Great Rural MoneySaving Hunt

Frugaldom

Hello,

Bonsibabe, don't stop posting, I like being able to compare notes with fellow MSE folks north of the border and can appreciate where you're coming from with regards to the costs involved in trying to heat a place, far less have the added problem of having to heat it using a heating system that was wrongly installed in the first place. Please keep us posted on any progress and of anything you do that helps improve the situation. I'm now trying to trade via LETS for firewood and watching out for suitable kindling through sites like Fr€€cycle so it saves having to burn coal or rely on electricity, especially when the winter storms can bring power cuts.

bonsibabe

Thanks nykmedia. Am dreading winter storms as if we get a power cut we are stuffed!! Everything in the house is electric so we would be at the mercy of the leccy company!!! Although I have a stock of thick warm blankets and am looking on freecycle for some camping equipment. We have a camping stove so will just be looking out for more bits and bobs just in case! We are pretty urban (just 10 mins walk from city centre) so chances are we would be sorted pretty quick but you can never be too careful!!

Frugaldom

Hello again, apologies for assuming you were rural, I was just jumping to that conclusion because this is the rural moneysaving thread. If you're near the town (or city) then you could try Fr€€cycle for a calor gas fire and try using cylinder gas. Trouble is that they produce too much condensation for my liking. I guess I'm lucky to have the open fire and I also keep the BBQ and charcoal handy - nobody says it needs to be summer to have a BBQ, it can be great fun in the snow, assuming there's a sheltered corner to set it up.

We've just finished building a pergola over the patio beside greenhouse, more as a way of saving the greenhouse from the storms after losing the last one to the winter gales in January. Earlier in the year, I bought big tarpaulins, and I'm now wondering if I have one large enough to cover the structure to provide a sheltered area suitable for hanging some washing. (I don't have a tumble drier.) It may not get the clothes dried properly but it would sure be a cheap way to have the sheets & towels or jeans etc blasted in the Autumn & Winter winds to help dry them out - less condensation indoors that way, too! I can't believe that I never thought of this until now! It would also double up as sheltered area for winter BBQs! :T

bonsibabe

No apology necessary nykmedia. I joined this thread because I love to read about about rural life, as it is a dream of ours to have a house in the country with enough land to enable us to be as self sufficient as possible. We are just waiting for the council to come out and hopefully there will be some light at the end of the tunnel.

We do live in the city, but we are also lucky as we have a lovely nature reserve and we are right on the water, with a lovely view of the big bridge that connects us to the northern areas of ross-shire. We've been foraging in the nature reserve and got loads of brambles and crab apples and hazelnuts! But I would absolutely love to live in the country!

Thanks for the tip re freecycle. I do use it and have been lucky enough to get some really good stuff from it. I'm putting some requests on to see if I can get some bits and bobs that we need.

Frugaldom

bonsibabe wrote: »

No apology necessary nykmedia. I joined this thread because I love to read about about rural life, as it is a dream of ours to have a house in the country with enough land to enable us to be as self sufficient as possible.

That was my dream, so I'm trying to live it from a small rented semi on a farm with a garden that's now being over run by chickens and ducks who spend most of their time undoing all the good work I do. :rotfl: On a budget of £4k, almost £1,500 of this is allocated to electricity, coal & logs in an effort to keep warm. We're used to an ambient temperature of around 15 degrees. For much more, I'd say you'd need to step up that amount to £2,000+ (*Don't forget there's no mains gas in the countryside, no mains water and no mains sewage.) You could opt for calor gas or oil heating, of course.

Transport costs are higher as we aren't on or within walking distance of anything, including a bus stop or taxi rank, food is more expensive on accounts of no large supermarkets so no real competition or even demand, choise of produce is restricted, there are no high street stores, main hospital, in the event of an emergency, is about an hour away, socialising is limited by who will drive where, no street lighting, no wheelie bins outside your door (ours is over a mile from our house), no supermarket deliveries as we aren't within the delivery radius for any stores and powercuts during storms aren't uncommon. On the plus side - I'd never survive life in the city, much too busy for me and I'd also need to get a 'real' job rather than work from home, spend hours in the kitchen cooking and every dry day in the garden attempting to grow my own food, get the washing dried and tending to livestock, albeit on a very small scale. I love rural moneysaving.

Edited in: * I'm assuming that rural relates to off the beaten track where it's not economically viable to install water mains to individual properties, sewer plants, gas mains, broadband or any of the other things that many people may not realise are luxury extras if they live close enough to, or in, a main village, town or city.

bonsibabe

I would so love to live outside of the city. Yes we are on the outskirts of the city and we do have the nature reserve and the coast on the doorstep which is lovely but we would love to be able to grow our own veg and I would absolutely adore to keep chickens! But hubby says our garden is not big enough, even though I saw a chicken coop in pets at home the other day that was big enough for 4 chickens!!! What he does not know is our garden is big enough and I'm saving to have our council fence reinforced with proper wooden fencing on the inside to stop people being able to see in. Then I'm going to save up and buy the coop!!! The first he will know is when he has to put it together so I can go get me some chickens!

