When Celestina*, 45, began planning for the Christmas holidays, she considered all the possible expenses of the season. She had three children: a thirteen-year-old daughter preparing the JSSCE, a 10-year-old son who just started secondary school and a 7-year-old daughter who was a picky eater. She set aside school fees for all three children, bought clothes for their Christmas Day outings and shopped for enough groceries to last through the holidays, spending extra to accommodate her youngest daughter’s very small list of acceptable foods. After everything, she had enough savings to get through the first two weeks of the new year before invoices from her consignment business started clearing. She believed she was set for the holidays until 10 days before Christmas when she got a call.
Her sister Marie* was in the country, visiting from the UK. It was a last-minute decision as her sister had won a bonus at work that gave her free air miles. Celestina had not seen her sister in 10 years, and her two younger children had never met her sister. It felt necessary, urgent even, that she drop everything and make the trip from Enugu to Lagos to spend time with Marie, who would only be in Lagos for 6 days.
“When Marie was leaving for the UK in 2013, it was supposed to be a short trip, but she decided to stay when she got there and couldn’t leave the country because she was there illegally. By the time she started the immigration process, 3 years had passed, and by the time she got her green card, 7 years had passed. She only got British citizenship this year, which cost her a lot of money. Her winning that bonus was a miracle. She could have spent that money on other things, but she came. Using the money I saved up to spend time with her is worth the stress I will face in January. Only God knows when she’ll be financially comfortable enough to come home again.”
With three children in tow, Celestina paid N120,000 to God Is Good Motors for one-way tickets from Owerri to Lagos (her youngest travelled on her lap). She returned home on the 31st of December after spending 4 days with her sister. Even though she didn’t have to spend any money on accommodation or feeding for herself and the children, the trip still set her nearly N300,000 naira over budget.
For Celestina, entering January with a financial deficit meant her younger children had their term disrupted as their school had a strict policy on school fees. Because Celestina’s oldest had JSSCE in three months, only she had her school fees paid in full. It caused her son emotional distress to have to stay at home until Celestina could raise their school fees through loans. Celestina had to take on an extra job, and spend less time with her family as she tried to repair the damage that her unexpected trip caused to her financial plans for the years.
Celestina’s story might be unique, but many Nigerians are familiar with the unexpected expenses that ruin the best-planned budgets during the yuletide season. It is even more common now that many Nigerians are relocating abroad and families have weaker support systems when things get out of hand financially. It is so common that Nigerians have a running joke about the dreaded ‘100 days of January’, because their savings and disposable cash are grossly inadequate for their expenses in the first month of the new year. This happens because far too many of us enter the New Year, with no financial preparation and little knowledge about the economic factors that can influence our ability to earn, spend and save.
WHY DO NIGERIANS FIND IT HARD TO SAVE TOWARDS THE NEW YEAR
To better understand why so many Nigerians find themselves in financial hot water in the first month of the New Year, we spoke to Nigerians across many backgrounds. The answers we received were varied and interesting. A surprising theme was that Nigerians had lost faith in saving as a way to grow wealth because of the ongoing challenges with foreign exchange and preferred to spend before their money was devalued. Peter Avose, a 41 year old driver, from Cotonou, who moved to Lagos in 2011 for work had a lot to say.
“Christmas used to be when I would travel back home to Cotonou to see my family. But I stopped going last year. Back then, the naira was stronger than the CFA, so travelling home was cheap for me. Now, it costs me more to stay in Lagos than travel home so I just send them the money I would have spent travelling, and spend as it is coming. If I wanted to work that hard to earn almost nothing, I would have just returned to Benin to work there.”
Peter plans to switch career trajectories, and move from working as a personal driver, to a commercial driver freighting goods for manufacturing companies.
‘I have heard they pay well, and they offer benefits like insurance and pension. I have never had a pension before and all that extra money from getting a steady salary will really help me plan my money better.”
Kevwe’s situation exemplifies another underexplored problem, the unreliability of the Nigerian banking system and how it has hindered people’s trust in financial services. As a uni student relying on a set monthly stipend from her elder siblings, Kevwe needed to account for every naira to make it through the month. That was until a prolonged bank downtime locked her precious funds in her own account.
