Folk are soooo wasteful

[Deleted User]

I have just spent the day with my sis-in-law clearing up her daughters house.Her daughter has moved to Dubai with her husband and children. The amount of stuff that was thrown into the skip was awful. But as we went around the house hoovering and cleaning for the new people I made sure that nothing was left .I have come home with a complete carful of bits and pieces from towels (abandoned in the airing cupboard,about 20) to a huge boxful of cleaning materials. (They did have four bathrooms in their house)Also cups,plates,glasses,sheets and pillows and duvet covers and curtains. I couldn't believe how much of her house was just 'junked' Does anyone else junk stuff when they move or is it just me being a tightwad?.
I can understand somethings being left as the container with their furniture went last Thursday but there was still anawful amount of stuf just left. There was an almost brand new washing machine and tumble dryer that was left, as no-one had the facilities to take it away !!:eek:
Are we living in a throw-away society or is it just me being old-fashioned ?
Still both my two daughters and I are pleased with all that I salvaged, I'm just off to put another load of towels in the WM it looks like the sun is coming out today.:rotfl: :j

Gingham_Ribbon

I used to be like that. Not any more! But I do come across things that we have too much of from our pre MSE days. We give them to friends/charity etc rather than dump them as it frees us up some much needed space.

Chipps

I don't think you're being old fashioned! After all, freecycle is a new thing, isn't it! I can understand people not wanting to take things with them under those circumstances, but it is rather a selfish attitude to leave them without making arrangements to give to others, either people they know or a charity or something like that. That seems to me to be the problem, a lack of concern for others' needs.
On the other hand, it's an ill wind... and all that, and you and your daughters have benefitted from their thoughtlessness. It's just a pity the other stuff had to be dumped.

Chipps

Thinking about it, a friend and I benefitted once from one of these people. It was a friend of a friend of my friend (if that makes sense!!!) who had just got divorced & wanted to get rid of things - my friend had a complete dinner service & part of a set of lead crystal glasses. Her family don't drink, so we got the wine glasses & decanters. My DD has them now, as I passed them on to her when she moved out and set up home. There were lots of other things like vases & fruit bowl and ornaments. DD fell in love with the Swarovski crystal miniatures, so she had them and started a collection!

dolly_day_dream

It's not such a modern thing though I do think that it has grown as we have been more and more infected with affluenza. One of the many jobs my mum had when we were little was cleaning for a family who used to throw out their bedspreads when they got dirty cos it was too much trouble to clean them!!! Guess who had the swankiest bedspreads in our street?

Lillibet_2

I used to be in property management & intially was dealing with check in & check out inventories of rented properties so saw lots (hundreds if not thousands) of houses just after tenants moved out. They left STACKS of stuff. Cleaning products were almost always left behind so were paper products like packs of (not just single in use ones) kitchen towel, loo roll, stationary, soap etc. Kitchen equipment was quite common, everything from tin openers & sabiter knives to waffle irons & microwaves. Linen & duvets (not just covers, the actual quilts!) were also quite common, Christmas trees & decorations, half-used medication, old (and new) peices of furniture & even full money boxes!. And yes, stashes of !!!!!! magazines, ends of suspicious-smelling roll ups, (legal & illegal) medication & twice some very suspicious white powder! And these people would often query why they were then charged for cleaning and/or clearence!!!

I always brought the cleaning & paper products home or left them for the cleaning company to take & use as these were considered "disposable" items. We would write/phone the ex-tenants & tell them we were storing other items for 10 days for them to collect after which time they would be disposed of. In reality we used to keep everything until December then all unclaimed stuff would be shared out between the staff & unwanted stuff donated to charites & animal shelters in the case of used linen.

Company tenants (whose employuers paid the rent for them) & people from/moving to overseas were always the worst, and as a usual rule of thumb the more expensive the property the more was left behind/cleaning required after they had gone. It quickly became very clear to me that there is such as thing as having too much!

Softstuff

I agree that people are far too wasteful. I'm off to Australia in 3 weeks and I'm trying hard to make sure that all of my stuff gets "Redistributed". Done 2 car boot sales so far, hopefully another 2 will happen.

Australians tend not to have as much of the throw away attitude that seems to be prevelant here. They recycle a heap more, charity shops aren't seen as a paupers option, and things tend to get used and sold on until they really are past it. I'm so looking forward to it!

newleaf

Moving house is rather stressful though, and if you have a lot to organise, I guess some things get overlooked until it's too late. (Especially if it's a move overseas). Personally I would leave stuff like cleaning products as it would be helpful for the new owner or tenant to be able to use them prior to moving in. Quite often I've had to wait in at the new house for various workmen and not had the benefit of any furniture, so if I found a cupboard full of cleaning stuff my day would be made!
The white goods could be advertised - buyer to collect. Somebody would be glad of them.

cha97michelle

We would rather run down supplies than chuck anything out.

We did find it rather useful when we bought the house we are currently in, as the old lady we bought it off donated to us all of her blinds and curtains, her dining room table and chairs, a matching wall unit, a tv, and wardrobes in all 3 bedrooms. Plus she had her family thoroughly clean the house, so i could just move in.

Most of our furniture has come from relatives, and as we are replacing it we are trying to reuse or recycle. E.g. Worn curtains are now dust sheets when we decorate. Blinds were not to our taste, but works well in the garage. Settee mum gave us because it was cream, and one cushion had a broken zip. A bit of cleaning and fixing, and we have a £2000 sofa.

My MIL was laughing at us last week as i said we were freecycling the living room furniture, and that we still had a sideboard that used to eblong to her mum in our garage. I wouldn't dream of just throwing out furniture just because it didn't match my taste.

I must admit it is fantastic now we can finally afford some new things and it is stuff that i love. Perhaps i should have hung onto some of the old stuff a bit longer.

Michelle

kiwichick

When we moved 3 months ago we took ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING. We did have an awful time when we moved in here though as the house is smaller than the last with no loft and no garage so rather than storing thing we would have used in the future I have given away;

a tumble dryer!
a fridge!!
a freezer!!!
a leather 3 piece suite!!!!
a computer!!!!!

I know I could have sold them for a few pounds, but we moved into what is a road of council houses, many of which are privately owned like ours, but plenty that are still council run. There is a huge population of elderly people. I cant tell you how happy/grateful they were to receive bits like this from a new neighbour. Made me feel all warm inside. I would always rather try to find homes for things than leave them for others to have to deal with.

BTW - I have towels in use here that were wedding gifts for my MIL, 40 years ago!!!!!

[Deleted User]

Moving is very stressful and I think we all start with good intentions but I know that I reached a stage when I gave lots of expensive items away as I ran out of time. Oxfam was the main benificiery eg a complete royal albert tea set.Children of aquantances had an expensive oak ercol 6 chair dining set, parker knoll, 2 tall bosch freezers, 1 tall bosch larder fridge and so on. Ok it cost me but on the other hand the people who had them were (obviously) delighted

However: lesson learnt as none of these would fit into this modern new town house. Any furniture we have bought here has been in pale oiled oak and is modular so can be fitted into any space if we should move again

and I am also learning to replace one with one ie one in and one out