways to scale back:
For every one of these things, determine how much you save and direct that difference to your savings account each month.
My privacy policy is simple: I don’t share your information.
Yea, it’s just a name, email and nationality, but I’m sure there are people who would pay for it. My thoughts on that: fuck those people and fuck those fuckers who sell personal information to them. You’ll find none of that monkey business here.
If I get hacked and your info get stolen, I’ll shoot you a note to let you know. I don’t deal in passwords, credit cards or anything like that though, so there’s almost nothing for anyone to take.
To see the full privacy policy — it’s pretty boring and cost me a lot of money — you can follow the link at the bottom of the page or in the confirmation email.
Domestic American air travel is a racket run by three major companies and a few smaller ones who effectively collude on prices to screw passengers and support their bloated executives and corporate structures.
Even regional jets, which are technically independent, are fucking death traps that I literally never, ever fly.
It’s not this way in other countries, because most people are sensible and see transportation as akin to a public utility. It’s therefore common to find flights on foreign carriers for under $100. I frequently see fares less $50.
Booking far in advance is therefore unnecessary, except of course in places where tickets sell out. Avoid the temptation to book months or weeks out if you’re just trying to save money. Not only will doing so lock you into dates you might regret, you may end up paying. Why? Booking sites now sniff for your computer’s location and display higher prices for foreigners.
Rude, right? Blame the mirror. We invented that.
First, some bad news for most Americans: automatic transmissions are as rare overseas as manuals are in the US. Unless you want to seriously overpay, make friends with someone who owns an old Miata and learn.
Second, anyone who wants to rent a car should obtain an international driver’s permit. This is easy — just 30 minutes at AAA.
When it’s time to rent, don’t get tempted by lower prices with small, local companies. Go with a big multi-national.
Understand your insurance situation through-and-through. Know the limits of your credit card’s automatic coverage and have a printout of the policy. If you can get a translated copy, even better. If you’re still in doubt after all that, just pay for their coverage.
Research the scams. Before you drive off the lot, walk around the vehicle and video record it. When you return the car, do the same. Also record yourself locking it and depositing the key in the night box if you return after hours.
If you get a notice from the rental company later saying you owe for damage or not returning the car, you can send them those videos with an E-vite to go get fucked. You might also copy tourist law enforcement, so they get fined to oblivion.
It’s tricky, but you need to basically study each country’s road laws and signs like you’re getting your student driver’s permit again. Most places have tricky rules, and they love to fine gringoes like us for violating them.
In Cyprus, for example, you can be fined for eating or drinking anything behind the wheel, even a Snickers. In Denmark, you’re legally required to look under your car before you get inside to ensure no one is underneath. In Spain, drivers with poor vision have to carry a spare set of glasses. Dirty cars are illegal in Russia, as is splashing pedestrians on a rainy day in Japan.
In some places, driving is really difficult. I pity any fool who tries to drive in Cairo. You can also very swiftly kill yourself on a German highway if you’re untrained. Driving at 120 MPH is far more complex than simply pressing the accelerator further.
Fare classes are highly inconsistent.
First class in one country is generally different to first class in any other. The same is true of second, third and so on. They vary wildly by country and system.
If it’s fiscally reasonable, I choose first for early mornings and overnights. They really are better, even just for security of your belongings.
The one time I settled for a second-class overnight, I had to physically fight a mouth-breathing Russian girl who was sweating vodka and wouldn’t stop burying her face into my lap to huff my underpants like Whip-Its. I wish I was making this up, but it’s true. I arrived sleepless, angry and ugly. It ruined my first day in Lisbon and I only had five. First class would have been worth the cost. Second class is my usual go-to. For shorter trips or anything after 9 a.m. I go second.
If I want an adventure, I go even lower. Some agents won’t sell those tickets to tourists though unless you insist.
Nomads and backpackers who don’t do the travel hacking thing usually buy cheap flights. Be careful of taking that too far.
For starters, you need to observe weight limits on baggage. In the US, no one gives a shit, but elsewhere they care. The care deeply. Never buy a ticket that forces you to pay weight overages.
Seats are also important, but not for comfort. I never take bulkhead or exit-row seats unless I pay for early boarding. Both offer less (or zero) under-seat storage, so being in a later boarding group puts you at risk of having nowhere to put your carry on — or as you’ll hear them called “cabin bags.”
I’ve even been on a flight where the attendant nearly made me check my personal item. I shut that down by threatening to create a scene and de-board, but I could have avoided it by paying $8 for priority boarding.
Countless people have asked if I used an around-the-world plane ticket for my first trip.
My simple response: Don’t ask dumb fucking questions. Also, no, I didn’t.
ATW tickets are nearly useless. They typically require you to book your stops in advance, so there’s too little flexibility. The fine print is also brutal and changes constantly.
Last time I researched them, the price was based on allotments of miles. The number of stops also changed the equation. All of them required you to choose a direction (east-to-west, for example) and none permitted travel in the reverse direction even slightly. Some airlines even insisted all departures had to occur from the same point as arrival, meaning if you traveled by land elsewhere, the airline penalized your mileage allotment.
I said airline there, but ATW tickets come come from a single carrier. Instead, you buy into an alliance, of which I believe there are still only three. Quite the lack of competition there.
ATW fares do lend themselves marvelously to itineraries where you go to a different city each month and make it the base from which you explore the region. This is something we’ll talk about later when we discuss hub-and-spoke travel.
If you have status with a particular airline, you may want to consider their ATW option — emphasis on ‘may’ — but be warned that flying everywhere robs you of some great experiences.
Domestic American air travel is a racket run by three major companies and a few smaller ones who effectively collude on prices to screw passengers and support their bloated executives and corporate structures.
Even regional jets, which are technically independent, are fucking death traps that I literally never, ever fly.
It’s not this way in other countries, because most people are sensible and see transportation as akin to a public utility. It’s therefore common to find flights on foreign carriers for under $100. I frequently see fares less $50.
Booking far in advance is therefore unnecessary, except of course in places where tickets sell out. Avoid the temptation to book months or weeks out if you’re just trying to save money. Not only will doing so lock you into dates you might regret, you may end up paying. Why? Booking sites now sniff for your computer’s location and display higher prices for foreigners.
Rude, right? Blame the mirror. We invented that.
The beauty of hub cities is the slow pace. How slow you take it will vary according to the number of side trips as well as your pace. If you commit to a month though, this introduces the possibility of renting an apartment. Even if you don’t plan to stay the full 30 days, apartment rental is generally very cheap. It can also make cooking easier, which also saves cash.
Cooking for yourself doesn’t have to mean eggs for breakfast and chicken dinners. You can dial up the adventure full throttle if you sign up for a greenmarket food tour and a cooking class right after you arrive. Not only will you know what to do with the local ingredients, you’ll eat better. Plus if you know what you’re doing, the vendors may screw you less, which will offset the price of the guide.
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