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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To wonder how many are trying to keep up with the Joneses

134 replies

Coffeeinthepark · 07/03/2014 19:14

I realise I've spent a crazy amount of time lately thinking about parts of my house that need improving. I've got a slightly dated kitchen, not my choice of colour but objectively 99% of the world's population would be very grateful for it and my own grandmothers could not have imagined such luxuries.

Problem is, all around me, people are redoing their kitchens and of course the nicer they become, the worse mine looks to me by comparison.

But new kitchens cost a lot of money and that comes at a cost of longer hours, more years working etc. I see a lot of families, including mine, working hard to do their houses up but I think it is a huge collective action problem of conspicuous consumption fed by beautiful interior magazines. Maybe I will do my kitchen and maybe it will make someone else feel worse about theirs in turn.

AIBU to think I should fight my desire for the dream kitchen?

OP posts:
SurprisinglyCalm · 07/03/2014 23:00

I live in an affluent area, bit one in which frugality is a virtue, and just about every

motown3000 · 07/03/2014 23:01

"Don't Let The Joneses Get you Down"

Here's what you should Say, Joneses got a new Car today
Hooray for the Joneses , instead you worry about the Joneses.
Remember Its their car they the ones that will have to pay.
Your Car Might Old but it never fails to get you where you want
to go. Instead you worry so you hair turns grey worry about the
Joneses.

SurprisinglyCalm · 07/03/2014 23:03

Sorry, posted too soon! Just about everyone I know would go with the treasuring of many, many books, and time for walks on beautiful days, and most of all, cultural stuff like going to recitals etc rather than having new kitchens fi tree, which would be seen as rather nouveau. So it's a different variation on the same theme - keeping up with the Joneses still, but culturally and intellectually rather than materially.

elastamum · 07/03/2014 23:03

I will spend a huge amount of money on our house this summer fixing the roof and the windows and no one will notice as it is a listed building so will never be updated. Our house has been here in one form or another since records began.

Its one of the things I love about this place. Although I own it, I am just one of many generations of custodians passing through. No pressure to update, just keep it liveable. The house may be a bit shabby in places, but it is historical and I am just looking after it for a few decades as best I can.

winterhat · 08/03/2014 00:01

I recommend you stop going in other people's ridiculously overpriced kitchens and reading interiors magazines OP Grin

HuntingforBunting · 08/03/2014 00:27

I genuinely genuinely could not give a fuck what other people have. Just enough room and money for us to like, that's alright by me.

HuntingforBunting · 08/03/2014 00:28

And I agree with a comment upthread, loads of this new stuff is debt

HuntingforBunting · 08/03/2014 00:29

To live!!! To live, not like. Ducking phone

Nocomet · 08/03/2014 00:35

My kitchen is probably dates from the early 80's quite possibly earlier. We have an avocado bathroom.

I don't care enough to swap holidays, hobbies and reliable cars for work surfaces.

LCHammer · 08/03/2014 01:05

Life really is too short to spend it choosing the perfect doorknob.

LCHammer · 08/03/2014 01:07

On of my friends is obsessed with keeping up with the Joneses. Painfully so. And guess what now? She wants to move. Leaving behind all her 'friends' and starting elsewhere, new neighbours etc.

OnTheCoverOfAMagazine · 08/03/2014 01:52

Custardo - I love your comment, I am where you were now...if that makes sense. I am a single mum, I rent from the council, I can't work at the moment due to an extreme trauma 8 months ago, we barely survive on benefits and have sold everything of value just to be able to eat and pay the bills. My home is warm, clean, cosy and full of love and I have to say there is a certain amount of freedom to be had in my position! It's very freeing to know that whether you want to keep up with the Joneses or not, you can't bloody afford to anyway! Definitely makes you appreciate what little you do have - and whilst I would love to provide my children with more, or better quality material items...I can only do my best with the tools I have, so again, it's quite freeing Smile

Chottie · 08/03/2014 06:34

OP - don't worry about other people's kitchens. It's not really relevant, don't put yourself into debt for the sake of a new kitchen. Life is so uncertain at the moment it is not a good idea to take on any extra debt.

TamerB · 08/03/2014 06:43

It isn't something that worries me, you are a lot happier if you don't.

BoffinMum · 08/03/2014 07:05

Carpets in kitchens represent a hygiene issue and should be changed for lino. Then the smell of post war rationing would disappear!

Badvoc · 08/03/2014 07:11

We have had to do loads of work to our house :(
Not because we wanted to, or to Impress anyone, but to ensure we had heat, hot eater and a non Leaking roof! :)
Kitchen is the next on the list as he plumbing is wrong and the electrics are actually dangerous.
But if I didn't have to?
No way!

EmmaBemma · 08/03/2014 07:20

Not me! I genuinely couldn't give a fuck about the Joneses. I seem to have missed out on the home improvement gene. I cook and bake a LOT and though my kitchen is very dated, it is clean and functional and that's all I care about.

