December 2018 Budget Recap

Happy New Year! As 2018 wraps up and 2019 kicks off, we concluded our eighth month of travel.

If you missed it, be sure to go back and read our post that summarizes the housing and food costs across the 15+ countries that we’ve traveled to so far.

As for the month of December, we came in way under budget – $1719 under budget, to be exact!

The cheaper cost of food in Australia, two weeks of house-sitting in Brisbane, and wrapping up Hawaii travel by using points all contributed to the savings.

December Travel Highlights

We started out the month of December on the beautiful island of Maui in Hawaii. After a short weekend visit, we flew back to the island of Oahu, where we finished up our second week of teaching rocket science (literally) to high schoolers.

We were even being conservative with how high a pressure we allowed them to go, but the water bottle rockets easily soared a few hundred feet towards their intended target in a field.

After a week back on Oahu and wrapping up our class, we decided to island hop over to the Big Island of Hawaii before heading to Australia. Finally, on December 12th, we said goodbye to the United States again until May 2019.

That kicked off our Australia travels! We connected through Melbourne before arriving in Brisbane, stayed two nights in a small hotel, and then met up with the adorable cat, Bibi, that we would spend the next two weeks with (until New Year’s day).

Key Savings

To aid us in coming in $1719 under budget, we had several areas of great savings for the month of December.

• Two weeks house-sitting – we took care of a cat, house, lawn, and garden, and were able to stay free for two weeks, about 20 minutes north of Brisbane.
• Long-term rental car – since we would have an entire month of house-sitting in two areas that weren’t directly in a city, we decided to get a rental car (“hire” a car, as the local Aussie’s – pronounced ozzies – say). We ended up paying the equivalent of $22/day for 36 days, and that included collision and liability insurance. Considering that as our “rent”, since we needed it to get to the house-sits, saved us quite a bit from what we’d pay otherwise for an Airbnb or hotel.
• $573 saved by booking our rental car and flights to and from the Big Island using Chase points

Total monthly B.A. Livin’ savings (not including Hawaii reimbursements for teaching) = $1440+

December 2018 Monthly Stats

We did the least amount of walking in December since we started traveling – and the number below includes about 25 miles of my running.

For those that prefer more of a visual display of budget data (positive dollars corresponds to under budget):

Travel Rewards Points Usage

We obtained over $2100 of value this month (or booked for future months in December) from using travel points. We booked all the following using Chase points that we get through all our Chase cards, and then receive a 50% bonus when redeeming for travel from our Chase Sapphire Reserve:

1. Rental cars on Maui and Big Island
2. One-way flight to Singapore for our Asian Celebrity cruise
3. One-way flight to Taipei from Shanghai after our cruise ends
4. One night in Singapore hotel, prior to our cruise departure

December 2018 Expenses vs. Budget

Below are our actual expenses vs. budget for the month of December 2018.

Food and housing were both way under budget. Ground transport was primarily due to the rental car in Australia, which is fine considering that as our cost necessary to stay for free at the house-sits.

Discretionary was over primarily due to new sneakers, a haircut, and moisturizer purchases for Alyssa.

Our expenses over time for December 2018:

Lessons Learned and Takeaways

• Australia is awesome
  • Australia definitely feels the most like the United States to us. I can even find peanut butter in grocery stores easily!
  • It also helps that the current exchange rate is 1 Australian Dollar to 0.70 USD, so while the prices we pay in AUD are not far from normal, we essentially get a 30% discount on all our food and other purchases.
• House-Sits save a lot of money on housing
  • In addition to saving money, they also allow us to stay in really nice areas and watch cute dogs and cats! It’s always sad when we have to leave.
• Use rewards points to save on travel
  • This should probably be common sense, but I get the feeling that many people become so obsessed with collecting rewards points and miles that they never end up using them all!
  • We always compare points value with prices, but especially when it would be much more expensive to pay out of pocket, we will typically try and use our rewards points

Assumptions and Notes:

• All monthly expenses are totals for two people

In January, we will spend the first half of the month in a small town northwest of Brisbane called Kilcoy. We will then be flying up to Singapore to take a cruise that will visit Thailand, Vietnam, and China!

That cruise will also be $23 under our daily budget every single day. Including taxes and gratuities, it cost us a total of $133/day. Not a bad deal, especially considering it’s all-you-can-eat 24/7, comfortable housing, and transporting us to a new continent!

Here’s to 2019!