How to Work Out Your Big Lap Budget (Before You Hit the Road)
Getting clear on your budget before you leave is one of the most important things you can do. A lot of families either get the budget wrong or they get so overwhelmed by the whole thing that they never even get started. It can be a ‘how long is a piece of string’ question.
We’ve travelled Australia a few times now, for up to a year each time. This is what we look at when working out the budget:
There Is No Magic Number
The number one question I get asked is: how much does it actually cost?
I wish I could say “every day will cost you $23.92” — how easy would that be? But it doesn’t work that way. Every family spends money differently. There is no right or wrong answer here. Today is just about getting aware of where your money goes, how you spend it, and whether you want to make any tweaks before you head off.
If you love your Uber Eats and the finer things in life — that’s completely cool. If you’re more of an op shopper and thrifty by nature — also cool. You do you. We just need to work out what your budget looks like for your family.
Once you’ve got a feel for these costs, we’ve walked through how to turn them into an actual daily number separately in Australian Caravan Budget: How to Work Out Your Real Daily Travel Number.
Start With What You Spend Now
Before you can work out what you’ll spend on the road, you need to know what you’re spending at home right now.
Have a look at your current weekly expenses. It might be a little surprising — and honestly, it’s a useful exercise regardless of whether you’re planning a trip or not.
From there, you can start working out what you won’t be paying on the road. Things like your mortgage (depending on what you do with the house), gym memberships, subscriptions. We cancelled a few things before we left, but kept our YouTube Premium because we actually use it — and I like uploading videos when I can.
Then there are the costs that come with you. Insurance — and this one can actually go up, because you’ll want long-distance towing cover for your roadside assistance. If you’re in the middle of nowhere and need a tow, you want to make sure you’re covered. Health insurance, ambulance cover — and please check that yours is Australia-wide, not just your home state.
Phone plans, internet (we use Telstra and Optus — one each, so we get the best coverage between the two), Starlink if you need it, car and van repayments if you’ve financed.
The gap between what you drop and what you keep? That’s your starting point.
That gap is exactly what our Budget Calculator & Planner walks you through. It’s the same spreadsheet we used to work out our own numbers before we left.
Your Budget on the Road Will Reflect Your Budget at Home
This is a really important one, so I want to spell it out.
If you’re used to Uber Eats every night at home, you’re not going to suddenly become a thrifty camp cook the moment you hit the road. It’s really, really hard to make big lifestyle changes overnight. So if you want to travel for as long as possible, start practising now. Get into the habits before you leave so there are no surprises.
Holiday or Lifestyle? This Changes Everything
Have a proper sit-down with your travel partner (or just yourself) and ask: is this a holiday, or is this a lifestyle change?
A holiday mindset means you’re going all out — seeing everything, doing everything, eating at restaurants and having the most amazing time. That’s fantastic. But it might be shorter.
A lifestyle mindset means you’re moving your life onto the road. Slow travel, home-cooked meals, free campsites, long stays in one spot. You can go for much longer.
Neither is wrong. But you need to agree on it before you leave, because two people with different expectations on the road is a recipe for stress.
The Big Costs to Think About
Fuel is usually the biggest one, especially if you’re covering big distances. Travel slow like we do — 200km days max — and fuel becomes manageable. Drive hard every day across the country and it will blow out fast.
Accommodation is the other one. Free camping (or wild camping as some people call it) is brilliant and there’s a lot of it around Australia. Caravan parks range from around $10 a night for a simple council-run spot right up to $100+ a night for the big resort-style parks with the bouncy castles and everything. We do about a week free camping, then pop into a caravan park for a few nights midweek to have a good shower and let the kids have a run around. Works really well for us.
We use Camps Australia Wide as our go-to, and cross-check with Wikicamps. Camps Australia Wide is the more reliable of the two in our experience.
Food gets more expensive the more remote you are. If you can, stock up in the bigger towns. And if you want to save money — cook in the van, look for roadside stalls and local markets, and pack your own lunches and coffees. We averaged around $150 a week on food, but we cook almost everything ourselves.
Experiences vary wildly. You can travel Australia spending next to nothing on experiences — the beaches, nature walks and community events are incredible and totally free. Or you can book things like swimming with the whale sharks at Exmouth (expensive, but absolutely worth it — book well in advance as they sell out). It’s really up to you.
Don’t forget the sneaky ones — coffees, ice creams, hot chips at roadhouses (guilty), laundry, national park fees. They add up more than you’d expect.
How Do People Actually Fund Their Trip?
Savings is the most common — work out a rough weekly budget, multiply by how many weeks you want to travel, and start saving toward that.
Some people use holiday pay or long service leave. Tim took his long service leave at half pay on one of our big trips, which was a great way to stretch it out. Others rent their house while they’re gone. Some do remote work on the road (I write and do content work from wherever we are, as long as I’ve got a laptop and internet). And some people stop and work along the way — pubs, caravan parks, farm work, trade skills.
There’s no one right answer. Most people end up using a mix of a few of these. The point is — it is doable.
Once you know your number, here’s how to actually fund it: 17 Ways To Fund Your Caravan Trip Around Australia.
👉 Join our Skool community for Freelancing 101 to see if working online could be an option for you.
Want Help Putting the Numbers Together?
Inside our Plan. Save. Travel! community, there’s a travel spreadsheet that does a lot of the heavy lifting for you. You put in your numbers and it works out your weekly costs, tracks your savings, and shows you how much you need to put away each week to hit your goal before your departure date.
