Nearly 4 in 10 (39%) Americans say they can’t afford to holiday shop this year – and 34% even worry they will go into debt due to holiday spending amid current economic challenges.
With the holiday season quickly approaching, many Americans will be forced to rethink their holiday spending, according to a new survey from Clever Real Estate, a St. Louis-based real estate company.
Clever polled 1,000 Americans and found that most Americans (61%) plan to adjust their holiday spending in 2022 because of inflation. Overall, 39% of Americans say they can’t afford to do holiday shopping this year – yet, of those, 79% plan to anyway.
Nearly 1 in 10 Americans (9%) plan to skip holiday shopping this year, with the top reason being that they can’t afford to shop (54%).
The survey found that 1 in 3 Americans (34%) plan to spend less on holiday shopping than they did last year. The average shopper plans to spend about $851 on gifts this holiday season, down from $893 in a typical year.
Of those planning to spend less, most, unsurprisingly, cite inflation as the primary reason for doing so (57%).
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More than half (58%) of respondents say they are heading into the holiday season stressed about their finances – two-thirds (67%) admit they have overshopped during the holidays at some point, and 76% wish there was less pressure to spend a lot of money on holiday gifts.
With only 48% of Americans meeting their financial goals this year, the magic of the holiday season looks like it could be replaced with stress and anxiety. As a result, Americans find sales (93%), free shipping (91%), and coupons (89%) influential in choosing to make a purchase from a store.
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With that, however, shoppers may be more impatient than ever this year – 16% of Americans expect gifts ordered online to arrive within two days, and 50% expect them to arrive within four days. Of Americans planning to shop this year, the vast majority (80%) are ready to get done early and plan to start before December.
Despite 34% of Americans worried they will go into debt due to holiday shopping, retailers likely do not need to panic: 91% of Americans still say they will be doing holiday shopping this year.
