Disrupt Retirement: Travel Full-Time as Nomads

Making the decision to become full-time travelers and live a nomad life wasn’t a conversation that happened overnight.

When Steve and I met on our first date (I was 44 and he was 50), I think the second question I asked him was what airline he liked to fly. From that question, our dreams of how to travel the world as a couple launched. We had no idea in our first conversation, though, that we’d disrupt our traditional retirement ideals and achieve all of our retirement dreams. But we have.

Different Retirement Dreams and Financial Readiness

Between our first date and our nomad launch date, we had kids to raise and careers to finish. We also had to reconcile our retirement funds. Whereas I had lifelong retirement plans to retire early and was on track, Steve didn’t really have a funded vision. He had assumed he’d work until he didn’t, not really contemplating what was next.

We kept talking about how much we both loved to travel.

Our annual vacations had us climbing the Great Wall of China, finding rich stouts in Dublin, and hiking the glorious striations of the Grand Canyon. Over time, we started to realize that we wanted to travel as much as we could when we retired. The typical idea of a life in a patio home on a golf course in Florida with occasional long vacations never appealed to us.

Having an active senior retirement of learning languages, seeing the Ancient Wonders of the World, and eating unidentified greens in a curry sauce did.

How to Retire Early When You Weren’t Planning to Retire

In the meantime, Steve tapped into the Financially Independent Retire Early (FIRE) movement. Through FIRE, he realized that the formula to fund retirement wasn’t complicated; spend less, make more. He got laser-focused on these two goals and his bank accounts built. He paid off debt, changed careers, and stopped spending.

I rebalanced my portfolio so we could pay off our mortgage, freeing up Steve’s income from mortgage payments to IRA contributions. We skinnied down to one car that had no payments. We focused on eating whole food, plant based meals, eliminating expensive nights out and pricey meat. Our electric vehicle and bicycles reduced our monthly energy costs. We stopped buying things, and we found anything we absolutely needed in charity shops. The only thing we accumulated was money; not liabilities, things, or waste.

Over a ten year period, Steve’s portfolio grew to a number he felt comfortable that would sustain his life. Social Security would supplement it, and soon, we visioned what we’d do in our retirement and what it would cost. During this time period, I retired at 49, having achieved my financial independence. We circled a date to depart, two years later. (For more details, see my book Two Carry-Ons and a Plan.)

Full-time Travel as Retirement

With two years to retirement, we started working through the particulars of what we thought retirement would look like. We’d eliminated the golf course home idea, but what could the idea of “travel a lot” look like? Would we:

• Own three units around the world and travel among them?
• Get a small turn-key place and take long trips from our home base?
• Rent our current home, return as necessary, travel the rest of the time?

We worked through all of these scenarios, thinking we’d always somehow have some sort of home base. Nightly conversations at dinner had us going in circles. We’d get clarity on one idea, but then another idea would surface.

It wasn’t until I took five months to solo travel through South America (while Steve finished up his career) that the idea about what we would do in our retirement became clear. 

Slow Travel, One Month at a Time

While traveling solo in Chile, Colombia, Peru and Mexico, I stayed for a month at a time in charming AirBnbs. I found comfort in homes equipped with a kitchen, sofa, bedroom and bathroom, usually in a neighborhood where I got to know the local baristas, moms in parks, and athletes in gyms. It was easy to recreate home, except with the excitement of new flavors, smells and sounds. I was enthralled. 

When I returned to Denver after my trip abroad, I pitched the idea to Steve.

“Honey, I’ve got an idea,” I opened the conversation.

“Okay,” he replied cautiously.

“What if we traveled the world, slowly, one month at a time? Our monthly accommodations would replace our home in Denver,” I pitched.

“What do you mean, my love?” he asked.

“We could we be ‘slowmads’! We could sell everything! What do we need with our house anyway?” I challenged him.

Why Do We Need a House?

Selling our house and becoming house free was a disrupting idea. All our lives, we’d had homes. We were bought into the idea that the value of our home paved the way to fund our retirement. Like our parents, we lived in the world where if we worked hard, we’d own our home and be debt free at retirement. We’d save and invest, using those funds to maintain our retirement life. The thought of selling the very tool that got us to retirement seemed ludicrous. 

