Depending on your financial situation and your family traditions, Christmas time can be a very expensive time for you. Setting a holiday spending budget at any time is a good idea and it’s especially wise (and probably necessary) if you’re in a position where you have less spending money than in previous years.

Here are some helpful Christmas budgeting tips:

• Try to use cash if possible. Avoid running up credit cards during the holidays unless you’re certain you can pay the balance off in January. Try to avoid going into debt at Christmas to buy people gifts.You don’t want to pay Christmas debts off over the next year.
• Shop for sales. Start shopping early and do comparison shopping to save money.
• Cash in loyalty program points to use for Christmas shopping. Air miles can often be cashed in for gift cards and grocery store certificates and that can help lighten the financial load.
• Do homemade gifts if you can. For neighbours, teachers, and acquaintances, and sometimes even family, you can knit something, bake a tin of goodies, or put together a basket of gifts.
• Set budgets with people. If you are exchanging gifts with people, set a budget that everyone can agree to.
• Do ’secret santa’ gift exchanges with large families instead of buying for everyone or buy a gift per family instead of gifts for everyone in the family.
• Set a ‘no gift exchange’ policy with family members if necessary so you don’t feel obligated or awkward about whether or not to buy gifts that you can’t afford.
• Make a list of everyone you need to buy for and allocate a dollar amount you’re planning to spend.  Add a budget for the extra expenses (food, decorations, etc), and make a plan for where this money is going to come from.
• If you need to make extra money for Christmas and want to do it online, here’s an article about making money fast online that could help you bring in extra cash.

Christmas can catch us by surprise financially when you suddenly realise it’s only 6 weeks away and you’re financially strapped, with a large family to buy for. If you’re doing the money jar budget, you might even consider setting aside a Christmas fund next year so that you can budget and plan in advance.