How to Support a Life of Travel
Sitting in Santorini in our first month of travel after quitting our jobs.
Say Good-bye to Your Cubicle Forever
How to get started
After years working 9 to 5 in a stuffy cubicle, we had both had enough. Don’t get me wrong, we both have had some great experiences at our past jobs, but we just weren’t doing what we loved. To be able to really live the lives we wanted to, we knew there were changes that needed to be made. That’s why we packed up, quit our jobs, and headed out.
We took the knowledge that we had and the bags on our backs picking up travel tips along the way. We were lucky enough to run into a fellow traveler in Bali, an Englishman named Matt, who quickly became a great friend of ours. We swapped travel info and inspo and became even further acquainted with life on the road.
One of the issues with living a life of travel is trying to break the stigma of not having a “traditional” career. It’s not a concept that people totally understand yet and has definitely taken some getting used to. Matt told us that his grandma wouldn’t have the easiest time grasping the concept so he just tells her he’s a traveling computer salesman (he actually builds websites for clients while traveling… close enough).
What’s the Catch…
When thinking about beginning a life of travel, you might envision it as this giant, earth-shattering moment where it hits you that traveling should be your life. For Matt, and us as well, it was much more casual. After meeting fellow travelers, we have noticed that this tends to be a trend. Our advice? Try it out! What do you have to lose? If it doesn’t work out for you, all it takes is a plane ticket back. You’ll never know unless you try.
Traveling can become an incredible way to network and market ‘on the go’ career. You’re surrounded by so many new people who you are able to inform about your work and even others in your same situation. Many places now even have co-working facilities where people who work remotely are able to go to have reliable internet access and also network.
An office away from the office. Sitting in the city or suburbs of the US, this may seem like such a crazy concept because you don’t see people working this way. But once out traveling, you realize just how many people are able to work remotely and support their life of travel.
Working remotely
There are inevitably some challenges that you’ll run into working remotely while traveling. Time differences, physical distance, and the fact that you’ll want to be adventuring rather than working are all issues that come when you mix work with travel. And what about access to workspaces? It’s hard to believe, but Wifi isn’t just found everywhere.
There have definitely been times on our journey where we’ve had to set up shop in rickety cafes and pay to use internet access. Gets the job done, though! The biggest hurdle is realizing that your new “office” isn’t going to come with easy access to supplies and resources.
You’ll have to be able to figure out what you really need to work remotely and learn from experience with what works and what doesn’t. The trick to a remote office is finding ways to do it minimally. Take with you what you’ll need and leave behind what you won’t. Once on the road, you’ll realize how little you actually need to work efficiently.
time zone trouble
Time zones are a trickier obstacle to face. It’s important to always be aware of which time zone your clients or company is in and know when will be an appropriate time for you to work based on that. You may find that you’ll have to answer a few conference calls in the middle of a Friday night or work a day ahead of schedule to keep up on deadlines. You’ll fall into a routine that works with both you and your work. If you’re able to find a job that’s flexible enough, you may not ever run into this issue! Lucky you.
The Price You Pay To Travel
Saving up for a continuous life of travel may sound daunting, but it’s important to remember that the amount you have saved can be stretched depending on where you’re traveling. When talking with Matt, we both noticed that our time spent in Bali allowed us to stretch our savings the extra mile. What might have taken us 4 months to save for can be stretched for maybe 8 months if you travel somewhere where the cost of living is lower. Take that into consideration when both budgeting and planning out details.
Not everybody is able to get this done in one shot, either! Many people travel and work remotely, head back home where they are able to make steady income again and reevaluate their plans, then head right back on out to try it again. If you have the drive to do it, you’ll be able to make it happen whether it’s a change in career path, change in employers, or even just asking your current employer if working remotely is a possibility.
Time to Make the Move
The biggest task at hand is ripping the band-aid off and going for it. Finding that first client. Making that first order. The first steps are always the hardest but always the most crucial. It is more than possible to support a life of travel! Continue to invest in yourself, your business, and your goals to make it all happen.
