December 14, 2023 • 14 mins
Imagine celebrating the holidays debt-free, with a clear budget and without a financial hangover in the new year. Too good to be true? Not at all! This episode (the second in our series) will walk you through my favourite shopping strategies that will not only help you stick to your budget but also snag the best deals. We’ll also discuss how loyalty programs and rewards can be a game changer, and learning to see unused items as potential extra income. With these tips in your arsenal, the holiday season will be a joy, not a debt trap.
But why stop at just the holidays? As we gear up for the last few weeks of December, it’s the perfect time to reassess our financial habits. I'll help you set achievable financial goals, track spending, and prioritize expenses. Budgeting doesn't have to be a bore, and finding additional sources of income can be even easier than you think. Even better, I’ll be here to support you through my financial coaching services, helping you chart your path to financial independence. So let's seize the reins of our financial future together and work towards financial stability, starting right now.
Let’s Stay Connected!
🌐 Website: thefinancialmoment.com
📸 Instagram: @thefinancialmoment
💼 Money Coaching: Need deeper support? Visit my website to learn how we can help you take control of your finances.
📢 If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate, and review the podcast! Your support helps us reach more people on their financial journey.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Elevate your Paycheck, the
podcast that is dedicated totransforming your financial
journey.
I'm Carolyn, your host andmoney coach that will guide you
out of that paycheck to paycheckcycle and onto a path towards
financial independence.
Are you ready?
Let's do this.
Hello, welcome back to thepodcast.
(00:26):
I'm Carolyn, your money coach,so I'm guessing by now you're
kind of knee deep into theholiday season.
You probably come to some workparties by now and, if you're
super organized, you probablyhave already bought and
purchased all your gifts.
So I thought I would pick upwhere we left off last week,
(00:46):
talking about the 12 ways tohave a debt-free holiday, but
before that, I just want to sayI had a beautiful time at my
birthday party last week.
It was so amazing to have allmy friends and family there and
just be able to share the momentwith them.
I also want to thank all of youfor your birthday wishes as
(01:08):
well.
A lot of you reached out onInstagram and sense of love, so
I do appreciate that and I hopethat you were one of the lucky
ones to receive my done for youservice within the coaching
package that I offered last week.
Okay, so for today, we're goingto talk about a couple more
ways that you can ensure to havea debt-free holiday.
(01:30):
Now I want to say this isprobably my favorite thing, but
for some of you you may not feelthe excitement that I do, but
it's to implement smart shoppingstrategies.
So what I mean by that isyou've already done the list,
you've created the budget, youknow exactly how much you're
going to spend, and now it'stime to get out there, and there
(01:53):
are two ways to do this right.
There's the online and orin-person, and, trust me, I have
done both, so I am well versedin this area.
So for some of you, you wereable to maximize Black Friday
and Cyber Monday.
There were a ton of sales, bothin-person in stores and online,
and if you knew at that pointof what it was you were going to
(02:16):
buy, that was the time to buyit right, because most of the
time, that is the biggest saleof the year.
But what we're noticing now thetrend is is that leading up to
back Friday, there are a lot ofsales.
After Cyber Monday, there arestill a lot of sales.
So, again, if you are veryspecific about what it is that
(02:36):
you're going to purchase, youare probably able to find that
deal, but you're gonna have todo a little bit of combing and
shopping.
The one thing you may notice isthat a lot of things may be
sold out by this point right,because of the big, massive
sales that have happened overthe last few weeks, that things
are starting to dry up like.
Inventory is starting to becomeless and less.
(02:58):
So this is where you're gonnahave to be a little bit creative
and not be so specific aboutexactly what it is you wanna buy
if you're at this point andstill shopping.
So do your research right.
Go online, see all thedifferent shops that have the
item that you want available, doyour price checking, and then I
(03:18):
would also head into the stores, because you never know if the
price online is different fromwhat is in the store.
If you're buying something thatis a little bit on the more
expensive side, then I suggestyou really do your research when
it comes to making thatpurchase.
