Summer is over and for some its time to pay up
Posted August 18, 2015Ecclesiastes 3:9-10 ESV “What gain has the worker from his toil? I have seen the business that God has given to the children of many to be busy with.”
Vacations are NOT a need but I do believe if you work hard you should be able to play hard as long as you don’t use a credit card to fund your fun. For example, let’s say you are budgeting $2600 for next year’s vacation. If you are paid bi-weekly this works out to be drafting $100 every two weeks to deposit into your vacation saving’s account. If you get paid weekly that would come out to $50 dollars a week. If you do this for an entire year you will have $2,600 to pay for your vacation and not have to rely on a credit card.
Let’s say you don’t save for vacation and use a credit card instead. That same vacation will take 15 months to pay off and cost you and extra $255 assuming your card charges 15% interest and you pay $200 towards your credit card bill each month! If you just paid the minimum amount due that would come out to a lot more interest and will take you many more months to pay that vacation off!
I want to help you by providing some free (or almost) free vacation ideas so you can pay down your debt, save up for your next vacation, and still be able to have some fun with your family.
If it’s for Free, it’s for ME!
National Parks
You don’t have to be a nature lover but your family may want to visit one of America’s beautiful National Parks. By going to www.nps.gov/findapark/feefreeparks.htm you can check out the FREE entrance days for the National Parks throughout the nation. Out of the 400 national parks only 133 charge an entrance fee so even if you miss the free admission days most likely you can still visit on the cheap.
Pacific Crest Trail Association
How does a week-long volunteer vacation in the high Cascades sound to you? You will backpack into a backcountry campsite and during the middle of the seven day tour you can lounge around camp and explore some of the beautiful surroundings on your own with your family. Now the cost is free but keep in mind you will have to do a little work (volunteering) by clearing overgrown vegetation on the trail and maybe having to cut and remove some fallen trees, but all play and no work makes Jack a dull boy… maybe I might have that backwards but seriously check out the following site where you can volunteer and take a mini vacation for free at the same time! www.pcta.org/volunteer/new-volunteers/
Local Sports Events
You don’t have to pay an arm and a leg for the privilege of watching professional baseball, football or soccer at an overpriced stadium but you can consider taking your family to your local sportsplex and watch local ball games of your favorite little leaguers. The best part is that it probably won’t cost you a penny if you pack your own snacks and drinks and most likely you won’t find yourself in the nosebleed section either.
Go on a Treasure Hunt
You may or may not have heard of this phenomenon called Geocaching but basically you are given some specific GPS (Global Positioning System) coordinates and then you attempt to find a hidden container. Most likely you have a few around your neighborhood. I have read that there are 2,679,334 geocaches around the world. The disclaimer is not all of the containers have hidden treasures in them but they are still fun to find. You do not need to buy a fancy expensive GPS handheld navigation system because you most likely can use your smartphone. You can find more information by going to www.geocaching.com/play
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting to get different results. You don’t have to get into debt up to your eyeballs to have the best memories with your family. I believe if you plan properly beforehand with your family you will be much better off than having to plan afterwards on how you are going to pay those fun times off.
article courtesy: http://nicoleodell.com/2015/08/summer…
posted by Steve Repak
on October, 21
Source: Good Reads