How Can You Get Through The Holidays When You Already Need Debt Help?
With Christmas right around the corner, many people who are in need of debt help are beginning to think about how they are going to make it through the holiday season and stay afloat with their finances. Considering forms of debt help such as debt settlement may be an option, but simple budgeting tips may also be helpful at this time. Because many Canadians are facing an employment crisis, or are just struggling with debt and need serious help, the holidays may become a time of stress instead a time of joy and cheer. So how can a person get through the Christmas season without going under?
Don’t spend more than you have
This sounds so very simple but I know that it is much more difficult to actually accomplish in reality. But the truth is that if you don’t spend more than you have, then you will not have to stress out about how you are going to pay that credit card bill in January. This Christmas, instead of buying a gift for every person in your family, try drawing names out of a hat and then set a reasonable budget of what you can afford, even if it is only $10 or $15. Gifts are fun, but they are not the most important thing. If getting out of debt is really important to you and you are intent on not going further into debt, then explain to your friends and loved ones that this year you are going to cut back on gifts and that you hope they will not feel obligated to buy expensive gifts for you either.
Plan out A Christmas/Holiday Budget
If you have not been saving up for this year’s holiday season, your budget may be quite small. Before buying a single gift or decoration, plan out your budget. Maybe you only have$50 or $100 or maybe you may have $1000 or more. Regardless of how much you can put towards your Christmas budget, plan it out beforehand. There are a lot of things that you may need to buy or pay for during the Christmas season, but there are ways to cut back on costs and save some money to make it easier on your budget. Don’t forget to include gifts for family and friends, gifts for school teachers or your boss and include items you may need for Christmas parties or hostess gifts. These gifts do not need to be expensive to be nice and they do not need to be extravagant to be appreciated. Homemade Christmas goodies or jars of salsa with a bow tied around the container or jar is a cute and delicious gift. If you are crafty there are many ideas for homemade Christmas crafts on Pinterest. If you want to host a Christmas party, make it a potluck style party where everyone brings a dish or drink with them to help cut your costs. The point is, still do the gifts and parties that you want to do, just find creative ways to bring the costs down and stay within your budget.
If you have more debt than you can handle and cutting back your costs and creating a budget isn’t enough, then you may need a different approach to help with your debt. We at 4 Pillars Winnipeg have a holistic approach for people who are struggling with money problems where we can deal with the debt, rebuild credit and teach key financial literacy concepts that ensure we maintain a 97% success rate for anyone going through our programs. If you think you may need more help with your debt, give us a call at (204) 201-2100. We offer a free one hour consultation where we go over your situation and present you with your options to become debt free and stay that way.
