Tips
How To Travel Cheap in Retirement
Now you have all this free time to travel - but how do you do it on a budget? We share our top tips for seeing the world during your retirement without breaking the bank.
Vehicle Relocations
We're biased, but we think vehicle relocations are the ultimate travel hack. Incase you're not familiar with the concept, rental companies need their vehicles moved after one way trips, so instead of putting the vehicles on a truck they put customers behind the wheel! This means that you can get access to a luxury car, campervan, RV, or motorhome for only $1 per day instead of renting it!
At Imoova, we offer vehicle relocations in Australia, New Zealand, USA, Canada & Japan. So for example you could drive from Osaka to Tokyo, Sydney to Melbourne, New York to Miami, or Paris to Barcelona for only $1/day. You can even get fuel & ferry costs reimbursed on certain listings - you'll never want to go back to renting campervans again!
New listings are added daily worldwide and they can be anywhere from 1 day to a couple of months in advance. Having the freedom of being retired is handy because you can pick up some last minute urgent relocations and get up to $1000 fuel reimbursed. The more urgent they are = the higher the fuel reimbursement.
House/Pet Sitting
House sitting has been growing in popularity in recent years. It's a win win situation with someone getting their house or pets looked after for free, and someone getting free accommodation rather than paying for a hotel. There are many Facebook groups for finding house sits, as well as sites such as Trusted House Sitters and Aussie House Sitters.
Being Travel Savvy
If you know how/where/when to book your travel it makes a huge difference. For example, when booking a flight don't go straight to booking direct or to a travel agent. Look at websites such as Skyscanner to compare prices across airlines. Even better, if you're flexible with dates they'll show you the cheapest dates available. If you don't have a destination in mind and you're feeling adventurous then you can choose 'fly anywhere' and they'll show you the cheapest place to fly from your chosen airport.
Similarly, instead of booking accomodation directly first check websites like Booking.com who usually offer discounts. The more bookings you make, the higher the discounts you'll recieve.
When booking attractions check websites such as Get Your Guide or Klook who also typically offer discounts, especially for concession card holders. Lots of the best travel activities are free! Art galleries, museums, a stroll through the city with a coffee, walks on the beach, not everyday has to be packed with expensive touristy excursions.
Make the most of off peak seasons and fringe seasons, in places like the Caribbean and South East Asia hotels are significantly cheaper during rainy season, often it will be short, intense bursts of rain and then clear up for the rest of the day so pack your umbrella and save some $!