If your items are on the lowerbudget, and then don't waste
your time running around to amillion different places, you
(03:39):
know, just kind of hit thebutton and make the purchase and
move on.
Sometimes we think we're doinga good thing by running all over
the place to find that deal,when, in fact, if the amount of
money that you're reallyspending on that item is not
worth the time and effort thatyou're spending like?
Have you seen the traffic outthere these days?
(04:00):
It's insane and the gas pricesare high.
So you wanna factor thesethings in.
If you're purchasing an itemfor that's around $50, you don't
need to go to four or five, sixdifferent stores to find that
particular item, because you'respending your time, your energy
and your money driving allaround just looking for that
deal.
(04:20):
Now, another part of my strategyis to really use loyalty
programs and rewards at thistime of year, right?
So I stack them up and I makesure that when it's time to cash
out, it's something that Iwanted to purchase, maybe for a
gift or for my groceries or fortravel or whatever it is, so
that alleviates some burden offmy budget.
(04:43):
Now, if you're like me andsometimes you forget what your
budget was when you walk intothe store, it's like you
magically it disappears fromyour mind then you want to have
these things on your phone orprinted out so that you have it
on you.
But even better than that is toonly take the cash that you've
(05:05):
allocated with you when you'reshopping.
So I know a lot of us are intousing debit or credit to make
most of our purchases, and thereare some safety risks when you
carry around a lot of cash.
But what I'm saying is, if youhave a specific budget for the
particular items that you'rebuying let's say you have three
(05:26):
people on your list that youneed to buy for and you know how
much it is that you want tospend perhaps withdraw that
money and stick within the cashthat you have in hand to
purchase those particular gifts.
This will force you to stick tobudget and leave those debit
and credit cards at home.
Okay, we've talked a lot aboutspending and budgeting, but
(05:50):
there are also some other thingswe can consider to ensure that
we're having a debt-free holiday.
Now, this is the possibility ofearning some extra income over
the holidays.
So we know that we're spendinga little bit more, but maybe we
can earn a little bit moreincome to kind of offset what
we're spending.
(06:10):
So in order to do that, maybenow is a good time to kind of
comb through and see if you haveany unused items that would be
of use to other people, perhapsfor gifts, right?
So a lot of the time when wepurchase throughout the year,
there are things in our housethat still have the tags on it.
(06:30):
We never used it, and perhapsit's something that someone else
could get some benefit from.
So take a look, right.
Look in your closet, look inthe basement, look, you know,
anywhere you restore items,there may be some things that
you can just sell and get aquick win from.
This is also a time where maybepicking up some part-time work
(06:50):
might be possible.
You know, I know it's busy, butstores and different
organizations may need someextra help during this time
period.
So picking up some part-timework or boosting the number of
hours you're working within yourown job may be a possibility,
(07:11):
or even kind of exploring a sidehustle that you've always been
thinking about, right?
Because now is the time whenpeople are spending, and so why
not try to make a little bit ofextra income during this holiday
season?
Now I just wanna let you guysknow that I am no stranger to
these strategies.
I've talked a lot about my ownpersonal shopping strategies, so
(07:32):
I do that all the time, but Ihaven't maybe mentioned that
I've also tried to bring inadditional income throughout my
life.
I once had a t-shirt business.
My daughter was just born and Iwas on mat leave and I get
(07:54):
these kind of crazy ideas when Ihave time on my hands, and
probably this is when she wassleeping through the night.
But anyway, this t-shirtbusiness had all these different
types of logos on baby t-shirts.
I would sell them.
I designed the logos and then Iwould put them on a screen
printing onto the t-shirt and Iwould go to all these different
(08:16):
Christmas markets and sell thet-shirts.
Now it was quite the business.
I developed the website all bymyself.
That was back in, I wanna say,2005,.
That's when she was born, oh mygoodness.
Anyway, and yeah, I would go tothe different Christmas markets
and just sell them, and thatwas my extra money that I made
(08:37):
to really help me through aholiday season.
