10 Easy Tips To Always Find Cheap Travel

The Ultimate Guide To Budget Travel

Over the last few years, I have gotten countless questions about how I travel so frequently and the answer is relatively simple: I do it for cheap! I’m going to go over a few tips and tricks about how I find cheap flights, my best tips, websites I use, notifications I set up, etc. so check it out below!

Let’s start off by saying the most expensive (typically) part of traveling is where you are going to stay. I am not the type of person, for the most part, that is going to stay in a hostel with a bunch of strangers. I like to have my own space which often leads to a larger lodging cost. If you are okay with staying in hostels, skip over the first part and head down to how I find cheap flights!

I also want to say there is NO secret sauce, magic, or anything to finding cheap flights/places to stay. It takes quite a bit of time and effort, but if you can be flexible and patient you will find a trip that works for you and your budget!

My Top Tips:

Friends - There are SO many options out there for where to stay in different cities and if you have a friend who lives in the city you are trying to visit, always ask them first (if you’re comfortable) if you can crash there. Personally, I would LOVE it if my friends would come stay with me because A- you get to catch up and B- it forces you to get out and explore your own city!

AirBnb - If you don’t have a friend in the city you are trying to visit, I always check AirBnB. If you are flexible on your dates and don’t have a flight booked yet, you can set your dates as flexible by +-1, +-2, etc. so you can find the cheapest places on various dates. Pro Tip - if you work remotely or have the ability to be gone for 4+ weeks, I have found the majority of AirBnB’s offer monthly discounts, and I’m not talking a few dollars…. I’ve saved a few thousand dollars by staying in one place for over a month. You may ask why an AirBnB host might do this? Guaranteed income for them. They know their place is going to be rented out for the full month vs potentially only 2 days. I did this multiple times last year and I ended up saving SO much money.

Be Flexible With Dates - Whether you’re looking for cheap flights or places to stay, being flexible is the best way to go. I know for some people this isn’t possible because of work, family obligations, etc., but if you can be flexible with your dates, even if it’s changing your trip to a different weekend, you are more likely to find lodging and flights for cheaper. To find the cheapest flights- going off-season is always the best way to go, especially if you can be flexible on those dates.

Be Flexible With Destinations - Let’s say you have specific dates you can take vacation… be flexible with the destination! Quite a few times I have said I want to go somewhere next weekend, but I don’t care where. This is one of the best ways I’ve found you can get cheap flights! I also love this because it forces you to go somewhere you’ve never been before. Say you find a cheap flight to San Diego and you’ve never been before - you’ll do some research, talk to friends who have visited before and explore yourself! It’s a great opportunity to put yourself outside of your comfort zone and go somewhere new!

Google Flights - This part is KEY. When I am looking for cheap flights I use a wide variety of websites to help and tons of different strategies. First I check Google Flights. Let’s say for the same scenario as before and I’m looking for flights to San Diego… the great thing about Google Flights is it shows you different airlines. The one draw back is it doesn’t show every budget airline, so you can also google search “airlines that fly from Charlotte to San Diego”, for example, and find what budget airlines fly there then search their websites. Any time I book a flight if I have miles, I will go on the airlines website and check a few things: how many miles roundtrip would cost, how many miles each direction would cost separately, and the $$$ for each direction separately. Often times a roundtrip flight using airmiles will be ludicrously expensive, say 60k miles but it’s not worth using that many. This is where Google Flights and SKipLagged (see below) come into play - I will also check both of those websites for a one-way ticket (make sure to check both flights there and return). Majority of the time I see that one direction is super cheap in miles, I’m talking 7.5k and the other direction you can find super cheap $$$ (might be on a different airline). It’s very strange but I have really found that booking each direction separately can save you tons of $$$.

SkipLagged - I know it’s kind of taboo to talk about, but I have used SkipLagged more times than I can count. When you go to SkipLagged’s website, you put in your starting airport and where you want to go, again we’ll use the same example: I put in San Diego to Charlotte. What skip lagged does is pull a list of every flight that begins in San Diego and either the final destination is Charlotte or has a layover in Charlotte, let’s say then continues on to Charleston. Often times, the flight with a layover in Charlotte and a final destination in Charleston is A LOT cheaper than having your “final destination” be in Charlotte. When you land in Charlotte, you just hop off the plane. The only thing to note about this is you can only take a carry-on or your luggage will continue on to Charleston. I know, I know, it sounds sketchy but SkipLagged was actually sued for this by airlines and guess what? SkipLagged won. It’s not our fault airlines are ripping passengers off. My only advice is if you choose to go this route, don’t put in your airmiles number because airlines can block you from flying with them if you do this say 20 times a year (there’s no exact number, but just be smart about it). When you go to book your flight, you will book it to the destination it says, but at your stopover in Charlotte you just hop off!

Sign Up For Flight Alerts - It’s February right now and let’s say you know you have a wedding over Labor Day weekend in Florida. Head over to Google flights, put in your starting airport and where you want to fly too and the dates, hit enter. When you scroll down the page a little bit you will see “Track Prices”. Toggle over and set up alerts by entering your email if you aren’t already signed in. Any time the price of those dates changes, you will get an email. I can almost guarantee you if the flight price is high for those dates that at some point over the next 8 months the price will drop. When you get that email, don’t hesitate, go ahead and book it because flight prices can change at any moment!

Scotts Cheap Flights - I honestly think I was one of Scott’s Cheap Flights initial subscribers - that’s how long I’ve been using them. This is a service (yes you pay for it but I think it’s $15 a year), but it can end up saving you hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars on flights. What they do is fairly simple - they find mistake fares. Now, what are mistake fares? It’s when an airlines algorithm glitches and is selling seats for extremely lower than normal. What I love about this website is you can set it up for your home airport/airports and select general destinations where you would like to be notified of a mistake fare! I have seen roundtrip flights from Charleston to Paris for as low as (I think) $200…. ROUNDTRIP. I also love they tell you exactly how to book the flights and on what websites. The only thing is you have to be pretty flexible. Sometimes they are weird mid-week dates so again, being flexible when trying to find cheap travel is KEY!

Mix And Match Airlines - I know I briefly mentioned this before but it will always be worth your time to check one way tickets on different airlines. Sometimes you can find a super cheap flight from Charleston to New York on American Airlines but the return flight on that same airline is 5x the price of the way there. This is when you should check say Delta or another budget airline to see if you can find a cheaper flight from New York back to Charleston. Often times you will find that booking each direction separately and on different airlines can save you a lot of money!

Use Points And Miles - Y’all. If you don’t have a credit card that is either through an airline or is getting you points to use towards flights then you are doing it all wrong. I put literally everything on my Chase Sapphire credit card or my American Airlines credit card and with every purchase I am earning points to use towards travel. Airlines will run certain promotions throughout the year for a higher amount of miles than normal… for example: right now Southwest is offering 40,000 miles for one of their credit cards, but I’ve seen them run promotions to get as many as 100,000 miles for the exact same credit card. You just have to be patient and keep an eye on their websites/offerings. Certain credit cards require you spend “X” amount in “X” number of months, but honestly, at least for me, it’s not that hard to spend a couple thousand dollars in three months if you are putting every single purchase on their. Think gas, groceries, birthday presents, dinners, drinks, adventures, those new AirPods you want to buy…. it all adds up. When you go to book your flight, there is nothing sweeter than getting a free flight simply for using your credit card to make purchases.

I hope you found this helpful! If you have any questions or other helpful resources on how you book cheap flights, please comment below and let me know!