It’s Valentine’s Day, and if you are reading the blog today I have to assume, you are in one of two situations: it’s just any other day and you are simply looking for good financial advice, or, you are desperately in need of last minute ideas on how to do Valentine’s without breaking your wallet. In order to help out those in the latter group, I’ve written this blog to help focus your efforts.
While frugality during Holidays has become a welcome norm, one may rightfully believe that today is not your average holiday. Speaking from my own experience, Thanksgiving and Christmas were relatively inexpensive compared to years past, and yet the time with friends and family was no worse off because of it.
But, getting too caught up in this line of thinking could lead to disastrous results, especially for those still fatigued from back-to-back eventful weekends.
So, in order to help out those truly in need, as well as keep things light, I spent some time searching for the best, most creative Valentine’s Day tips from around the web. Below are sites that in their own ways offered great (and sometimes humorous) tips:
- Be attentive to how high you set the bar early in courting says FatWallet.com’s Laura Pagles at Bargaineering.com. If you need to back things down from diamonds to something more manageable, find gift ideas that have unique qualities – of note, Pagles recommends less costly black pearl earrings for any mate with a pirate interest.
- Andrea Dickson at Wise Bread gives tips on how to be frugal when it comes to flowers.
- This post on the Canadian financial blog Financial Highway gives a few more no and low cost tips; but perhaps its best suggestion is to plan ahead. My favorite however comes from a reader comment suggesting marriage on February 14th to cut down on holiday costs!
But the site that offered the most ideas, as well as ones that had little emphasis on money or cost at all, surprisingly wasn’t from a financial website at all. Do with this what you will… but, if you are in a last minute bind, it wouldn’t hurt you to scan through the 101 ideas available in the form of a free e-book at Michael Webb’s theromantic.com.
The consistent message from our experts? It is possible to do Valentines without breaking the bank, or being unnecessarily cheap.
Reader sharing time: What are your ideas, or plans, for Valentine’s Day on a budget?
Robert Schmansky, CFP®
Financial Advisor
Sound Capital, LLC
Royal Oak, MI
[...] 13, 2012 by Robert Schmansky, CFP® Last year’s Valentine’s Day blog was about how to not break the bank on this [...]
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