How to save money during the holidays
November 20, 2017
As the holiday season rolls around, many of us are busy making lists and mental notes as to what we are planning to give to those special people in our lives. One of the big questions during this time of the year is if you have enough “green” to buy all these presents.
As college students, having the money to buy luxurious things isn’t easy, but by trying to save what we have, we may be able afford presents. For the students trying to scrounge together some extra change for presents, fret not, there are ways to save money for the upcoming holidays.
According to https://www.thebalance.com/best-ways-to-budget-for-the-holiday-season-4117100, the obvious question to ask yourself when deciding gift giving is to decide on how much you can afford. As much as we all wish we could buy our parents a new house for Christmas, sometimes it’s just not in your budget.
Decide how many people you plan on giving a gift to and plan accordingly on how much you are going to spend in total, without leaving you without having electricity for the next month.
https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/finance/5-ways-budget-holiday-season/ says when making a list, do check it twice; that way you can keep track of who you are giving a gift to and how much you plan on spending for each gift. That leads to the second point: track your spending. Keep track of everything you spend money on to make sure you stay within budget.
Another important thing is to set a spending limit or budget. Some people will have more gifts than others and that’s where the tricky part comes in: Know how much you’re willing to pay for a gift on each person and make sure you stay within budget with still getting a gift for everyone on your list.
When it comes to gift giving, there always seems to be that one individual that makes it difficult to find a gift for, especially if their responses to questions are indecisive and leave you in the dark. https://www.thebalance.com/best-ways-to-budget-for-the-holiday-season-4117100 says that the rule for when you don’t know what to get a person can fall in any of these 4 categories:
- What they want
- What they need
- What they can wear
- What they can read
Any of these categories can help in making the decision process just a bit easier on the buyer.
While the holidays can be exhausting and tiresome, they are a great way to be able to get closer to family and have fun. Just as long as we don’t go over budget of course