Who doesn’t love flying first class, staying five star, or eating Michelin level food? If you’re like me, you appreciate the finer things in life, but also know they usually come with a hefty price tag. For most of us, budget is a true consideration when booking travel. We want the most bang for our buck and to truly enjoy our travel experiences, but without breaking the bank. Enter budget luxury travel.
Everyone has different preferences and areas where they prefer to cut costs. We want to share some ways that we splurge on luxurious hotel stays, business class long haul flights, airport lounge access, and the occasional fancy meal. All without spending more than we can really afford or cutting our travel time.
Choose the Right Time
Our number one tip for making luxury travel more affordable is super simple. Choose the right travel times. Simply choosing to travel in the shoulder season or the off-peak season will drastically reduce prices for almost all aspects of your travel plans.
Research when the off-season is for your desired destination. Choose times when the sights you want to enjoy will still be open or available. Look into other events and sights that may only take place in the off-season. Our post Five Weeks in Europe: How to Create the Best Itinerary gives some tips about planning trips around events that are happening. Look for concerts, markets, and festivals that are happening in the off-season and create a trip around them.
Plan Splurges
If you don’t already have a habit of doing it – learn to make a budget for your trip. Make a daily food budget and then budget in some special meals. Choose which luxury hotels have the most reasonable prices and book them first. Then choose your other stays with the remaining budget.
All of our Hilton stays in Europe (see The Best and Worst Hilton Hotel Stays in Europe) and some other properties included breakfast buffets with our room. A substantial breakfast can make it possible to delay and/or skip lunch. One way to save is by eating more at the beginning of the day when prices are lower, and/or eating the fixed price menu a lot of European restaurants offer for lunch. Dinner is usually more expensive. Have a late breakfast and a late lunch or grab something very inexpensive from a shop rather than having a sit down dinner.
If you have lounge access (see Is Airport Lounge Access Really Worth It?), it can really save you some money on food that you can then use for a splurge when you arrive at your destination. Our post on the perks of the AMEX Platinum discusses how you can use your lounge access both as a luxurious retreat and as a money saving tool to feed more money into other luxuries.
Credit Card Perks & Loyalty Rewards
One of the best ways to add luxury to budget travel is to take advantage of the travel benefits that come from credit cards or being a member of a loyalty reward program. Loyalty reward programs give you perks and upgrades on airlines and in hotels. Travel credit cards offer other perks and benefits to elevate your travel experience.
On our trip through Europe we had Hilton Diamond Status through our AMEX Aspire Hilton card, which included perks like free breakfast, room upgrades, a $250 resort credit, and a $100 food/property credit for Conrad/Waldorf properties. By combining this with our AMEX Platinum perks, like $200 off AMEX FHR property stays and $100 property credits while there, we were able to create an awesome splurge stay at the Waldorf Astoria Versailles. In the end, we ended up paying only about $100/night for a $300+/night room, plus we had amazing breakfasts, free drinks, and $200 worth of fine dining.
Note: Cards like these come with hefty annual fees. Check out our posts Is Being a Hilton Diamond Member Really Luxury? and Luxury Bang for Your Buck: Why You Should Consider the AMEX Platinum to decide if a travel credit card might be right for you.
The Points Game
The very best tool for budget luxury travel that many people aren’t using to the full, is the points game. That is, leveraging credit card points to score luxury options for less. This is an especially valuable tool for flying business or first class for affordable rates. It can also help with free hotel stays and restaurant discounts. How does it work?
Years ago, I collected credit card points, but I didn’t really know how to use them. So, I would end up cashing them in for statement credits, having no idea that I was wasting massive opportunities for more valuable cash ins. Simply put, you have to know which points to collect and how to transfer them for the biggest payback. You also need to pay attention to welcome and bonus points offers that can quickly up your points to amounts that will score you big value.
We highly recommend doing your own research regarding collecting and using points on sites like The Points Guy and Upgraded Points. Not only can you learn the best points strategies, but they keep up to date with the latest bonuses, best travel cards, and even on transfer offers.
We personally find AMEX points and Chase points the most valuable for us. AMEX points have incredibly high value for airline transfer partners and Chase points are super flexible and have a 1:1.25 value when used for booking travel with Chase.
Examples of how this has worked for us: Chase points we had already accrued covered our roundtrip flights to Europe. Then, by opening certain cards and completing minimum spends, we were able to collect enough AMEX points to fly business class roundtrip to Taiwan on EVA Airways (a value of more than $10,000!!). Since we were spending a lot of money remodeling our house before we went to Europe, we also opened several Hilton cards and were able to use the welcome bonuses and points we accrued from spending for more than half our stays in Europe. A serious help to our budget.
Get Started Now!
Budget travel doesn’t have to be uncomfortable or completely devoid of luxury and splurges. You can get started even with something as simple as a zero annual fee Hilton Honors Card which currently comes with a welcome bonus of 70,000 points plus a free night at a Hilton property after you spend $1000 on the card in the first three months. If you use our referral code, we get a small points bonus for referring you!
Or, if you’re ready for a great all-around travel card with an annual fee of only $95/year and amazing perks like a 60,000 point sign up bonus, awesome travel insurance, and a $50/year hotel credit – use our referral to open a Chase Sapphire Preferred card and start racking up the rewards.
Please note: Your approval for all credit cards is dependent on having a good credit score and other factors determined by the credit card company. We cannot guarantee your approval.
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