How to take a road trip on a budget
Planning a trip is always so exciting as you get to plan your dream trip. But sometimes, money can, unfortunately, get in the way.
For most people, we work a normal routine, 8 to 5 work days, from Monday to Friday of every single week. Me included. When planning a trip, you will probably have a couple of limitations such as your vacation days first of all but also your vacation budget.
Staying on budget is important. You don’t want to go on your trip and spend more than what you have and end up paying those extra expenses for an extra six months instead of saving for your next one.
You can find my best tips on how to take a road trip on a budget below! Make sure you keep reading so you can keep your budget on track for your next great adventure!
Set up a road trip budget
Plan a road trip budget beforehand
When planning a road trip, it’s important to consider the budget you have in order to have a good time. If money isn’t an issue, it might not be that important to plan your costs.
However, if you are putting some money on the side every week or every month towards vacation time, you might only have a certain amount you can spend. Things happen and you might go a little bit over budget but it’s still important to try to calculate it as best as you can so you can avoid having to pay plenty of extras on your credit card when you come back.
Take the time to sit down and look at the total amount you’ll have to spend for that road trip. Then start breaking it down into different categories.
You can break it down as follow: shopping for missing items, airfare and fees if needed, rental car, accommodations, gas, road fees, food, and activities.
Give your kids a budget
While planning your budget, you can also think about a budget for the kids. You can do that by either setting up an amount for the kid’s expenses such as little souvenirs they want to buy or clothing you need for them.
You could also give each of your kids an amount of money they get to use whenever they want to. It’s a good opportunity to get them to understand how it works but also that if they spend it on useless things they don’t really want, it can run out quickly.
keep track of every expense
If staying on track moneywise is something very important to you, or if you are a little tight on budget and you don’t want to go over, you can use some great apps to keep track of every single expense on your trip.
A great app for this is Travel Spend. It is free to download with in-app purchases if you want to. Travel Spend will help you keep track of everything. If you need to split expenses with your buddies, this app will help you do it.
You can easily input your overall budget to start off and add your expenses as you go. The app will show you your daily average costs. You can even have a graph telling you which expenses are costing you more.
A great thing about this app is that you can also use it offline which is great when you are in a different country without data on your phone.
You can easily choose a category for every single expense you input in the app. Such as accommodations, groceries, shopping, restaurants, and more.
Using either this app or another one that you like to keep track of your spending, will help you stay on budget and avoid unnecessary expenses.
Road trip on a budget: Preparation
Be prepared
Being somewhat prepared can help you save money and stay on budget. You don’t have to have everything planned by the minute but at least having a general idea of your travel plans will help you do just that.
Before leaving on your road trip, it’s a great idea to sit down with your travel buddies to make a plan. Of course, you’ll have to decide on the dates that you are leaving but plan places you would like to visit.
Take a map out and decide on what cities you would like to stop, and decide on what attractions or what visits you would really like to do while on that road trip.
Having a general idea of places to stop and things to do, will prevent you from backtracking. It will help you plan your itinerary. Having an itinerary doesn’t mean it will be set in stone but it does give your road trip a purpose.
If you end up backtracking all the time because you wanted to do something but you’ve passed the city where it was, this will cost you more in the end. You’ll end up spending more money on gas but you’ll also spend some extra time driving around and less time exploring.
Make sure you have insurance
On any given trip, it’s important to have insurance to cover medical emergencies but also roadside emergencies. Especially on road trips, you’ll need good coverage in case something happens.
Make sure you compare different insurances before you leave and make sure you are covered for your planned road trip dates.
Have medical insurance. Some credit cards offer medical protections abroad. Take a look and see if the coverage is enough. You can also buy different insurance elsewhere to be covered if there isn’t insurance with your credit card or if the coverage isn’t what you need.
As for car insurance, verify with your personal car insurance if they cover you abroad. If so, is the coverage the same as at home? In this case, you might not have to purchase extra insurance. You could always purchase extra coverage for the time of your road trip as well.
Make sure you are covered because if something were to happen, insurance will cover a great deal of those expenses. However, if you didn’t purchase insurance or your personal ones don’t cover, you will end up having to pay a lot of extra money and will for sure go over budget.
So make sure to plan an amount of money in your budget for insurance coverage if you do not have any already.
If you want to be even more covered, you could also get roadside assistance coverage. This way, if you ever needed it, you would have it to help you out.
Avoid holidays
When you’re setting up your road trip details, it’s important to consider holidays. If you’re tight on budget or budget-conscious, remember that traveling during holidays will most likely cost you more. Accommodations tend to have higher prices during holidays.
