what do you class as frugal ?

sexykellylovespink

how far will you go to be frugal ? i am after tips ect as i am new to this......................thanks x

thriftlady_2

I prefer the word thrifty. It has a more positive image I think, less austere.

Being frugal/thrifty for me is making the best of whatever resources are available to you.

We all have different budgets and priorities. Good food is a priority to me and I probably spend a lot more on it than many are able to, but I make the most out of everything I buy -stretching meat, making as much as possible myself and using up leftovers.

sexykellylovespink

thriftlady wrote: »

I prefer the word thrifty. It has a more positive image I think, less austere.

Being frugal/thrifty for me is making the best of whatever resources are available to you.

We all have different budgets and priorities. Good food is a priority to me and I probably spend a lot more on it than many are able to, but I make the most out of everything I buy -stretching meat, making as much as possible myself and using up leftovers.

my mum calls it thrifty, she looks at me funny if i say frugal and asks me were i get these funny words lol........... thank you for ur tips xxxx

staffie1

For me it's cutting out as much waste from my monthly budget as possible, and when buying a product or service, shopping round for the best VALUE.

It's not about trying to live on £1 a day or something daft like that.

I think people can take these things too far - you still need to have some quality of life - and it's perfectly possible to be a moneysaver and enjoy life without forcing yourself to live on a few crumbs you've found at the back of the fridge like some seem to on these forum discussions lol

miss_keep_counting

I count frugal/ thrifty (I actually prefer the use frugal!) as simply making changes to my life I would not have otherwise.

It's a bit like a diet/ healthy living. A diet is short term, quick fix and can backfire... so things like not going for a night out, not buying the pair of shoes I want are short term frugal things I can do which wont always work as I may then do another 'big spend'

But changing my phone bill from £45 to £20 a month by shopping around and sacrificing a hot new phone, cutting my shopping bill to be healthier and teaching myself to cook is showing I can cut it from £150 to £80 a month.... using free buses or walking rather then trains is becoming a way of life... all of these are positive changes which in the long term, become lifestyle.

So frugal to me is short term and long term lifestyle changes to make me happier and healthier and result in me saving money for a happier home

[Deleted User]

I think I am fairly frugal,although I do enjoy my life style and certainly don't live on crumbs. I like to make the most of what I have in the cupboards.At the moment I have been trying to work down my freezer as it needs defrosting and it has taken me since almost September to do this .I still have about a months food left in there to eat up. I also have been 'shopping' from my cupboards as I listed all that I had in there and found that there was over £140.00 worth of food in tins ,jars ect stashed in my kitchen.This too I am working down so that eventually I will have a smaller stock cupboard and more space. I find it a challenge to make a meal out of whatever odds and eds I can find .I make all of my HM soups and they 'pad' out my evening meal so the main meal isn't quite so big.Or I make milk puddings for pud .
I eat very well and have lots of fruit and veggies.
It's like a game to see if you can beat the big supermarkets at their own game .Once I used to go to MrT's or Sainsbugs and just walk around chucking things willy-nilly into the trolley without really thinking what I was buying, but now I only buy what is needed, and have cut my outgoings for food almost in half .But the spare half has gone in the bank for my holiday this year, and I have enough to pay for the rented house and the two ferries in August on the Isle of Wight (my DD and family are coming as well)
Meal planning is very helpful then you don't end up throwing things in the bin.I could all my meals from scratch, and have very little wasted food in my house. Last night I made a jelly ,into which I put a small tin of mandarins I found in the cupboard.I made a pint of custard to cover it and with a little left over I covered a banana that was starting to go over a bit .So I have a jelly and mandarin custard, and aslo a plate of banana custard .enough puds for at least 3-4 days cost
jelly 10p
pint of milk and caster sugar and custard powder 60p
Tin of mandarins ,reduced because of a dent 22p
so for 92p I have four-five pudding.Cheaper than paying 55p for one single yoghurt.Its not so much the cost, but just changing what you do with what you've got, so that you get more for your money .
I always try to cost out the price of my evening meal and I can usually get it for around a pound or even less. I don't eat ready made meals ,mainly because I don't like them, and think I can make the same only better tasting for half the price .A pound of mince is so versatile it can make so many things especially if you throw a handfull of ordinary porridge oats in with it .It streetches the meat to go further.Why buy pre-packed veggies when the ordinary ones are cheaper, and you can pick out the best ones.
I think in this time at the moment everyone is tightening their belts ,but you can live fairly well if you think of your shopping as a business, and get the best value for money that you can, with what you've got.When I see on t.v. families moaning that they have spent £150.00 per week for four to eat, I think I could easily feed them for half that amount.

Larumbelle

Personally, I don't mind being called thrifty or frugal. In my strange little mind, 'thrifty' somehow sounds more fun, and 'frugal' sounds more serious and nitty gritty! But either is fine. Most of the other names seem to have negative connatations though - mean, miserly, tight, skinflint, penny pincher - all sound horrible. Fortunately I can dismiss any of these names being thrown at me as jealousy

Whatever you call it, to me frugality is about finding ways to achieve the life you want with the resources you have available to you. Obviously the biggest of these resources is money, and to be frugal you always need to live within your means, but it's not the only one. Time and principles are the other biggies for me. The ways we achieve this will vary from person to person and family to family, I don't think you can really be prescriptive about it.

