Everyone’s had that sense of dread when the Christmas season starts creeping up. One of the more notable reasons for this is the money that’s often involved. You’ll not only have to think about gifts, but decorations, an increase in energy bills, food, and much more. It’s easy to see why this makes people get stressed.
To counteract that, you’ll want to try to save money this Christmas, but you wouldn’t want to look like a Scrooge when you’re doing so. By using a few holiday hacks, you can make sure you get this done without seeming like you’re being cheap. You’ll need to go about this the right way and balance everything out to do so.
Seven holiday hacks will be notable among these, as they’ll let you save some money while still buying great gifts and enjoying the holiday season.
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Save Money This Christmas: 7 Top Holiday Hacks
1. Buy Generic Brands
When you’re buying gifts, you’ll likely choose the more well-known brands, but that’s far from the only option you’ll have. Generic brands can be just as high-quality as these but cost much less. Since they’ll be almost the exact same, there’s no reason not to consider them.
The cost savings make it worth considering, and many gift recipients aren’t going to care that it’s a generic brand. It’s one of the quicker and easier ways to save on the costs of your presents.
2. Search For Deals
Buying generic brands isn’t the only way you can save on your Christmas presents. Instead, it could be worth searching for deals in the lead up to the season. While this could mean buying the gifts early, it’s more than worth hiding them away for some time to save on the costs.
You can also use more than a few apps and websites to help with this, such as NetVoucherCodes.co.uk. These let you find codes and vouchers that reduce the price of many of the gifts you’ll be buying. While this is an extra step in the buying process, the savings are worth it.
3. Unplug
Electricity bills can skyrocket during the holiday season, and this can be one of the more notable areas when you’re trying to save money this Christmas. The main cause of this rise will be your heating and decorations, but minimising it doesn’t need to be as complicated as you might think.
Instead, it’s a matter of unplugging things when you don’t need them. Despite what you might think, electronics still use power if they’re off and still plugged in. While it mightn’t be as high as if they were on, it’s still more than nothing. Unplugging the electronics you’re not using makes sure that doesn’t happen.
4. Pause Gym Membership
If you’re a gym lover, you’d know exactly how much it costs to keep doing there. You’ll also know how much time it takes, which could be at a premium during the holiday season. You simply mightn’t have the time to go to the gym over Christmas. That could mean your money is going to waste.
It could be worth pausing your gym membership for a few weeks to save yourself some money. That doesn’t mean giving up on exercising, however. Instead, try working in some home workouts where you can and getting back to the gym once the holiday season is over.
5. Use Cash Back Apps
There are more than a few cash back apps that let you earn points by doing certain activities. Many of these involve buying things you’d normally buy while using the app, so you wouldn’t need to go out of your way to use them. These transactions give you a predetermined number of points, which you can then build up.
Once they hit a certain point, you can cash them out, letting you make money during the Christmas season. While this doesn’t necessarily focus on saving money, it lets you make some when you’re buying all the things you’ll need to buy. The apps let you make the entire process much more affordable.
6. Choose DIY
Christmas presents don’t always need to be bought. Instead, some of the best ones are often handmade. They’ll not only be straight from the heart, but they’ll cost much less than store-bought options. You’ll save money while giving the gift recipient something they should enjoy.
If you take this approach, make sure you give yourself as much time as possible to make the presents. While some of these can be relatively quick and easy to make, others could take quite a while. By starting early, you can make sure everything’s ready for when you’re giving out the presents.
7. Use Cold Water
Not all hacks to save money this Christmas focus on holiday-related activities. Instead, you could look at a few things you do around the house and figure out what you can change. Your laundry habits could be one of the more notable of these. If you regularly wash your clothes at hot temperatures, then that’s worth changing.
Halving the temperature you wash your clothes at could reduce your laundry-related bills by up to half. That’s without compromising on how well it’ll wash your clothes. Choosing to wash your clothes at 30 or 40 degrees will be much more affordable than doing so at 90 degrees, despite offering the same cleaning power.
Save Money This Christmas: Wrapping Up
If you’re trying to save money this Christmas, you’ll look for quite a few ways to do it. Many of these can feel like you’re being a Scrooge, and friends and family members might start thinking you’re being cheap. Nobody wants that to happen, making the entire process seem relatively stressful.
You could feel as though you’re stuck between being a Scrooge or looking incredibly cheap. That isn’t the case. Instead, there are multiple holiday hacks you can use to make everything more affordable without seeming like you’re a Scrooge.
DIYing what you can, buying generic brands, looking for deals, and similar tips will all help with this. With a bit of work, you shouldn’t have a problem saving money this Christmas.
