Watching Your Wallet: Tips for holiday travel

(WILX) - A new study from Nerdwallet suggests 43% of Americans plan to spend money on flights or hotels during the holiday season -- up from the 19% from last year.

Close to 30% of Americans who didn’t travel during the 2020 season plan to spend money this year.

Travel this time of year is notoriously expensive, which is why Sara Rathner -- a personal finance expert with Nerdwallet -- said people are looking for ways to save.

“We found that 89% of travelers were looking for ways to save money,” Rathner said. “That’s not a huge surprise because Americans were planning to spend money on holiday travel are looking at about $1,800 in costs.”

The amount of money can be a real burden for a lot of people, so what can you do? While it’s currently November, experts urge people to save for travel as far in advance as you can.

“If you’re not going anywhere for Thanksgiving, Christmas is still over a month away,” Rathner said. “Put some money aside every week, have it available for those last minute expenses. That can keep you from having to put those expenses on a credit card.”

If you are waiting another year and 2022 is the year you plan to travel, start saving for that now.

If you do use a credit card, have a plan to pay off that debt as quickly as possible. Don’t let it linger and only make minimum payments.

Keep holiday travel plans flexible. We keep seeing massive cancellations among the airlines. This is typically a stressful time already with airline staffing issues and possible winter weather.

It’s a good idea to look into travel insurance, but make sure you know what a policy covers before purchasing it.

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