Frugal Downside - All my stuff is old

xewecan

Controlling costs means I don't throw things away. I buy used, I repair, I make due, I do without, I don't get caught up in appearances, etc.

The net effect, is I'm living a life with old stuff, behind the curve on just about everything. I am easy on my possessions. They rarely break or wear out to the point of replacement. When I decide to get rid of something, often nobody would want it.

Objectively, one could say my quality of life has dropped over the past 10 years because of this. It's hard to buy things degraded to my minimum acceptable state. So I was living richer when I first established myself.

I also locked into choices that are suboptimal, but would be wasteful to undo. My 4 person kitchen table was great for a 1 bedroom apartment. Moving into a townhouse, we stuck the leaf in the table and called it done. For 10 years. Our dining room would hold an 8 person table.

My car... It's fifteen years old now. Low to the ground, rusty, worn shocks, mediocre night visibility, limited hauling capacity, etc. Not at all what I'd buy today. But we got a deal in 2008 and it's still running, so I'm not replacing it. The insurance is so cheap.

This all happened so gradually. The individual items don't bother me and life feels normal. Stepping back and looking at things objectively though, I pretty much don't own or use nice things. A lot of people would have a real problem with my day to day standard. I'm not intending to change it, but there is definitely a trade off.

xewecan

xewecan said:

Controlling costs means I don't throw things away. I buy used, I repair, I make due, I do without, I don't get caught up in appearances, etc.

The net effect, is I'm living a life with old stuff, behind the curve on just about everything. I am easy on my possessions. They rarely break or wear out to the point of replacement. When I decide to get rid of something, often nobody would want it.

Objectively, one could say my quality of life has dropped over the past 10 years because of this. It's hard to buy things degraded to my minimum acceptable state. So I was living richer when I first established myself.

I also locked into choices that are suboptimal, but would be wasteful to undo. My 4 person kitchen table was great for a 1 bedroom apartment. Moving into a townhouse, we stuck the leaf in the table and called it done. For 10 years. Our dining room would hold an 8 person table.

My car... It's fifteen years old now. Low to the ground, rusty, worn shocks, mediocre night visibility, limited hauling capacity, etc. Not at all what I'd buy today. But we got a deal in 2008 and it's still running, so I'm not replacing it. The insurance is so cheap.

This all happened so gradually. The individual items don't bother me and life feels normal. Stepping back and looking at things objectively though, I pretty much don't own or use nice things. A lot of people would have a real problem with my day to day standard. I'm not intending to change it, but there is definitely a trade off.

thank you so much for your response.

maryb

If you feel an attachment to certain things it does not matter if they are old or shabby.  If you don’t feel the love, replace it or change it - get a big bit of plywood to make a new top for your table and put a nice tablecloth on it and lay the table prettily.  Old money is often shabby - their values mean it doesn’t matter

Cornish_mum

Hi we are totally the same; we prioritise good value and buy once well, and then use until its completely fallen apart. I gladly take hand me downs and don’t worry about things being perfectly matching. I really don’t like to see waste or replace functioning items just for appearance’s sake; as I don’t like to see resources being poorly used.

So I have a house with 6 beautiful double glazed wooden sash windows (which we saved up to replace) and 2 original single glazed, cracked and damaged sashes I can’t fully open with hand me down curtains (with ripped lining). I won’t replace them until we have enough spare money to do it properly. The old windows and curtains aren’t pretty but they are perfectly functional.

CM

DullGreyGuy

xewecan said:

Objectively, one could say my quality of life has dropped over the past 10 years because of this. It's hard to buy things degraded to my minimum acceptable state. So I was living richer when I first established myself.

I don't get your comment on "buying things degraded"?

I think it more subjectively than objectively as it really depends what you consider nice/good in terms of stuff and how you define quality of life. I went through a phase of buying expensive shoes for work/smart casual and in the last 15 years have bought 1 pair of shoes and 1 pair of boots which were both impulse buys as the 20 year old ones they supplement still get commented on as "love the new shoes" after a polish. 

Personally don't think quality of life is measured by the size of your TV or how many programmes your oven has. A good cook will achieve better results with a basic 1 function oven and gas ring than a poor one with a £50,000 kitchen. Some will get more joy from admiring their pristine kitchen, others from eating good food. 

 
I strongly believe in buying the best you can and then looking after it, the only areas where I replace things before they are beyond their useful life is mobiles, laptops and TVs. Even with them I'm talking about replacing every 3-6 years not every year (and TV can probably come off the list soon as its increasing incremental year on year improvements). The first two could probably go longer but are vital for my work and don't want to be working an extra few hours a day because the computer is too slow running a model 

There are some that take it further than I would and I'd question their sense, there is one chap famous that lives in the City in a small period house that still doesnt  have electricity so he uses a charcoal iron etc... maybe that's a bit more of a lifestyle choice. It depends if you enjoy using your 50s manual hoover or hate that it doesn't do a good job and look longingly at the Dyson's each time you walk past one in a shop.

