Frugal Living

[Frnc]

The latest thing we did was to get rid of one of the cars. We kept two at our last house as we were in the middle of nowhere and didn't fancy being stuck if we only had one and it was off the road. Now that there is a regular bus that goes past the front gate and it's only a mile to the nearest Co op we can easily manage with one. If we get desperate for food (but being good preppers we won't will we?) there's a surprisingly well stocked shop in the village.
Mr A also changed his big "Chelsea tractor" (useful for towing the livestock trailer) for a smaller, much more economical car.

You can get almost anything delivered these days, often at no delivery cost. Sainsbury's were hard to get at the start of the pandemic, but after a few weeks or months I was getting weekly deliveries for about £1.50. I get bits and bobs off Amazon and Ebay for no delivery cost usually (I have Prime). I got paint for the prep room off Amazon for example. But some things are a rip off eg Anthisan is nearly 3 times the price on Amazon as it is at Sainsburys. But I got Ambre Solaire cheaper off Amazon.

[Frnc]

Paying £100 a month for gas and electric, is more than enough at the moment, but that will change next Sept when my fix ends. Used a lot less gas this winter, but over the year I spend a bit more on electricity. Bought a mini oven to try to reduce that a bit. Not much I can do to reduce it any more. It's about £50 a month, for 3 adults.
Council tax £140 can't do anything about.
House and contents insurance plus my bike is about £40
Food and other groceries excluding booze is about £120
Phone £7 for 3GB which rolls over for 3 years. Phone paid for.
Internet £39 includes land line. Is pretty fast.
Paying £33 a month for new boiler for 3 years, but the care cost came down to £13 a month, fixed for 10 years.
House has cost me a fortune. Made a couple of not great decisions. I just pray it will all be over soon and nothing else will go wrong.
Mortgage paid anyway.
Got two lodgers.
Pension coming in a couple of years.

[jennyjj01]

Right now ,our frugality is mainly towards dealing with power and food. And quite successfully too.I suspect that’s many other peoples priorities.

So how have you dealt with extra expenses? Is life particularly frugal?

For the last 8 months or so I/we have switched from casual spending to frugality to the max, rather than deplete our retirement savings while awaiting state pension in a couple of years.

1) We switched from fairly casual weekly ASDA home delivery, to a weekly round robin of the cheaper stores, buying value brands.
1a) When visiting Home Bargain, we try to not buy stuff on impulse.
2) Over winter, we seriously toned down home gas consumption by driving down heating settings and using the crock pot and washing line rather than Electric oven and tumble dryer.
3) Slashed discretionary spending especially our weekly meals out plus takeaways. That was scary spending.
4) Modified diet to feature less Beef and less processed food. We can now budget to feed ourselves for £5 per day per person.
5) Embraced TooGoodToGo, to 2 x £3.10 bags per week. Sometimes they get cancelled, but each bag is usually good for 3 meals.
6) Trimmed alcohol consumption, but not enough.

7) One big coping strategy has been a return to part time paid employment, though that looks to be temporary.

Inflation is depleting the worth of our savings, but at least they're not haemorrhaging nominal balance.

[Frnc]

Right now ,our frugality is mainly towards dealing with power and food. And quite successfully too.I suspect that’s many other peoples priorities.

So how have you dealt with extra expenses? Is life particularly frugal?

For the last 8 months or so I/we have switched from casual spending to frugality to the max, rather than deplete our retirement savings while awaiting state pension in a couple of years.

1) We switched from fairly casual weekly ASDA home delivery, to a weekly round robin of the cheaper stores, buying value brands.
1a) When visiting Home Bargain, we try to not buy stuff on impulse.
2) Over winter, we seriously toned down home gas consumption by driving down heating settings and using the crock pot and washing line rather than Electric oven and tumble dryer.
3) Slashed discretionary spending especially our weekly meals out plus takeaways. That was scary spending.
4) Modified diet to feature less Beef and less processed food. We can now budget to feed ourselves for £5 per day per person.
5) Embraced TooGoodToGo, to 2 x £3.10 bags per week. Sometimes they get cancelled, but each bag is usually good for 3 meals.
6) Trimmed alcohol consumption, but not enough.

7) One big coping strategy has been a return to part time paid employment, though that looks to be temporary.

Inflation is depleting the worth of our savings, but at least they're not haemorrhaging nominal balance.

I don't think there's a lot more you can do. Similar to me in almost every detail. I do have the lodgers, but I've also had the roof saga. I've been quite stressed about it, but hopefully it will all be over soon.

[Yorkshire Andy]

I don't think there's a lot more you can do. Similar to me in almost every detail. I do have the lodgers, but I've also had the roof saga. I've been quite stressed about it, but hopefully it will all be over soon.

There's a roofer on Facebook roofing outlaw or something like that video last night "If you think a good roofer is expensive try a cheap one" with a moronic grin

Work mate has a. Issue in his council house his Mrs reported a patch of damp over 3 months ago.... It's not an emergency..... Several more times similar response till the ceiling begun to collapse.....

"You should have told us sooner" was the response

Now looking at temporary housing whilst they gut the new build to fix leak replace ceiling l and chipboard flooring

[GillyBee]

FRNC and Jenny
You are both acting proactively to do what you can to both trim costs and find extra income. You are both way ahead of most people. There are a lot of people out there who won't start to take a real look at their income/expenditure until they are already in trouble. We will all get curve balls, prepared or not whether these are major household expenses or sudden unemployment. Being prepared makes the difference between coping (if only just) and sinking into desperation.
That is "Preppertude" and you both have that in spades.

[Frnc]

FRNC and Jenny
You are both acting proactively to do what you can to both trim costs and find extra income. You are both way ahead of most people. There are a lot of people out there who won't start to take a real look at their income/expenditure until they are already in trouble. We will all get curve balls, prepared or not whether these are major household expenses or sudden unemployment. Being prepared makes the difference between coping (if only just) and sinking into desperation.
That is "Preppertude" and you both have that in spades.

Cheers. I wasn't always. If Covid or my roof issues had hit in 2007 or the next few years I'd have struggled, as I had no savings and debts. Also lodger situation wasn't steady like it has been for almost 10 years now. Not sure when I paid off my mortgage and debts. I had to give up my business due to disability and I couldn't get benefits.

[jennyjj01]

Being prepared makes the difference between coping (if only just) and sinking into desperation.
That is "Preppertude" and you both have that in spades.

Can we split the royalties for the copyriteon that?

[jansman]

Another little *tweak* is cutting wastage too. Especially with food. Just got back from fishing and looked for a sandwich. I’d have had cheese,but there’s ham needs using. Sounds simple,but no waste. Ham had a days life left. Now it’s gone!

[Frnc]

Another little *tweak* is cutting wastage too. Especially with food. Just got back from fishing and looked for a sandwich. I’d have had cheese,but there’s ham needs using. Sounds simple,but no waste. Ham had a days life left. Now it’s gone!

I waste almost nothing. Occasionally a bit of cauliflower if I've not managed to use it all. Bread gets frozen after about 6 days. Cheese lasts as long as it lasts, I never chuck any. I did chuck a bit of dried pasta that was opened months ago and got left wide open, but I've put a plastic bag over the new opened one. I sometimes chuck a pit of pasta sauce becauae I'm not supposed to eat too much tomatoes, so if I open 500g and have 4 lunches using 100g each, and 4 x half pack of tortellini, I might chuck 100g.