To start a Prepping for Poor People thread?

[TooBigForMyBoots]

I'm poor (household income well below £20k). With the energy price rises, CoL crisis and possible power cuts ahead I'm wondering what tips other people in my position have to give to prepare us for the winter ahead.

As this is a thread for poor people, recommended purchases should be £7.50 or less. This is not the thread for recommending Agas, sheepskin boots, 70quid blankets or moving house.

Feel free to move this to Prepping or CoL @MNHQ if you think it's better there.

Don’t throw away holey wool jumpers/cardigans as you can felt them in hot water/ washing machine and then use them for cushions, hats, blanket squares and draughty excluders. Once felted you can cut up and sew them together.
If you can knit then you can unpick and reknit.

Have you ever noticed on war films (the ones filmed at the time) children often have fair isle jumpers? That was because when a child out grew their jumper it would be pulled back and reknitted.

You don't need a popcorn maker, the microwave is fine, put just enough to cover the base of a bowl or pyrex fish, cover with cling film or a plate and leave for 2 mins on high. Actually it's quite fun to watch.

Re the makeshift four poster. If you are desperate and have a tent you can set it up inside and move your bedding in.

This is a good time to look for a tent if you don't have one and think you might need one. I got one for £2.50 for a friend's son's Xmas present a couple of years ago. They actually do go camping.

Is it The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn? I love that book, it is outdated but has so many good tips.

I put that insulating foil behind all our radiators yesterday. Two packs did nine radiators.

It's supposed to ensure that 95 percent of the heat from the radiator gets reflected into the room - instead of heating up the wall behind it.

I bought it on Amazon and it was £20 per pack so just over £4 per radiator.

One by one, I'm finding and dealing with all the draughts in our house. I closed off our chimney with a Chimney Sheep - a woolen pad thing. You have to be careful doing this in other ways for example with a pillow as it can lead to damp. If you do use a pillow, leave a small gap for ventilation.

Next is getting a roll of that sticky draught excluding tape for some leaky French doors.

Then I'll tackle our front door properly. I already have a homemade draught excluder along the bottom which was made years ago from tights filled with rice in a fabric cover. I need to put something on the letter box and then put up a heavy curtain over the whole thing.

Meal planning will focus on the slow cooker and heating things up on the hob. Lots of tins.

I have Turtle Doves seconds from ebay. I can't find the imperfection there should be. The colour is a surprise but I love the ones I got. £7.99 delivered.

If at all possible, play the long game with your money. I realise that people on tight budgets don't have a lot to play with, it's expensive to be poor, because you can't bulk buy etc etc, I've been there, but if you start small, you might be able to make small changes and build up over time. Plus not everyone is on the absolute bones of their arse, it's something that can help a lot of people make their money go a little further.

For example, if you can buy a 4 pack of beans once a month, instead of buying one can every week, it can be much cheaper over time, especially if you find some on offer. Same for other canned goods, cleaning products, toiletries etc etc. Plus if you can buy 4 tins of beans this week, you don't need them the next few weeks, so have slightly more to spend on something else. If you have a little spare money the next week, you might be able to do the same with canned soup or buy a bigger bag of potatoes, etc.

So if you can shop like that, after a while you get into a rotation where you get a bigger pack less often, so you spend less overall and makes your budget go a little bit further.

My other suggestion for if you live somewhere where the cheap supermarket is in walking distance, but not close enough that you can carry shopping home, try and get a shopping trolley - there are loads on FB marketplace from a fiver.

So you can walk to the cheap supermarket and bring your shopping home in your trolley, instead of shopping at closer more expensive shop, or having to get a bus/taxi home, or getting shopping delivered from a more expensive supermarket.

Might need more than one trip a week, but I've never done a single regular weekly shop and I don't think it's the cheapest way to shop anyway.

This is a thread for thrift hobbyist rather than poor people.

Guess it depends on your definition of poor. I'm on 22k as a lone parent and I think it's a useful thread.

FFS not this again.

No-one is saying every tip has to be doable or helpful to everyone.

Just because a suggestion cannot be done by a family of 8 in a bedsit that is only allowed to buy their groceries one day at a time from the corner shop they live above, while not having with tuppence ha'penny to to live on, it doesn't mean it's not worthwhile or helpful to some.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (or some other well respected charity/spokes organisation for those in need) defines 'poor' as a family of 4 having less than £1600 pm to live on after housing costs.

