As Christmas is near, the festive mood is on and it certainly demands partying, entertaining and offering gifts. And all these definitely means over expenditure. If you are planning to avoid excessive drain out of money and don't want to be named Scrooge, it would be good to plan in advance to save money at Christmas without compromising on the fun filled entertainment. Adapting to money saving strategies help to focus on your spending habits to safeguard the festive seasons without selling items or approaching for a second mortgage. Following are a few effective strategies will help you save some real good cash at Christmas:
Plan out a Budget for Gifts
You surely maintain a budget to keep a balance of your income and expenditure. In your budgeting doc where you have listed your groceries, monthly rent, car payments you could add a gift category to manage your expenditures on gifts for occasions. For Christmas what you could do is to figure out the number of gifts that needs to be purchased. Maintaining your money for 12 months will help you gather good funds to shop your Christmas gifts. Have a target money fixed for all your gifts and it will help you save lots of money and it will help you avoid the assistance of plastic money.
Thrift celebration approach
Christmas is a time when friends and families gather at a place and it won't look odd if you serve cocktails instead of hens in the party. It would also be great if you could put up something like cookie exchange, or maybe some games for the night or better than all a series of movies for the chilling night. Everyone attending the party would really enjoy a dinner with a stuffed Turkey and it would be easily affordable if you could possibly save all year round and it won't be harsh on your pocket as well.
Start piling items you need
Start stocking up early to avoid the rush at stores that start from the 20th for Christmas as people start gathering stuffs to prepare for the festive night. Start assembling non organic items that won't perish which could be stuffed and come handy for the big day. This will certainly help you in distributing your finances among items while maintaining the balance between your income and expenditure. Also in this way you could start stuffing up items that you love and by the big day you will have all your favorite items with you without a miss.
Coupons and Time
Avail the coupons that you are made available to people just few days before Christmas and they seriously will help you save a lot of money. Using these coupons on items that you purchase in bulk would help you manage your finances well. Like serving plates, decorations etc.
Keeping aside the ideas of gifts you could also spend some time with friends who need guidance or assistance or may be someone whom you get to meet very rarely. A few friends who are back on holidays would appreciate your visit and spending time at their place and you could also carry small gifts to add the flavor. You could also arrange for a dinner party at the local restaurant or at your house for such friends.
Following the above steps will help you save a lot of money on Christmas and you could thus set an example and spread the word of celebrating Christmas smartly by effectively managing your finances.
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