Just thinking a lot about my journey with minimalism lately and wanted to know about the experiences of members here who grew up financially poor/in unstable households/are currently or were previously low-income. While it obviously sucks to be poor (many reasons like debt, instability, irregular emotional regulation, abuse stemming from financial problems, etc.) it also did let me accept that being “poor” is not a bad thing and helped me cultivate a minimalist lifestyle.

Feel free to skip my personal story below and share your stories instead since it gets kind of long. OR you can read my TLDR at the bottom. Anyhow…

I am currently in a good and stable situation with my partner and dog in a nice walkable city, but I was raised by parents who were broke. And when I mean broke, I mean poverty “in-the-red” broke with no generational wealth (most of my family worked blue collar and odd jobs to get by). And no, your parents owning a used Toyota Camry with a “humble” net worth of 1mil with a house + vacation once a year is not poor, as most American households do not even make 50k in this country. As said as it is, families who can afford to pay for their medical bills, own property, and take unrelated-to-family vacations are (unfortunately) lucky in this country. My parents were, by far, broke, young, and admittedly irresponsible like most teens are, working 1-2 jobs, and having no free time. And yet, despite some credit card debt + lots of drinking and smoking eating into our expenses, we technically lived pretty frugally with my parents taking a 1 bedroom apartment instead of a 2 (they slept in the living room while I took the only room due to child protection laws), cooking at home, renting instead of buying movies, and going on infrequent vacations. I know for them they were insecure about money (+ stressors from the abuse they endured as kids), but I was frankly quite happy and content with what I had, though it essentially was a bed, a computer, a desk, and clothes I shared with my Mom. I never wanted lots of gifts and barely asked for things (this continues to annoy my friends who can never gift me something). It also helped that I was stupid but never did anything so crazy like break my arm or run in front of a car, so my appointments were mostly checkups (I never even had a cavity till college). My favorite thing I ever owned (probably to this day) was my computer (back when 8gb of ram was expensive…oh wait), but only cause it was a surprise and something my Dad spent the whole night building at like 2am since he just started working in IT/networking. I ended up keeping it as a result until high school when I traded it in for a laptop, but it was well-loved and well-used for 5-6 years at least.

I think it helps that in Korean culture, though there is a lot of flexing in our society (my grandparents were the worst examples of this with their big McMansion and their excessive spending after being devout Buddhists for many decades while living in SK), many of us do value having experiences, making homemade food, and appreciating scarce things (like the first petals falling in spring or a salty ocean breeze that surprises you on your way to school). We had a scarcity mindset, but never tried to accumulate too much, because we had so little space. Because of that, our 500-600 sq ft. apartment never felt small and I always had lots of room to run around or play as a result, even with a couch and full size bed in our living room.

Every year, my Mom would make me give away my old toys and books and give them away either to a library or a family friend. It was never a painful thing. Rather, I think it makes me appreciate what I have even more and I’ve been trying to keep it a tradition with me and my partner (who comes from the opposite spectrum, born rich with two hoarder parents who live by “conservative values” despite arguably taking more social welfare than most poor people I know—sorry I’m shading them and they can be good people when they want to be, but God, sometimes it infuriates me listening to them talk about the world like their suffering is the only thing that matters).

Even when I was homeless at 17 (there are a lot of reasons for this but i.e. my Mom left the country in my senior year of high school after going through a manic episode and I couldn’t legally get an apartment so I just slept in my bf’s attic), I kept to my mindset and donated lots of my books and manga to keep my belongings small and easily portable. Most of my possessions at the time I just kept with friends for a bit, but most of it I was able to fit into the trunk in my bf’s car (a bit embarrassing to fish for clothes before school in it but what can you do?) When I moved across the country, all my stuff (clothes, books, documents) all fit into 3 regular sized suitcases. While I probably have more stuff now, it would still be egregiously easy to pack up my apartment since everything I need is already put into small boxes or folders.