How to Make Money and Travel - Matt’s Story
Watch the full interview here:
Read instead of watch:
Matt: 00:00 Did you mean Matt? Yes.
Fin: 00:01 Let's have a cheers.
Tim: 00:01 Cheers.
Matt: 00:02 Cheers.
Fin: 00:02 Thank you for doing this.
Tim: 00:03 Thank you.
Tim: 00:04 Tim and Fin here with our continuing series, How to Make Money to Travel.
Fin: 00:09 I feel like we're in our news room again.
Tim: 00:11 High school news.
Fin: 00:12 Thanks Tim. We're here with our friend Matt today. Say hi, Matt.
Matt: 00:15 Hello.
Fin: 00:16 Matt is from England, and that is going to be really fun to listen to his accent all day. But apart from his beautiful accent, we also have some great content to share with you, because Matt has a full life of travel. But apart from what you see online of all the Instagram worthy photos, Matt is just a guy who likes to travel. Matt, when was the last time you posted an Instagram photo?
Matt: 00:39 Mm, about a year ago, I think.
Fin: 00:41 Proof right here that you do not have to be a full time Instagrammer or a travel blogger to travel the world. So that's why we have just like pulled Matt on camera here to ask him some questions about what he does for work, to give you some more ideas beyond kind of what we've shared already in the series.
Tim: 00:58 We'll also be joined today by many neighborhood roosters, so you'll hear them in the background. That's just a reality of Mexico. Esta es Mexico.
Fin: 01:06 Esta es Mexico.
Tim: 01:08 This is our first time ever interviewing somebody too, Matt, so we thought we'd start with the lightning round for you.
Matt: 01:14 Okay.
Tim: 01:14 Tecate or Coors Lite?
Matt: 01:16 Teagle.
Tim: 01:16 Teagle. UK, Great Britain or England?
Matt: 01:20 I'd say England most of the time.
Tim: 01:22 Thanksgiving or 4th of July?
Matt: 01:25 4th of July.
Tim: 01:25 Okay. That's the right answer. Perfect. English Breakfast or Ginger?
Matt: 01:30 Toughie. Ginger these days, I think.
Tim: 01:31 Ginger.
Matt: 01:32 10 years ago it'd have been English Breakfast.
Tim: 01:34 Congratulations.
Matt: 01:35 Thank you.
Tim: 01:35 You started it off completely correct.
Fin: 01:36 Let's make a cheers.
Tim: 01:37 Cheers.
Fin: 01:37 Good job everyone. We're through with first round.
Tim: 01:39 This is your first very serious question, by the way. What does your grandma think it is that you do?
Matt: 01:47 Well, she knows what computer is, so if you need your computer repaired, I'm the guy to do it.
Tim: 01:55 Okay.
Matt: 01:55 How she thinks I get this work or when I'm moving around, and do I just go and post flyers every time I go to a new place or something? I don't know. I'm a computer repair guy.
Tim: 02:04 Okay. We all have to kind of like make up things that we tell our family that we do because it's complicated. Can you tell us what you actually do to support yourself?
Matt: 02:16 I want to say a coder, but most people say a software engineer. So basically, I built websites mostly back end and front end for some ... like at the minute for some clients I've got back in the UK.
Tim: 02:25 How long have you been doing that for then? Because we've talked earlier, you didn't go to university for this, you're kind of like self-taught on this.
Matt: 02:33 I'd like another job, like a sales job. But everybody is like, "You can't make any money." So I taught myself to code in my spare time. And then managed to kind of find a couple of clients and carried on doing the job until the client work built up enough to get enough money. And then we did part time at the job and carried on working with clients. And then eventually went out-
Tim: 02:52 It's a sales job you did?
Matt: 02:54 Yeah. And then eventually when I was kind of busy enough to cover myself, then I moved away.
Tim: 03:00 You didn't self teach the coding, then become an employee for somebody else. It was always a side gig. You always got your own clients.
Matt: 03:08 Yeah. Yeah. Any job that I've had hasn't involved being a coder.
