Budget for Gifts: Father’s Day
June 9th, 2006 | by Molly's Brother |Father’s Day is just around the corner and when money is tight, it’s always difficult to find the money to purchase any gift. I know this from personal experience! But, when I started to include gifts as a line-item in my monthly budget, I created an account specifically for gift-giving. Here are some things to think about when planning for gifts.
1. Plan Out Occasions for Gifts As your monthly spending plan starts to come into focus, sit down with a calendar and go through it month-by-month, highlighting holidays, special birthdays and other celebrations like anniversaries and–of course, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day.
2. Limit Your Spending For each occasion, then decide what is an appropriate amount that you want to spend. Budget out an amount and, most importantly, stick to your budget. Knowing how much money you have to spend will also help in narrowing down the options once you are shopping. I quickly discovered that, with a budget in hand, out of control spending ceased to occur.
3. It’s the Thought That Counts Remember that it’s the intention that counts. People like gifts because people like being thought of and being remembered. For example, in a couple of weeks, Dad doesn’t need a new thousand dollar workbench or a new piece of electronic equipment (nor does he need another ugly tie, for that matter). Check out these Fathers Day gifts for him.
You’ll be amazed at how much money you’ll save once you actually become conscious of spending. Planning ahead saves mountains and mountains of money in the long run.