So it can be done, right.
Just think about what yourpassions are, what you're
excited about, and it's going toreflect in what it is that
you're doing.
And it really just starts withfamily and friends, right.
A lot of the time, a lot of mypurchases were from people that
I knew we were all having babiesaround the same time and so
(09:00):
they're like, oh, my goodness,such a cute t-shirt.
I have to get it right, and itjust kind of word of mouth.
And then I went to theChristmas markets and more
people knew about me and so itjust kind of explodes from there
.
So don't be afraid to trysomething different, right?
That was way outside of myforte in the finance world.
So have fun with the creativeprocess and really think about
(09:22):
how you can just bring a littleextra income to help you through
this season.
Now there's also the impulsepurchases that tend to be made
around this time of year, andthe reason is because we're out
and about and doing moreshopping than we normally do on
a regular basis, right?
So, for example, if you'regoing to a big box store, maybe
(09:45):
you're gonna pick up somegroceries, you have your list
and you're ready and you headinside.
Well, this is the time whenthese stores offer all sorts of
different attractive things,right?
And you're gonna walk by thereand you're gonna be like, oh,
maybe I should get that, or oh,you know what, I might as well
pick up this.
And you really have to exercisesome discipline here, because
(10:08):
the stores, they know exactlywhat they're doing, right, they
are placing those items in yourpath for a purpose, right, so
you pick them up.
You know, when you're in ashopping line, there's always
items like kind of lined upbefore you actually go to pay,
and this is done for aparticular reason it's because
(10:31):
you're waiting.
So you're waiting.
You're looking around, you'rethinking, oh well, maybe I'll
just grab a bag of chips, or oh,I'll just grab a chocolate bar
or whatever it is that they havekind of while you're waiting
and it's a purchase that youweren't planning to make, it's
not on your list, it's probablysomething that you don't even
need.
But you're there, you're boredand you're looking at what they
(10:52):
have to offer.
So, this impulse buying, weneed to kind of rail it back
right, rail it back in, becausethis is where the slippery slope
is.
We end up purchasing thingsthat weren't part of what we
originally were intending to buyand that can really blow our
budget out of the water.
So how can we practice somediscipline in this area?
(11:15):
You gotta stick to that list.
And then, next up, I really wantyou to comb through the list
you created from last week andidentify what your priority
expenses are.
So think of the budget that youcreated as your wish list.
You know these are all thethings that you wanted to do.
You've totaled it up at thebottom and I'm assuming you have
(11:38):
that money to pay for it.
Now let's say you don't right.
You didn't create a budgetthroughout the year and now
you'd have to scramble and findthe money to be able to do the
things that you want to do.
So this is where prioritizationis really key.
You're gonna have two columns,so I want you to create a good,
pull out another piece of paperand create two columns.
(12:00):
One is essential and one isnon-essential.
So as you go through that listthat we talked about last week,
identify what is your absolutes,what are your must-haves, and
once you have that, let's justsee what that totals.
Now is that total a little bitmore reasonable?
(12:20):
If you haven't saved and arenot going to be making any
additional income throughout theseason, then it's gonna have to
come from your main source ofincome.
So something has to give atsome point, right?
So as we look at our list,really identify what is high
priority and then you know what.
Maybe you do save some money.
(12:41):
You know when you're outshopping, you're implementing
the strategies and you have someextra at the end so you can
pull over some other items fromthe list that weren't a high
priority from before.
Okay, so that's kind of a biglist for you this week.
I want you to really implementsome strategic shopping
(13:02):
strategies.
I want you to consider making alittle extra money over this
time period and then, finally, Ireally want you to identify and
prioritize your expenses.
And if you're still looking forways to tighten up your budget,
I do have a free guide.
If you go tothefinancialmomentcom
(13:23):
backslashbudget-tips, I havemuch more extensive information
in there on how to kind of justtighten up that budget before we
head into the new year.
So this was a shorty but a giddy, and I really want you to work
on these strategies as we moveinto the last couple weeks of
December.