If you want to avoid paying extra for the same thing, try to avoid road tripping during any important holidays. This way you will have the regular prices instead of the inflated ones.
This can add up quickly if you’re paying extra money because of the holiday going on.
Travel during off-season
Avoiding holidays is one thing but if you want to save even more money, traveling during the off-season is even better.
People tend to travel when kids are not in school anymore. Which most likely means summertime, Christmas break, and spring break.
Traveling during these very busy seasons will cost you more for mostly everything but you’ll also have a whole bunch of tourists there with you. The places you want to visit will be packed.
The off-season can vary from one country to the other but fall and spring are usually less busy and because there isn’t a lot of tourism going on, they tend to have off-season prices that are even lower than normal prices. A big plus, you’ll also have a lot of places to visit almost to yourself or barely anyone there with you.
Road trip on a budget: Packing
Make yourself a packing list and use it
Having a packing list is a must. Well, I guess not for everyone but I prefer having a list handy so I don’t forget anything while packing.
I have a general packing list that I will adapt to the type of trip I am going on. Whether I’m going on an all-inclusive vacation, a camping trip, or a road trip, my packing list is easily adaptable.
You might be wondering how using a packing list can help you budget-wise on your road trip. Well, if you’ve packed everything you need with the help of your list, the chances of forgetting something are low.
Forgetting something isn’t necessarily a big deal, but you will have to buy it if it is something you can’t go without on your trip.
Forgetting your favorite sweater isn’t too bad. You can totally go about your road trip without it and have a good time. Forgetting your phone charger or your GPS charger on the other hand is something else. You’ll have to stop somewhere to buy one and the cost of it will add up to your costs and can easily make you go over.
You can download my free all-rounder packing list here to help you on your next great adventure!
Road trip on a budget: Transportation
Swap your car for a campervan
Road tripping with a campervan instead of a car can also save you a lot of money. It will serve as transportation but also as your accommodation.
Driving a car or a campervan, you’ll have to use gas anyways so it won’t make a big difference in your budget. Accommodations all over the place can add up quickly when comes to budgeting.
When you compare staying in a hotel, motel, or Airbnb for every night on your road trip versus the cost of having a campervan, the overall cost will end up being lower than accommodations all over.
In some countries, you are even allowed to do some wild camping which you wouldn’t even have to pay for a campground to stay at!
When we traveled to Scotland, we rented a campervan from Bunk Camper. We rented the van for 14 days and stayed in campgrounds every single night and the overall cost still ended up being cheaper than if we had rented a car and stayed in different accommodations.
Having a campervan will also give you more flexibility in your itinerary. If you’ve booked accommodations, you will have to get to that city at the end of the day, even if you are too tired to keep going. Most hotels have cancelation fees if you cancel last minute. Driving a campervan, you can sleep wherever you feel like.
Use a fuel-efficient car
You don’t need to have the most recent model of your car or even an electric car in order to stay on budget. If your car is somewhat fuel-efficient, it’s a good thing for you.
If you don’t need to be driving a huge pickup truck, take a smaller car that will cost you less in gas. Nowadays, a lot of models are fuel efficient, even small SUVs. You can definitely use that to your advantage in order to not be spending a huge amount of money on gas.
Sometimes, this just ain’t possible. If you’re carrying a trailer camper, for example, you’ll probably need a pickup or an SUV able to pull that kind of weight. If this is the case, make sure to budget for gas accordingly. Driving with a trailer in the back will use more gas in your tank. Calculate that when budgeting. Add extra to your budget than you would normally when you’re not carrying a trailer.
If you need to rent a car skip the rental car insurance
I told you earlier that insurance is important. However, if you are renting a car or campervan, don’t buy their rental insurance. It will end up costing you twice as much for the same coverage.
Contact your own personal car insurance to see if they can offer you coverage instead or compare different other options.
You’ll find a way better price than the one offered by the rental dealership.
Avoid driving during peak hours
Driving during peak hours, you’ll probably be spending more time on the road. Peak hour will usually have more traffic jams along the way.
By driving during peak hours, you’ll end up spending more time than needed driving as it will take you longer to get from point A to point B but you will be using more gas for your car as well.
If you’re trying to stay on budget, avoiding peak hours will help you lower your gas cost in the long run.
Find cheap gas options
When the time comes to fill up on gas, take the time to look at the gas prices around the area you’re in. From one station to the other, gas prices can vary.
Just on our last road trip to the United States, prices could vary almost 50 cents a gallon in stations right beside each other.
