Jan
4 Things We’ll Do Differently This Year
Photo by Marvin (PA)
Life’s a learning process isn’t it? And a good job too! There are plenty of mistakes we made in our first year as Location Independent Professionals and plenty of things we’ll do differently in 2008.
Here are the most useful ones that we’ve learnt a lot from and perhaps you can too…
If you’re first time visitors to a country, keep plans flexible
To give ourselves a feeling of more security and familiarity during our first year as location independent professionals, last year we booked and planned to stay specific lengths of time in each destination. Out of the 4 main places we spent time, 2 of them we left earlier than originally planned because they weren’t what we expected nor were looking for at the time. We lost money therefore on:
- Flight changes
- Discounts we’d negotiated for longer term stays
- Deposits we’d paid
This time around, we’ll keep our plans a lot more flexible, check and get slightly more flexible ticketing options and not commit ourselves to accommodation that turns out to be not-quite-as-nice-as-looked-on-the-website by paying all the rent in advance.
Plan some downtime to focus on the businesses
We grossly under-estimated the impact that moving around would have on our ability to focus and work on the businesses. It’s not so much the travelling itself but it’s the week or so beforehand in the lead up to leaving a place and the week or two after arriving when you’re trying to settle in, that take it out of you. Add that up and you’ve lost a month for each new place you visit!
In the future we’ll be much more aware of this and we’ll consider the following:
- Spending longer than a month in certain places or choosing just 2 or 3 places to visit each year
- Alternate between visiting a new and exciting place and a familiar or ‘easier’ destination (e.g. English-speaking, culturally similar to other places we’ve been) to give us time to focus on the business.
Focus more on cashflow
We’ve had to dip into our savings and stick things on credit cards a couple of times this year when we’d rather have paid cash. We simply didn’t take into account the fact that we’d be having to pay rent up to 3-6 months in advance and whilst we knew the cash would be coming from the business, we didn’t always have it when we needed it. 2008 will be the year of “cash” which brings me to the next point…
Save 12 months in the bank
It’s the same advice you’ll hear when planning to make a big career move or leave the corporate rat race to start up on your own…saving up to 12 months cash in the bank will not only help with the above, it will also allow you to take some time off and fully appreciate all the wonderful places you’re visiting without even having to think of the business.
We had about 6 months cash savings when we left that I’d allocated to use for our LIP life if we needed and we certainly needed some of it to bankroll some of the larger upfront bills. This year we’ll be aiming to build this up to 12 months.
Some rather large learnings in there for us and mistakes which we won’t, if we can help it, make again.
If this is going to be your first year as LIPs, then enjoy it for what it is and if (when) things go wrong, chalk them up to experience and learn from them for the next year!
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Just thought I would drop a comment to save I love the work you are doing here at location independent living.
Whilst I cannot take on some of the traveling aspects of what you say (our second child is due in the summer) I intend to use your techniques to develop my business to service clients around the world. In effect I am location independent to them,
For others out there procrastinating about shelling our for the e-book that comes with this site, I say go for it, in particular, I liked the parts about breaking the news to friend and family.
Neil - there are some really child friendly places in the world, (friendlier than England) Spain being one of them, but I agree that the value of this site isn’t just the travel aspect. I see that you’re from Gateshead and I think your point is a good one - you don’t have to be lying on a beach on the Costa Brava to be location independent.
The book is excellent, I was one of the lucky ones who got it as a Christmas present from Lea (thanks again Lea) and as someone who has lived in quite a few places around the world, have to say that it is worth every penny. In fact that’s not true as there’s so much great info in the book that really it’s just a token price - the true value of what it can save you in terms of time, money, stress and inspiration would be far, far higher.
I’m going to be doing a full review on my blog and have signed up for the affiliate programme as I suspect that many of my readers/listeners are learning Spanish to become location independent and Lea’s book will be a real help to them.
Lea,
Loving your articles on FSw and now enjoying your blog!
Best,
Kristen Fischer
@ Neil Matthews - thank you for stopping by and leaving a comment - it’s great to get feedback and find out what everyone else is up to. And thank you for your kind words about the book…glad you enjoyed it and that you’re finding it useful. Good luck with the new addition to the family…how exciting for you all!
@Kirsten Fischer - yay, a fellow FSw writer! Thanks for visiting. Just checked out your blog as I’m a novice when it comes to the freelance writing game - some great stuff there, thanks!
Thanks, as always, Chris
Well you should remember Lea that when I was roaming around, the internet was just being developed so we had to learn everything in the school of hard knocks. Having learned the hard way I am able to better appreciate something that is really useful, coming from somebody who thinks about their mistakes.
Thank you for the excellent tips! I’m planning a family vacation to Paris this year to try out the country and location independent living. I’ve been a consultant for 8 years and my children are almost raised (college and high school age). So, living in and exploring France while working sounds wonderful!
Hi Renita - thanks for dropping by. Paris…wow! I am sure you’ll love it, it’s a fantastic city. Have fun exploring France…do you speak French?