Having a good handle on your personal finances is important. When your goal is to see the world, your finances become absolutely crucial. Having a good grasp of your financial goals — and how you’re going to reach them — is at least as important as deciding on where you’re going to travel and how you’re going to fund the trip. Furthermore, the two are incredibly intertwined.

Everyone’s financial situation is different, of course, but there are a few tips that are pretty much universal for anyone focusing on their finances for the purpose of travel.

1. If it isn’t online, it isn’t going to happen: There are great ways to make sure you can get your mail anywhere in the world and it’s generally not too hard to get an envelope headed back to wherever your billing address is. But both options can take weeks more than what you might be used to. Operating online is much easier, and allows you to handle your money across international borders with far fewer hassles.
2. Automate as much as possible: You can make paying your bills an automatic process, and it’s certainly worth the effort. Between jet lag, time zones and amazing adventures, it’s not too hard to lose track of what day it is, which makes missing a payment that much more likely if you have to log on and arrange for the payment specifically.
3. Separate your savings: No matter where you are, you need a rainy day fund. But it can be pretty tempting to dip into your emergency savings to buy a plane ticket, so I suggest separating out your savings accounts. Personally, I’m a big fan of ING Direct, which allows you to divide your savings account into separate sections — you can see at a glance what’s in your emergency fund versus what’s in your travel fund.
4. Think for the long-term: I’m not a big fan of the idea of the traditional retirement. I’m not really expecting to quite working just because I hit a certain age and considering how many people are focusing on freelancing or otherwise operating their own business to travel, I don’t think I’m alone. That said, I’m still setting aside money towards a retirement fund. A lot could happen between now and then, so I still think it’s worth having money set aside for the future.
5. Currency exchange is crucial: Don’t get too used to thinking in a particular currency. The amount a dollar will buy fluctuates every day and the same is true for other currencies as well. That makes it very important to keep a clear idea of the actual money you’re spending, whether we’re talking pounds or pesos.

Do you have any tips that have made managing your finances while traveling any easier? Please share them in the comments and we’ll see if we can really build this list.

Photo — Monkeyc.net