So have a great week, guys, andwe will see you same time, same
(13:48):
place.
Thanks for listening to theElevate your Paycheck podcast.
If you love this episode andneed deeper support, head to
thefinancialmomentcombackslashsupport to see how we
can support you, no matter whereyou are at today.
We help our clients organizetheir finances, create savings,
(14:10):
eliminate debt and create aroadmap to their financial goals
, which makes them more incontrol than they ever dreamed
possible.
So head tothefinancialmomentcom
backslashsupport and make thisthe next step in your financial
journey.
You're listening to Elevate your Paycheck, the
podcast that is dedicated totransforming your financial
journey.
I'm Carolyn, your host andmoney coach that will guide you
out of that paycheck to paycheckcycle and onto a path towards
financial independence.
Are you ready?
Let's do this.
Hello, welcome back to thepodcast.
(00:26):
I'm Carolyn, your money coach,so I'm guessing by now you're
kind of knee deep into theholiday season.
You probably come to some workparties by now and, if you're
super organized, you probablyhave already bought and
purchased all your gifts.
So I thought I would pick upwhere we left off last week,
(00:46):
talking about the 12 ways tohave a debt-free holiday, but
before that, I just want to sayI had a beautiful time at my
birthday party last week.
It was so amazing to have allmy friends and family there and
just be able to share the momentwith them.
I also want to thank all of youfor your birthday wishes as
(01:08):
well.
A lot of you reached out onInstagram and sense of love, so
I do appreciate that and I hopethat you were one of the lucky
ones to receive my done for youservice within the coaching
package that I offered last week.
Okay, so for today, we're goingto talk about a couple more
ways that you can ensure to havea debt-free holiday.
(01:30):
Now I want to say this isprobably my favorite thing, but
for some of you you may not feelthe excitement that I do, but
it's to implement smart shoppingstrategies.
So what I mean by that isyou've already done the list,
you've created the budget, youknow exactly how much you're
going to spend, and now it'stime to get out there, and there
(01:53):
are two ways to do this right.
There's the online and orin-person, and, trust me, I have
done both, so I am well versedin this area.
So for some of you, you wereable to maximize Black Friday
and Cyber Monday.
There were a ton of sales, bothin-person in stores and online,
and if you knew at that pointof what it was you were going to
(02:16):
buy, that was the time to buyit right, because most of the
time, that is the biggest saleof the year.
But what we're noticing now thetrend is is that leading up to
back Friday, there are a lot ofsales.
After Cyber Monday, there arestill a lot of sales.
So, again, if you are veryspecific about what it is that
(02:36):
you're going to purchase, youare probably able to find that
deal, but you're gonna have todo a little bit of combing and
shopping.
The one thing you may notice isthat a lot of things may be
sold out by this point right,because of the big, massive
sales that have happened overthe last few weeks, that things
are starting to dry up like.
Inventory is starting to becomeless and less.
(02:58):
So this is where you're gonnahave to be a little bit creative
and not be so specific aboutexactly what it is you wanna buy
if you're at this point andstill shopping.
So do your research right.
Go online, see all thedifferent shops that have the
item that you want available, doyour price checking, and then I
(03:18):
would also head into the stores, because you never know if the
price online is different fromwhat is in the store.
If you're buying something thatis a little bit on the more
expensive side, then I suggestyou really do your research when
it comes to making thatpurchase.
If your items are on the lowerbudget, and then don't waste
your time running around to amillion different places, you
(03:39):
know, just kind of hit thebutton and make the purchase and
move on.
Sometimes we think we're doinga good thing by running all over
the place to find that deal,when, in fact, if the amount of
money that you're reallyspending on that item is not
worth the time and effort thatyou're spending like?
Have you seen the traffic outthere these days?
(04:00):
It's insane and the gas pricesare high.
So you wanna factor thesethings in.
If you're purchasing an itemfor that's around $50, you don't
need to go to four or five, sixdifferent stores to find that
particular item, because you'respending your time, your energy
and your money driving allaround just looking for that
deal.
