Moneywise24 Personal Finance

Last week I was enjoying my annual leave to the fullest; I stayed home for the first part of the week (which motivated to write the article How To Spend A One Week Holiday At Home), in the second part of the week I visited the wonderful city of Prague, capital city of the Czech Republic,  with friends.

I can’t stress enough the great time we had. Architecture is absolutely stunning, the food is great, and Prague is quite an inexpensive city.

Actually, Prague can be inexpensive, but it can also get quite expensive. Me and my friends intuitively did all the right things to stay on a low budget as much as possible; I spent around 250 USD during the 3-night stay, and that is including the costs for the hotel.

During our stay, I recognized that we kept our expenses relatively low by looking at three key things. I guess it can be applied to many touristic destinations.

Hotel

Hotels can be quite expensive, and sometimes you pay a fortune for hotels that are crappy and dirty. Often, hotels located in the city center are simply too expensive. They know they can afford this, as many business people and more wealthy tourists want all touristic attractions around the corner.

We stayed in a hotel in the area called Karlín, which is directly next to the city center. We could either walk to the city center within 15 minutes, or take the metro for 2 stops. There was enough parking space for our car, and it was free. In addition, there as a supermarket in the area, and some restaurants and bars for a last drink before going to the hotel. Read the rest of this entry →

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Holidays are a perfect opportunity to just relax and chill out. In the past, I used to travel around during my holidays, but at a certain point it was simply getting too expensive and it was eating away my money. So, I decided to take some shorter holiday throughout the year and actually stay home.

Staying home during annual leave was quite a new experience for me. I really didn’t know what to do with my time. Most of my friends in the city I live in would be at work during the day, so there was virtually no possibility to spontaneously meet up. Often I ended up in front of the television, or reading a book. But this quickly gets pretty boring.

Still, spending a holiday at home can be great time to do some things, that I usually didn’t have time for… or that I am simply too tired to do during a working week. Let’s have a look at my personal favorite nine things to do during a holiday spent at home:

Getting up early

Okay, I didn’t mean at 6 in the morning… but I usually don’t sleep until late in the afternoon either. It is just too much of a pitty to let a day pass by. I would get up around 9 or 10 in the morning at the latest, make myself a coffee and perhaps a light breakfast. I check my e-mails and watch some news. Read the rest of this entry →

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I know this topic might be a bit controversial, some people welcome it, others don’t. The keyword is ancillary fees within the airline industry. Basically, ancillary fees are any additional fee paid on top of the ‘naked’ price for a flight. This means, that any additional service apart from the mere transportation from A to B is being charged separately, be it a blanket during a 12-hour flight, meals, beverages, newspapers, earplugs to hear music, internet access, or even a place near the pathway, or at the emergency exit.

Ancillary fees are already for a great part common practice in the U.S. and with low cost carriers in general. You may book a Ryanair flight for $5, but end up paying $130 if you add extra charges for luggage, taxes, and food and beverages. Still, many airlines around the globe have not yet adopted ancillery fees and offer an all-inclusive package, but are discussing the topic heavily.

The introduction of ancillary fees is controversial, depending on what someone is looking for on his or her flight. On the one side, ancillary fees simply means not having to pay for a service which is not being needed. But then again, can we determine what is needed and what is not beforehand?

Another concern is how ancillary fees will shape the fee landscape. Many people claim, that for them flying will become less expense, since they can save on services not required. But the big question is, will the overall price really drop that much? If I would book a flight and pay for all available services on top, would I pay just as much as an all-inclusive flight?

As with real estate, or land plots, there is a lot of money to be made by splitting up property and selling smaller packages. For example, a plot of land, which costed $500,000 might be split up into 4 equal parts and be sold for $180,000 each; that’s a total of $720,000. Similar strategies are conducted in supermarkets, or by marketing agencies, by selling products in smaller packages at a smaller price, where the reduction of pricing is far less than the reduction of product quantity.

Ancillary fees is a hot topic, and I will surely follow this with great interest. Let’s see where we are at in 5 years from now.