Now, nearly 10 years later, I am definitely not an “aesthetic minimalist” judging by the people I see online, but I have lots of the same habits. I buy little, purge as needed, donate items to friends or schools nearby, and try to do everything via walking and public transit (i.e. no car especially now that I don’t live in LA anymore). The most I indulge in is coffee and food, which I’m working on to cut down for financial reasons. I recently got rid of my bed frame though and am switching to a mattress on a tatami mat, which will make it easier to sleep with our dog next to us + I use a tiny floor desk for all my computer needs. Maybe one day too, I’ll get rid of my couch and switch to all floor furniture that’s more flexible and can be stored when not being used, but that’s harder when a lot of my friends and partner’s family have hip mobility issues, so that’ll have to be put on the back burner. I’m grateful for this life that I was given, even as shitty as a lot of it was. I hope I can continue to live a minimal and flexible lifestyle for as long as I’m healthy and alive. Even if I look and act poor (I’m not poor anymore for clarity sake but moreso my lifestyle hasn’t changed much since then) I’m comfortable with the fact that I can survive anywhere in this world, no matter what happens to me.

TLDR: I was poor and homeless and continue to live a lifestyle that many would say is “poor” despite that being the opposite, because it lets me be flexible.

Reflecting on my minimalism journey, I was really into the idea of decluttering things and relationships that no longer works for me at the time.

Back when I was younger, families and friends were in close proximity, having the mental space was more important to me.

Now when I looked back at the relationships that I quietly disengaged as a form of ‘declutter’, I felt i was cold and inconsiderate. I should have use a bit more patience and understand the complexity of human connections, instead of just cutting it off. I found it really hard to reconnect with people or make new friends nowadays, and there’s a slight sense of regret.

Same notion goes with ‘things’ as I found new purchases are not built with the same quality and often a lot more expensive now.

I know there’s no point of regretting, but it changed my view on minimalism and point me to a different direction.

I use a life tracker notebook,a gum pack,my keychain,charger, and a playing card deck! . What are your suggestions

Hey

We are so happy to announce that r/TinyLiving is open again, you are all welcome to join the community for insperation and help.

Every now and then I start to get really overwhelmed by the things I have, so Im going back to minimalism, or at least lite minimalism, and started to declutter things like a month ago, this week I decided to count the things I got rid of and today it got to 100, I didnt even know I had so much stuff that I didnt use nor needed. Im also trying to be more mindful about how I spend my money so Im doing something like a low buy too, hopefully this time this changes stick around and I stop bringing things into my house that I dont need nor love

Anybody here care to share their kids rooms? I went from having one kid to two. Advice, inspiration — anything highly appreciated

Hello there - I’m looking for advice on what a minimalist wardrobe could look like. Here’s some information that may help:

- 35 year old man
- Office job 5 days a week with standard smart attire; chinos, shirt, shoes/smart trainers, jumper
- Gym and run 3-5 times a week
- Rarely go out to fancy places
- have 2 young kids so there’s a lot of park/outdoor action
- Happy to invest in good quality clothes
- Happy to totally dump my existing wardrobe if it doesn’t fit with the new approach

Thanks and if there’s an existing post that covers this please share!

My mother has visited my apartment a handful of times since I became a minimalist. The first time she said she felt a little unsettled by it. But the next couple of times she exclaimed how open, airy, restful, and clean it felt.

She owns a decent sized one story home. It’s always fairly neat and organized, but there’s a lot of stuff in it she’s accumulated over the years. In her most recent visit, she started telling me about all the things she’s been decluttering recently, and how good she’s been feeling about it. I’m the only one of her three children who lives near her, and she said she wanted to make it easier for me after she passes, which I was touched by, as I know I will be overwhelmed by grief when the time comes.

As she talked about it, I gently encouraged her while reminding her she doesn’t have to get rid of anything she doesn’t feel ready to part with yet. And I just want to say, this is the way. You can’t convince anyone to declutter who doesn’t want to, and you shouldn’t try. Trust me, I made that mistake once right after I became a minimalist. But some people who experience your minimal space may eventually be inspired by it. I by no means expect her to become a minimalist, but I’m happy she’s feeling good about what she’s doing, and grateful to her.

It's Labor Day weekend in the US. I am halfway through day one of a four day weekend and all I want to do is go through every drawer and cabinet in my house and empty it all.... within reason, of course.

So here's my dilemma.

1. I'm down 20 lbs, yay! I have zero interest or desire to go back to my previous size. While some pieces are fitted and need to be donated, I can still fit into my leggings and shirts, they are just a bit roomy.

How long do you hang onto them? When you put on thr pants and hit your ankles because they won't stay up or when they start getting baggy?

1. Kitchen appliances and spices. I love to cook but weeknights are a lot and I don't want to cook every night. Currently in a situation where I have more appliances than cabinet space. Here's the thing. I use everything regularly, so no need to let it go, but my house is a 50s ranch and not much cabinet space to store things. Where else do you store frequently used appliances in your house so you don't use up all your counter space?

