The holidays are awesome until they become a debt inducing nightmare. The glitter, lights, and sentimental commercials are enough to get even the strongest willed human to dive head-first into a consumerism frenzy. Instead of being about family and great food {which even that can get a little too expensive}, it tends to get overshadowed by a pressure to buy, give, and overspend your way into the New Year.
Instead of resolving to eat beans and rice for six months just to pay for holiday over-spending, here’s some tips that will hopefully keep us all well within our budgets:
- Make a list. Life is just better with lists. List all of the people you need to give gifts {be realistic} and set a dollar amount for each person. Does it add up to a budget you can afford? If not, trim it down BEFORE you head on your way.
- Stick to cash only. This is probably the easiest way to ensure that you live within your means this holiday season. If you want to do online shopping, get a prepaid visa {that you bought with cash}.
- Equal is not always better. Don’t feel like you have to spend the same on your toddler as you do on your teen. Money and gifts does not equate to love, so no need to worry you love one over the other. Older kids have higher priced items–get the iPod and the Barbie and call it good.
- Store-bought is not always better. Homemade gifts may feel somehow sub-par, but they aren’t. They are affordable gestures of friendship, in fact, I might embroider pillows with that exact sentiment on it for my holiday gifts this year. 🙂
- Budget for entertainment costs. Feeding people costs a lot of money. Make sure to budget for that before you decide to host a holiday soiree {or, better yet, consider a potluck in your budgeting}.
- Stay out of the stores after the holidays if you have hit your budget. Yes, the sales are good, but $20 worth of goods is still $20 over-budget.
- Find the motivation behind overspending. This one is about to get deep, so brace yourself. Why are you so committed to over-buying? Are you trying to make something up to your kids? Are you compensating for a crappy childhood? Are you trying to live a life beyond your means to impress other people? Figure out what is at the root, and fix that problem instead.
- Comparison shop. Shop the ads and online before you ever hit the stores. Know exactly what is a good deal and what isn’t. That way, you can at least get the most bang for your buck. Plus, comparison shopping while you sit in your jammies and sip hot cider is pretty awesome.
- Create a holiday savings account. It might be too late to use it this year, but go to the bank and set up a separate account that has money automatically transferred from your checking each month. That way, come holiday time, you’ll have money set aside. Try to resist the urge to even look at that money throughout the year too.
- Fill your days with activities that cost little to nothing, but keep you out of the stores. Try to watch all of your favorite Christmas movies before the season is over, or play a different board game with the kids every night from the day after Thanksgiving up to Christmas. Those distractions will actually become some of your best memories.
How do you stay on budget during the Holidays?
~Mavis
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