Black Friday is coming up, December is just around the corner, and yes Christmas shopping is here! The Christmas shopping season is known to cause emotional and financial stress. Emotional stress because it seems like you can never find the perfect gift for everyone on your Christmas list. Financial stress is caused because spending lots of money for the ideal gift has become somewhat of an axiom. This is why I am here to share some Christmas shopping tips with you guys for this holiday season:
Look out for post holiday discounts. First and foremost post-Christmas shopping needs to be kept in mind. Not only is Boxing Day the greatest day of the year because it is my birthday but there are major deals happening that day.
Watch your credit card usage. This has happened to everyone at some point. You use your credit card to buy your friend a new shirt, you swipe again when you find the perfect gift for your Dad, and so forth. Fast forward a few weeks and January rolls around to smack you in the face with a nice fat credit card bill. All of those small purchases have been tallied up and the result is a credit card bill that will take months to pay off. Watch your credit card usage. Keep note of every time your credit card leaves your wallet. Remember that Santa Clause has a pre-paid credit card.
(See Good Financial Cents for more Holiday Credit Card Spending Tips.)
Have a list with a rough idea of what to get each person. This is probably my biggest mistake every holiday shopping season. I walk into a mall without any idea of what to get certain people. As a result this means that I have no clue on how much money I will spend on each person. This also means that I wasn’t paying attention in the weeks leading up to Christmas. If you pay close attention you will know what to get every person on your Christmas list before you even enter the shopping mall. Yes I know Santa Clause has an unfair advantage over us because he receives a Christmas list from each individual person, but we still need to put the pieces together to figure out what to get everyone.
Set a reasonable budget. You don’t want to be the cheap friend nor do you want to blow your life savings on gifts. I realize that Christmas shopping isn’t all about money but don’t let that be an excuse to get your brother a bar of soap. Set aside a reasonable amount of money and make sure that you try to stay within this budget. Santa Clause has an unlimited budget, you don’t.
Take advantage of retail returns. When the in-store return date has expired many credit card companies give you “return protection” allowing you to return most gifts up until 90 days of the original purchase. Not saying that this will happen but it’s very likely you could get your girlfriend the wrong gift.
I have probably missed at least 50 Christmas shopping tips so it’s time for you guys to share some with me!
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
When money was more of an issue, I would always give friends “inside joke” types of gifts. They would only cost maybe $15 to $20 dollars but everyone loved them a lot because of the sentiment. I won’t give any specific examples because… well it was college and they weren’t always very appropriate for public consumption.
I have a great feeling as to what you are referring to Edwin — and yes I have given similar gifts. Everything is good as long as everyone involved finds it funny. If not, you might have to look for new friends lol.
Either I dodged a bullet with a few of my gifts or some of my friends are thick skinned. Luckily I never lost any friends or even got into fights over gifts.
Thanks for mentioning return protection! Most people overlook the free perks that their credit cards give them that can actually give them an edge over the chaotic world of retail. Great tips, great post.
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Thanks for the post. My personal opinion, when your short on money, keep your credit cards in house. Shop responsibly!
Ah, Christmas shopping, the most dreaded of all holiday rituals (for me, anyway). Here’s the best advice I can give for making the holiday shopping a little less painless:
-Try to start a Secret Santa program within your family/group of friends/coworkers/any other group where giving may be required. Rather than buying a gift for all twelve of your cousins or for the fifteen people in your office, sway everyone into exchanging names so that you only need to buy one gift for each group. In one step, you’ve cut your shopping list down to a small fraction of what it would be otherwise.
-Agree to price limits on gifts. If you have a price limit for everyone on your list, you can more easily budget, and you’ll have more incentive to keep your spending under control.
-Make your own gifts. Probably much more of an option if you happen to be crafty (in a ‘I’m good at making things’ way, not a ‘I’m sneaky’ way), you could always make something as a gift for those on your list. (My fiancee went to a Christmas party for her ceramics club on Saturday, and fully half of the presents that were given out were hand-made; she got a cup from a girl she admired, and she just loves it.)
There you go, a few tips for making your Christmas shopping go a bit easier.
@Roger Man you are way better at this than me! I’m definitely going to copy/past this for a post next year.
Btw do price limits ever work? I always find that the person who sets the limit does it so that they can buy something more expensive and look like the best gift-giver of the group. Or maybe I’m just paranoid lol.
Heh, go ahead; I’m just sorry I didn’t get here earlier, or I would have done something like this on my own page.
As for price limits, they do seem to work pretty well in my family. Of course, most everyone just gets each other gift certificates at this point; we all earn money and nobody bothers really coming up with a list, so it’s our only real option. So, anyone who goes over the limit just looks like they couldn’t follow directions