You don’t need to go out of your way to find the best prices but at least compare the prices if possible.
You can use the GasBuddy app which is really handy. You’ll need data or WIFI in order to use it but it will tell you all the latest prices near you. It will definitely help you find the cheapest price in your area.
Filling up by the highway can also be a more expensive option. Using GasBuddy will again help you out instead of overpaying for gas.
Get a gas points card
Point cards can come in handy if you are going on a long road trip. There are point cards out there where you can use your points to either diminish your price or even pay for a fill-up. You could sign up for one of those and use it to your advantage to fill up for free.
Try to avoid tolls
Tolls can add up quickly to a budget. You won’t be able to avoid all of them but you can set your GPS to avoid them.
Sometimes, it just isn’t possible. Set up a part of your budget for tolls. This will prevent going over budget.
Prices aren’t usually bad. It’s a small amount but can add up quickly. If you are traveling with a trailer, it will cost you a bit more.
Have an emergency kit
Carrying an emergency kit can save you money if you break down during your road trip. Having a couple of things handy can save you from calling a tow truck and the bill that comes with it.
Before leaving, make sure you have all the necessary to at least change a flat tire. Add some jumper cables in case you need to boost your car. Bring what you need, but also consider what you are capable of fixing in case you break down.
There’s no need to carry extra weight for nothing. You’re probably not going to need it but it’s good to know how to change a tire in case it does happen. You can’t prevent everything from happening. You might end up needing the tow truck anyways but if you know how to fix a couple of things, it could save you a couple of bucks.
Use navigation
This is a no-brainer for me. With today’s technology, it’s so easy to have a map on your phone or GPS to help you navigate unknown areas.
Using navigation won’t lower your road trip costs but it will prevent you from having to drive more because you didn’t go the right way and you ended up driving an extra hour. This will help you stay on budget.
Road trip on a budget: Accommodation
Stay outside of the city center
The closer you are to the city center, the higher your price will be. If you want to stay in the city center, it’s fine to do so but you’ll have to consider it while planning your budget.
You probably won’t be able to find a hotel for 50$ a night if you’re staying where everything is happening.
You don’t have to book a hotel an hour away from the city center. Just a little outside the downtown area and prices will already be a little lower.
Have a higher budget for accommodations if you are planning on staying downtown, or if you have a fixed budget you can’t go over, choose properties a little outside of the city center to pay a lower price.
Compare hotels & Airbnbs
While you might want to stay in specific accommodations, or even do a bucket list property, compare prices before booking.
If you have a property in mind that you really want to go to, go for it and book it. For your other nights, compare prices in each place you want to stay. This way, you can save a couple of bucks by booking a property with a lower price that still has many great perks.
You don’t have to book a shitty hotel in order to save money. There are many properties and hotels all over the world that are affordable, comfortable, look great, and have also great amenities.
Just take the time to research them before booking anything.
Try the Hotel Tonight app
The Hotel Tonight app can help you find last-minute accommodations in your area. Last-minute can also mean lower prices. Sometimes hotels want to fill up their rooms and will have lower prices.
This app can help you find a last-minute hotel but you can also view the prices. Even if you are not last minute, you can go through the app and book hotels at a lower price.
This can definitely come in handy to save a couple of bucks!
Book accommodation with a kitchen
Booking accommodations with a small kitchen can save you money in the long run. Eating out for every single meal can be expensive. Take some time to cook a little bit. Not only it will save you money but sometimes it also feels good to eat a great home-cooked meal instead of restaurant food all the time.
Consider camping or sleeping in the car
Staying at a campground is always cheaper than staying in a hotel. There are a lot of very clean campgrounds out there with all the facilities you’ll need.
If you like camping and you don’t mind bringing your camping stuff in your car, this can definitely be a budget-conscious option for your accommodation.
If you have a camper, you can definitely use campgrounds to have a comfortable site to spend the night.
You can even adapt the inside of your car in order to use your car to sleep. You don’t need to have a van to do so. You can easily adapt a bed area so you can sleep comfortably in your car. Test your setup before leaving on your road trip so you’ll at least know how to get set up at night, but you’ll also know that you’ll be sleeping well while saving money!
Find free campsites
There are a lot of free campsites out there. You just have to find them to take advantage of them.
Remember that utilizing free campsites also means being respectful and leaving it just the way you found the campsite or even better.
You can read my guide on how to find free campsites to help you do just that. It is a great opportunity to save on accommodations on your road trip and stay on budget.
Reunite with friends/family
If you have friends all over the world and you are going near where they live, why not reunite with them and spend a couple of days with them? You could stay at their place if they want to of course.