I was lifting the very comfort blanket we’d held onto for years. What did we want more? Comfort or adventure? If we were to sell our house and eliminate the expense of maintaining a house, what could we spend our money on instead? The house was too big for our empty nest, it wasn’t in a neighborhood that we needed anymore (good schools, good to downtown, close to airport), and it wasn’t in a state that had a retirement-friendly tax structure. 

If we sold our house, what would we do with our things?

Why Do We Need Things?

Again, I took a swing at the comfort of our lives. Our things; the extra shoes, the heirlooms, the holiday ornaments. What if we got rid of those, too? What would eventually become of those things in the long run?  Would our children want the heirlooms we held onto, the art we collected, the dated clothing, or the pictures we’d cherished? And if our kids would ever want them, could we give these things to them now rather than later? 

We had to disrupt our thinking about our things, too. We started thinking about our house and our stuff as problems our children would have to manage, and we realized we didn’t want to burden them with these difficult and emotional disposal decisions. Rather than holding on to things and passing them to our children and friends, we took on the responsibility of making these repurposing decisions now while we were alive.

Do Your Kids Want Your Stuff?

We called the kids, aged 18, 24, 30, to the house. They took everything they wanted. We additionally gave them a few things we felt they should each have. Next, we packed our travel bags with the things we wanted to carry, and then we sold everything else. The house, the car, the heirlooms, and even the Christmas decorations.

It felt great. Freeing. Liberating. Light.

Regrets Are For Dreams You Didn’t Fulfill

We sold it all.

Next, we concentrated on the big wide world of adventure that we wanted to explore. We booked our flights to Dublin. Now, four years later, we’ve been around the world twice, seen 50 countries, and we’ve eaten countless dishes of unknown greens in tasty curry sauces. We ask ourselves if we had any regrets.

Not one.

We’ve made nomad friends galore who are living similar lives. Some have little places tucked in corners of the world they return to rest, others have storage units they wish they could clear, but all love their nomad lives. 

We all stress that this life is not a vacation. We have to plan for every bed, find every meal, learn all the transit routes, calculate currencies daily, navigate insurance and medical needs, and still call our family to remind them that we love them. Yet we do take vacations from our nomad life. Sometimes it’s nice to buy a fancy dinner, have someone else clean up after us, and lie on the beach sipping paper-umbrella drinks. 

Could You Travel Full-Time?

If you’re thinking about retiring to a life of full-time travel and being a nomad in the world, start by asking yourself these three questions. The questions are not around whether you love travel or not. The questions are deeper and get at whether you could disrupt your ideals for retirement.

1. Why do you need the things you have in your home?
2. What keeps you in your home now?
3. Who will you upset if you were to sell it all and leave?

These are complicated questions that could have possibly very difficult answers which might take time to resolve. But answer them and keep moving forward as you work through your contemplations.

Circle a Date on the Calendar

In the meantime, while you work through these questions, circle a date on the calendar. You might know exactly when that date is (Retirement Party, December 12, 2 pm), or you may have no earthly idea when the date is. 

If you’re in the later category, pick your favorite holiday. Then add a year within the next five years. Like Halloween 2026 or Valentine’s Day 2028. Once you’ve got a date circled, I promise you, everything else will fall into place.

Retiring as Full-Time Travelers

The nomad life we live now, one where we travel the world slowly, finding time to volunteer, making friends, playing pickleball, writing books, and cooking local flavors wasn’t an infrastructure we ever imagined when we first started thinking about retirement. But with long chats, researching different ways to retire, watching youtube, and digging into our comfort zones, we found a formula that works for us. And the biggest reward of it all? We’ve found others who do this lifestyle, too. Come join us!

For more information about how to launch a full-time traveling lifestyle, read Two Carry-Ons and a Plan. Or if you’re wondering what Nomad Life is really like, read The Nomad Life. Both are available on Amazon in ebook, audio, and print.