‘For three weeks, earlier this year, I wasn’t able to withdraw from my savings account. My bank went haywire, and nothing worked. Not even USSD. I began borrowing from my friends to cover my basic expenses, and by the time I was able to access my savings, I was already 100k over budget with no way of paying it back. Even now, I’m still having issues accessing my money.”
For Leonard, a 27 year old freelance content creator, inflation has forced lifestyle creep on him and made him skeptical about saving. He had always relied on extra gigs to supplement his income as way to compensate for all the events during Detty December, but inflation meant less jobs and more competition, and ultimately less money.
“Over the last few years, inflation really shows its madness during Christmas time. There is no fuel, no light and everything is more expensive. Any budgeting you have during Detty December is for you, it stops applying when you leave your house. I’ve stopped trying to plan and just hoping God sees me through.”
For Leonard, getting dollar-denominated gigs is the way to go. He believes the dollar is his only protection against inflation, and with a regularly paying dollar hustle, he can stay one step ahead of chaos.
Most of the respondents we interviewed understood the importance of having a financial safety net, especially for new year expenses, but didn’t feel they had enough income or opportunities to plan for this.
WHAT’S THE WAY FORWARD FOR A FINANCIALLY SECURE 2025?
There are many reasons why the average person might struggle to save for the new year, many of which are out of our control. Forex challenges, rising inflation, and a growing distrust of traditional banking seem to be the most common, and the consequences vary from having to forgo seeing family, racking up unnecessary debt or reducing quality of life. However, financial planning can mitigate many of these unexpected complications, especially if cultivated as an all-year habit.
Financial planning can be daunting for a first-timer or an overspending repeat offender, but everyone can start with these suggestions:
FIRST, BUDGET
Budgeting is a superpower if you want to plan for the new year. Documenting your income and expenses allows you to see where you are overspending and where to redirect money to ensure that you always have emergency reserves. The Piggyvest Blog has a directory of guides on creating and optimising budgets that will be really helpful in getting you started.
SAFELOCK IT
Putting money away for the rainy day is hard if you struggle with discipline. However, Piggyvest’s Safelock feature allows you to get instant returns on your savings and have money locked away for a set date. This is a great way to reward yourself for saving and still have money when you absolutely need it during the new year.
DON’T JUST SAVE, INVEST
Saving is a great entry point into financial security, but investments are where things really take off. Investments shift the focus of your personal finance strategy away from short-term stop gaps to long-term returns. Features like Investify on the Piggyvest app allow you to put away money into investments that mature after a set period of time or can be sold within the platform to other users if you are in a bind.
BUDDY UP
There is real power in community, and one way Piggyvest leverages community is through the Race To The New Year Challenge. The Race To the New Year Challenge was first introduced in 2020 and leverages the already existing Piggyvest Target Savings feature, which allows users to set a target and save incrementally towards that target while earning interest. Where a lot of target savings are personal, Race To The New Year uses the momentum of the new year and the power of a large community to inspire people to save and follow through.
The rules of Race To The New Year are simple: users of the Piggyvest platform join the challenge by opening target savings to save ₦90,000 by the 5th of January of the coming year. Each member is expected to save a minimum of ₦1000 daily for the duration of the challenge, which lasts three months. The idea is that every saver on the challenge enters the new year with enough money to cover their basic needs and a little extra in the form of 12% interest. The challenge provides incentives to be sensible with holiday spending and incentives to prepare for the new year. This year, over 11,000 Piggyvest users have saved over ₦600,000,000. That is an average of 3 million naira per person, nearly 40 times more than the target goal.
Like many of Piggyvest’s features, the Race To The New Year Challenge helps automate saving and teaches the importance of financial discipline. Features like Safe Lock, Flex and Target Savings help users create passive income through interest and other incentives. Most importantly, they help users see that their challenges with saving, planning, and financial literacy are not unique. This systemic problem can be understood and solved with help from your community and your favourite savings platform.
So, January does not need to be dreadful if you seek help to improve your financial security.