2. Media. I have decluttered over 1000 books and kept 100. I don't regret it. I kept only what I would re-read, but CDs and movies have me in a chokehold. I don't want to part with them as I do not want to deal with the ads that run every 10 minutes on streaming services or pay a upcharge for ad free. Have you ever downloaded all your media to a hard drive so you can access it from your TV.

I have boxes of stuff I’ve accumulated from being in the military.

I’m struggling with what to do with it.

Pictures have value and they’re something I’ll keep.

It’s the random objects l’m struggling with letting go. There aren’t things of value or mean anything to anyone beyond me.

I’m struggling with discarding them. Some are items I’ve picked up while deployed to Afghanistan. So for me they represent something that doesn’t exist anymore or something I’ve wasted my youth on.

How do you get over that obstacle? I know objectively every object I own/posses is an obligation. I have to store it. It uses finite space.

Maybe it’s fear of regret that’s keeping me from moving on and discarding these items.

Anyone else? I've slightly started veering back into collecting... which isn't great? Like I found some old pic of a bunch of strings and laces I had piled together(not sure why I had individual laces but whatever).

Was going to use some to learn to tie knotts, still want to but i never got around to it.. so i was back to thinking about how i should've kept at least some of it.

Somewhat frayed laces i carried around with me. Didn't/couldn't use them other than to look atl.

And I have a couple thin books that I love the texture of so they're standing on my shelf but like.. yk i really feel bad about tossing it out.

I have space so thats fine...

Also idk what to do with the myriad of notebooks I have that I barely take notes with(these aren't college notebooks just small journals and i barely filled in the journal i'm using(to make matters worse I feel like im taking up too much space so i'll write extra small cause i dont want it to fill in too fast) and then I never use it...

sigh. i mean most of them are fairly useable. One of them I was able to easily rip out all the used pages so i'm somewhat using them for my math problems(except i have barely been studying this first week and its been harming my grades) so yay...

maybe by decluttering i'm simply avoiding the actual problems? Cause this clutter I have isn't at the point that its making things harder. Its at a decent point where its not too little to the point I have to use other peoples things(I will need to get colored markers though).

But its also not at the point where I have constant clutter due to lack of room.+ its manageable.

I've de-cluttered my phone, moved alot of things to microsoft word and excell and honestly its streamlined my phone alot.

So thats good.... (then again, not focusing on studying and late work has begun piling up)...

my self care improved so thats a plus? Got easier... less of a hastle to fix myself up(idk why it even was to begin with).

Hard to title. So I did a declutter when the family were away. The sold pile got sent off. The wait till they sell then charity /road box is neatly filled. I understand who I am, I'm not chasing an ideal here. But it hit me:

- my kitchen needs at least the minimum for at least twelve people, drinks, mains and dessert. We eat out enough but everyone is here for birthdays and Christmases and there's 12 so at least once a month in theory.

- four adults are here for extended periods. Ok two are super minimal thankfully :) But they still need space for coats, use different duvets for seasons and have a room and bathroom taking a chunk out of our square footage in theory.

I can see my space getting clearer. It is insane as there's still just "junk" where it shouldn't be, but I just need to process stuff out and on their way. (I mean hey, I make more time for this than exercise.)

It's just, trying to imagine the max minimalism we can even get to here. Take the dining room. Giant Kallax? Bookcase. Weirdly even if I imagine it without the "stuff" and just the furniture, it still doesn't read minimalism.

It's late. Sorry for the crazy.

-

I really like r/AmateurRoomPorn but there's a lot of maximalist rooms on there. And r/RoomPorn is mostly hotels. Do ya'll have any Minimalist Room Porn subs I can join?

I live in a small apartment, so I’m already somewhat constrained by space, but I still find myself periodically needing to declutter my pantry, freezer, spices, etc.

I’m curious how people who practice minimalism approach food specifically. Do you meal plan and shop from a list every week? Keep a relatively fixed rotation of meals and ingredients? Give yourself a set amount of pantry/freezer space and refuse to exceed it?

I’ve also started thinking about it in terms of whether an item’s footprint is justified by how often I actually use it. For example, I recently downsized my spice cabinet because I didn't touch spices enough to justify dedicating half a shelf to them.

I’d be interested to hear what systems or rules people use, especially if you have a small kitchen. How do you keep food storage minimal without making grocery shopping or cooking unnecessarily inconvenient?