Pooky

To me, being thrifty/frugal (I don't mind either word) is about using our time and money wisely.

By batch cooking, bulk buying and meal planning I've got our budget to the limit we're happy with. By shopping around for utilities I know I'm paying the best price possible each month for the gas and electric I have to use, but also by being more savvy, turning stuff off at the wall, blocking drafts, layering up etc, we use less power - therefore smaller bills.

Every aspect of our life has been parred to the level we're comfortable with and I think that's the key, what's comfortable for us isn't always for others.

I do get angry when people say they can't adapt to a more frugal lifestyle because they don't have time. It's all a matter of balance and if you want life to be simpler and cheaper then you have to make the effort.

pickle

When I joined this forum years ago I didn't really think in terms of saving money. I usually just spent what was available. I always thought my husband was such a tight-wad and now I'm more penny pinching than he is!

These are the tips which I've learnt from this forum along the way:

* Try value brands as often you can't tell the difference.
* Make all your meals and use lentils etc. to bulk out the meal. Saves on meat costs.
* Make your own laundry gloop (did this recently and couldn't believe how much cheaper it is). I can't tell the difference.
* Meal plan - have a plan of what you're going to cook a week/month in advance so that you can plan cheap meals.
* Freeze stuff - I now freeze things like chopped up mushrooms and peppers rather than throwing them out. You can freeze loads of things. I make pizza bases in my bread maker and freeze them so I don't buy take aways. I can't remember the last time I threw something out!
* Buy clothes/toys from the charity shop - it's cheaper and greener and it benefits the charity.
* Make cat litter by shredding paper.
* Break dishwasher tablets in half.
* Stardrops for most cleaning - love it for my floors and lasts forever.
* Use old towels cut up (or whatever) or buy reuseable dishcloths (I like the LIDL ones which I cut in half) and wash.
* Try not to use the dryer.

My own tip:
Have a calender and write all your monthly outgoings eg. rent/mortgage etc. on the top and cross off as you go. Keep a running balance of your credit so you know how much is going out. I also write down the amounts spent on the calender at the supermarket to keep an idea of how much I spend there as I used to spend a lot so it keeps me mindful of it. Also if I have a savings target then I try and stretch the meals etc. particularly at the end of the month.

I'm still a learner but I'm much further ahead than I was a few years ago. It's become a challenge now as I enjoy not wasting money and being a more savvy consumer. I get to spend more for the things I want now. My aim when I started was to pay off debts and get a deposit for a house. Now it's to be mortgage free. I've just got to get my head around the more complicated financial tricks, that's my next challenge.

onetomany

pickle wrote: »

When I joined this forum years ago I didn't really think in terms of saving money. I usually just spent what was available. I always thought my husband was such a tight-wad and now I'm more penny pinching than he is!

These are the tips which I've learnt from this forum along the way:

* Try value brands as often you can't tell the difference.
* Make all your meals and use lentils etc. to bulk out the meal. Saves on meat costs. (did this recently and couldn't believe how much cheaper it is). I can't tell the difference.
* Meal plan - have a plan of what you're going to cook a week/month in advance so that you can plan cheap meals.
* Freeze stuff - I now freeze things like chopped up mushrooms and peppers rather than throwing them out. You can freeze loads of things. I make pizza bases in my bread maker and freeze them so I don't buy take aways. I can't remember the last time I threw something out!
* Buy clothes/toys from the charity shop - it's cheaper and greener and it benefits the charity.
* Make cat litter by shredding paper.
* Break dishwasher tablets in half.
* Stardrops for most cleaning - love it for my floors and lasts forever.
* Use old towels cut up (or whatever) or buy reuseable dishcloths (I like the LIDL ones which I cut in half) and wash.
* Try not to use the dryer.

My own tip:
Have a calender and write all your monthly outgoings eg. rent/mortgage etc. on the top and cross off as you go. Keep a running balance of your credit so you know how much is going out. I also write down the amounts spent on the calender at the supermarket to keep an idea of how much I spend there as I used to spend a lot so it keeps me mindful of it. Also if I have a savings target then I try and stretch the meals etc. particularly at the end of the month.

I'm still a learner but I'm much further ahead than I was a few years ago. It's become a challenge now as I enjoy not wasting money and being a more savvy consumer. I get to spend more for the things I want now. My aim when I started was to pay off debts and get a deposit for a house. Now it's to be mortgage free. I've just got to get my head around the more complicated financial tricks, that's my next challenge.

can you please tell me how you do the laundry gloop i would love to give it a try

OrkneyStar

onetomany wrote: »

can you please tell me how you do the laundry gloop i would love to give it a try

Laundry gloop recipe from Grocery Challenge thread.
Regarding thrifty/frugal I prefer thrifty, and to me it is simple:- getting value for money from everything and not wasting anything unecessarily (within reason). Of course we have treats (nice food, shower gel etc), the fact that I save on some things means we have money to spend on other things iyswim!
I make a lot of foods from scratch and eat a more varied diet (ekeing meat out with veg NOT oats or lentils and eating more veg in general, eating more fish etc) try not to throw food away, buy some second hand clothes/donate mine to charity, recycle plastic/cardboard etc, use real nappies on DS, walk more instead of driving short distances, use half as much washing liquid in machine, things like that.
It is not about being a martyr to thriftyness though, I enjoy it!