When we started considering quitting our normal life to live full time on the road the first question we, and all our friends had, was can you afford to do it. We had heard that it was possible to earn money whilst on the road from various sources. Youtube adverts, amazon links, ad revenue are all ways that we’d heard you can generate income. So we started researching other full time travel bloggers / vloggers. Mosts sites and channels keep their financial situations a close guarded secret, so you are left wondering how they can afford to live this nomadic lifestyle but if they can do it then what is stopping us from doing it.
The general lack of information on travel bloggers finances was the reason that we wanted to share our finances with you. We want to make it clear, so that if any of you are planning to do a similar thing, it may help you make that big decision. We are realistic and know that to make our lifestyle fully sustainable, from making Youtube videos or writing blog posts is not easy and if it’s possible will take a lot of time and effort.
How do we make money
When we started considering quitting our normal life to live full time on the road the first question we, and all our friends had, was can you afford to do it.
1. House Rental
This is our biggest asset and after 30 + years of hard work we own a lovely house. We heard of many bloggers who had sold their house to fund their travels, as they say live for today and enjoy life, but for us it didn’t make sense to sell it. As soon as you sell it then your money will slowly go down (unless you make it big online !) So we sold everything in it and rented it out. Our house gives us an income of £1,356 . ( £43 per day)
2. YouTube
We started our YouTube channel so that our family can keep up with our adventures and to keep lasting memories for us. Videos bring everything to life, in a way that written blog posts can’t. As time went on and our channel slowly grew, we started looking into how to earn money from it. I am sure that like us you have heard that is possible to generate an income from YouTube. Income can be made from Youtube by choosing to place adverts on your videos – like when you watch TV. However as a new channel you are not eligible until you reach certain viewing targets.
At the current time you must have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time over a rolling 12 months. When you first start, this seems like an impossible task, after you get your 23 friends to subscribe, even if they all watch it to hit these targets really seems like a fantasy! Keep posting them and trying to continuously improve your content and with time, hard work and persistence you will reach these targets.
Below you can see our channel progress since it was launched. Our official full time travels stated in May 2018. Prior to this we posted some trips and used our last family holiday to Malaysia as a practice run and to learn the art of vlogging.
3. Support us
We were contacted by a number of you, who asked how you could help us or how to buy us a coffee, and so the ‘support us’ page was created. We have added a number of ways that you can support us and we would like to say a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone that has helped us. It is really appreciated. We want to explain the various ways that you can help as the amounts received will show on future monthly income posts.
There are a number of ways that you can help support us:
Share our content.
This doesn’t cost you a penny but will help our channel grow which in turn will help us financially. Repost on social media and tell your friends about what we are doing.
Buy us a coffee.
We are both coffee addicts and so what better way to help us than buying us a coffee. Since this was launched in September 2018 we have received a total of 39 coffee $108.20
Direct one off contribution via paypal.
A number of you have told us that you love our content and want to help keep us on the road or thank us for making a video on their home town. This was added onto the web site at the beginning of the year and so far we have received a total of £355.
Air BnB
This is a great way to help us and a win win as it doesn’t cost you a penny. If you’re new to Air BnB use the link on our web site and you get £25 discount and we receive a small referral fee.
Amazon Links
Most of you probably use Amazon from time to time. Did you know that if you click one of the links on the description of any of our YouTube videos, and buy any product within 24 hours, we get a small commission. So it costs you no extra and you get to help us. To date this year we have not earned any money from Amazon links. We are starting to wonder if we have set it up correctly. Here’s a link to our camera (just shop normally after clicking) – click here
If any of you are buying items on amazon and use this link and drop us a message – it would be great to see if it works.
4. Sponsorship.
So far we have secured one of official sponsor. A Plan Insurance – Thatcham Schemes. They have sponsored us for our van insurance for this year saving us approximately £500. A-Plan have offered all of TREAD the Globe’s followers a preferential rate. To receive this it is important that you call the correct branch (quoting TREAD the Globe) and number so please call
Thatcham Schemes: Tel 01635 879 910
What to expect from future posts
As you know we are currently in the process of getting ready for our drive around the world, in ‘Trudy’ our campervan (setting off Jan 2020). From now until the end of the year, each month we will share with you our income, and any costs associated with the preparation of the global trip.
Once we set off in January we will share monthly, detailed income and expenditure of everything we spend during the 2 year trip.
July 2019 - Income & Expenditure
YouTube
July was our busiest month on YouTube, with 122,00 views and these generated us an income of $293 (£235). It just shows you how many views you need to earn this kind of monthly income
Other Income
House Rental: £1,265.50
Paypal Contributions: £100
Buy me a coffee: £0
Amazon Links: £0
TOTAL INCOME JULY: £1,600
Once we set off in January we will share monthly, detailed income and expenditure of everything we spend during the 2 year trip.
Expenses
In July we started doing some preparations for the world trip.
Web site themes / plugins . £96
Branding for ‘Trudy” . £353
We also have some ongoing standard expenses
House Insurance: £25
Web site hosting . £12.50
(epidemic sound) Music for videos £10
Tubebuddy £15
FB Linker £4.95
Data Sim £26
Mobile £7
Total Expensese £549
Note at this point we are not including food, fuel and other day to day expenses these will be included when the world trip starts.
We hope that you enjoyed reading this post and it helps give you a better understanding of our financial position. We are slowly making it sustainable and the world trip is going to test our budgeting to the maximum. We have a long way to go to make the blogging and vlogging sustainable but it’s moving in the right direction – thank you for your ongoing support.
Marianne & Chris
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