(04:20):
Now, another part of my strategyis to really use loyalty
programs and rewards at thistime of year, right?
So I stack them up and I makesure that when it's time to cash
out, it's something that Iwanted to purchase, maybe for a
gift or for my groceries or fortravel or whatever it is, so
that alleviates some burden offmy budget.
(04:43):
Now, if you're like me andsometimes you forget what your
budget was when you walk intothe store, it's like you
magically it disappears fromyour mind then you want to have
these things on your phone orprinted out so that you have it
on you.
But even better than that is toonly take the cash that you've
(05:05):
allocated with you when you'reshopping.
So I know a lot of us are intousing debit or credit to make
most of our purchases, and thereare some safety risks when you
carry around a lot of cash.
But what I'm saying is, if youhave a specific budget for the
particular items that you'rebuying let's say you have three
(05:26):
people on your list that youneed to buy for and you know how
much it is that you want tospend perhaps withdraw that
money and stick within the cashthat you have in hand to
purchase those particular gifts.
This will force you to stick tobudget and leave those debit
and credit cards at home.
Okay, we've talked a lot aboutspending and budgeting, but
(05:50):
there are also some other thingswe can consider to ensure that
we're having a debt-free holiday.
Now, this is the possibility ofearning some extra income over
the holidays.
So we know that we're spendinga little bit more, but maybe we
can earn a little bit moreincome to kind of offset what
we're spending.
(06:10):
So in order to do that, maybenow is a good time to kind of
comb through and see if you haveany unused items that would be
of use to other people, perhapsfor gifts, right?
So a lot of the time when wepurchase throughout the year,
there are things in our housethat still have the tags on it.
(06:30):
We never used it, and perhapsit's something that someone else
could get some benefit from.
So take a look, right.
Look in your closet, look inthe basement, look, you know,
anywhere you restore items,there may be some things that
you can just sell and get aquick win from.
This is also a time where maybepicking up some part-time work
(06:50):
might be possible.
You know, I know it's busy, butstores and different
organizations may need someextra help during this time
period.
So picking up some part-timework or boosting the number of
hours you're working within yourown job may be a possibility,
(07:11):
or even kind of exploring a sidehustle that you've always been
thinking about, right?
Because now is the time whenpeople are spending, and so why
not try to make a little bit ofextra income during this holiday
season?
Now I just wanna let you guysknow that I am no stranger to
these strategies.
I've talked a lot about my ownpersonal shopping strategies, so
(07:32):
I do that all the time, but Ihaven't maybe mentioned that
I've also tried to bring inadditional income throughout my
life.
I once had a t-shirt business.
My daughter was just born and Iwas on mat leave and I get
(07:54):
these kind of crazy ideas when Ihave time on my hands, and
probably this is when she wassleeping through the night.
But anyway, this t-shirtbusiness had all these different
types of logos on baby t-shirts.
I would sell them.
I designed the logos and then Iwould put them on a screen
printing onto the t-shirt and Iwould go to all these different
(08:16):
Christmas markets and sell thet-shirts.
Now it was quite the business.
I developed the website all bymyself.
That was back in, I wanna say,2005,.
That's when she was born, oh mygoodness.
Anyway, and yeah, I would go tothe different Christmas markets
and just sell them, and thatwas my extra money that I made
(08:37):
to really help me through aholiday season.
So it can be done, right.
Just think about what yourpassions are, what you're
excited about, and it's going toreflect in what it is that
you're doing.
And it really just starts withfamily and friends, right.
A lot of the time, a lot of mypurchases were from people that
I knew we were all having babiesaround the same time and so
(09:00):
they're like, oh, my goodness,such a cute t-shirt.
I have to get it right, and itjust kind of word of mouth.
And then I went to theChristmas markets and more
people knew about me and so itjust kind of explodes from there
.
So don't be afraid to trysomething different, right?
That was way outside of myforte in the finance world.
