Beating Broke

Frugal Christmas Tips

December 13, 2010 By Shane Ede 3 Comments

I don’t want to panic you or anything, but Christmas is just around the corner. Inf act, it’s only a hair more than 10 days away. Some of you are way ahead of the curve and have had your presents bought and wrapped for months. Others, like myself, are still finishing up your shopping. For me, it’s a procrastination problem. Others, it’s a funding issue, and they just have to wait until they have the money to spend on all those presents.

If you ask me, the presents are the worst part of the season. I enjoy the holidays, but I truly despise the commercialization of them. I’d rather not do any of the presents schtick and merely enjoy the time off work spend with family and friends. Never mind that it would save us all from having to endure the marketing blitz that is the month of December, or the horror stories of those who risk life
and limb to get that super cool toy at 3 a.m., only to have their children play with it for five minutes and then go off to build a fort out of the box.

But, unfortunately for most, that part of the holiday has become so ingrained into the holiday that it is impossible to remove. For those, I offer a few tips to help lessen the burden.

Give Homemade Gifts. Maybe you are an excellent baker, or a scrapbooker extraordinaire, or maybe you’re handy with a tool. Not only will making your own thoughtful homemade gifts be cheaper, but they also show that you put more thought into the gift than just perusing the circular and finding the latest thing.
Go in on gifts. Many people, including myself, don’t have a very long list of smaller priced items that they want or need. But, most have at least a thing or two that is higher priced that they either want or need. Go in with a group of relatives or friends and buy that one big item. You’ll get away with paying a lesser amount, while the person will receive a bigger gift that they want rather than a bunch of smaller gifts that they don’t really want.
Go dutch. Instead of hosting a big meal and cooking it all yourself, make it a potluck. Not only will you get the best that your friends and relatives have to offer as far as holiday food goes, but it will significantly reduce the amount you’ll spend on groceries.
Fill the holidays with activities. It sounds silly, but the more down time you have to ponder the lack of presents, the worse everybody feels. If everybody knows they’ll only have a little bit of free time before going off to play board games, they won’t notice a few less presents.

Whether you take advantage of ways to save money this holiday season or not, do try and keep in mind that the season is about spending time with those that you care about. Try to overcome any of the usual holiday squabbles and enjoy their company, and enjoy the season!

photo credit: Tatiana12

Financial Intentionality

December 10, 2010 By Shane Ede 6 Comments

Financial bloggers, myself included, speak rather frequently about setting goals for your financial life. Goals are super important. If you don’t have a goal, you have no direction. Further, if you don’t have a goal, you have not intention for your money. You are intention-less.

What is your intention for your money? What purpose should your money serve?
A typical goal for money is to pay off this or that. To save for this date, or this item. But, deep down, there is an intention there. If your goal is to pay off a debt, the intention is for your money to make you debt free. If you’re saving up for something, the intention is to buy what you want without adding debt. If you’re saving up for a date, the intention is to reach that date with some amount of money to pay for things without adding debt, or having to live in a trailer.

Financial Intentionality, in my mind, is more important than financial goals. If the intention is all wrong, it just won’t help you out. I don’t think that it’s black and white. Call it karma, or morality, or whatever, but having a good intention will always get you farther than a bad one. Not only that, but I think that intentionally guiding your money is a better way.

My intention with my money is to facilitate a debt free lifestyle where I can enjoy what I do, and not have to worry about where the next payment is going to come from. There are sub-intentions. Or, rather, intentions that lead towards that grander intention. I intend to use my money to pay off my debt. I intend to use my money to provide for my family in a way that allows us our necessities and a few luxuries without causing us to go further into debt or life extravagantly.

What are your intentions with your money? Are the goals that you’ve set in line with those intentions?

Study what you do with your money. Are your spending habits in line with your intentions? How about your goals? Perhaps your intention is to become debt free, but, one of your short-term goals is to save up for a new HDTV. If you don’t really need that TV, your goal is way out of line with your intention.

Spend your money with intention. Keep your intentions in mind as you set your goals and spend your money.

photo credit: Truthout.org

Beating Broke Rules: Bonuses

December 8, 2010 By Shane Ede 11 Comments

Beating Broke Rule: Spend your Bonuses wisely.

Every year, many of us are lucky enough to receive some sort of bonus from our employer. (If you’re self employed, that’s bonus enough. 😉 ) And when we do, the inevitable question arises. What do I do with the money? And then, how to budget for it?

The simple answer is to spend it wisely. In a more complex answer, it depends on what your goals are for your financial life. Using your bonus to buy Christmas presents may make you feel good for a month or two, but will you feel guilty afterward? You’ll feel much better, in the long run, if you spend the money wisely towards your goals.

Here’s the downside to that, though. You’ll also feel guilty if you use it all for debt repayment. Each of you will have a different situation, but here’s how we usually use our bonus here in Beating Broke.

Consider taking 10% of the bonus and blowing it. Buy some presents. Take your family out to dinner and a movie. Whatever you want. Give yourself 10% in cash and free rein to do whatever you want with it. You’ll feel better when you do.

With the remaining, take a look at your situation. Do you have a purchase that you’ve been saving up for, or putting off until you could afford it? I’m not talking about those gifts, or the television upgrade, but things that you really need. Maybe some costco eyeglasses? For example, a portion of my bonus (if I get it) will go towards buying new tires for one of our cars and paying for a repair that one of them needs. It won’t take the whole bonus, but a good portion of it. And it will be extremely relieving to not have to come up with that money out of my normal paycheck. If the bonus doesn’t come, I’ll still have to pay for those things, but it might take a little longer to pay for them.

Maybe your situation doesn’t have a purchase like that that you need to pay for. But, maybe you’ve got some debt that it could help retire. What we don’t spend on tires and repairs, will likely go towards paying off a debt. It won’t pay off any of them all by itself, but it will cut the payoff by several months. And, while that doesn’t give me the same feeling that just blowing the money on stuff does, it will leave me feeling much better for a far longer time.

The bottom line is this. Think about how you spend your bonus and spend it wisely. You’ll feel much better for it.

photo credit: jypsygen