Being a college student can be tough in the summer, do you work your butt off and make a ton of money or do you relax and spend some time with your friends? We think you should definitely do both but if you don't want to spend the earth on activities and vacations this summer, we've got three tips to help you stick to your budget!

1. Have A Staycation

Exploring your city is a great way to have a relaxing break without having to venture to far away from home. This means you'll save a load of money on travel and accommodation costs and you can spend more on visiting attractions and treating yourself to meals in places that perhaps you wouldn't normally visit. I'm sure your local town or city will have so much going on over the summer from food markets to music festivals and some of them might even be free entry. Do some research and plan your summer without having to travel miles out of town.

2. Travel For Less

Just because you're working with a budget doesn't mean that you can't get away from your home town and have an actual vacation. Road trips can work out a lot cheaper than flying places!. Whilst you are traveling you don't need to subject yourself to awful motels, try camping - but only on legitimate and licensed camp sites (or save 10% on hotel rooms with our latest retailer Hotels.com)! ‌

‌ Try cooking for yourself the whole time you're away. If you rent an apartment or a hotel room with a small kitchen in it you can really cut costs on your meals whilst you're away. Shop at local supermarkets and fresh food markets and you'll save so much more money that you can spend on exploring, boat trips, water sports and more fun stuff that will make amazing memories! Another way to save money while on vacation is not to shell out for things like sun chair if you're only planning to chill on the beach for a couple of hours. Lay your towel on the sand and save that $5-10 for something else.

3. Eating & Entertaining

The summer is the perfect time for BBQs at home, breakfast parties, cocktail making classes; you name it, you can do it from the comfort of your own kitchen. You could even make more than you need and try and sell your most popular baking or cooking at a local market, this way you'd actually be making some money this summer and you could create your own little business! Obviously there are an absolute ton of things to do in the summer when you're on a budget or even for free but these were my three favorite.

What are you up to this summer?