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The Future Self Savings Method
In 2016, I began saving up for an experiment living as a digital nomad. It was the first time I had to seriously think about what my “runway” would be. How long would my money last if I were to have no income coming in, and I wanted to continue traveling?
I decided to take a small bets experiment, figuring that 2 months abroad would be a enough to gauge what this digital nomad life is all about.
I calculated my monthly expenses — rent, food, all the big items — and created a “travel fund” worth at least 2 months of expenses. Even if the South American countries I was interested in had a lower cost of living, I wanted a wide margin to account for unexpected expenses like flights, emergency AirBnBs, and shenanigans.
To my surprise, I returned from that trip with a more money leftover than I had budgeted…and it felt good.
I got my first taste of buying myself future months of freedom.
Conventional financial advice promotes two extremes
The typical financial advice rest on two points:
On one hand, build an emergency fund. Experts like Dave Ramsey suggesting a starter fund of $1000.
