Hello everyone! Welcome back from your adventurous and hopefully relaxing spring breaks. Whether you were home with family, embarking on a road trip or zipping off to a beach, here’s to getting a well-deserved breather from the everyday stresses of the academic calendar!

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Now that the final break of the year has passed, you’re probably in the midst of summer planning. You may have applied to jobs, made plans to go home, or decided to do some traveling. But once you’ve set some plans in stone, the hardest part is done, and you can start to look forward to a bright summer!!!!

After accepting an offer, or deciding where you’ll travel, you may wonder, What else should I do to prepare? Most likely, there are some logistics you’ll need to consider going forward. You may need to make a check list for living arrangements, finding optimal sources of transportation, and figuring out what to do for entertainment!

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One of the crucial factors in these plans is having a budget. I took a step back to analyze how these financial decisions can impact my summer plans. A budget not only affects where we live and work, but also how we travel, what we buy, and what activities we do in our spare time.

These factors compelled me to ask: What if money weren’t a factor in our summer plans? How would it change where we applied to work, travel, and do for fun?

Having this newfound freedom could open the doors to several possibilities. It might lead us to live and work in places we never before considered. Personally, if the cost of rent weren’t a factor, I’d love to spend the summer working and living in a city I’ve never before visited. New York tops my list: After finishing a day at work, I’d spend the nights exploring every last nook and cranny in the city. From the Empire State Building, to countless museums and Broadway shows, I’d fulfill my bucket list and unpack the Big Apple’s greatest treasures.

Odds are, if we didn’t have to worry about money, we would make some adjustments to how and where we spent our summers. You may pursue work in a different location, take a fun road trip and travel to new lands, or get a little R&R from the busy school year! With an unlimited budget, what would you do this summer?