Estimated reading time: 9 minutes
Prepare for the festive season with these five money-saving tips. Make it a time of togetherness and joy while reducing stress and creating lasting memories.
Find Peace This Festive Season Through Finance
Saving money for the upcoming festive season is not always an easy task but there are ways to lessen the burden.
No matter what customs and traditions you follow, whether it’s Christmas, Hanukkah, or the winter solstice, the December “Festive Season” can be a time of togetherness and inspiration.
It can also have family members at each other’s throats, but these cold, short days are best spent with those you love the most.
The festive season can also give you a renewed perspective on what you want from your life.
It can rebuild relationships and familial relationships (hopefully) and provides plenty of opportunities for us to tap into what is most important in life and to tune out all of our everyday troubles.
Financial Stress During The Festive Season
On the flip side, it can also be a time of incredible stress.
Between wallet-stretching expectations of gift-giving, connecting with and hosting certain people with whom you generally have a toxic relationship and whose very presence can make even the shortest days seem long, the holidays can be extremely difficult for many of us.
Those mental health professionals often talk about how this time of year can send those already dealing with depression into a downward spiral.
This can cause immense loneliness, sadness, hopelessness, and frustration in those who cope perfectly well with the other eleven months of the year.
There are many reasons for this, but often, the greatest problem area during this time is financial.
Planning For The Festive Season
We can stick rigidly to a carefully crafted budget from the second week of January through Black Friday, but as the season of big gifts and big meals falls upon us, careful planning can fly right out of the window.
Canada is fortunate that it doesn’t have this season so after Thanksgiving as they do in the United States, but that’s a small consolation prize as we watch all our careful saving and budgeting go up in smoke – or a smoked turkey, even.
To help you overcome these inevitable and always surprising expenses, below are 5 ways to save extra money for the festive season.
1. Get The Right Credit Card
It is the most obvious solution, by far, but also one of the riskiest.
A credit card allows you to transfer your extra December expenses to the following months effectively.
This can make it much easier on you as paying $10,000 at once can hit you much harder than paying $1000 over ten months.
Plus, with the sheer overhead of the December festivities, it’s often much easier to spare a few extra dollars in the quieter months of the early new year.
If you’re considering getting a credit card to best manage your financial needs, you must get the right one.
Compare leading credit cards to determine which one best suits you.
Credit cards can help you become more solvent, but they can also do the opposite.
The difference often lies in whether your credit card is appropriate for you.
For this reason, having more credit available isn’t necessarily a good thing.
Choose a card that provides only as much credit as you’re likely to be able to pay off.
If you can’t see yourself ever paying off the maximum amount, it’s too much.
Furthermore, choose a card that helps you with your current financial circumstances.
Many credit card companies will take on your debt with no interest in the first few months.
This can give you a good headstart on taking back your financial circumstances.
2. DON’T Get a Credit Card
It’s the exact opposite of point one. credit cards always come with the risk of drowning in debt.
So, if you feel like you’ll not pay back your credit either because you’re not necessarily excellent with money or because your daily life already pushes you to your limit financially, it’s probably best to resist the temptation altogether.
What this means, very simply, is that you have to understand your financial limits and plan accordingly.
Ideally, while working out your budget for the year, remember to include the extra expenses in December right from the off.
Putting that extra bit aside can be its challenge, of course, so you can budget from “December out” rather than the reverse.
This means that come December, you will understand that you will spend more than usual, so you can dip into your savings with the express intention of replacing what you took out in January or February.
Another option is to budget December as projected expenses so you can save for the holidays all year.
Alternatively, you can take your January salary early with the understanding that you may be living extravagantly during the holidays but will be especially cautious for the next month or two.
3. Prioritize
Most of the time, we don’t know our priorities.
This is true of nearly everything in life, but it can become especially problematic regarding our finances.
Rather than clearly defining what’s most important to us, we often spend without considering the consequences and put far too much money into what we don’t need.
