Money Experts Offer Ways To Cut Holiday Spending
Financial counselors locally and across the country are advising people to approach holiday spending with prudence and not panic, frugality and not fear. Everyone is jittery and some have lost money in the economic downturn, but it doesn’t have to be a blue Christmas.
Some common threads in their messages are to make a special holiday budget and resist all temptation to exceed it; to use cash instead of credit cards because you can’t create another $20 bill the way you can make one more charge; and to trim the gift list, possibly to the point of drawing names among family members so that each can receive one special gift or giving presents to children only.
Samantha Hilliard of First Command Financial Services makes those suggestions and advises shopping close to home instead of making out-of-town trips.
“Of course, the price of fuel has gone down,” she said, “but trips still cost money for fuel, food and incidentals, and there’s so much more in the immediate vicinity now than there was last year.
“Another idea is to give gifts from home,” she said. “Older generations can pick this time to hand down family heirlooms and other special things that come from the heart. People can give collections of recipes. Children can write poems for grandparents. They cost nothing, and they’re heirlooms themselves if they’re written in a person’s own handwriting.” More.
No related posts.
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
