How to Make the Most of Your Vacation  

The travel season will soon be upon us. Vacations should provide us with relaxation and memories of the good times we had, but not with a mountain of debt. With the help of practicalmoneyskills.com, we've put together some tips for minimizing your travel and vacation debt. Before planning your travel and packing your bags, consider these helpful tips:

1. Be realistic about what you can afford. Of course you want to go all out to take an awesome, exotic vacation, but choosing a trip you can't afford will only add more stress to your life. Taking time to relax and unwind will be negated if you end up having to pay it off for several months to come. Set your sites on something within your price range. Whatever it may entail, it'll beat having to be at work!

2. Create a budget for your trip. You can create a general budget to use as a guideline, or you can create a very specific one using a free, web-based travel calculator created by practicalmoneyskills.com, which can help you calculate the cost, from gas to lodging, and everything in between. It can be found HERE. 

3. Shop around. With the plethora of websites out there devoted to comparing flight, hotel, and car rental prices, there's no reason why you can't get the best possible deal. You can start with some of the most popular ones such as Expedia.com and Travelocity.com, but there are other sites to help you be a thrifty traveler.

4. Protect yourself. Always, always, always make your on-line purchases for travel-related items from websites that you know are legitimate. During your travels, keep your identification documents and credit cards in a safe place at all times, not only to protect your accounts, but your identity as well. One smart move would be to photocopy the contents of your wallet (front and back) so that in the event anything is lost or stolen, you have a way to notify the proper agencies of the situation. Also, it's a good idea to let your credit union and other financial institutions know about your travels ahead of time so that the activity posting to your account in Cancun won't be flagged as fraudulent!

5. Expect the unexpected. Things often crop up that you don't anticipate, so it's a good idea to set aside an extra 10 to 15% of your travel budget for such emergencies or surprises.

6. Have a blast! You've worked hard for the vacation and were conscientious enough to devise a solid financial plan, so enjoy yourself!