So much of what I read here and elsewhere makes me think everyone is losing the plot. We all have a finite span on this tiny spinning lump of rock. You live, you die, that's it forever. In my opinion, that makes it an imperative to squeeze every last bit of joy out of life, spend your time on the important things and the people you love, and not fretting about other people's sodding kitchens.

woodrunner · 08/03/2014 07:26

I agree, EmmaBemma.

Yes, lots of it is keeping up with the joneses. And if that's how you want to spend your money OP - why not? I'd rather have a holiday.

Flylady says declutter and deep clean your knackered old kitchen. It looks unbelievably better if you treat it as though it were a dream show home.

I'm a little bit judgemental of people who need naice cars and homes to prove to the world how well they've done. My measurement of how well someone has done is how happy they and their family are, and how much pleasure they get from life day to day. The people with the shiniest cars on show often come over as the most dissatisfied, as though there's nothing apart from outside admiration that makes them feel they're on the right track.

Shimmyshimmy · 08/03/2014 07:35

We did a massive extension to our house, had to move out. We ran out of money to finish - which isn't unusual, we got all the things we really needed like functioning bathrooms and kitchen. Among other things we had no carpet upstairs and front garden was a bloody mess, neighbours were in despair but we took the dcs to Florida for a holiday, they'd had enough of tiles, kitchens, bathroom etc.. It took us 2 years to pull the money together for the front garden, we still went on holidays.....neighbours got increasingly upset and I must admit I'm glad the driveway is done now, we still don't have carpet but reading this thread has made me feel an awful lot better about the approach we took...we didn't want our dcs childhood memories to be full of house renovations, even though I love my house, life is for living...
I know people are surprised that we haven't got the carpet yet, we have money, we didn't bleed ourselves dry but it's earmarked for holidays, rainy day fund, eating out etc the house fund is added to but it's not the priority.

cozietoesie · 08/03/2014 07:43

Three years ago, a surveyor referred to my kitchen as 'adequate'. (Talk about damning with faint praise!)

My house has also been referred to as 'old-fashioned' - although I'm hoping to make the transition to 'period' in due course. Wink

Do I care? I do not. I'll undertake core stuff (roof, plumbing, electrics etc) right away but all I care about the rest of the place is that it's reasonably clean and works well for us - which it does. I'd much rather spend any spare monies on slightly better food, good books and movies and decent internet etc. (Most of which are funded by having given up the car when we moved to the city.)

And no-one among my family and friends has said a thing. Maybe they regard us as eccentric but that's just the way we live and they seem to accept it. If they didn't - tough!

kerala · 08/03/2014 07:54

We are doing this! Lovely old house bought 5 years ago had ikea small free standing kitchen up til now which horrified a lot of people hilariously. Interest rates low so have remortgaged to fund a huge knock through/glass door/ fresh new ikea again kitchen but retaining period features. It's going to be stunning.

Not doing it to show off though but so our kids have a gorgeous environment to grow up in. Dh and I had little new builds growing up so this is a novelty for us. Once works finish in 2 weeks house can go back to being a backdrop for our lives rather than a focus.

kerala · 08/03/2014 07:57

Oh and house across road much smaller than ours just sold for figure we will have spent buying and doing up. So we sort of seeding it as an investment as hopefully we will at minimum recover what we spent.

Badvoc · 08/03/2014 08:10

Kerala...yes, we have always done work because we wanted to or needed to. I like looking at other people's lovely houses, but it doesn't make me want to live in them iyswim?
We hope that his is our forever house - so we are also looking at the big picture.

kerala · 08/03/2014 08:54

Yes it's personal though some get real pleasure out of renovations and their environment very important to them others couldn't give a hoot. Our set up affected by fact some income generated by house as we have paying guests. Also home exchange so use house to get great holidays. So we sweat our asset!

Also op is right now buyers expect open plan smart kitchens and if selling your house will be discounted by amount required to get house like that. We would rather do the work now and get to live in it like this for 20 years then sell at a discount so someone else does this.

CambridgeBlue · 08/03/2014 08:54

I find myself doing this a lot but really wish I didn't. I don't want to care about what other people have got compared to us but I do.

My DM lives in the most stunning Homes & Gardens type house with an enormous garden and all the trimmings. My DF lives in a two room rented place furnished from the charity shop or things he's made. It sounds cliched but DF is 100% happier than Hyacinth Bucket DM.

Our house is clean, warm, comfy and decorated/furnished in a way that we like. It's a bit small (modern house with very little storage) but we manage. The kitchen and bathroom are both quite shabby and even constant DIY is starting to have problems hiding that. On the one hand I know it is still a million times better than many people's homes but on the other I'm bombarded with images of 'perfect' kitchens and bathrooms and made to feel I 'should' have them - even the estate agent who valued our house a while back said most people would want to put in a new bathroom and that the kitchen would be seen as dated. It's so depressing.

I want to be like my DF and not give a toss. We work hard in fairly good jobs but are never going to have the money for major changes so I need to stop it bothering me - as people have said, what difference would a new kitchen really make to our life?

I hate the materialistic, must-have society we live in but I don't know how to get out of the cycle or earning - wanting - spending. I'm getting better but I find it really hard.