Yes, it seems a little bit strange to plan your Christmas budget right now. After all, we haven't even reached Halloween yet! But, the truth is that it is vital that you plan ahead for events like Christmas. The entire holiday season represents an "unexpected" event that seems to cause budgetary strain whenever it arrives. You know Christmas is coming, but it still comes as a shock when your December budget blows up.
Remedy the problem by taking a few precautions that can help you spread out the cost of Christmas through October and November as well, rather than just trying to cram it all in during December. You don't want to have to resort to carrying a balance on your Canadian credit card to make your Christmas ends meet.
Make a List
The first thing to do is make a list. Indeed, creating a list is almost always a good idea when it comes to any budget goal. You can use your last year's spending as a guide. Figure out what you spent on food, decorations, gifts, entertaining and other expenses. Decide what you will buy this year for the holiday season, and estimate your costs. This will help you make a Christmas spending plan.
Figure Out How Much You Need to Set Aside
Now that you have a list, you can figure out how much you need to set aside until December/Christmas. If you think you will spend $600, you will need to set aside $200 each month to meet your requirements. You can break it down to $50 a week, or even to $7.14 a day (or round up to $8 a day to provide you with more room). Plan to spend $8 a day on Christmas related planning. If you don't spend the $8 that day, put the money into some sort of bank account (preferably a high yield savings account) that can help you build it up for pricier purchases down the road.
Keep an Eye Out for Sales and Discounts
Among the lists you should be making is a gift list for others. If you know what you are going to buy for your kids, or for your sister, you can keep an eye out. Watch for sales and discounts. Meanwhile, you will be saving your money in a high-yield account. When you see something on sale, whether it's a case of bubbly that can be used for a party, or a great deal on the digital photo frame you want to get for your mom, you can scoop it up for less. Spread out your purchases, starting now, and your bank account won't be as impacted.
Use Credit Card Rewards
If you are smart about your credit card spending, you can use rewards credit cards to help you this holiday season. You will still want to set money side on a daily or weekly basis, to make sure that you have what you need to pay off the credit card balance so that you aren't paying interest. But you will find that using your rewards credit card for holiday shopping can be a real help. You don't have to get into debt this holiday season, and you can build up cash back and other rewards without carrying a balance. Plan ahead, and you will find that this Christmas goes better than last year.
Those are some good ideas about budgeting for Christmas. We view Christmas as the one time of year we buy clothes and toys for ourselves and the kids. I think a lot of people may buy clothes throughout the year, but we consolidate all of our shopping into the Christmas season. We usually find that most items are a better deal so we get a better bang for our buck. I’ll have to look into actually budgeting better for Christmas as we do always seem to get burned in January with crazy
credit card bills. Great ideas and timely!
Thanks!