How You Can Avoid Overspending this Holiday Season

By the time you start your Christmas shopping, you may be emptying out your bank account or the balance on your credit card could not be soaring.  After all, it’s fun buying gifts for family and friends so you may be tempted to overdo it.  By making a few changes, you can avoid overspending this holiday season and start out 2018 without being into debt too much, or at least be able to pay off the statement balance by the due date so you can avoid interest.

Track Purchases

The problem with online shopping along with using a credit card is that you can continue to buy, buy buy, without really any stopping, I guess until you hit the credit limit, but that just means you can continue to make purchases until you get the bill next month.  By tracking spending whether it’s an app or a simple spreadsheet, you can add up the purchases that you have made so far and subtract from the total budget that you had set for shopping, although we probably know that the limit will be exceeded, so you may need to free up even more money.

Cut Costs in Other Areas

Since you know Christmas shopping is coming, the earlier you can start the better, so in order to really add up the extra money, you can start cutting back in other areas in the months prior.  Whether that is reducing going out to eat and going grocery shopping instead, brewing your coffee at home instead of stopping, or cutting your cable bill and opt for Netflix for around $10 a month could save you plenty of money over a few months in order to cover your Christmas shopping bill with ease.

Generate Extra Cash

Sometimes money is pretty tight even with cutting in other areas, so you may just need to generate more income, whether that is getting a second job during the holidays for extra income, or selling items that are collecting dust around the house.  While following sep ira rules to save for the future is important, you may need this extra money to get you through the holidays and then once you can get into 2018 without debt, you can focus on getting financially ahead by building an emergency fund and saving for the future.  Once you see the extra money start to add up, that may be extra motivation to continue to work hard and continue to reduce expenses.

Take Advantage of Price Comparison

Years ago, in order to save money, you would drive around from store to store to see what the best deal was before driving back to make the purchase, which was a lot of work.  These days you have any website you can think of to check out prices, not to mention Amazon being the usual frontrunner, that you can really take advantage of comparing prices to save as much money as you can.  On top of saving money, you can also get free shipping and still arrive in time to give out.