Old Finances (back in the day)

Ida_Notion

ALIBOBSY wrote: »

When we wanted a new dress we wouldn't go to the clothes shop, often we would go to the market and you picked a peice of material and a pattern for mum to make up. There seemed to be a thing in the 70's for kids to wear matching outfits even if not twins lol.

My mum used to make a lot of our clothes too. Mostly sewing, but I remember a phase she went through with making us crochet dresses. The longer you owned them the more they seemed to stretch lengthwise, with the hem heading further towards your ankles every week. I've a feeling crochet was all the rage at the time (1975-ish) because she made a few other little bits and pieces (mats for the sideboard etc) and all the magazines on the papershop shelves looked to be full of it. For some mysterious reason though, we were the only kids at school sporting the crochet dresses 'trend'. I've a feeling we gave in far too easily

Bitsy_Beans

Hardup_Hester wrote: »

We didn't go hungry, but the meals got a bit monotonous sometimes.

Oh goodness the endless pork chops I had as a child because a) they were cheap and b) my father would have never entertained something like pasta for tea. It was always meat and veg and one night a week egg and chips

I was born mid 70's and my mum made all my clothes when I was little, it was cheaper to buy fabric back then. There were loads of haberdashery's but now I find there is hardly any. All the furniture was pretty much second hand, we went for walks alot as it was free. I'd only eaten once in McDonalds when I went to a birthday party there :rotfl: It was a treat to LOOK at the toys in the toy shop every Saturday and for some reason we always asked my dad to drive down the high street past the cinema so we could see what was on. Dunno why because we very rarely went :rotfl:
I remember the Man from the Pru coming round each week for his money and the man from the pools coming too. Funny the little things I'd forgotten that I have remembered this week

LilacPixie

I was born in 1981 so can't really add that much to this. What i do remember is my dad was an engineer, north sea oil was quite new and very lucrative so income wise as a family we were quite comfortable money wise considering the income of the area we lived in. My memories will be more mid 80's onwards i guess

I can remember my dad drove an Austin Princess, a big bronze wedge shaped thing that he seemed to be forever working on. My parents had a black and white TV that you changed the channel by twisting the dial and then one day my dad came home with a colour TV and a beta max video and that was something special:rotfl: I think at the time he had been working alot and that was the 'treat'. I can remember my grandparents coming over to 'watch' the new contraption. My grandparents TV was a thing in a wooden cabinet with a record player in a drawer under the screen.

My mum had a twin tub washing machine, i remember holding the wooden tongs waiting for he to be ready to lift the wet clothes from the washing bit to the spinning bit. I can remember supermarkets have different powders for automatic and twin tub machines.:rotfl:

My Gran was always making jams and chutneys and alcohol. She seemed to brew everything from Rhubarb to elderflowers but we kids were never allowed to watch or help like it was some sort of mad experiment not for kiddie eyes. I actually feel sad that i never ever saw her do it, she died when i was 12.

Clothes seemed to be more expensive then. I can remember wanting a hooded top from the 'kylie' range at mackays and it was about £12 that was 1990 ish and I only got it after about 2 months of extra chores, looking on the M&CO website today the kylie range still exists but hooded sweatops are 15-16 quid. it seems like clothing has reduced in price in real terms

The_Thrilla

Going back to the Rates. They were not quite the same as Council Tax. Every home had a rateable value, and you paid that rateable value every year. The bigger and more valuable the house the bigger the rates. The difference between the rates and the council tax is that you paid just the rateable value whether there was one person living in the property, or two hundred. The Council Tax takes account of the number of people in the property, as well as its value.

About the cylindrical device that put a lock on the phone to prevent the kids from using it, I worked in an office where a colleague told me that her kids had found a way around it. You pressed the cradle so many times to get a digit - once for 1, twice for 2, up to ten times for zero - until an entire phone number came up. I tried it on one of the office phones, and she was right. It worked.