This is another opportunity to stay somewhere for free. You’ll be able to enjoy quality time with friends or family members you don’t get to see that much but also save money on your trip.
Road trip on a budget: Food
Meal planning
While it’s important to budget for food, when I’m on a road trip and I buy some groceries, I don’t necessarily calculate it in my set budget beforehand. The reason is, if I were at home, I would probably be spending 200 to 250$ for groceries only for the four of us. So with my vacation pay for those weeks, I just use that money as if I were home.
It is however important to not go crazy and buy everything! Shopping for groceries can get expensive quickly.
You can avoid that by meal planning. Plan your meal ahead. You don’t have to plan weeks at a time but doing so for a couple of days will help you save money.
By knowing what you are going to cook, you can make yourself a list and go grocery shopping with it. You are most likely to stick to it then go grocery shopping without any meals planned.
You’ll just end up buying so many unnecessary items that it’ll cost you a lot in the end.
Do some cooking
Cooking will keep you on track regarding your budget. If you are spending the same amount of money you would for groceries at home, you won’t be spending tons of money in restaurants.
If you are eating out every single meal, you are going to be spending a lot of extra money on your budget. It will get expensive quite fast.
Have snacks on hand
Carry a snack bag while road-tripping. This will avoid stopping at gas stations and buying expensive snacks along the way.
Bring lots of healthy snacks and a couple of chocolate bars and candy for special occasions. You’ll be able to drive for longer without having to stop every few hours to buy some snacks to keep you fed.
Buying your own snacks before your departure or when you do a bit of grocery shopping will keep you on a budget more easily. Snacks in a gas station will tend to be overpriced for the same items from the grocery store.
Pack a lunch in the morning
If you’re having a big day ahead of you, pack yourself a lunch before leaving wherever you stayed the night before.
Buying a couple of items while grocery shopping to make your own lunches will be way cheaper than buying prepared sandwiches or salads from the store.
Take an extra five or ten minutes before you leave to pack a great lunch for everyone.
Not only will it save you money but it will also give you great picnic opportunities. You won’t have to spend extra time trying to find a restaurant or a gas station to find yourself an expensive lunch.
Make eating out a special occasion
It’s OK to want to eat out in great restaurants once in a while. Plan your food budget including a little bit of extra so you can splurge yourself by going to a couple of restaurants.
You don’t have to go to a restaurant that will cost you 700$ for one meal, but you can allow yourself a good restaurant on your trip or even just one that you feel like going to.
Make it a special occasion on your trip too! Dress up and have some fun! Enjoy the restaurant and the moment.
Even if you have a budget to keep track of, road trips are supposed to be fun and you should also enjoy a bit of extra while traveling!
Eat out for lunch instead of dinner
Eating out can also be less expensive if you go to a restaurant for lunch instead of dinner. You can definitely go about your day, eat out for lunch and then make yourself a great home-cooked meal before enjoying your evening.
Many restaurants and cafes have amazing food that you can enjoy. Great ambiance restaurants can also be fun during the day.
Bring your own coffee
Coffee can seem like a small amount of money in your budget but buying coffee every morning at Starbucks or any other coffee shop can add up quickly!
Hotels usually have coffee machines in their rooms. If you are renting a cabin or Airbnb, you’ll probably have a full kitchen with a great coffee machine. Traveling with your own van, RV, or even trailer camper, the coffee machine is probably a must! In our travel camper, we never take it out and we always have some coffee handy!
Bring your own coffee with you. You might spend ten or fifteen bucks on a coffee package but it will still cost you less than a five-dollar coffee every single morning!
You can for sure buy some great take-out coffee once in a while but in the long run, it will get expensive if you do it every day. So bringing your own can help you save money on your overall road trip budget.
Seek out happy hours
If you are planning on going out during your road trip, drinking alcohol can get expensive very quickly as bars tend to charge a great amount for a small drink.
Seek out happy hours to get the most out of your money! You’ll still be able to have plenty of fun and on top of that, you’ll be paying less for your drinks!
Many establishments have happy hours on a set day of the week. Find the information on their website and have some fun!
You can also buy your own alcohol, it still costs a bit of money but it will be cheaper in the end than buying a drink in a bar.
Take advantage of free breakfasts
There are plenty of hotels out there that offer free breakfasts when you stay with them. Take advantage of that before leaving in the morning.
