As you know, we’re going to Los Angeles next month for some fun and sun. It’ll be our first time there and we’re looking forward to going.

Dave Ramsey has a saying he’s fond of ” If you live like know one else, later you can live like no one else.” He has a point, if we’re willing to work harder towards a goal than most people, we’re probably going to succeed more than most people. Thinking on a much smaller scale, we want to scale back on our spending here for a bit so we have a bit of fun next month.

Money isn’t an infinite resource in our house, so we have to make the most of what we have. That starts with us anticipating some expenses for the trip.

Vacation Expenses

Some expenses we’re planning for the trip include:

• Eating Out ($200)- We’re not going to eat out every meal, but I really would live to try out some local places while we’re there.
• Car Rental ($200)- It seems like this would be a good option since we really want to explore the area.
• Miscellaneous($100)-  I’m not big on buying a ton of souvenirs, but I’ll pick up something along the way.

We snagged our hotel at a great prices, but airline tickets even with a discount are expensive. To make sure we have some money to play around with, we’re cutting back on some expenses now.  Our hope is to have some more money in the vacation fund besides the food money we allocated.

How We’re Cutting Back and Building Savings

First on the chopping block is eating out. The good news is with the healthier eating habits we’ve been using, we’ve unconsciously cut back on eating out. The plan is to be very selective when we do go out and make sure we take advantage of deals and specials. We’re also inviting friends over or going to friends’ houses instead of just going out to eat.

We also have an other income stream this month with a temp job, so that money is going straight into savings. I had done extreme savings with temp jobs I’ve taken (saving 60-80%), so this is doable. The trick is to deposit and set up an automatic transfer ASAP.

Your Thoughts on Vacation Spending

We like to over estimate expenses rather than assume we’ll be completely frugal on the trip. How about you? How you do you financially prepare?

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