Christmas Budget - how much for the entire period?

[Ebedee]

Just wondered how everyone worked out their budget for Christmas? I've some savings, and don't want to blow the lot on tat, but would like to enjoy nice food and get some decent presents for 4 young adult kids. I'd also like to upgrade home decor a little (Maybe a new telly for myself & hubby if possible). Is £100 per kid reasonable?

Everyone will be different, I think it's whatever is within you means

We have 2 young DCs, we don’t really see a budget but usually spend around £1k. This includes presents, nice Christmas food, christmassy activities such as crafts, Christmas books and a couple of Christmas events/days out.

The amount will be different for everyone because everyone’s income, fixed outgoings & family situation will be different.

One thing I can say for certain is that I have never got into any form of debt to pay for Christmas and I never will. It’s just one day, it happens every year, it can be as modest or extravagant as you choose to make it, but it’s never worth getting into debt for. Cut your coat according to your cloth, as my very wise grandmother used to say. And she was right.

I set aside a rough budget of £600 and try spread it out in October and November.

I'll start adding one Christmas food item to the shop every week (e.g crisps, crackers, chocolates, chutney) and put them in a wicker hamper I've recycled year on year. We then open it on 15th December and have loads of nice treats stocked up ready. (Maybe £5 a week? So £60)
For Xmas lunch I do my shop with m&s, it's £50 deposit, and then I budget another 2x £50 in Oct and Nov to cover the whole order.

For decorations, we use the same artificial tree and basic decorations, but I like to do a bit of a refresh, so will spend £25 ISH and make my own. I think I'm going for bows this year, so will buy some nice ribbon and tie straight to the tree.

Christmas stockings - maybe £10 each, a nice bath/shower product, some chocolate and something novel.

Christmas presents - £100 on my DH, and then we agreed a per person budget for wider family, last year was £25 (so that's 8x£25)

And this is the first year with a baby, so probably £million on him!!

So roughly £565 plus the gazillion pounds spent on the baby 🤣

If we were going to have a drink, it would be a bottle of Bailey's and maybe some beers, but that will come from a separate dining out budget I allocate every month (we won't drink in the run up so I'll use 3 months worth of budget for it etc) so possibly another £150 towards Xmas.

I'm a single parent of one, on a budget.

Last year was £600 all in. Was tight but managed. Have upped to £700 this year. Already spent loads on what seems like very little, mostly from Vinted, as small child is just young enough to not understand second hand yet.

Have bought theatre tickets and santa tickets already. Family presents are my bane though; too many bloody extended family members I have to account for.

We save £200 pm.
We buy for family , and Teachers.
It includes things like santa visit which our local one is £18.99 a child. So x 3 that belive in santa , plus adults £7.99 is £80 just for that!

It includes 4 stockings as do the eldest one still.
Eldest would like a ps5
2 dcs need a bike
1 dc would like a new tablet as theirs has broken.
So that alone is over 1k Easily.

They then get maybe 5 tree gifts each , clothes / games/ barbie or whatever.

When they're small absolutely do it cheaper I did. And I look for bargains all year. I have loads in amazon basket waiting on prime day to see if any get reduced. I do get things like books in charity shops as stocking fillers if possible.

I add a food item into basket each week shopping.
Clubcard and nectar points buy the meat and dinner food. We don't buy alcohol.

I stopped buying for extended . We buy for parents x4 and 1 sibling. It gets crazy otherwise.
We do also buy for 1 couple and their dc that's it.
It was a game changer.

I have saved about 3k this year for Xmas. I have a savings account that is set so it can't be touched till November. I have saved about 1k of that as I want a new tumble dryer and Robo vac in Xmas sales. 2k will be Xmas ( we will be out alot and aswell as nieces and nephews have a good few god children outside of family ) won't be extravagant but we need to cover it. I also don't get paid till Xmas eve and want to ensure I have some for January

About £600 all in £300 on presents (parents, 2 kids, sibling, aunt and uncles, nursery and school teachers, 2 Godchildren)£50 Santa visits, 250 for everything else including food.

i start buying presents in the January sales, look out for immaculate books being given away and any deals I can to get that present budget to stretch.

I counted last year and it cost £2.5k. We did host everybody which was most of it,but it is ridiculous, not least as I dont particularly enjoy Christmas. Take me to spring now please!

It doesn't really matter what other people spend, it's what you can afford. You cut your coat to fit your cloth.

We don’t do Christmas anymore and it’s lovely and freeing. I know it’s not what you asked though.

