Definition of "hard up"

hard up

adjective
comparative more hard up, superlative most hard up
1. (colloquial) Lacking money; impecunious; in financial difficulties.
  Quotations
  I can speak with authority on the subject of being hard up. I have been a provincial actor. If further evidence be required, which I do not think likely, […]
  1886, Jerome K. Jerome, Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow, On being hard up
2. (colloquial) Lacking anything.
3. (colloquial, by extension) Desperate.