Some hotels have buffet-style breakfast so you can decide what you want to eat. So you won’t be eating the same cereals or bread every single morning. You can have waffles, bread, yogurt, fruits, cereals, bread, sausages, bacon, beans, fruit juices, coffee, hot chocolate, and tea. Some hotels have so many options that you don’t even know what to have!
It is part of the price you pay for the night so why not take advantage of it instead of paying for breakfast somewhere else?
Road trip on a budget: Activities
Get a National Park Pass/activity pass
Whether you are traveling in the USA or Canada, there are a ton of national parks to explore. If your road trip is bringing you into multiple national parks, maybe buying a park pass can save you money in the end.
Make some calculations while preparing for your trip. Verify how much a single entry costs for each park you will be visiting. Compare that total to the amount it would cost you to buy a National Park pass for the family instead. If it ends up being cheaper to buy a pass, go ahead. You’ll have some money left to use for another purpose on your trip.
There are also activity passes that exist. We ended up buying one in Scotland at the St-Andrews castle. The clerk was amazing by the way! He actually asked to see the itinerary that we had planned out and ended up telling us that it would be cheaper to have the activity pass over paying every single entry fee. We didn’t even know this pass existed until he mentioned it to us.
We bought two passes that cost us around 70 pounds total. With all the castle visits we did that were included in the pass, we probably would’ve ended up spending over 200 pounds! Sometimes, it can be to your advantage to buy passes if most or a lot of your planned visits are included in the pass.
Plan out costly activities ahead of time
Preparation is key when planning any type of trip. Especially when you’re on a budget. When you’re looking at the activities and visits you want to do, make sure to budget for them too.
Some attractions will cost you more than others. So if you plan on doing some of them, make sure you plan your budget accordingly.
If you only have a set amount of money in your budget set for visits, you might have to choose which ones you really want to do. Unfortunately, sometimes we are not able to do every single thing we want to. Either it’s a time limitation or budget limitation.
Plan those activities ahead of time. Book them in advance. Calculate them in your budget. Don’t forget to include a part of your money towards activities.
Trips are meant to check some bucket list items on your list! Make sure to include them in your budget too. Who knows when you will be back in that area, plan it and budget for it so you can stay on track once you are out exploring.
Avoid touristed areas
Tourist areas are unavoidable most of the time. While planning your road trip, you will probably be visiting lesser-known places but also touristy areas too.
I’m not telling you to not go visit them but remember that these places will have higher prices everywhere. Restaurants, shops, basically everything around tourist places will have higher prices than 2 streets down.
If you are visiting a couple of these places, take into consideration the higher costs. You might want to eat outside of that said area to save a little bit of money.
Avoid tours
Tours are sometimes worth it and sometimes they are not. If you are planning on doing a tour to visit some sort of attraction, do some research beforehand. Find the best tour for you. Find tours that will give the best for your money.
Avoid tour groups that are expensive and that have big groups. These tend to be very busy, people have lots of questions and you will get stuck waiting on them to move on to the next place.
There are a lot of attractions that offer self-guided tours. This could be another option instead of guided tours. With self-guided tours, you will be able to go at your own pace instead of waiting around with a time limit on your hands.
You can even rent out audio visits nowadays!
Road trip on a budget: extras
Loyalty programs are worth it
Travel loyalty programs can be used to your advantage while planning your trips. There are so many options out there!
You can have a loyalty program with a specific company such as airlines, hotels or miles of some sort. There are a lot of possibilities to choose from.
Even with a rewards credit card, you can use points for gift certificates with travel companies.
I personally have the RBC Avion credit card and I accumulate points for flights. But I can also use my points to book vacation packages and car rentals. You can get gift certificates for stores you like too. If you don’t find what you need in order to pay for your vacation with points, you can use points to pay your credit card instead.
Some cards even give you discounts for hotel branches and even more! Travel credit cards are a must in order to help you take a road trip or a trip on a budget!
Find the one that works for you and start earning! It will make such a difference by lowering your cost.
There you go! I hope I’ve been helpful to you so that you can take a road trip on a budget.
The key is in the planning! Don’t overspend. Go on trips that will be budget-friendly for you but that you’ll also enjoy!
Don’t go somewhere just because it will be within your budget! Go somewhere that is calling to you but make sure you are budget conscious while having the trip of your life!
It’s OK to have big dreams, but don’t get yourself into debt to do so. Take the time to plan it properly and use these useful tips in order to save extra money!
Disclosure: Please note that some of the links above are affiliate links. At no additional cost to you, I earn a small commission if you make a purchase through these links. I would never recommend anything I don’t personally love and use!
Do you need more help planning your road trip? Make sure to keep reading!
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