The average amount of money that Americans spend on Halloween hovers at around $8.8 billion dollars. Although a lot of that money is for candy, a good portion also goes to decorations. Each year, it seems like folks try to outdo each of their neighbors when it comes to generating a good scare. You might get into the Halloween spirit by converting your home to a haunted house but that doesn’t mean you need to spend a fortune.
In fact, there are many ways to scare up a few frights on a budget. Consider these ideas:
Go On a House Hunt
Consider your front yard as a kind of Halloween canvas. Your mission is to fill up that space with any kind of creepy things. The best place to start is rummaging through your own home. There are plenty of objects you can pull out and give them the Halloween treatment. An old suitcase can have a fake hand crawling out. A pup tent can be the scene of a bloody Friday the 13th tableau. And you’re sure to have plenty of old clothes that can be stuffed for some scarecrow action.
Swap Out Your Porch Bulbs
Nothing says, “Halloween” like eerie lighting. You can swap out your front porch lightbulb for a red or orange bulb. A few strategically placed mini spotlights can use your yard’s trees to cast shadows. It will help to have some of those scarecrows hanging from the branches.
Deploy Sounds of the Season
It will only take a few moments of an online search to find the “sounds of the season.” You can download a lot of thunderstorms, shrieks, moans, and groans. It might be best to reserve the playing of those sounds on Halloween night. Just put a speaker up to the window and plug in your playlist.
Set Up a Graveyard
A popular yard decoration for Halloween is creating a graveyard in your front yard. There are plenty of prefabricated tombstones that you can find at any Halloween store but you can also make your own for less. Art supply stores will have chunks of Styrofoam that you can carve and spray paint grey. You can also get some fresh topsoil and pile it up to look like a freshly dug grave. Anything you can have popping up from that dirt is good, too.
Hanging Ghouls
An old white sheet with frayed edges wrapped around a soccer ball can become the perfect hanging ghost for your tree. You can attach branches under the sheet to act as arms.
Buy Ahead
The day after Halloween shouldn’t be focused on the cleanup. That can wait. Your first priority will be to head to the Halloween section of Target, Walmart or any other place that sold items for the season. This is where you can score a lot of great deals for next year. That is being smart with your Halloween budget.
