Gap year money - How much should I save?

This is a bit of a difficult one really because your budget will depend on all sorts of different factors.

After you have booked and paid for your project(s) and flights, you are still going to need to remember to budget for things like visas (if you need any), bits of kit you might need, medical bits and bobs such as vaccinations and all sorts.

Next you've got your in-country spending money:

First thing to bear in mind is what is included on your project. If all your food, accommodation and transport is included (flights are only included on the Complete Gap) then you are only going to need spending money for ‘extras' such as additional activities, extra snacks, souvenirs and little costs like Internet and phone calls. If only some or none of your meals are included then you'll need to adjust for that and you might need to budget for any additional nights accommodation and so on.

Second thing to think about is that costs vary depending on where you are in the world. I mean, a fiver in Asia and Latin America is going to get you a lot farther than in Australia or the USA. So, in terms of additional meals not included in programmes then you can get a really good meal for as little as £1.50 if you want to really budget whereas in the USA, meals are not expensive but you're going to be paying about £5 for an evening meal. Accommodation is based on the same principle, as is alcohol…everything really!

The last thing to think about is how many activities, sightseeing stuff, trips and so on you're going to do. Some of the project locations can be quite isolated to give you a more genuine experience, so there are not going to be a lot of additional activities etc for you to do. However, if you are somewhere like New Zealand or Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe which have a number of extreme sports, you are likely to be spending a lot an extra activities.

So, really the best thing to do is talk to your travel advisor to see how much that they would recommend you take to your particular destination, have a bit of a think about the kind of stuff that you might want to be doing and maybe do a bit of research to find out about general costs in the places that you are going.

Real Gap's team of travel advisors will give you a rough idea about how much gap year money you're likely to need. The following guidelines should help start you out on your gap year calculations.