How to Reduce Money Hassles at Christmas Time

Posted by admin | Stress | Friday 19 December 2008 2:01 pm

How to REDUCE MONEY HASSLES at Christmas time

I talk to so many people who find it difficult to make ends meet as this time of the year. They buy presents for family and friends just to save face.

I really feel for the family unit where, in many instances, only one person is earning an income as they generally have two or three young children. Dependent on how much money comes into this household, the extra presents cause undue financial burden. Just providing Father Christmas presents is more than they can handle financially, let alone a family holiday.

Extra stress creates a ripple effect especially with regard to increase income. People react in different ways. Sometimes this is describes as being ‘out of character.’

Frustration

The main provider may feel compelled to find another avenue to meet the extra financial burden. This could be via any of the following:

· Work overtime

· Second job

· Sell assets

· Borrow money

· Theft

If you were to break these down into practical scenarios none would provide a win-win situation.

Theft, well, what can I say? You may be lucky enough to get away with it, but at the end of the day if you were to get caught you would do more damage to yourself and the family unit. You are setting yourself up for failure.

If you borrowed money you would still have to repay it. Although this may work in some situations, it will not work for all, and it may prolong the problem.

To sell some assets could be a good solution that may not impact too much on the family unit, depending upon which assets you sell.

Working overtime or at a second job would require the main provider to be away from the family home for longer periods of time. This would put extra pressure on everyone causing tiredness and fatigue resulting in the smallest insignificant argument to get blown way out of proportion.

What could you do differently?

My first suggestion would be to sit down and have an open discussion on who you are going to buy presents for and stipulate a price that you are both willing to spend.

· There are many happy families out there who only buy for one person and the limit is set at $30 or $40. This becomes very affordable, especially if they come from a large family unit.

· It is imperative that as a couple you revisit ‘present buying’ to make sure you are on target. A process that works well for many families is that they choose the presents from catalogues that are delivered to their mailbox. This will avoid impulse buying and the possibility of going over budget.

· Father Christmas presents could be bought throughout the year and stored at another family members’ home or use the space in your attic, basement or garage.

· Write down everything you are going to buy and how much it is going to cost you, this will keep you accountable and assist you in planning your finances accordingly.

· Record every cent you spend to determine where you may ‘waste’ money.

· In Australia there are wonderful organisations that allow you to select food, drink and present hampers that you can pay off all year round. I am sure there are other organisations worldwide that will offer a similar service.

Chrisco http://www.chrisco.com.au

Castle Hampers http://www.castlehampers.com.au

Hamper King http://www.hamperking.com.au

· Plan well in advance and put aside $10 every week into a Christmas account, at the end of the year you will have $520 to spend on presents or food/drink or even spending money to do something special with the children over the Christmas holidays.

Holidays

If your intention is to holiday at this time of the year, I would hope that you have planned and budgeted it into your financial structure well before December. If you haven’t, then I imagine you will be struggling to financially put the whole package together and you may need to rethink what you can honestly afford to do.

I know a couple who book holidays to distant places so that they are not faced with having to deal with family at Christmas time. They openly admit that they have no time for their family and as they only get three weeks holiday a year, they make sure they go where they want to go and do what they want to do, as they have no children of their own. Christmas does not have the same meaning for them, as it would to those of you who do have children. Maybe when they do have children, they’ll decide that holidaying around the world is not appropriate at this time of the year. Then again they may not. After all, it is their choice.

What about YOU! What does Christmas mean to you? How do you cope financially in the build up to Christmas? Do you travel during the festive season? If so, where to? Do you travel to be with family or to get away from family at this time?

I am sure your story will resonate with many of my other readers. You may email me your feedback on this article and when the blogsite is operational I will transfer your feedback to the comments area.