Big travel spenders a surprise

Set yourself a realistic daily spending limit.

Try saving a small amount each week in the lead-up to your holiday.

Let your bank know when you’re heading overseas. Always get travel insurance.

Source: Julie and Jeremy Byth plan several holidays a year. Picture: Claudia Baxter/AAP Image AUSTRALIA’S biggest-spending generation when it comes to travel is not who you’d think.

Forget Millennials chasing life experience or retirees spending the kids’ inheritance. According to new Suncorp research, it’s 25 to 54 year olds.

They each spend an average $4597 per year, compared with $3205 for over-55s and $2735 for the younger generations, Suncorp’s Cost of Travel report found.

Among this big-spending generation are Julie and Jeremy Byth, both 43, who try to take an overseas trip annually as well as several domestic holidays.

Mrs Byth said the biggest attraction of regular travel was “the quality time we get to spend together as a family”.

“Life at home gets really busy and you

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are caught up in the day-to-day,” she said.

They travel with son Sinclair, 9, but also holiday with other family and friends.

Mr Byth is a train driver and Mrs Byth is a manager at a disability organisation. She said her age group had enjoyed the rise of flight discounts that had made air travel “almost a form of public transport”. “Travel is easy to book and a lot more accessible because of how it’s evolved,” she said.

Suncorp’s executive general manager of stores and specialty banking, Jason Stephens, said people in their mid-30s to mid-50s had high earning potential and more flexibility to spend than other generations did.

“Travelling with children would also come into play, and could significantly increase the amount they spend,” he said.

“There is a stereotypical assumption that once you hit retirement age, every second week you’re jetsetting to a different location because you suddenly have all this free time.” In reality, retirees were working longer, helping adult children with childcare, and receiving low returns on their cash savings, Mr Stephens said.

Suncorp’s research also found that one in four Australians were constantly saving for their next trip and 40 per cent still used cash to pay for expenses when overseas, but half were not always aware of exchange rates and fees.

Beyond Bank Australia’s general manager of customer experience, Nick May, said the 30s, 40s and 50s were expensive times of people’s lives.

“It’s also a time when we are usually fit and healthy and keen to reward ourselves for all the hard work during the year,” he said, while warning to budget and plan ahead for a holiday.