Does talk of a road-trip get you as excited as Tom Cruise on Oprah’s couch?  Well, let us introduce you to your new best friend…“relocation deals”.

We recently took up a relocation deal for our latest road trip from Brisbane to Sydney. Being based on the Gold Coast, we’ve frequently explored Northern NSW, but never further south than Angourie – great spot, by the way! With the many public holidays in April, this was the perfect opportunity to use one of those extended weekends to explore further with an inexpensive relocation deal.

Relocation deals are where car-hire companies need vehicles moved to a certain location and will offer you heavily discounted rates, as little as $1 a day, to do so! Sometimes, free fuel on top of that too!

It’s a win-win situation for both parties – the hire-car company gets their vehicle moved to a location for a fraction of the cost they would otherwise pay, and the happy road-tripper gets a substantial discount on their hire fee.

Some of the many companies offering these deals include iMoova, Transfercar, DriveNow and Coseats. All offer a range of vehicles too, including cars, 4x4s, campervans, and motorhomes. Don’t just limit yourself to Australia – these deals are offered worldwide!

We booked our deal through iMoova, which offered 3-day campervan hire from Brisbane to Sydney for $1 per day. We wanted to do the route in five days, so added two extra days for $75 each, bringing our 5-day hire total to $153. Our flights back from Sydney to Gold Coast cost $45 each – no special deals needed for that one, just a quick search on Momondo!

After adding incidentals such as tolls, petrol, groceries, impulse buys and camping fees, the whole trip cost approx. $550 total or $275 per person. We minimised our costs by “free-camping” – check out the “CamperMate” app and cooking our own food with the supplied portable gas cooktop and our food from home (which we loaded in the van’s fridge with before we hit the road). Of course we also treated ourselves to the obligatory chocolate-covered frozen banana from The Big Banana and scrumptious handmade Beemster cheese from a cheesery! Although you can always go more extravagant with the camping locations or dining out, there’s something special about getting the real-deal camping experience.

So what’s the catch?

Vehicle hire companies generally offer the discounted rate for a minimum number of days to reasonably get the vehicle to the particular location. For example, a Brisbane to Sydney relocation is generally offered at $1/day for three days with an allowance of up to 1,150 kms. Although this can reasonably be done, you may find it doesn’t allow for as much sightseeing time as you’d like. You can purchase extra days at a higher rate (which will also increase your km allowance) to make the trip less rushed.

These deals aren’t usually released until about two months in advance of the travel date, so it’s not something you can plan months ahead.

As with all vehicle hires, the hire company will hold a sizeable deposit, which may take some time to be refunded back after the vehicle is returned. In our case, we chose the standard insurance (at no extra cost) with a $1,000 refundable deposit held for four weeks. As for motorhomes and higher-end vehicles, the deposit can be substantially higher, but this can be reduced by opting for higher insurance coverage (at extra cost).

Be sure to return the vehicle on time, otherwise you could be penalised.

As always, read the fine print to ensure you can meet all the requirements for the relocation!

How to snag a good deal?

With new deals posted daily and selling out quickly, check for deals early and regularly. You can even be added to a mailing/waiting list to be notified when a certain route or time period becomes available if you can’t find the deal you’re after.

Why we’re sharing this little-known tip?

We’ve all heard it before – “life is short”. There’s nothing more valuable to add to life than more adventures, experiences and memories, particularly those shared with loved ones. As awful as it is, there eventually comes a time when we lose a loved one and we soon realise that the only thing left of any true value are the memories you shared. We always wish there could have been more memories.

So we encourage you to grab life by the unmentionables, get out there, explore and make those special memories. More often than not, they won’t be from time spent in front of a computer, TV or phone screen.

We are huge adventure junkies but we’ve always managed to do our trips on a budget by keeping it simple. We’re all for keeping the costs low to allow for more trips, more often!

Understandably, road-tripping like a hobo doesn’t sound like the ultimate adventure to everyone. But if you haven’t given it a try, a relocation deal might be a good way to dip your toes in the water. Yes, it might be out of your comfort zone, but isn’t that when we have the most memorable experiences?

In this beautiful big world of ours, there are endless places waiting to be discovered and what better way to do it than with a little home on wheels.