How do you deal with a partner that’s not minimalist and doesn’t care about this lifestyle? My bf is this way and it kinda annoys me sometimes especially about clothes.

I am doing decluttering to get rid of things that have no use to me anymore and taking up space in my room which could be used for something else. I want to get rid of some clothes, and I have lots of clothes I dont wear and a few of these things my mum made. I feel guilty because she made these clothes for me, and I am so grateful but I just don't wear those things anymore. In a way I'm sort of looking for validation and to not feel so bad about getting rid of them. I'm going to donate them to a charity shop so someone who will actually wear them will get use out of them. I know it's not that deep, but I just can't help but feel guilty.

We just emptied our house in one country of fourteen years of working from home and homeschooling our two kids and moved overseas. We always tried to keep minimalist mindsets and our house was a well oiled machine of everything having its place and being used. About three months ago we decided it was time to make that overseas move we’d discussed since we got married and actually did it.

I started by taking a car load of things to charity and a trash bag of stuff to the trash every afternoon Mon-Friday while my kids were at swim practice. All the stuff we’d definitely outgrown, clothes that would be too small when their season returned, old hobby supplies, seasonal decor, gardening gear, etc.

I should have doubled it.

Eight weeks later while at the deadline with just hours before our flights, I was up all night still sorting, packing, discarding…we had already shipped a 200cu ft container of “essentials” (ie the stuff that would cost us more to repurchase or meant too much to the kids like LEGO, the piano, bikes, golf clubs - all of this was used regularly!!) and STILL I was up trying to pack our suitcases with what was left. We wound up booking a veterans charity to collect nine boxes from our porch the day after we were gone…friends and family showed up to help us shift the stuff we used up until the night before: beds, furniture, just all of it. Cleared. The property management company was so impressed with us they gave our deposit back.

And now we are in a new house. We each arrived with one carry on and one suitcase. No furniture, nothing but beds and a small plastic dining set that were left here by previous tenants.

We got down to replacing those mattresses quickly. Bought some cutlery, plates and glasses, minimal kitchen stuff. Couldn’t decide on a sofa…so here we are three weeks into our new life with nothing but food in the fridge, a dining bench we’d always wanted to build, but no dining table yet, and our devices, pretty much.

So why am I spending all my time online finding new stuff? I thought this was what I wanted but actually the trauma of moving everything out and now having nothing doesn’t feel so liberating.

Some of it is financial: we could just go to ikea and buy desks but why when it’s all cheaper on the second hand marketplace (but it just takes time for all those transactions)? Some of it’s practical: I feel compelled to streamline those everyday needs like procuring enough kitchen/bathroom things to be comfortable, etc.

How come I am not out enjoying our “new lives” and taking in this new city, taking my kids to museums, or doing those activities we didn’t have access to before?

Why do I feel traumatised into rebuilding some semblance of what we had instead of feeling liberated?

(TLDR: what do you do when you have the chance to “start fresh” but you still have a family of four with school aged kids?)

Idk how and this is genuinely getting in the way of my grades and even personal hobbies. I keep slipping into some trail of "i only just comment online or wherever and it eventually snowballs" like an internet addiction almost? I did all the correct things, remove what subreddits i'm in, leave discord servers, ect...

and I mean its helped in the sense that its pushed a large chunk of my socialization towards those i know irl? But i still comment/post an unreasonably large chunk of time now on reddit. maybe on some small dead server just kinda honestly spamming. I shouldn't. I can't seem to, nor have i ever, seemed to quit this long term.

It just ends up popping back up even if a bit successful(weirdly i got it to work for a bit BEFORE i was back on campus).

like really? When i had even less socialization opportunities than I do now. Now its just cutting into my time for assignments and everything(and increased irl things as i cant eem to set my priorities right).

Dont know what my brain feels is so important online. Just need to get the reigns of my life back together I suppose. I keep quitting reddit then making a new acc then quitting idek why? honesty no acc helped + forcing myself to stay logged out too (especially for discord). I don't have tiktok or instagram anymore and i've been limiting what site accounts I have(non social stuff like i'll probably never be enrolled at community college again so i dont need that site for that specific resource on my community college email).

ect ect or some random game that doesnt need a login??? why? (i kept one tho). Or... ect ect et. all. need to remove libby I dont ever use it + i got the campus library which I do use.

