Thank You, Mr. Tax Man

How do you fulfill your travel dreams when home expenses, kids and other necessities get in the way?

Obviously, saving money throughout the year helps a little, but it’s been my experience that what I manage to save is never quite enough to cover the one or two big trips I like to take a year.

What I really need is a decently-sized, lump sum of money suddenly handed to me. I play the lottery but so far that hasn’t paid off. What I have been able to count on is my yearly tax refund. And while I’ve never gotten enough money back from the government to fund an entire trip, what I do get helps a lot.

Apparently, I’m not the only travelholic eagerly awaiting her IRS refund in the mail. A recent survey of some 1,788 U.S. travelers found that a little over 40 percent (43.8) will use all or part of their tax refund to pay for their travel. More than a quarter (27.4 percent) said they’d use all of it.

Equally as many respondents said they’d use a little less half — or $1,000 to $1,499 — of their refund (assuming a $3,000 refund). Just over seventeen percent said they’d use $1,500 to $1,999, while 13.7 percent said they’d use $500 to $999.

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The survey results come care of Travel Leaders Group, a massive travel agency company, so their customers aren’t entirely unbiased when it comes to travel. As an example, 94 percent of survey respondents have already taken or plan to take at least one leisure trip this year. Travel is not unimportant to them.

It’s so important, in fact, that 36.1 percent said they plan to take more leisure trips this year than last, and 39.7 percent said they will spend more on their leisure trips this year as well.

What about you? Will you use any of your tax refund to fulfill your travel ambitions this year?

–written by Dori Saltzman