We save in the monthly budget £100 to £200 and more in December usually. We buy a tree, do a panto trip, visit Christmas lights which is free apart from cash to stick in charity buckets. We host everyone for dinner so that’s the most expensive and often a second dinner for those that couldn’t come on the day. We enjoy hosting and the whole family doesn’t get together often enough so it’s worth it though.

I also have a kid with a December birthday so saving in the year is the only way to make it work without stress really! As others have said I wouldn’t get into debt for any of it.

My family consists of me, DH, 3 adult DC. We spent £1000.

We save £250/month Jan-Oct so have £2.5k to spend on Christmas. That’s divided roughly into £500ish for experiences like Christmas theatre trips, Santa visits etc. and food and the remainder is spent on gifts. We don’t have a huge family to buy for, but tend to spoil DS because he’s an only child and doesn’t really have anyone else to buy for him.

I have set a budget of £1000 this year. 2 adult kids that I like to spoil and to include food too. Fortunately we don’t drink really so I’ll grab a bottle of baileys an d some tins of cocktails and that’s that.

I’ve bought some gifts already. An Echo Show and kindle colour soft for my eldest - have saved around £140 there by buying at prime day type deal prices.

so on the one hand, a grand sounds plenty but I do have to allocate it mindfully. Last year was 3k but I’m not doing that this year because it was just too much

This.

There are so many variables.
But, overwhelmingly, it will be steered by how much disposable income you have.
Then the way you 'do' presents in your immediate and also extended families.
(There seems an inverse correlation between the amount families spend on presents and the amount of disposable income people have).

Whether you are including outings in that expense - be that a panto or the ballet, and whether you like to go to sports fixtures on Boxing Day or various Christmas 'experiences'

Whether you also host drinks parties or extended family gathering

etc
etc
etc

I have 2 dc and usually spend between 5-800 per child. Then for DP and my parents I spend another 500ish. I don’t by for extended family. So then it’s just food and activities which is probably another 500ish so around 3k.

We don’t budget and we don’t really count the cost. I try not to buy Christmas food before Christmas as I would just eat it. We are not big on things as gifts unless something seems really appropriate (Bose noise cancelling headphones, boxed set of the West Wing were good buys) so more likely to pay for a weekend break, meals, courses, concerts, theatre tickets etc. although we may do silly Secret Santa £5 or £10 gifts on a theme. In recent years someone else has cooked so I just ask them to do a shopping list and we shop, order the Turkey etc. and clearly share washing up duties.

We usually buy one Christmas / tree decoration each year and now have enough for two trees. I like getting out the old favourites wrapped in tissue paper. DH and DC have both studied / worked abroad so they used to bring home decorations from their travels.

Thank you everyone for your input. I guess I should have asked what % of disposable income was reasonable for a total Christmas spend.

We are a family of 4 (2 adults and 2 primary school aged DDs) and we budget £1000 for Christmas.

£600 of that is presents. We tend to budget £100 for each DD but we also have a LOT of nieces and nephews.

£250 on food and drink, but that includes hosting a party for extended family so I don't think it is too bad.

£60 on our annual panto tickets.

£40 on breakfast with Santa at the local pub.

£50 on miscellaneous bits. I've just bought DDs a new Christmas jumper each (off Vinted) or we'll spend a bit of money at the school Christmas fête.

We budget pretty aggressively for Christmas so that we don't go into any debt. I have a spreadsheet to mark off exactly what I've spent on presents and what I've bought, and I start in June to spread the cost. I've almost finished present buying for this year.

From September I'll start adding one or two items a week to the food shop and storing them in the garage for Christmas. Again I've got a spreadsheet so I can tick off what I've bought and see exactly what I still need to buy as we tend to get the same stuff each year. For example Sainsbury's today had 25% off three bottles of wine so I got some to put away and I've already bought things like chutney, a nice box of chocolates, foil trays etc. You do have to be disciplined about not eating it though!

Every year is different for us. My eldest is 19, has his own income and is at university, but still lives at home. If he wants something he tends to buy it himself at the moment 🤦‍♀️ He's not mentioned anything this year as of yet. Last year he wanted a fancy watch and I managed to get it half price so paid £160 for that. My youngest is 12 and has only asked for the FC 2026 game for the switch he got last year 🤷‍♀️ So some years cost more than others. I never go into debt, and most of the food and drinks are paid with Tesco club card points 👍

We save £200 per month in a 12 month high interest account. It matures October each year. That covers presents (budget is £4-500 per child plus £1-200 each DH and I and £200ish for family presents, but we always over spend). The rest on food and outings. I’ve put DH in charge this year as he has no qualms whatsoever about appearing mean and spending less. £2400 should be plenty, but teens are expensive. Last year bought phones which were £550 each plus then went a bit mad on other smaller presents to make a pile.