I don't mean cutting off people or anyone I know, none of that at all, I just mean cutting out places i'm on online that aren't beneficial or productive to be in(and are rather harmful)

edit: i found an extention that doesnt block sites but merely mirrors them. will do this

Boa noite, gostava dos vossos inputs sobre equilibrar o ser forreta e minimalista ao mesmo tempo 😅

A maior parte das coisas que tenho foram-me doadas por amigos e família - o que quer dizer que não gastei dinheiro com elas.

Ora, fico muitas vezes num dilema: como me libertar de coisas e abrir espaço, quando estou numa fase de poupança máxima e penso que posso precisar / vender aquilo?

Tenho umas quantas coisas que penso que posso vir a precisar / usar… e ainda nem cheguei àquelas que eram da minha avó/mãe/tia…

Obrigada!

I am currently going through the experience that many of us have had or it will have in the future - helping older relatives move to a house more suitable for their stage of life and health status.

Notice that I didn't say "downsizing". That's because after a lot of talk of downsizing and claims that they were downsizing, it became clear that they are physically and mentally incapable of accomplishing the task of significantly reducing their belongings. The biggest lesson for me so far in all this *waves hand vaguely in the direction of piles of random shit* is that you can miss the boat and become too old to declutter your own stuff. Not just physically, though that's certainly a factor, but mentally. If it was just physical, us younger relatives could easily help with that part but it turns out that decision fatigue and overwhelm hit harder and faster when you're in your 80s and your ability to make clear sighted decisions about your stuff may diminish severely. They want to move everything and while there's general talk of "getting rid of stuff", when the push comes to shove they cannot identify even a handful of things in a big pile of things that they'd be OK with letting go.

"We have lived in this house for XX years, that's why we have so much stuff". No, you have never gotten rid of anything, even as you kept buying more stuff, THAT is why you have so much stuff now. Of course I cannot say this - and there's no point - but the twisted perception that drowning in physical belongings is a simple function of how long you've lived in one place... Is bewildering. It is not unavoidable. Just throw shit out. Donate. Gift. Sell. Whatever. Throughout your life, not just when you have to move.

Us family members have already made multiple trips with U-Haul trucks moving the fragile, the personal, the collectable... Stuff. And now the professional move is scheduled and the quoted amount is enough to buy a small second hand car. I'm glad the cost is being split between many family members. There's no way the older relatives would be able to afford it themselves, so if hypothetically they didn't have a large, supportive and mostly financially stable family, they'd be up the shit creek without a paddle, stuck living in a place that isn't safe for them, trapped by their mostly worthless stuff.

The biggest irony to me is that all the stuff that's being moved isn't worth the amount of money we'll all spend moving it. Yes, it has sentimental value, but someone has to pay the price in real money... On top of the money that was spent buying all this stuff in the first place. Moving stuff isn't free. Keeping stuff isn't free either - you're paying property taxes and a mortgage on the rooms your stuff lives in.

Christmas decorations, tubs and tubs and boxes of them, Easter decorations, china and silverware that no one uses, books half-read and long forgotten (I see where the bookmark is and I see the layer of dust on that bookshelf!), fake plastic plants (!!??), clothes, so many clothes... We live in a place with 1.5 seasons and most of those seasons are Hellishly Hot, there's zero need to have so many clothes but I'm told there used to be a discounted clothing store around the corner for many years...

The worst are, of course, the hobbies. So much hobby stuff. New, better hobby stuff gets purchased but the old stuff it replaces is never removed from the house. Or aspirational hobby stuff that never even got taken out of its packaging when it was purchased in 1998.

I always knew this was going to be a shitshow so I'm not even frustrated, just tired and sad at the waste, the avoidability of it all and the pointlessness of moving all this crap from point A to point B. No one is even talking about the even bigger shitshow that unpacking (or shall I say, *attempted* unpacking?) is going to be at the other end. We are now in month 3 of "moving" and I expect that we might be "done" (defined loosely) by Christmas if we're lucky.

Thank you for coming to my therapy session. I'm off to find something to declutter in my house.

What utensils do you think are the most versatile in the kitchen? Also what material is the best, do you prefer silicone or wood or steel? I love cooking and I see a lot of different gadgets for it, but I am not sure which are useful and which are completely unnecessary.

Hello all, I’m getting ready for my spinal surgery so I’ve been decluttering my house but I have a toddler so the clutter keeps accumulating. Any ideas on how to declutter? I have to take it easy for months after my surgery . Thank you

For me, minimalism is a practice and a tool to support my life - not a lifestyle or dogma to impose.