Teapot55

We’re very similar. 

2008 car functions perfectly (bit under-powered for our occasional trips away via motorways), passes mot and insurance recently was even lower than last year. The other car was passed down the family years ago because we were hardly using it. We now mostly walk or jump on a bus. 

Most of our furniture is cast-offs. Carpets really old but not worn out yet. Clothes: some are pre-loved. 

But, most appliances and tech from John Lewis (online since local one shut) and quite new. We don’t replace them till the previous ones have worn out. Latest spectacles £500. Routine dental checkup plus hygienist was £110 this week. The other one of us is still with an NHS dentist though.  Good quality coats and shoes. 

House is watertight. More new dg windows recently plus beautiful new fitted blinds to living rooms. House needs updating, which we’re doing painfully slowly. Got the means but not the motivation. 

Rosa_Damascena

DullGreyGuy said:

xewecan said:

Objectively, one could say my quality of life has dropped over the past 10 years because of this. It's hard to buy things degraded to my minimum acceptable state. So I was living richer when I first established myself.

I strongly believe in buying the best you can and then looking after it, the only areas where I replace things before they are beyond their useful life is mobiles, laptops and TVs. 

Me too, but often I find better quality items in charity shops. New stuff doesn't appear to be built to last, it's built with deliberate obsolescence in mind. 

Where I draw the line is having a "Heath Robinson" home. I look after things and don't like things that look shabby, or DIY with a poor finish.

Gers

My late DM still had a chair she bought in around 1961, complete with receipt. It had been recovered twice and is now with a dear friend who requested it once my DM died.  She also had a circa 1940s sofa and two chairs which she 'inherited' from the previous owner of her home. Again, she had it recovered. It's now with a major props company as the auction house declined to sell it because it was stuffed with horsehair and I refused to throw it in the dump.

Nothing wrong with old things as long as you are happy with them.

MikeJXE

I am pretty much the same I have everything I need and nothing I don't

Before my wife past we had everything we wanted, lived in a 4 bed modern home

I now live in a 1 bed flat, rented, given the money to the kids and grandkids 

The only luxury is I splashed out 4 years ago on a 3 year old jaguar 

But i have what many people cant find no matter what they do, 

I have HAPPINESS 

greenbee

Most of my furniture has been passed on from family and friends. It has chips, ring marks, stains, and the occasional 'alteration' made by grandparents or even great grandparents. As @Rosa_Damascena says, it is often better quality than new furniture would be. It also holds memories.

ElaniArtin

xewecan said:

Controlling costs means I don't throw things away. I buy used, I repair, I make due, I do without, I don't get caught up in appearances, etc.

The net effect, is I'm living a life with old stuff, behind the curve on just about everything. I am easy on my possessions. They rarely break or wear out to the point of replacement. When I decide to get rid of something, often nobody would want it.

Objectively, one could say my quality of life has dropped over the past 10 years because of this. It's hard to buy things degraded to my minimum acceptable state. So I was living richer when I first established myself.

I also locked into choices that are suboptimal, but would be wasteful to undo. My 4 person kitchen table was great for a 1 bedroom apartment. Moving into a townhouse, we stuck the leaf in the table and called it done. For 10 years. Our dining room would hold an 8 person table.

My car... It's fifteen years old now. Low to the ground, rusty, worn shocks, mediocre night visibility, limited hauling capacity, etc. Not at all what I'd buy today. But we got a deal in 2008 and it's still running, so I'm not replacing it. The insurance is so cheap.

This all happened so gradually. The individual items don't bother me and life feels normal. Stepping back and looking at things objectively though, I pretty much don't own or use nice things. A lot of people would have a real problem with my day to day standard. I'm not intending to change it, but there is definitely a trade off.

Sometimes I have the opposite perspective:  think of -nouveau riche- -fast fashion- Not nice

My heart hurts when I go down a street with skips full of partical board furniture and plastic toys. My grandmother inherited most of her furniture and it was all so beautiful.  I buy only charity shop for almost everything, and use gumtree for anything else. When I buy second hand, I can see how it will wear, and I prefer that to buying new. I think compared to our parents, we do not have the same lifestyle trajectory and stepping back as you have said, we can see that our expectations can't be the same. They bought houses of £10,000s and sold for £100,000s...when is that going to happen again?

I take a cue from my son (21yo) and his generation whose trajectory is even lower than ours. Charity shops are the trend now- just go in and see all the bright young things!

The words are -antique-  -vintage-

FYI Salvation Army will give you credit for each bag of clothes you donate.

My grandmother taught me to move the furniture around every few years. It's a lift. Try it!