August 2018 Budget Recap

For the month of August, we ventured farther south in Europe during some of the record breaking heat days in the mid-40s (Celcius) – upward of 110F! We went from Spain to France via train, then up to the much cooler climates of Belgium, on to Amsterdam, and ended the month on an overnight train in Germany.

At the end of the month, we came in just $38 over our monthly budget, which still leaves our cumulative budget more than $1250 under budget. Considering we spent several weeks on “vacation” – I know, an odd concept when we’re traveling for an entire year – with our friends that visited us in Spain, and then with some more fancy wine tours and other allocations in our entertainment budget, we were happy to end the month right on target.

August 2018 Monthly Stats

In the month of August we again covered five countries while going through four languages (technically both Bruges, Belgium and Amsterdam, Netherlands share Dutch, although Flemish – a Dutch dialect – is more popular in Bruges):

If you want a view of our cumulative budget, check out our budget summary page.

August 2018 Expenses vs. Budget

In August, we did not have any housesits, so we split our housing between 11 nights in hotels, 18 nights at Airbnbs, and 2 nights on overnight trains – i.e. free housing 🙂

During the first few weeks in Spain, we were touring with two friends that came over to meet us, Pete and Jen. Thus, we did eat out a little more often than we typically would; however, even with this, our food budget was $200 under for the month, averaging just $32 total a day for both of us.

Ground transportation shows up as very over budget, primarily because we traveled by train and took no flights for the month. Taking both ground transportation and flights together as a single “transportation cost” category, we were about $200 over our $1200 transportation budget of getting from place to place.

Discretionary means that we drank more expensive wine than planned 🙂 The month of August also had us spending on souvenirs, haircuts, and a new pair of shoes for Alyssa.

Without further ado, here are our actual expenses vs. budget for August 2018:

Total Monthly B.A.Livin’ savings from travel points and travel hacks (not included in above budget): $2,395

1. $900 savings for Residence Inn Stay in Amsterdam, booked using Marriott 7-night awards certificate from Southwest travel package.
2. $737 savings (vs. the cheapest rates) at the two Paris hotels. One booked using free night certificate from IHG Rewards Credit Card, and other booked using Hilton Honors points.
3. $327 savings for Bruges hotel booked with Chase Ultimate Rewards points
4. $210 saved booking trains using Spain Renfe pass, which allows you to book a number of trains (in our case four) for a flat fee up-front.
5. $97 for Spain rental car booked with Chase Ultimate Rewards points.
6. $67 saved by using Airbnb gift cards purchased from Raised
7. $30 saved in Bordeaux, France for booking a wine combo tour on Viator
8. $27 saved in Barcelona for visiting museums on the free museum day.

And showing our expenses over time for August 2018:

Click the above chart for a link to an interactive version

Lessons Learned and Takeaways

11 Nights in Luxury Hotels – for [Almost] Free!

We had many hotel point and certificate redemptions (11 nights!) in the month of August, which kept our housing cost under budget for the month. Even when some of those redemptions included The InterContinental Paris Le Grand (typically 800 Eur/night), the Hilton Paris Opera Hotel (850 Eur/night), and a 7-night stay in a new Residence Inn on the water in Amsterdam.

Total cost for those 9 nights: $49! (the annual fee on my IHG credit card, which allowed us to book the one night for free in Paris at the Intercontinental).

The Hilton stay in Paris for a night was achieved by redeeming Hilton Honors rewards points. That was much more pricey at a nightly rate of 58,000 points, but fair redemption for our points at a value of 1.7 cents (USD) per point.

Lastly, we used a free 7-night certificate (Category 1-5 Marriott hotels) that we obtained in January 2017 when we used a Marriott Fly and Stay package deal for 270,000 points, which got us a Southwest Companion pass for two years, 110,000 Southwest points, and the 7-night stay at a Marriott!

How much value did we trade in Marriott points and what did we receive in return? At a standard value of 0.9 cents per Marriott point, we turned our 270,000 points (~$2430 in value) into something that has easily already saved us over $4000 based on all our free Southwest Companion Pass flights for Alyssa. If we only used the 110,000 Southwest points and the Companion Pass each time, that would be nearly 110,000*.015*2 (for CP) = $3300, and we’ve actually taken other Southwest flights, and had the week free at a hotel – so it was well worth it!

Note: At the time in 2017, the Marriott fly and stay packages were much cheaper, and we had obtained enough points through various credit card signup bonuses. Unfortunately, the deal looks like it costs considerably more Marriott points now, and hotel transfers from Marriott no longer count towards Southwest Companion Pass eligibility.

Notes:

• All monthly expenses are totals for two people
• USD Exchange Rate monthly averages for August 2018:
  • 1 USD = 0.866 Euro

Euro to USD Chart for 2018

Source: https://www.x-rates.com/average/?from=USD&to=EUR&amount=1&year=2018

Summary

While we just met our budget for the month of August, we are anticipating to be substantially under budget again in September due to numerous housesits and some low-key, relaxing areas that we’ll be staying at.

That being said, we’ll be flying back to the states first thing in October, so we’ll definitely need the budget buffer before embarking on our two-week cruise, Disney vacation, and US road trip!