For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere as the days begin to shorten, the daytime temperatures begin to be cooler leaves change color and fall from their trees, and the year draws to a close, the traditional “Holiday Season” is around the corner. Many people start to get the feeling of “Good Will” and “Giving” in their hearts and spirits. They also get the inspiration to decorate for those remaining holidays.

Unfortunately, a lot of those people whose attention has turned to doing “Good Will” and “Giving” have not planned how they’re going to do it or how much they’re going to spend on it. Thanksgiving approaches and whoever is hosting the meal scurries out to buy everything for the meal. Others not only buy for the meal, but they also put extra attention on cleaning or redoing their house so it will accommodate the festivities. Many times the extra cleaning or modifications to the home are contracted out to professionals in those areas.

In the mix of all of this preparation for Thanksgiving is the “Good Will” & “Giving” being intensified by all of the “Black Friday” & “Cyber Monday” advertising. All during the preparation and eating of the meal, our minds are processing everything we’re going to buy on “Black Friday” and/or “Cyber Monday”. Then, the day after Thanksgiving, while we’re still in a Thanksgiving Meal insulin coma, we start shopping to fill our lists.

Sadly for many of us, while we made up a list of things to buy, we didn’t decide how much we’re going to spend on what we’re wanting to buy. Many of us also allow ourselves to be pulled into purchasing impulse items for people because we’d forgotten about them or we just “know” they’d love it. Then, before we know it, our shopping cart is overflowing. The same thing happens, sometimes, with our virtual shopping cart on “Cyber Monday”, too.

Once “Black Friday” & “Cyber Monday” pass, we’ll spend a lot of time between then and Christmas finishing up our shopping list and adding on for those who slipped our mind, like the kid’s teacher, the mail person, or that person at work whose name we drew in the “Secret Santa” event in our office.

On the day of our holiday gift-giving event, we also have to either prepare a meal or attend one. If we’re preparing it, it’s just like Thanksgiving and we’re off to the store to purchase the ingredients for our meal. Should we be celebrating at someone’s home, we’ll often bring something to go along with the meal or festivities.

This probably sounds very familiar for most of us because we travel through this scenario year after year. In fact, according to USA Today – Money article by Hristina Byrnes 24/7 Wall Street, “Holiday spending bill: Most of us spend $1,000 or more on gifts, travel, and goodies”.¹ According to the World Economic Forum’s article “Christmas, by the numbers: 5 facts about holiday season spending” Americans will spend over $1 trillion on Christmas this year, and the average American will spend 15 hours shopping for Christmas.²

In Yahoo Finance’s article titled “Americans Plan to Spend Over $150 on Christmas Dinner — Here Are Smart Ways You Can Spend a Lot Less” by Andrew DePietro (December 21, 2018)³ there’s more evidence of the amount is spent per person on Christmas. Another startling fact is that 22% of Americans believe their Christmas spending will leave them in debt according to Fortunly’s article “Christmas Spending Statistics: Deck the Halls with Boughs of Money” By G. Dautovic Last updated: June 18, 2020⁴

So, now Christmas has arrived and we have all enjoyed the day and the gifts that we received. Next on our calendar is New Year’s Eve. In 24/7 Wall Street “New Year’s Eve by the Numbers” – by Evan Comen December 2017⁵, it says that an estimated 92% of U.S. adults celebrate New Year’s Eve. Over half of them will do so with people other than family. One in five will spend the night at a restaurant, bar, club, or other establishments.

According to many of sources, Americans, who celebrate away from home, will spend approximately $150 or more on ringing in the new year. These expenses are for tickets to events, seasonal clothing, drinks, food, and transportation, etc.

Next, we have New Year’s day and while there’s no hard data on how much people spend on it, we can surmise that depending on whether we go to someone’s house or a bar to watch the parades and bowl games, we’ll have expenditures for that too.

Of course, after Christmas and New Years, the next thing that we encounter is the January credit card bill hangover. Most people experience it each time they open the statements from their credit card companies. For many, this may be a short-lived experience because they figure their tax refund will pay off or make a sizable dent in those bills. One problem with this philosophy is that the refund gets used to pay for last year’s expenses and isn’t used to help them with the current year’s expenses or to invest for their future.

Check back next week as we discuss other holidays throughout the year that aren’t normally planned for and how those holidays can derail your budget/spending plan to either cause you to have to cut elsewhere or resort to credit to pay for them. We’ll also look at how birthdays, especially for our kids can sabotage our goals and dreams. Also, we’ll have a special offer of a Gift & Holiday Spending guide to help you plan for the entire year instead of right before or as they happen.