Is the nomad life still affordable?

Recently I’ve been sharing how I still have a lot of anxiety around travel.

Partly due to Covid, partly because I don’t like flying and partly because I’m conscious of the high carbon footprint of air travel. So at the moment, I prefer to travel more locally rather than go on big trips and I’m very happy with that.

I’ve been quite surprised by the positive response I’ve been getting from readers, thanking me for talking about this and sharing they also feel nervous or stressed about travel still. ❤️

But one reader emailed me last week sharing another aspect of travel that is causing her stress, and that is: money.

She shared that she felt really anxious too, but in addition, her business had taken a huge beating during the pandemic and she simply can’t afford to go on all the trips anymore that she’d like to.

I was quite blown away by her honesty, to hear a fellow digital nomad open up about how she simply can’t afford much travel right now was humbling.

And the truth is, I very much relate to her. For years, I’ve been feeling the cost of travel rising.

For example, in 2016 we rented a room in a coliving space for ca €600/month. The average price is now ca €1500 in the same city.

To rent a small studio on Airbnb in Munich, my home town, will easily set me back £2500 (the average price is £5500 🤯).

All of this was happening pre-Covid already but the pandemic has accelerated the rise in travel costs. A quick Google search confirms this, travel is getting increasingly expensive:

• Airfare has increased by 20–25% over the last 2 years and is expected to rise by another 10% this summer.
• Airbnb prices have been skyrocketing, which is also causing massive gentrification and housing crises, especially in popular destinations like Lisbon. (a topic for another time)
• This also makes it even harder to buy property, which is the best (and most affordable) way to set up a home base as a digital nomad.
• (never mind the soaring energy prices, inflation & a cost of living crisis in many countries)

But I’m sure non of this is news to you, right?

Why then have I seen hardly any conversations about this financial strain on digital nomads?

Is it because we’re all crushing it and earning so much that these increases don’t affect us?

I doubt it. Sadly.

While money is a big part of the conversation in the DN space, usually it’s only in terms of generating “passive” income, having 6-figure launches or “leveraging geoarbitrage” to live like royalty in countries with lower living costs (aka colonialism).

And admitting that travel is expensive (often prohibitively so) doesn’t really fit the aspirational digital nomad image. It’s all about freedom, working 4 hours per week while making money in our sleep and being able to go wherever our whimsy takes us at a moment’s notice.

So where am I going with all this? Honestly, I’m not even 100% sure yet. But I know that shame definitely plays a role in us not opening up about money issues.

And as Brené Brown says, shame loves secrecy, so let’s bring this topic out of the dark to remove some of the shame.

If you’re struggling to afford to travel right now, it’s ok. This is a super hard time.

If you’re not struggling, that’s awesome, you’re doing great!

But either way, let’s talk more about it.

Hit reply and let me know what you think!

p.s. Do you want to read more stories like this? As part of my “content experiment” I thought I’d publish some of my musings that I usually share in my weekly DNG newsletter with you here. (Sign up if you want all the jobs from our community in your inbox!)