No doubt, Christmas is a huge festivity and lots of fun, but once the fun is over, many people are left facing the reality – a rather hefty bill in the New Year!
And it can be pretty hard to avoid using your credit card to pay for items in the festive season, however, if you have good savings in the run up to Christmas, by getting cutbacks in your shopping, that could go a long way in helping to soften the load in the coming year.
That’s exactly what we intend to show you how to do effortlessly with this post, by using some nifty apps, which makes the whole idea of Maximizing your Savings for Christmas a bit easier.
But, there is a big huddle to cross for many people, that’s the question of whether to save money or go borrowing for Christmas shopping?
Why Save for Christmas?
Go borrowing to cover your Christmas expenses could seem a tad easier, especially for those with good credit standings, but it comes at a bigger cost in interest and fees.
It’s quite difficult to go all out to pay for Christmas spending out of your December’s monthly pay alone, and savings clubs won’t offer interest on savings and there is bigger risk saving through the bank, no interest and additional charges.
So it makes sense to ensure you save up as much as you can beforehand, and the earlier you start saving, perhaps the less you need to put aside more money each month. As even a small amount saved over time can turn out to make a huge difference.
10 Apps to help you Save for Christmas
All thanks to the Internet and technology, there are now tons of apps that will put money back in your pocket this Christmas season. And we’ve scooped the best apps in this review, by asking around, and even using most of the apps ourselves to find which are the very best money-saving apps for holiday shoppers.
1. Swagbucks
Swagbucks is rewards and loyalty-program operated by Prodege LLC, and based in El Segundo, California, USA. It actually pays you to do things you normally do online anyway, shopping. And you can earn additional cash by simply watching videos, or filling in surveys.
The earned money can be put right into your PayPal or redeemable as a gift card. Swagbucks loyalty program is really that simple, and almost everyone we talked to loved it. In fact, it sounds just too good to be true!
2. Shopkick
Shopkick is one of the best money-saving app for the online deal hunters, it allow shoppers to have fun while shopping everyday by earning rewards as they do it.
They have several partners online and in-store and you earn “kicks” every time you buy an item, which you can redeem as gift cards to use on Amazon, Starbucks, or anywhere else they are supported, you’ll definitely stop wasting money when shopping next time.
3. Yowza
Yowza has over 50,000 retail partners and it’s location-based app, so you get local offers that might otherwise be missed.
The app also offer a great way for shoppers to connect seamlessly with local businesses. And if you don’t want to use the location service, no worry, you can still search too.
4. SnipSnap
SnipSnap is rather more like a streamline coupon system that extreme couponing shoppers keep, so that they can get cutbacks on purchased items. You’ll surely get a little overwhelmed with how many offers there are on Black Friday shopping and Cyber Monday.
It also allows you to search the web for coupons, which are automatically downloaded to your phone.
5. Rakuten Ebates
Ebates receive commissions from stores for sending you their way and they are good enough to share that commission with you. That means everyone gets a cutback and so, are happy!
It’s also easy to use, simply shop at any of your favorite retailer via the Ebates portal and Ebates will send you a check or PayPal payment. Nothing more, seriously it’s rather too amazing to be true.
6. Join Honey
Honey is a browser plugin for Opera, Chrome, and Firefox that scours the entire web for coupon codes and automatically try every available one online the instant you want to make payment. It removes all the hassles of manually searching for coupon and trying even expired coupon codes.
Just imagine, you see an awesome offer at any online store, and click BUY, a coupon code is automatically available, and applied even if you have no clue it existed. That’s how amazing the service works!
7. Ibotta
Ibotta is a great money-saving app that makes available deals at your local grocery store based on department.
It can even get better, allowing you to scan barcodes at home to accumulate cash back. And once your earnings hit $20, you can withdraw it directly on PayPal.
8. Coupon Sherpa
Coupon Sherpa brings the best of coupons on the web onto your phone. Just show the coupon on your phone at any checkout, and you’ll get a cutback on price.
You can also email it to yourself and print it out. The Coupon Sherpa app has lots of other great features to help your couponing life.
9. Kayak
Kayak app allows you to compare prices for hotels, and car rentals for a number of companies.
But not only that, you also can book your flight and everything else you need for traveling as well, all at a great discount!
10. Red Laser
Red Laser allows you to do everything from comparing shops to finding coupons and good deals, to even storing loyalty cards.
And you also get product reviews, with descriptions, and nutritional information, which service is awesome to have handy during this Christmas season.
Final Words
The best money-saving apps are there to help you get some real cash back for the holiday shopping you’re already going to do, anyways!
And just because you’re spending money on shopping, albeit very necessary, don’t mean you have to lose out on the little cutbacks from using these apps for the holiday, and also doesn’t mean you have to be totally broke while shopping for the season.
