6 Tips for Saving Money at Christmas

Saving money at Christmas time is important to everyone. Most of us spend hundreds of dollars each year on gifts and want to feel we have spent our money wisely. The most important thing to saving money at Christmas is knowing what you want and what it is worth. In addition to this, here are six tips for making the most of your Christmas funds.

Start Early

Money

As the Christmas season winds up, so can pricing on some gift items. There is nothing worse than knowing the worth of an item on an average Tuesday to find out the Christmas sales offer it at the same or more. Shopping Veteran's Day, Labor Day, Independence Day, or even sales, which are less shopping-oriented holidays thereby increasing the buyer's power, can yield greater savings.

Black Friday

The busiestshopping day of the year does have some great savings. However, with the chaos involved with Black Friday sales, it is impossible to be at all the sales at the right time to gain all the savings available. Therefore, it is critical to "prioritize which items are most important and can offer the most savings.

Cyber Monday

Cyber Monday, the Monday following Black Friday, is new to the Christmas season shopping sales. This added sales day makes it possible to coordinate savings by eliminating some shopping items from the Black Friday list. Make sure to coordinate what stores and any stipulations to the deals are considered when shopping on Cyber Monday.

Comparison Shop

This type of shopping can be time consuming and tedious at times, but can be lucrative. Do not makethe mistake thinking that one store offers the lowest prices on everything or that the prices aren't very different. During this time of year, prices can be drastically different based on how many of an item has been ordered by the store.

Use Coupons

Retail stores send out and offer online coupons galore during the shopping season. Do general searches online for coupons, retail, and mail search newspapers ads for added discounts. Make sure to look at expiration dates and any special stipulations.

Alternative Shopping

During the shopping season, we can get caught up with retail store sales and advertising. However, shopping on one of the hundreds of auction websites can also offer significant savings. High-demand products, such as electronics, may not be ideal forthis type of shopping, as these items may have inflated prices due to demand.

Knowing what you want and what it is worth in conjunction with these tips can offer the Christmas shoppers the opportunity to get the most for their money.

6 Tips for Saving Money at Christmas

Saving Money Tips for Children

1) If your employer allows, participate in a child care flexible spending account. This is a special account that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) created that allows you to set aside money for child care expenses with pre-tax dollars. You ask your employer to take out a certain amount of money each month from your paycheck and you can use this money tax free for child care related expenses.

2) Inquire to see if your company has partnerships or offers discounts for certain child care provider services. Companies will sometimes negotiate discount plans with local child care providers to help offset child care costs.

3) See if your public school district offers a half day pre-kindergarten program for 4-year-olds. These programs are usually free and by signing your child up, it will reduce your child care needs to a half day from a full day.

4) If your employer allows flex hours, job sharing or telecommuting, you may be able to use these to juggle your schedule and cut your child care costs.

5) If both you and your spouse work, see if it's possible to arrange your work schedules so they overlap as little as possible. This will allow you to reduce the number of hours your child has to spend at child care.

6) See if there is a relative that can help with child care.

7) Consider hiring a nanny and sharing the cost of child care with a few good friends. This will allow you to pay less individually for child care costs and the nanny will make more overall.