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Traveling can be quite expensive. First, a large proportion is spent on getting to your destination, either via plane, car, train, or whichever method of transportation you use. Second, daily activities and food and beverages might eat up a large proportion of your budget. Last, you will need a place to stay. Most people choose for a hotel, a hostel, a campsite, or similar. Especially for the more open-minded people among us, there is a cheap alternative to the so expensive lodging: it is called couchsurfing (www.couchsurfing.com).

Couchsurfing is not as much focussed on cutting costs, but it is more a way of life. It is built on the principle idea that there is a basic trust among people, and that participants offer their couch, guest bed, mattress, or any possibility for guests to stay one or more nights. On the other side, participants may search the Couchsurfing database to find lodging opportunities at their destination. In addition to actually finding a place to sleep, the most important benefit of couchsurfing is to get to know the locals as you would otherwise not have. Hosts (those offering their couch) often also offer to show guests around town, they might introduce you to some of their friends, or invite you to come along at a party.

How to register

Couchsurfing is free for everyone, and all it needs is a registration at the website. Once registered, you can make a profile, upload some pictures of yourself, and tell something about yourself. Your main goal is to achieve a basic level of trust, so that if you are approaching people to host you, that from looking at your profile they will get a pretty good idea of who you are, what your passions are. As you are building your profile, you can also indicate whether or not you would be able to host people. Not everyone might have this possibility due to various reasons, so you may also indicate that you are unable to host people, but you’ll be happy to show visitors around town or meet up for a coffee.

Participate in local events

Couchsurfing has a large message board system, allowing you to exchange information and ideas around a variety of topics. Many couchsurfers meet up locally at a regular basis, and this would be your first step into meeting up with other couchsurfers live in order to get a good idea of what it’s all about. Also, if you are traveling you might want to see if there are some events at your travel destination and simply join; Couchsurfing does not know any boundaries.

Building trustworthiness

There is always the elementary question: who can I trust, and who can I not. Remember, Couchsurfing is accessible to everyone, and there might be some people who are abusing the website for their own interests. In order to build a trust system, Couchsurfing has build a strong reference system (here you can read what others are writing about another person), a ‘vouching for’ system, and the possibility to have your identity and your address verified. Using these three parameters, you can easily identify who is more trustworthy, and who is not. In order to start building your references, it is recommended to become active in the community as soon as you can; join local events, or participate in the forums.

Couchsurfing is a great platform to save additional money on lodging, but moreover it is a way of life. Members are typically students, individualists, or very open-minded people who want to have a different kind of travel experience.

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Yes, I know… I wrote an article one or two weeks ago about why it makes sense to spend Christmas at home, yet I am planning a trip around this time of the year; I live in Frankfurt, and my family lives in a smaller town in The Netherlands, so I decided to visit my family for Christmas. So I though. Just as I was about to get on a delayed flight at 13h10, the flight crew anounced that Amsterdam Schiphol Airport has cancelled all flights and is closing its doors for the rest of the day. The reason? Snow.

So, I went down to get back my luggage… I thought. As I am writing this article from home, I am still waiting for my luggage. The Frankfurt luggage transportation system does not seem to have all that capacity for such large amount of delays and cancellations, so I am affraid I will have to wait until tomorrow. Nevertheless, I am thinking. It really doesn’t snow that much in The Netherlands. How come Schiphol is closing down for the an entire day due to a bit of snow, whereas things seem to work out just fine in much tougher environments, such as Greenland or Canada. The same happened in my hometown last friday when it started snowing: the bus company, in charge for all bus routes throughout the city, has decided not to let any busses on the roads. Mind you, that city does not have trams or a subway system; all public transportation takes place via bus.

It is a bit hard for me to actually make such a harsh statement, but I can’t let go of this feeling that many companies nowadays would rather reduce risk and save money, and as a result let hundreds of thousands of people get stranded, in stead of assuring business continuity. Actually, corporations such as public transport, airlines, or airports, have an obligation to the community and general public. And I am really wondering: is it really all that dangerous to let flights take place, or have busses driving with snowy weather, or is it simply a cover up for their monetary decisions?

I would be very anxious to hear about your experiences. Perhaps you live in Canada, Greenland, or any other region with harsh weather environment. How are things organized over there?

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