Tim: 03:12 So you had to sell yourself from the very beginning of it then?
Matt: 03:16 Yeah, I think I was quite lucky. I did just word of mouth. Like someone would hear that I'd built a website for somebody, and then you just end up getting another one. But then also you're learning as you're going. So like when I was building websites back then, if someone would ... it would always be a yes. So if they asked me if I could do something, I'd just say yes to it. And I'd be like, "Is that even possible?" And then go back and research it. And then spend ages learning it, and yeah. So it was a very, very long process. So you're not really making any money for a long time. The projects are taking a long time. Things are going wrong because you're just learning as you go. And also I think for the online learning was quite ... there was a lot less of it then. So you were just kind of just Googling stuff and going with what you find. Yeah, it's just learning as you go.
Tim: 03:56 So you're doing that for a few years. You're like building up your client list. Then eventually there has to be an inciting incident or just it comes over. You're like, "I don't want to live in Brighton anymore. I want to go live somewhere else and still do this." What happened there?
Matt: 04:16 It's weird. One of my friends said to me one day, like what I was doing did allow me to work from anywhere. And I just kind of agreed with him. And then thought I could kind of do that, but never did it. And it was always ... I suppose it was kind of a bit of a dream thing back then. And it was only like a couple of years later that I started. Yeah, I suppose I just got a bit bored of Brighton, and I had a motorbike. And I thought, Screw it, let's just go do like a month ride around Europe a bit." So I rode through France down to Italy. So I planned it all out. And I was just working along the way, staying in Airbnbs. And yeah, I got back from that, and kind of got the taste for it a little bit then.
Matt: 04:54 And then, I think I was just one night, I was doing a bit of research, and I came across Bali and a coworking space in Ubert. I quite like the idea of that. So I started trying to plan that out. And then at the last minute, that's when I noticed that there was another one kind of under construction in Changzhou. I was a bit unsure whether it was real or not in a way. Like you just see, "Oh it's under construction," so you don't know what you're going to turn up to. But I decided, "Okay, screw it. Let's go to Changzhou and see what happened.
Fin: 05:22 What's the worst that can happen? Your in Bali.
Matt: 05:24 Yeah, exactly. But it was very daunting. I booked in for two months. I planned to go for two months and ended up staying for four. And that was kind of my first ... that was in 2016. And then I went back to the UK for the winter for some reason. I don't know why.
Tim: 05:41 Obviously regret it.
Matt: 05:42 Yeah.
Tim: 05:47 That's the point.
Fin: 05:47 Further emphasized that you should be on the road.
Matt: 05:48 Yeah, yeah. And then January 2017, I left and didn't really go back. And started going from Thailand to Indonesia to some other places.
Tim: 05:59 Well, I thought there was going to be some dramatic insight-ing moment in there. I guess we didn't have that either. It's even more casual than that. Like go try it for two months. If it doesn't work, it's like just a plane ticket back. And you had nothing to lose.
Matt: 06:14 I know, I was lucky that I did really get on with it. Because I don't know like if I had just done that two month test and hadn't really enjoyed it, even though it could have enjoyed the next time, I don't know whether I'd end up saying at home, or I don't know.
Tim: 06:26 Give it a try and see.
Matt: 06:27 Luckily all went well. Kind of met some cool people.
Tim: 06:29 I hope were included in the cool people, but probably not.
Tim: 06:33 I guess I can go back to what are some of the challenges you run into working remote? Because it's one thing when you're doing it in the same, at least country as your clients, but I don't know, just things you run into and obstacles you've had to overcome being remote all the time.
Matt: 06:52 I think everyone would say wifi obviously. Yeah, most-
Fin: 07:00 You never know.
Matt: 07:01 Yeah. Most of the places you go to, wifi is very up and down. I tell you, there's not really that much stuff. I feel like I'm kind of ... I've got everything in my bag. I've got everything now that I need. Like from experience, I kind of have everything there. I've got my mini office, I've got my second screen.
