Christmas On A Budget: How To Save Money For Christmas

One of the major things that makes Christmas interesting and precious is the mini-celebrations among families and friends. All around the world the Christmas celebration comes with unique traditions, such as gifting, family dinner, street carnivals, Christmas carols, and so on, which averagely cost about 156% of monthly incomes, according to an observation by The Guardian. This means not everyone cares about having Christmas on a budget.

Christmas is less than a month away, and I am sure the preparation is about to begin.  So, before you proceed with your plans, how about I share how you can save money to celebrate your Christmas on a budget?

Create a Budget for Christmas

Getting ready for a festival like Christmas requires a lot of financial planning. It would help if you considered what your bank account will look like after the celebration. 

Would you have enough to take you through before the next payday? If not, you need to put all proposed spending on a sheet and have an estimate of what you would be spending. For example, If you need to cater to 5 people during Christmas, you would have to calculate the amount you would spend per head. 

Remember: you need to stick to your budget — that’s the real deal. 

Set Spending Priorities for Christmas

Black tax is a familiar term among Africans and Christmas is that unavoidable season that you have to pay it forward. As mentioned above, budgeting is good but prioritizing your expenses will help you with your budget. 

In the case of giving out money to relatives, you have to put yourself on a reality check — if it’s not urgent, crucial, or life-threatening, nothing binds you to give out the money that might affect your well-being. Spending based on priority will help you save and keep you financially in check.

Avoid Tempting Christmas Deals

Christmas deals are enticing and can shift your focus from your budget and priorities. The best way to tackle this is to go for deals that are already part of your Christmas items. This way you stay within your plans while getting good deals. 

Therefore, if the ‘best buys’ are not part of your Christmas essentials, or part of the items you had planned to buy, stop yourself from swiping the cards.

Reduce your Christmas Dinner Expenses

It means a lot to most extended families to have a combined dinner to celebrate Christmas. Usually, one person or a family hosts the dinner and invites the rest of the extended family. 

To cut costs this year, the responsibilities can be shared among families where one unit takes care of the drinks, another takes care of the food, and so on. With that, it has reduced the cost of expenses for just one person. You can suggest this to your family because everybody benefits economically.

Shop Before the Rush Hours

Getting the best deals for Christmas happens long before the celebrations.  Although sales come up during the festive periods, expenses like food items, and gifts, become extremely expensive.  

To save yourself from the surge in prices, shop way early to avoid paying double the original price. This helps you save money to use on other essential things.

Shop Reasonably Priced Gift Cards

Gifting is one big part of Christmas. This year, you don’t need to spend so much to give gifts to your loved ones. They will still warmly receive your expression of love. You can buy gift cards from stores like Amazon, Shein, H&M, and Marks & Spencer. These stores have budget-friendly vouchers for as low as $5.  

If you are a bitcoiner, you can easily spend your satoshis to buy gift cards. We have an article on the things you can buy with bitcoin this Christmas. Click here to have a read.

Countdown to Christmas with Automatic Savings

The way we have different Christmas traditions, we also have different Christmas countdown traditions. Whichever one you are used to, you can challenge yourself to save daily until Christmas. 

Fortunately, Bitnob allows you automatically save in bitcoin according to your intervals of preference for as low as $1 worth of bitcoin per day. You can set your savings to run daily, weekly, and monthly. 

Click here to understand in full detail how automated savings work on Bitnob. You can make this an annual tradition where you start saving for Christmas at the beginning of the ember months.

Final Words

Most people think that budgeting, prioritizing, and saving are difficult during the holiday season, but if you are focused, you can have a joyful and affordable Christmas. The aforementioned tips and tricks can assist you in getting through the holiday season without going over budget.