Do you need that extra pair of shoes?
Is buying that collectible off the internet necessary when you can barely afford groceries?
This time of year is perfect for taking the time to prioritize what is most important to you and how to allocate your money accordingly.
These steps help for December but it will also make a huge difference for the rest of the year.
Make a list of all your priorities, and then try to rank them.
Of course, some will share a spot with others.
You’ll also find that some aren’t as important as you’d previously imagined.
By having a proper idea of your priorities, you begin to see that you don’t need to spend money on all of them.
Perhaps hosting a party isn’t as important as it seemed for the past five years.
Maybe prioritizing the most important people in your life is more worthwhile than spending time and money to get together with estranged family and friends.
4. Focus On Yourself And Get Perspective
One of the big mistakes we make around the festive season is that we become entirely other-focused.
We only think about what we must do to keep others happy and forget what we need.
Everyone has a torrid time trying to keep everyone else happy, and we all lose.
Turning your gaze inward can help not only you but others as well.
Think about what you need and what you want from others.
This will help you better understand what they need from you.
You can take steps to care for your own needs and theirs.
You’ll find that instead of panicking and buying an expensive, impersonal gift, you can give something thoughtful – something whose value does not lie in how much it costs.
5. Less Is More
We have a tendency to assume that the more you spend on something, the more value it has.
A thoughtful gift that you know the recipient would make good use of or bring a huge smile to their face can be a lot cheaper than splashing out on the most expensive presents, but it can also be far more rewarding, meaningful, and personal.
Similarly and even more importantly, considering just how much of our festive budget goes to the meals we host and the parties we give, there’s little more important than taking stock of who matters to you.
We may believe that it’s the size of the crowd that determines the success of your Christmas mean or New Year’s party, but having a hundred work acquaintances, many of which you outright cannot stand, is never better than having a small group of close friends or family over for an intimate dinner.
Be Honest With Yourself
Most importantly, keep it as real as possible throughout the festive period.
Ask yourself if you’re buying an expensive gift because you know it’s what the other person would like or because of your pride.
Do you need to host a gigantic Christmas dinner when a cheaper lunch would work better for you?
Hosting a New Year’s party is necessary when it is so much easier and cheaper to attend someone else’s party.
It’s just a matter of constantly asking yourself these kinds of questions.
Authenticity is key.
- Don’t invite those you don’t want to invite.
- Don’t give presents for the wrong reasons and to the wrong people.
- Don’t pretend that you’re as rich as your mega-wealthy friend.
- Don’t act like you’re the soul of the party when you want to be an attendee.
This won’t just help your pocketbook; it will greatly improve your mental well-being when it is so easy to lose ourselves, not just in what we don’t have but what we don’t actually want but think we should anyway.
Remember these things; you may have a Merry Christmas and a genuinely happy New Year.
Discussion: How do you plan for the holidays throughout the year?
Leave me your comments below.
Post Christmas….a time of reflection! About 6 years ago, I decided to hop off the bus that led to holiday hangovers.
I set a budget for Gift giving that includes food, festivities and gifts. I decided how much to spend on each holiday throughout the year, then broke it down to weekly contributions. I kept a small amount in reserve in this account (to cover those sudden, unexpected gift giving obligations like baby showers, wedding showers)
I think about all the gift-giving…birthdays, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Easter,Christmas….and set a limit for each holiday per person. Then, (admittedly) the hardest part is sticking to that amount.
Saying that, I put $70 a week away to be prepared for holidays all year long. $3,500 to ensure I don’t have the stress of paying for Christmas in July, or November next year.
Now, maybe you don’t have as many people to buy for, or as much to contribute, but even saving $20 per week would give a cushion of $1,000 in the year!
I just reviewed my expenses for the year in gift-giving and found that it’s been bang on, for the last five seasons. (remember, I only started this 6 years ago now….so the first year I built up the reserves.)
My credit cards are at zero, so is my gift account.
And that’s the way it should be.