Tim: 07:14 Can you tell us ... Yeah. your kit.
Fin: 07:16 What's your like set up?
Matt: 07:18 Just laptop, like a good stand. Everything that's minimal, so I can fit everything in like a small rucksack. I've got a second screen, which I use sometimes.
Fin: 07:28 It's currently our viewing screen for Game of Thrones on Sundays. That's our setup.
Matt: 07:33 It does second as a very, very small cinema screen.
Tim: 07:36 And you have the very important pieces. So he's also got a proxy. Or a VPN, sorry.
Matt: 07:42 Oh, yeah, a VPN for various things.
Tim: 07:45 So we can actually log into the US.
Matt: 07:48 Yeah.
Tim: 07:48 HBO.
Fin: 07:48 We can watch Game of Thrones.
Tim: 07:52 Not available in Mexico.
Fin: 07:52 It's mostly about how to watch Game of Thrones around the world.
Tim: 07:52 It's very important.
Fin: 07:54 Your clients are all in the UK, right?
Matt: 07:57 Yeah.
Fin: 07:57 So they're all in the UK time zone. How do you manage then different time zones around the world? If you're in Asia, if you're over here in Mexico, what are they? Eight hours, seven hours ahead from right now?
Matt: 08:07 Yeah. Yeah. When I was originally going to Bali, I thought I was going to be working throughout the night. So I would be in doing English hours, and then just chilling in the day. But that that plan changed within like two days of being in Bali. And yeah, like just it's not-
Fin: 08:24 Did you tell them?
Matt: 08:25 Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Fin: 08:26 Oh, okay.
Matt: 08:28 All this stuff is not mission critical. I think people just like to have you there, but when you're not, things still work. Like if your quality of work is good, then yeah, you just make it work. Like occasionally, there has been occasional phone calls I've had to ... especially been out on a Friday night, and then suddenly you need to have a call with someone at like midnight. So you kind of like, you're out with friends and you've got to duck into the coworking space at midnight and jump on a call quickly and pretend everything is good.
Matt: 08:55 But yeah, you just make it work.
Tim: 08:58 Do all of your clients know that you're remote? Or sometimes is it easier just not to bring it up? Because why would they need to know so long as the work is being delivered, right?
Matt: 09:07 Yeah. If I'm speaking to someone, especially newer clients, I don't normally tell them. It's weird. Sometimes people have a weird attitude of one ... Some people will be like, "Oh, you're obviously getting paid too much if you can be living in," I don't know something that costs a lot less, to live. That that makes no sense.
Fin: 09:23 Oh, it's the idea that you're living a life of travel, so you're living a luxurious life, you mean?
Matt: 09:29 Yeah, which ...
Fin: 09:30 Whereas your cost of living is actually lower.
Matt: 09:33 Yeah, I feel that most people, a lot of people that you meet are doing ... they've got a startup or something, so they need to keep their overheads down. So they do this to keep their overheads down, because you can come to a part of the world where it's a lot cheaper to live, eat, etc.
Tim: 09:47 For somebody out there who is watching, thinking about going remote, do you have any advice for somebody just starting?
Matt: 09:54 I suppose, especially going with like some of the good coworking spaces and stuff like that. When you get there, you're surrounded by a lot of people, like potential clients, like people that you meet, people that are in the same situation.
Tim: 10:04 No, that's huge even there. I forget how much help we got from ... Even just seeing people at like dojo in Bali, doing what you're talking about. Like just even meeting you, being like, "Oh you can actually work and have a real job and make pounds and live somewhere else."
Fin: 10:22 Yeah, that was a huge moment for Tim at the end of the trip, going to Bali and seeing those people being like, "Oh we had our year of travel, saving and traveling, but look at all these people working and traveling." Just like, you know what? It feels probably crazy sitting in the city or the suburbs of the US, because you don't know anyone doing that. But all of a sudden then like, "Oh, we've been out here," and those coworking spaces, you meet all those other people that have a similar lifestyle.
Tim: 10:52 Okay.
