Ten ways to have money you can spend for the holidays.
1. Hold a garage sale, rummage sale, yard sale, or white elephant sale.
Clean out your garage and attic and basement and see how much you can sell. Not only will you have a cleaner living space with all that stuff gone, you’ll have money you can spend for holiday gifts and entertainment.
A white elephant sale.
2. Sell your unused items on Craigslist.org.
This could be even better than a yard sale, especially for more expensive items. You’ll be able to advertise in a wider area, and be able to get competitive bids for your goodies.
3. Rent out a room in your house.
Depending on where you live this could bring you several hundred dollars a month income, or more, for very little effort.
4. Empty your garage and rent it out for storage.
Again, depending on where you live and whether you need the garage for storage yourself, you could rent part of it to someone for storage. This could bring you $50 to $200 per month.
5. Sell extra fruits and vegetables from your garden.
Unless you have a large garden this might be just a little money, but every bit adds up. If you have a large garden this could bring in a hundred dollars or more.
6. Bake pies or cakes and sell them to friends and neighbors.
If you make $10 per pie, and sell a few each week, you’ll very soon have plenty of money to spend for the holidays.
7. Walk dogs, mow lawns, babysit in the neighborhood.
Daily walks for dogs might bring in $5 or more per dog. Lawn mowing varies depends on the size of the lawn and where you live, but in large metropolitan areas could be $10-$20 per yard. Babysitting is always in demand for good people who care well for children.
8. Pack your lunch instead of eating out, and put aside the money saved.
This could save you $5 per day, $25 per week, $100 per month at a minimum.
9. Offer to drive co-workers to work, have the other riders pitch in for gas money, and set that aside. (It’s like a carpool, but you’re the only driver.)
With the price of gas nowadays, this makes a lot of sense. You will be spending the money anyway, and having others pitch in with the costs will give you a change to save $40 per tank – set that aside for spending on holiday gifts.
10. Don’t eat out for the next couple of months, and save the money for holidays instead.
If you eat pizza for a family of four, with drinks, you’ve easily spent $50-$60. Save that instead and enjoy the holidays with it.
What other money-saving ideas do you have for dealing with holiday spending?