Times were hard around 1980. We had a mortgage when the interest rates were high. My wife had two jobs. As well as working in the office, I played the bass guitar in a band at the weekends. I remember I had a Shaftesbury 66 bass that I bought second hand, and I had a Simms-Watt amplifier that was ancient even for back then. Somewhere along the way the bass had been signed by Jimmie Randall from Jo Jo Gunne. I had a 1968 Mini with an automatic gearbox, so you could drive it from one breakdown to the next without having to change gear. No one believed me when I said that you could bump start it. I had to roll it down a hill and demonstrate a bump start to the doubting Thomases.

We had a small black and white Sanyo television which still works perfectly to this day - as does the Simms-Watt amplifier.

One good thing we had back then was that the railways, and the utilities were nationalised, so the prices were quite cheap. Now they are really extortionate.

In London, you would travel by tube by buying a ticket. No oyster card scam. And there were no loudspeakers at the station telling you which parts of the system weren't working and which stations were closed.

jannyannie

Bump starting cars, remember that one. As a 19 year old I remember feeling quite safe, I used to walk home from parties at 2am. Also remember No6 cigs, never smoked myself but I can see the packets. When I was 19 I became a vegetarian (I eat meat now) and people thought I was really odd, you couldn't get a vegetarian meal in a resturant. I also remember laughing a lot, we had an open house, you never knew who'd be sleeping on the sofa when you came down in the morning, usually a huge biker bloke! And we had a proper lunch break, none of this grab a sandwich at your desk whilst you're still working rubbish. I also passed my driving test at 19, couldn't afford a car for 5 years but which time I'd forgotten how to drive!

ceridwen

Reverbe wrote: »

I'd love to butterfly.. tho my life was very different than it was now.. I was only a child then still living with my parents.. will be watching this thread closely tho. Always interested to hear tales of the old lifestyles on these boards..

Just a little point tho... I dont think any of those last three are necessary or even desirable.. possibly the life insurance but that only matters to those who have kids

...and isnt life insurance the one that pays up the rest of the mortgage for a married/living together couple if one of them dies? So - I have always thought "As a single person - I dont need this. But if I were married then he and I would both have to have it - so the other one didnt lose the house if we died".

****************

I dont really think I can compare personally - as my circumstances have changed. Back then - I was living in rented accommodation - but fast forward to 2011 and I own a house and the mortgage has finished.

Back then I didnt have to worry too much if I became unemployed (as I did - more than once!) - as the benefit money was enough to manage on. These days - because of the large cuts in benefit there has been since then - I wouldnt even get enough to "keep body and soul together" (whether living there or here). Howsomever - I'm old enough that I dont actually care if I lose my job now:)

My salary is probably lower in real terms than it was then on the one hand - but having built up the possessions I have and paid off the mortgage I am managing to save hundreds of £s a month at last (on a salary that wouldnt be enough to live on in different circumstances).

butterflylady131

I remember when our TV broke, we had to sit in the living room and watch a black and white portable tv. Never occured to me that we could buy one on credit, we just saved up for one!
Things were repaired more then, now we just buy a new one, and forget that we have to pay!
I remember having lots of second hand furniture, always good quality (people looked after things more then too), and always having food on the table. We used to make sure that the elderly neighbours on our street had plenty to eat too by giving food away that my dad had got excess of. But no one seems to bother that my dad has enough to eat these days now he's in his 70's (me and my sisters do though).
Seems sad now, when I think that the "Big Society" David Cameron wants was all too prevalent 30+ years ago. Now it's been killed by consumerism, and greed:(

Reverbe

I am baffled to see a local shop has recently opened doing furniture on rental.. was that common in days of yore??I know electricals - washers, tvs etc were but things like beds and sofas??

3v3

Reverbe wrote: »

I am baffled to see a local shop has recently opened doing furniture on rental.. was that common in days of yore??I know electricals - washers, tvs etc were but things like beds and sofas??

In the form of Hire Purchase it was

Ida_Notion

Beds and sofas weren't rented (to my knowledge, anyway). All that kind of thing was bought second hand. I know it was supposed to be nothing more than a cliche to suggest that rented TVs would always pack up over Christmas when the rental shops were shut, but most years ours actually did. I still can't think of The Sound Of Music without remembering the Christmas when my mum's next door neighbour invited us in to watch it because our rental telly had made a seasonal departure. Again. I think it was the same year Elvis had died (1977?). I don't remember anything else being rented other than the telly.