We’ve talked a little bit about the ways to save during the holiday season already this month. The good news is that there are so many different ways that you can manage to trim your budget more than you’ll trim your tree, meaning you can have an enjoyable and stress free holiday and manage to not drain your bank account. Here are our last two tips to help you save money this holiday season.
Pick some cheaper holiday traditions
Traditions are one of the most enjoyable parts of the holiday season. Many people have traditions that include expensive travel, paying for special holiday attractions, or extravagant gifts. If you can’t afford to continue these traditions, it’s easy to feel guilty for not being able to continue the traditions just for tradition’s sake. Instead of getting rid of traditions that you can’t afford entirely, try replacing them for more affordable options. Here are a few of our favorite inexpensive holiday tradition ideas:
-Tour neighborhood Christmas lights
-Watch a holiday movie with hot chocolate at home
-Go sledding
-Make homemade gingerbread houses or holiday sugar cookies at home
-Go caroling
Be wary of sales and know when to stop
Seeing a sale sign elicits some sort of primal need to buy whatever has been marked down, even if it’s not something you need or even particularly want. Shopping sales is a great way to save a little bit of extra money during the holidays, but make sure that you’re only buying things that you actually want and will use. A good rule of thumb is to consider whether or not you’d pay for this item if it wasn’t on sale and it had a normal price tag. If the answer is no, put it back and walk away. Comparison shopping is also a great way to shop sales effectively. When you’re considering buying an item, check the prices of that same item in other stores close by and see if you can find the best price. Some stores will do holiday price matching, so it’s worth looking into that too.
It’s all too easy to go overboard on the holidays. You feel like if there’s any room left in your budget, you should just keep on spending. It’s important to know when to stop, and when to know that you’ve done enough. A good way to do this is to decide, BEFORE you leave your house to do Christmas shopping, how many gifts you’ll be purchasing. Once you’ve reached this number, stop. No matter how many sale signs you see, stop. This will keep you from spending money you shouldn’t.