Got No Dough - Saving Money in Slim Times

With Halloween being a week away, some of us still need some quick and cheap ideas for costumes.  If you’ve looked at the stores, you’ll see that most costumes are not very cheap at all.  So where do you get good costumes at good prices?

1. Check parenting forums for their for sale or trade items.  There are many great deals on there and if they have a section where you just pay shipping, you can get an even better deal.
2. Check eBay.  The past couple of years I have gotten pretty good deals on costumes for my older son.  The best part is that I resold the costume the next year and got my money back!
3. Go to thrift stores.  Thrift stores have all kinds of costumes, clothes and props, so your creativity is the limit.
4. Lastly, if your store has an area where they keep dress up clothes, check there.  A lot of times they have the same types of costumes as the Halloween section, but at a reduced price.

Ideas for Cheap Costumes

• Ghost
• Clown
• Hobo
• Witch
• Dress as the opposite sex
• Businessman

Just to share what I did this year.  I got my youngest’s costume from a friend.  She was only going to charge me shipping on a cute little pumpkin costume (which would have been $3), but then she just sent it to me for free.  My oldest wanted to be Spiderman, but I was having a trouble finding a nice costume at a reasonable price.  I was outbid on eBay so many times and was getting frustrated.  So, while I was at Walmart one day, we were going through the toy aisles.  In the back, they had a dress-up section which had a Spiderman costume.  Couple of bucks cheaper than the actual Halloween costumes and it comes in a hanging case.  I think I got great deals this year!