That sum is probably higher now, given inflation and, while someone on that income is not going to be able to buy everything they'd like to without thinking about it, they're far from sitting in a cold dark bedsit, sharing a can of cold beans for dinner. So they might appreciate some new ideas of constructive ways that they might be able to make their money stretch a little further.

I too bought the eBay turtle doves… and as soon as I opened the packet I realised what I could do with the merino jumper that’s gone under the arms but I’d hoarded kept waiting for inspiration.

I’ve long thought those who embrace the “Marie kondo” way of life are those who know they can afford to replace shit.

Surveys on Curious Cat to earn a bit of extra income?

To be fair, we're all going to be poorer soon when the tripled energy bills and quadrupled mortgage rate start biting.

I have commented on here before about how being thrifty sure seems to involve buying a lot of stuff, but I don't feel that way about this thread.

My favourite tip so far is using solar lights as night lights in the loo which will stop us wasting that free solar energy that we could use to save money and energy elsewhere. Might look into solar powered power banks too.

Boil the kettle ten minutes before you fancy a cup of tea or coffee. When you actually come to make the drink, your kettle will take less time to boil, thus saving energy.
Nah, have your entire daily quota of tea between 12.30 and 4.30 am on cheap rate electricity.

This is a thread for thrift hobbyist rather than poor people.

I disagree. There are many threads on Mumsnet that are absolutely for thrift hobbyists, but this is not one of them. This actually has useful suggestions.

Great idea for a thread. We're trying to save wherever we can.

Forget fruit and salads, go for max nutrition per pound spent.

This is a bit extreme. Yes, bin off the strawberries and the little bags of rocket. But apples and oranges are cheap. Carrots and cabbage are cheap, make coleslaw.

I agree, and max nutrition is not just about calories. Many fruit and vegetables are well worth the money for their nutritional value. I make sauerkraut from just red cabbage, salt, and a thumb of ginger, costs next to nothing.

I need to get into making sauerkraut. I buy cabbage because I like it, but even I get half a small one from the supermarket (which costs pennies) it seems to last for several meals.

Foil blankets are brilliant for keeping heat in. If you put them between layers they make you less sweaty. So underneath a sheet, between two blankets etc. you sound like a crisp packet though!

holland and Barrett do soya mince/soya chunks for 1.99 a bag. The soya mince has 50% protein and as long as you have plenty of flavour in your sauce, it makes a nice meal.

if you make tea for more than one use a teapot. So one teabag in a tea pot and let it stand for a bit.

One thing which I've tried a few times really successfully is to have a no spend week or fortnight.

The idea is that you don't use your car / don't buy food or coffees out / don't buy anything even from charity shops / eat what you already have in the house / use what you have for kids activities etc etc.

I've found that it really makes you focus on what you've got. I usually go through the cupboard and the freezer so use up the little bits of things that are sitting around; encourage the kids to eg use the colouring book they haven't touched; make do with what I've got for everything.

Its actually quite a fun challenge and we usually end up trying some different recipes, baking our own treats or going out to pick blackberries etc so makes it feel a bit fun too. Saves loads!

The fees yourself for £1 a day Facebook group is good for tips. There are people on there who are yellow sticker experts and never buy anything that's not reduced! They always say 'shop your cupboards first'

And also Olio is good, best time to use Olio is the few days before Christmas, the supermarkets give away tons and tons of food, I made last years Christmas dinner with free vegetables and potatoes off Olio! I also waited until lunchtime on Christmas Eve and got a whole turkey with a yellow sticker for £9 from Tesco

I'm going to give this a go. There's probably enough in our kitchen to get through a fortnight. We'd just have to buy bread, fruit and salad.

Yeah, ignore the Mums in a quiche (or indeed any type of flan, they won't share!) Sorry, this made me pmsl.

Er TV absolutely is an essential - it keeps us docile and distracted this allowing those in power to keep getting away with their shit.

She didn't say cress? She said growing her own food including microgreens and cress, which she mentioned specifically because they can be grown on windowsills which was a very nice thing for her to mention, considering this thread is for people on low incomes and many people on low incomes live in flats and get pissed off with the 'start a veg patch in your garden' brigade.

Egg and cress is a popular sandwich choice BTW.