This post is part eight of our 2026 Money Confidence Roadmap, your monthly guide to reducing stress and building confidence with money.
It’s almost hard to believe we’re three-fourths of the way through the year. Next month, Summer ends, and it’s onto the Fall and Winter holidays.
Historically, Americans overspend. Sometimes because they’re caught up in the emotions of the most wonderful time of year. Other times, it’s simply a lack of planning. Last year, the average American planned to spend about $114 on Halloween and $890 on winter holiday shopping. That doesn’t even factor in the $2,334 on travel expenses.
The third quarter of Consolidated Credit’s 2026 Money Confidence Roadmap is focused on creating a holiday spending and travel budget.
Setting a realistic plan is the best way to ensure emotional spending doesn’t get the best of you and avoid starting a new year with a holiday debt hangover.
Start with Halloween
Halloween is a good place to practice the habit before the bigger holidays hit. A costume, some candy, maybe a few decorations: It adds up faster than it should.
Set a number before you start shopping the same way you would a grocery budget: once it’s spent, it’s spent. Buying candy and decor in the weeks before Halloween (rather than the night before) also tends to mean better prices – not worse.
Build your gift budget before you build your gift list
It’s tempting to make the list first and figure out the money later. Flip that order. Decide on a total dollar amount for gifts before you start browsing, then divide it across the people on your list.
A written number – even ballpark – gives you something to check purchases against in the moment, which is exactly when emotional spending tends to take over.
A few ways to keep that number realistic:
- Use a sinking fund. Set aside a little from each paycheck between now and December so the cost is spread out instead of landing all at once in one card statement.
- Separate “want to buy” from “have to buy.” Necessary gifts (kids, immediate family) get funded first; everything else fits into what’s left.
- Watch for Buy Now, Pay Later and store card offers. They can make a purchase feel smaller than it is, and multiple BNPL plans stacked on top of each other are easy to lose track of by January.
Give travel its own line item
Traveling for the holidays? Budget it separately from gifts. Flights, lodging, and holiday shopping tend to get lumped together mentally, which makes it easy to underestimate the total. Booking early, being flexible on travel dates, and setting a firm ceiling on lodging costs can meaningfully change what that final number looks like.
Tie it back to where you are in the roadmap
This is also the point in Q3 to revisit a few things from earlier checklists:
- If your emergency fund isn’t yet at that one-to-two-month cushion, even a small automatic transfer now means an unexpected expense in November doesn’t have to compete with holiday spending.
- Pull your credit reports again if you haven’t checked them since Q1. You want a clear picture of your utilization before holiday charges start hitting the cards, not after.
- If you’re still working through a debt payoff strategy, this is a good moment to decide, in writing, that holiday spending won’t interrupt it.
None of this is about skipping the season or being the person who says no to everything fun. It’s about deciding the number ahead of time, in a calm moment, so you’re not deciding it in a checkout line in December.