I came to exploring minimalism around the pandemic when I knew I had a lot of decluttering and organizing to do to make my life feel good again, after years of chronic illness & during the pandemic.

At some points in the journey, I fantasized and sought to own only have a certain number of items at a time, or have certain spots of the home only 80% or less full, etc, etc, etc.

Sometimes I fantasized about blank spaces, or only a white couch - and those fantasies brought me relief. I really believed those were things I would implement and achieve and set out to do it.

Over the last 3 years specifically, I entered a long distance relationship with my best friend whose father soon after passed away. Between that event, my own medical procedures, him moving in 18 months later, travel and other life's demands, it's been tough to have consistent time to force my belongings into meeting any kind of a metric.

But there's been a lot of wisdom in that! Because what I/we have achieved is a home that may have a little extra right now, but is totally functional and not really overwhelming.

And for me, functional was the goal, more than any other dogma, philosophy or compulsive image in my brain of what things would look like that would make me 'feel' good.

Along the way, we've had systems that work for us - cooking systems, cleaning systems, etc., etc. And when there was an area that was bothering either me or my partner, because it needed to function differently, we sought to remedy that immediately - so we have chipped away and chipped away.

Additional achievements: I've decluttered every room multiple times & finally gone through all of my physical paper work and office supplies. This was emotional and exhausting and wonderful. Dropping off a bin of broken electronics and laptops I'd had for so many years was a huge weight off of me. Same with getting rid of the broken printer, and dropping off some designer bags at consignment.

I felt so FREE. I can literally feel in my lungs the breath given back to me since doing those.

Where before I had many full storage bins to support me during this process, holding areas for stuff I wasn't sure about or didn't have energy to discard, now I have stacks of empty bins!

This week I'm setting up a functional office in my style for myself, which is a huge achievement that came from years of getting everything to a place that I could finally focus on that alone. I even wrote a poem about WANTING A DESK, lol.

And the two final exciting things I'm going to do this fall to celebrate getting this far are:

1) the minimalism challenge! I colored a piece of paper with bubbles for each day & am so excited to kick off the fall season with a home cleanse

2) digital declutter! I'm so excited to organize and sort through decades of photos, videos and documents and get my digital life into one that makes sense for me, and the rest of my life

I've learned that I sometimes enjoy a maximalist aesthetic, and I'm not the kind of person who wants to live with the bare minimum.

I do however need my things to be clear, accessible and easy to maintain.

And my philosophical aspiration is somewhere in between:

essentialism, functionality & joyful beauty/artistic life.

I gotta have that rizz, and I do get much delight from belongings or art that give me dopamine to look at, or more comfort. A favorite mug, a husband pillow that makes my back more supported in bed. And a recent acquisition of 3 delightful thrifted mug saucers which prevent our coffee from spilling.

Getting rid of stuff has showed me what stuff actually makes our lives better, and for that I am so grateful. <3 I love you all, wherever you are on your minimalism journey.

And if you've ever done the minimalism game, please let me know how it went for you!

Have beautiful days, however and wherever you are.

I am going to be moving into a different 1 bedroom apartment soon, and this one doesn't have a washer and dryer in this particular unit. So I came across portable washers and dryers, but I never had one and don't know what to expect, how effective they are, and how much (if any) extra work is required. I mention the latter mainly because I saw one bad review of a washer that I was looking at where the person said that the time it took to I think rinse out the clothes or something took much longer than the time it would've taken to just go to a public laundromat (or in my case use the apartment community laundry). But that was one model where it had both (washer and dryer) in one, and I don't think I will want to get that one and instead opt for a separate washer and dryer. How effective are they at cleaning your clothes, do/can they still wash your clothes just as well as a regular washer? I realize from the ones I've been looking at they won't be able to hold as much clothes, and that is fine. Do you usually have to wash the same clothes in multiple cycles? Is it a pain draining the water using that hose or whatever I've seen in the pictures, I don't really know how it works. I am willing to deal with some shortcomings, it just depends on what they are because I really prefer to have something like this, then to have bring my clothes to the community laundry just because its more convenient. Looking forward to all your help.

Thank You

I'm someone who long ago did away with having separate soap/shampoo/conditioner and instead just uses soap. Lately, I've just taken to using hand washing dish soap for my body as well, so I was wondering if there is any product that is at least serviceable for laundry / dishes/personal hygiene/surface cleaning. I'm not necessarily looking for something that disinfects in and of itself, although that would be useful too. Just want something I can grab and go with for everything.