Matt: 10:52 I feel like I love his drive as well. I've met a few people there in dojo that maybe they've been there, they've been traveling, and then they've kind of been coming into dojo for whatever reason, but it's not their full time thing. But then they go home, and then they change their life to accommodate. Either they go home for a longer period, and they train themselves up to do something, which allows them to work remotely, or they move from their current job to another job doing the same thing. But with employers that allow them to do it. Or they ask their current employer, "Can I work remotely," and do it that way. And I feel like if you've really got the drive to do it, then it's not that difficult a thing to do.
Fin: 11:37 What was the timeframe between, I should probably go down this path to you're reaching out to your first client?
Matt: 11:45 Well I suppose my situation is different in that I almost had the client straight away, but I really didn't know what I was doing. So I was learning, which was actually really good, because then you've almost got like a real case study to work on. And then you're learning for that case study. Where I find, I don't know, like sometimes when you do like tutorials and stuff, it will be like, "Oh you're going to build a website that does something which you'll probably never ever going to build." And yeah, you kind of lose interest in it. Where if you've got like a real case study, then-
Fin: 12:14 Okay.
Matt: 12:16 But you know, that was my particular case.
Fin: 12:19 Yeah, but that's a good example. So then it's almost like, don't forget the client side as you're going through a course, then it's almost like you could be halfway through the course, feel completely lost, but also thinking that that's a good time to reach out to clients so that those intersect at some point. Because if it takes three months to find somebody, you're going through the course along with it, and then you're going to keep learning, and then those two can intersect.
Tim: 12:44 That is the hardest thing. And you hammered that home in your video about your consulting job, like getting that first client. And at some time, you just need to pull that bandaid off and to actually do that. And I haven't had to do that necessarily, but I guess for the Amazon business actually like placing that first order instead of getting frozen up in analysis, that sort of thing.
Fin: 13:09 You've got to pull the trigger at some point.
Tim: 13:10 Yeah.
Matt: 13:11 When you are somewhere like Bali, you can live on ... the fact you can live on a budget. So you could almost go there with your plan like, right. You give yourself six months to kind of learn something, then you want to find a client. Just if you set out a plan, the fact you are somewhere where it's a lot cheaper to live just makes that a lot more accessible, I think. If you don't currently have a job, and yeah, that that is your plan or something to do, going away to do it for like a year or so is pretty accessible, obviously with a little bit of savings.
Tim: 13:41 Give yourself plenty of runway. That's what we were talking about too when we first started. Like just enough to keep investing in yourself or growing your business.
Fin: 13:51 We've been talking about that and the videos, like the cost of living. So if you're thinking even now about quitting your job to give yourself more time to work on your full time business or finding a client or learning a new skill, then in the States and you think that might take you four months, or you have enough savings for four months, maybe those four months are actually eight months somewhere else in a location, that's a cheaper cost of living. So that'll give you more time to work on your project.
Tim: 14:16 More runway.
Fin: 14:16 And it'll get you on the road. And that's the whole point of this series of life of travel.
Tim: 14:23 If you have any questions we didn't cover that you think we should ask people in the future, make sure to let us know down below. This is our first time pretending we're Tim and Fin and asking these sort of questions. So, hey, I don't know. Congratulation.
Fin: 14:37 Thank you, Matt. Good job, Matt.
Tim: 14:38 Thank you for being our Guinea pig, Mattie.
Fin: 14:41 Was that scary?
Matt: 14:41 A little bit.
Tim: 14:42 Okay.
Matt: 14:43 Boom, boom, boom.
Tim: 14:44 We're doing that and the ... Okay.
Fin: 14:46 Boom, boom, boom.
Tim: 14:46 Perfect. That's it.
Fin: 14:47 Okay, good job everybody.
Tim: 14:47 That's it.
Fin: 14:47 Now we'll take Matt to dinner.
Tim: 14:50 Matt, you did a terrific job.
Fin: 14:52 So good.
Tim: 14:54 That went way better than ...
Fin: 14:57 It's nice to have a third person.