So have fun with the creativeprocess and really think about
(09:22):
how you can just bring a littleextra income to help you through
this season.
Now there's also the impulsepurchases that tend to be made
around this time of year, andthe reason is because we're out
and about and doing moreshopping than we normally do on
a regular basis, right?
So, for example, if you'regoing to a big box store, maybe
(09:45):
you're gonna pick up somegroceries, you have your list
and you're ready and you headinside.
Well, this is the time whenthese stores offer all sorts of
different attractive things,right?
And you're gonna walk by thereand you're gonna be like, oh,
maybe I should get that, or oh,you know what, I might as well
pick up this.
And you really have to exercisesome discipline here, because
(10:08):
the stores, they know exactlywhat they're doing, right, they
are placing those items in yourpath for a purpose, right, so
you pick them up.
You know, when you're in ashopping line, there's always
items like kind of lined upbefore you actually go to pay,
and this is done for aparticular reason it's because
(10:31):
you're waiting.
So you're waiting.
You're looking around, you'rethinking, oh well, maybe I'll
just grab a bag of chips, or oh,I'll just grab a chocolate bar
or whatever it is that they havekind of while you're waiting
and it's a purchase that youweren't planning to make, it's
not on your list, it's probablysomething that you don't even
need.
But you're there, you're boredand you're looking at what they
(10:52):
have to offer.
So, this impulse buying, weneed to kind of rail it back
right, rail it back in, becausethis is where the slippery slope
is.
We end up purchasing thingsthat weren't part of what we
originally were intending to buyand that can really blow our
budget out of the water.
So how can we practice somediscipline in this area?
(11:15):
You gotta stick to that list.
And then, next up, I really wantyou to comb through the list
you created from last week andidentify what your priority
expenses are.
So think of the budget that youcreated as your wish list.
You know these are all thethings that you wanted to do.
You've totaled it up at thebottom and I'm assuming you have
(11:38):
that money to pay for it.
Now let's say you don't right.
You didn't create a budgetthroughout the year and now
you'd have to scramble and findthe money to be able to do the
things that you want to do.
So this is where prioritizationis really key.
You're gonna have two columns,so I want you to create a good,
pull out another piece of paperand create two columns.
(12:00):
One is essential and one isnon-essential.
So as you go through that listthat we talked about last week,
identify what is your absolutes,what are your must-haves, and
once you have that, let's justsee what that totals.
Now is that total a little bitmore reasonable?
(12:20):
If you haven't saved and arenot going to be making any
additional income throughout theseason, then it's gonna have to
come from your main source ofincome.
So something has to give atsome point, right?
So as we look at our list,really identify what is high
priority and then you know what.
Maybe you do save some money.
(12:41):
You know when you're outshopping, you're implementing
the strategies and you have someextra at the end so you can
pull over some other items fromthe list that weren't a high
priority from before.
Okay, so that's kind of a biglist for you this week.
I want you to really implementsome strategic shopping
(13:02):
strategies.
I want you to consider making alittle extra money over this
time period and then, finally, Ireally want you to identify and
prioritize your expenses.
And if you're still looking forways to tighten up your budget,
I do have a free guide.
If you go tothefinancialmomentcom
(13:23):
backslashbudget-tips, I havemuch more extensive information
in there on how to kind of justtighten up that budget before we
head into the new year.
So this was a shorty but a giddy, and I really want you to work
on these strategies as we moveinto the last couple weeks of
December.
So have a great week, guys, andwe will see you same time, same
(13:48):
place.
Thanks for listening to theElevate your Paycheck podcast.
If you love this episode andneed deeper support, head to
thefinancialmomentcombackslashsupport to see how we
can support you, no matter whereyou are at today.
We help our clients organizetheir finances, create savings,
(14:10):
eliminate debt and create aroadmap to their financial goals
, which makes them more incontrol than they ever dreamed
possible.
So head tothefinancialmomentcom
backslashsupport and make thisthe next step in your financial
journey.
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Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!