Things your frugal elders told you

[HappyHiker]

My Dad taught me how to establish credit when I was a young married, with out a clue.

Step #1. Save the money (in full) for the item you want to buy
Step #2. Buy it on credit fr the best interest terms you can negotiate.
Step# 3. Make all payments on time until paid in full.

Rinse and repeat.

Bingo! You now have good credit.

This lesson worked well. We now pay cash and/or pay off our credit cards in full each month. Don't care if we have credit or not..we're on a cash basis. If we don't have the cash we don't buy it. Including cars, which we buy used. Our only new car was a 1969 Fiat 850 Spyder which we bought for cash with wedding gift cash. Cost us $2000.

[Gardnr]

Look after your nickels and dimes. The dollars will look after themselves.

Dad's variation was, "watch every penny, the dollars spend themselves". As a dairy farmer, he had to buy cows, feed, tractor/loader/holding tank and the hired milkers. But he didn't need 5 pair of boots, and for free, I did chores after school starting age 10, just as the older kids did. Mom got an allowance to run the house-no exceptions. After he died, she talked a bit about that and how tough it was to feed 6 kids on that and everyone's clothing/footwear including his farming clothes that wore out quickly.

[Teacher Terry]

My folks owned a resort that was only open in the summer. We all worked because when people checked out we had 4 hours to clean 4 cabins, clean all the rowboats for each cabin and rake the beach. We were really hustling. We didn’t get paid but did get a allowance.

[Alan]

The term 'frugal' seems to imply that there's money to be spent, which never really applied to my family. The only money related thing I ever heard was "Ya cain't spend whatcha ain't got."

[Teacher Terry]

My older sister remembers when money was really tight. By the time I came along things were better financially. They were still frugal like rarely did we eat out. They knew how to manage money.

[catherine]

The term 'frugal' seems to imply that there's money to be spent, which never really applied to my family. The only money related thing I ever heard was "Ya cain't spend whatcha ain't got."

Yeah, that sounds like my MIL who used to say, "We were poor but we didn't know it, because everyone was 'poor'." She was one of the most frugal people I ever met. Also one of the most generous. And even though she was frugal, she didn't skimp on quality. Her stuff lasted forever.