How To Build A Basic Travel Budget

When you’re thinking about traveling it’s always a good idea to build a budget. First you have to figure out how much you can spend and how much time you want to be away. This is a very simply guide to building a basic budget, and this is what I use most of the time when I plan on traveling to a new location.

You can build a budget in two ways. The first is go build a cost estimate based on where you want to go, then you know how much you need to save up for a certain trip. The second is to build a spending estimate based on how much money you plan to spend, if you already have the money.

Lets start with what I call a spending estimate:

First figure out how much you want to spend or can afford to spend. This will be your “Available Funds”. Divide this by the total time you plan on traveling (in days):

Available Funds / Total Time = Daily Budget

For example, if you currently had $2,000 for a 15 day trip, this would look something like:

$2,000 / 15 days = $133 per day

Once you have your daily budget you can get a better idea of how much you can afford to pay for a hotel every day, as well as how much you’ll have in your pocket for other expenses. The most common things you’ll have to pay for on a daily basis are food, transportation, and lodging. Anything extra like beers, cover charges for bars and clubs will be extra expenses that will vary throughout each week and each day. I like to break down expenses into three different areas:

#1: Lodging.
#2: Food and transportation
#3: Extras (Beers, cover charges, tourism excursions, souvenirs etc.)

Generally speaking I allocated one third of my daily budget to each of these categories. So if we go by the above $133 daily budget, I’d probably be looking for a hotel or hostel that costs $44 or less. If I cut back on the lodging costs then I have more to spend on food, transportation and extras. At the same time, I allocate about $44 per day for food and transportation and another $44 per day for extras.

Once you have a basic budget you have a better idea of how much you can afford to spend each day. Once you get to where your going make sure you at least keep a mental note of sticking to your budget. A budget isn’t any good if you don’t stick to it, and the whole point of making one is to make sure you don’t overspend.

I’ll be making a more detailed budget creation tutorial in the near future but this should give you a better idea of how to budget and estimate costs before you travel.

How The Global Recession Effects Global Dating

How The Global Recession Effects Global Dating

Today I wanted to touch on a topic that has looming over our heads for a while now. It’s pretty clear we’re knee deep in a global recession and it’s not just effecting the United States. Practically ever economy in world is feeling the impact of this global economic slowdown. But what does this mean for global dating? How will this global slow down affect the men that are a part of this global dating movement?

Well, I have some good news and bad news and I’m going to lay out the pros and cons of this recession for you.

If you’ve read my book you know that I point out in one of the sections how the men from developing nations migrate to the wealthy nations in disproportionate numbers to the women. This leaves many single women back home and many single guys competing for the women in your local area.

One of the pros of this recession is that this trend is set to diminish and even reverse a bit within the next few years. As the global economies worsen the men that have migrated to will start to feel the economic pain of the recession. Many will loose their jobs, and many more will be making less money than they use to. For this reason, many of these men have already started to return to their homelands.

A recent article on newsday.com describes the fact that immigrants are now making a lot less money. You can read the article here: click here

I use to live in an immigrant community in the United States and I have a lot of personal friends that still live there and I keep in touch with them. I’ve already heard reports of vast amounts of men returning to their countries because of the economic situations in Europe, North America, and other places.

An article in networkworld.com gives us a glimpse at this trend. The article points out that:

Fewer companies filed petitions for H-1B visas this year as the economic recession continues to threaten U.S. jobs and shrink the demand for foreign talent.

U.S. companies since April 1 have filed some 42,000 petitions with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services agency for 65,000 H-1B Specialty Occupation Visas available for 2010, a fraction of previous years’ petitions. In 2007, the USCIS received some 150,000 petitions in a matter of days, and in 2008 the agency conducted a lottery after 163,000 petitions were filed in less than a week.

So what’s the good news about this bad news? The silver on lining on this particular cloud is that the male to female ratios in countries have experienced a lot of immigration, countries like the United States, will start to get a bit better.

The bad news is that as immigrant men move back home the ratios in developing nations such as Colombia, and Costa Rica will start to even up and won’t be as lop-sided as they use to be. In other words the rations won’t favor the men as much as they use to in places like Brazil. However in order for this to drastically effect either the ratio of men to women in the upper or lower tiers, it’s going to take a few years and by then, the global economy may recover and we will resume the trend in migration of men to more economically fertile pastures.

There’s also one very positive aspect to this global slowdown. With tough economic times ahead, many of the upper tier men who would have traveled, or who traveled in the past, will not be able to make the trip anymore due to the current economic situation. This means that the amount of upper tier men who make it down to the lower tiers will be far less during this economic slowdown.

My suggestion is to take advantage of this fact and make an extra effort to save money and slot some time. Since there are less foreigners traveling to Latin America, South East Asia, and Eastern Europe, it’s going to spell out better results for you in the end, as long as you can take your trip.

If your in a position to take a trip at this point in time, once you get to your destination it will be well worth it because now you’re competing with less foreign guys.

Many of the women I’ve met who have online profiles have told me that they talk to many guys, but for the most part it’s a waste of time because fewer men are traveling to visit them. Take this into account, when you’re saving up some time and money to travel to the lower tiers… with the current state of affairs, your trip now will mean a lot more to the women you will visit.

Finally, I’d like to add that safety may become a bigger concern as the world wide economies are impacted by the global slowdown. So be safe, no matter where you go! Although I haven’t seen too many signs of increased safety concerns in Latin America, I would advise everyone to be extra cautious due the current economic climate.

I’ll catch you later,

Global Dating During The Recession

Hanging Tough

I recently read an article in the New Yorker about companies who plow through recessions and even pickup spending, advertising, and costs through tough times. Sounds counter intuitive, doesn’t it? The article points out that many a time; these companies end up gaining lots of ground while other companies are cutting back and loosing ground.

I feel that this applies 100% to global dating. In the midst of this economic recession, many men are cutting back on travel plans. People are scared to take vacations for fear of losing their jobs. Less people in general are traveling. This might be bad for the airline industry, but its great for global dating and I’ll tell you why (at least from the men’s point of view).

As less and less men travel to places like Latin America, South East Asia, and Eastern Europe because of the recession, there is increasingly less foreigners you have to compete with in these regions of the world.

Also as less men travel to these places for vacation, business and leisure, you’ll be more of a rare commodity. As the supply of foreign men in Brazil, for example, dwindles, the value of these foreign men will inevitably go up.

Another thing to consider is the fact that the airline industry is suffering greatly at this point in time because of the recession. Right now, airlines are offering great travel deals in order to entice travelers who are no longer spending on plane tickets.

So don’t put off your travel plans if you have them. And if you don’t you might want to start looking a mid recession get away. Right now might be the best time to travel.
In my next blog post I’m going to specifically discuss the pros and cons the recession is having on global dating.

Talk Soon,