I think that self sufficiency is also a good way of teaching our kids where our food comes from. We grew strawberries for the first time this year in a half barrel and the kids were so happy to see them growing and they tasted so much better than the shop bought ones. I'm lucky because my children would rather be tramping through the nature reserve foraging for hazelnuts and brambles than sitting at a computer or watching the tv. When hubby was in the forces we lived in germany and we used to go get blueberries from a bush that grew on the path behind our house. The bush was growing from under a fence from a man's garden and i went to his door and asked if we could pick the extra berries and he was more than happy to let us as he had more than enough for him and his family. And we used to get all our eggs and veg from a smallholding just down the road from where we lived. We got to know the family so well that when we went to get our veg, they used to take me and the kids home in their car so I didnt have to walk for 2 miles with the kids and a pram full of heavy veg. And at christmas they used to just give us extra for nothing. Such nice people they were. I remember teaching the man's wife how to pickle eggs and she loved it! I gave them 2 jars of pickled eggs and I think even now they are probably hooked on them haha.

We are lucky where we live we have good neighbours and green space within a 2 minute walk but it will always be my dream to have about an acre just all to myself to do whatever I want with it. I do love to read your posts as they give a real sense of living in the country.

bonsibabe

Hi all. Just had our leccy bill this morning and it came in at £500 for the quarter!!!! So straight on the phone we went. Got a very nice man who actually noticed that £400 of it was actually a debt from the previous tenant of the house!!! Not bad considering we've been in the house for almost a year! So we are down to about £90 for the quarter.

I take back everything I said about ASHP heating systems!!!!! Looks like it actually is a cost efficient heating method! But will have to wait and see for the next bill as this will cover christmas and new year so the proof will be in the pudding!

Still waiting for the counci to come out re the insulation or rather the lack of it but well happy with the leccy company for sorting it all out within 20 minutes! I might just have to stay with them now lol.

Hope you are all well. I have a hectic weekend ahead of me as I have a job interview on monday. It's a job I went for months ago but didn't get. The guy who got the job phoned me today to say another post has come available at short notice and invited me in to interview for it. So fingers crossed this time. Apparently the chap that phoned literally pipped me to the post for the job so I'm hoping that the interview goes well and if it does I'm hoping they will let me still go to college for my 2 classes a week as I would really like to still be able to do my masters as it will benefit them in the long run!

Hope you all have a lovely weekend. Nykmedia - hope the weather is nice for you in your area too xxx

Frugaldom

Good morning, ho[e everyone's weekend goes well. It's stopped raining here at last but the short days/long nights and miserable weather has brought a halt to egg production. We've had 2 eggs from the 2 ducks over the past week and only half a dozen eggs from about 20 hens.

Bonsibabe - that is amazing for your electricity for a quarter. Over the past 3 months I've put £200 in my meter (and that's without any heaters being on) plus I've been burning coal & logs. It will probably double over the next 3 months as it's getting too cold for just the open fire to keep the chill off the place. I've adopted every possible draught exclusion idea that I can find from the 'preparing for winter' thread and am already glad that I gathered as many pine cones during summer, as these are fast dwindling.

Anyone got any moneysaving, eco-friendly ways of detering moles? Our garden is beginning to look like a sea of mud, as all the molehills are being scratched into the lawn by the chickens then trampled into mud by the ducks.

rhiwfield

Nykmedia, Pity you're in rented property otherwise installing a woodburner/multi fuel stove would probably make a huge difference in heat output .

As for moles, let me know when you've found the best way

Bonsibabe, glad the ASHP is performing, get the insulation done and you're sorted!

Need to rewire the compost bins this morning, found a rat in one last night. Dont know why but rats give me the shivers.

downshifter

rhiwfield wrote: »

Nykmedia, Pity you're in rented property otherwise installing a woodburner/multi fuel stove would probably make a huge difference in heat output .

As for moles, let me know when you've found the best way

Bonsibabe, glad the ASHP is performing, get the insulation done and you're sorted!

Need to rewire the compost bins this morning, found a rat in one last night. Dont know why but rats give me the shivers.

I'm in rented too, it's the only way I could possibly afford to live in an area like this, middle of nowhere. As previously mentioned sometimes the downside can get to you a bit, such as people not delivering as the track is too bumpy, or their satnavs can't find you, or having to lug bin bags up the lane (no wheely bins here sadly), lack of public transport is the worst as petrol is by far the largest unavoidable expense, no gas, no broadband (and I reckon dialup is dying too, it's a real pain in the 21st century and I work from home), very expensive oil heating ( trying to manage with just the log fire but it's getting a bit miserable now there's so much evening) but getting up on this beautiful morning, looking across the fields to the hills beyond, with the wet grass glistening, the chicks clucking and the dog running freely in the garden, (and I have moles too, we just live with them so no hints I'm afraid) no sounds of traffic or other people-sometimes I think the world has come to an end and no-one has told me - well suddenly the privations become so insignificant. To top it all I've got the weekend off work, even though it means I won't get paid. How wonderful is that!

But Bonsibabe, your news about your heating is the best thing to hear this morning, it must have been such a worry and now it's all going to be ok. Keep up with the dream, I strongly believe in visualising what you want in as clear detail as possible, that way you'll find that all the choices you make seem somehow to be in the right direction, even without you consciously doing that. Works for me anyway!

Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

DS