The cheapest thing you have ever done.... come on now, admit it.

[sgeeeee]

Here are a couple of the things I do that some people find cheap.

1) DW and I travel by car a lot. We travel all over the country to visit places and do volunteer work. Since we live in Mesa, AZ, we end up traveling across Reservations fairly frequently. Of course, nearly all Reservations today have casinos. And casinos have free coffee and soft drinks. Niether of us has any interest in gambling, but we often stop at casinos, park the car, walk in with our travel mugs, fill up on free drinks, and go back to the car to carry on our journey.

2) When I was working, I traveled a lot and the company tended to put me up in very high-end hotels. I always collected the free soap, shampoo, hand lotion etc. each day from the hotels I stayed in. I traveled enough that DW and I have not purchased any soap or shampoo in over a decade. We still have quite a stockpile too.

We spend plenty of money on things we really want, but try not to overlook a chance to save (even pennies) when it doesn't diminish our pleasure and core values.

 

[Enuff2Eat]

Here are a couple of the things I do that some people find cheap.

1) DW and I travel by car a lot. We travel all over the country to visit places and do volunteer work. Since we live in Mesa, AZ, we end up traveling across Reservations fairly frequently. Of course, nearly all Reservations today have casinos. And casinos have free coffee and soft drinks. Niether of us has any interest in gambling, but we often stop at casinos, park the car, walk in with our travel mugs, fill up on free drinks, and go back to the car to carry on our journey.

2) When I was working, I traveled a lot and the company tended to put me up in very high-end hotels. I always collected the free soap, shampoo, hand lotion etc. each day from the hotels I stayed in. I traveled enough that DW and I have not purchased any soap or shampoo in over a decade. We still have quite a stockpile too.

We spend plenty of money on things we really want, but try not to overlook a chance to save (even pennies) when it doesn't diminish our pleasure and core values.

sgeeee, how about them towels? ;-)


enuff

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

he made you pay something for that bunny!

You *always* pay something for the bunny...

 

[sgeeeee]

sgeeee, how about them towels? ;-)


enuff

That's a line I've honestly never crossed. That would be stealing.

I did think of one other "cheap" thing we do, though. We do collect a few extra condiment PCs when we stop at restaurants along the road. These come in handy when we backpack or do primitive camping somewhere.

 

[whitestick]

Well, since we are admitting things.
When I was working on a project to do engineering changes on a string of microwave towers across the midwest during the winter, rather then spend the per diem money, or use gas to drive to a motel in the next town, two of us bunked in a two room burlap tent all winter long. Campground was closed for the winter, so no charge to camp. We had a catalytic heater that we would fire up, for a couple of hours when we got to the tent from the job site, and used an electric griddle to cook our store bought food. Of course we ran an extension cord to a neighboring site, to get the electricity for that griddle. They had left it turned on, thinking no one would be there during the winter. Since it was winter, we didn't need a refrigerator to keep food or beer cold, we just set it outside the tent. Took shower at work, using the eyewash dispenser. Brought TV from home, to plug into aforementioned neighbors cord. Could only get two stations though, thought about climbing a tree to hang an antenna, but neither of us had climbing gear.
Since the tent walls weren't insulated, when it snowed, and the heat from our bodies melted the snow on the top of the tent, we had to "flip" the ceiling to get the slush and snow off, so it wouldn't fall on our necks when we went outside.
At the time, we didn't realize how bad it was, but in retrospect, it does sound a "bit" cheap.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Oh I took the towels too...called them my "towels of the world collection"...

I had a few ladyfriends exclaim from the powder room "Hilton?..."

 

[saluki9]

Wow, I have nothing to compete with you folks

I guess the closest I come is when I take an extra packet or two of equal from Starbucks (never to put in coffee of course) but for my tea later in the day.

 

[Outtahere]

Yep, I'd say ya'll are pretty cheap.

The only thing I do that would be considered cheap is I save those twisty things from food storage bag boxes, I have a small box full that I use for all kinds of things, like to reclose frozen bags of veggies.

I do a lot of the above and I also reuse gift wrap.

 

[HFWR]

I've bought used tires (thankfully, back in the bad ol' days)...

I own several Goodwill sport coats, $5-$7 ea, plus drycleaning...

Buy (almost) everything generic; heck, some of it's too bad even for me...

Outtahere, your avatar needs something................ Oh, yeah, ME in the middle...

 

[W2R]

I also reuse gift wrap.

My mother used to re-use gift wrap, and she even used folded rectangles cut from the leftover scraps of gift wrap for gift cards on our Christmas presents.

Guess I come by this LBYM stuff naturally. When I asked her why she never bought lettuce, she told me "it turns brown in a couple of days so why bother!". Now that is cheap. I'm not THAT cheap.

 

[Sue J]

I reuse paper towels. My son washes his hands a lot at the kitchen sink. It's not anything OCD-like, he just likes to wash after coming into the house, after working with anything. Sounds like a fine habit to me. But he uses TWO BOUNTY PAPER TOWELS everytime he dries his hands! So I've told him to leave those on the side counter for me and I reuse them for things like spots on the kitchen floor, cat throw-up, spills on the stove, spatters in the microwave, stuff like that. I wouldn't use them for things like wrapping food in the microwave, but I see nothing wrong with getting a 2nd use out of a fairly clean paper towel.

He thinks this is really cheap, but I think I'm thrifty! And he's not the one paying for the paper towels.

 

[Empty Pockets]

I hit a pheasant driving home one day. Yup, I picked it up off the road and took it home and cooked it.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Do you need the recipe I gave tbone-Al for the birds who kept flying into his windows? Stuffing with sausage, wrapping in bacon and grilling?

I just need to figure out a way to get a cow to fly into one of my windows...

 

[simple girl]

I buy the majority of my clothes from Goodwill. One store even had a frequent shoppers card, and after you filled it up you got $10 free merchandise. If you shop at the right Goodwill store (ie. areas close to affluent residents), you can find some really nice things! I admitted this to one of my girlfriend's once (after she complimented me on my clothes), and she was appalled. Oh well!

Instead of buying new shoes, I just put a little shoe polish on, and they look good as new! Part of this is because I like to save money, but a big part is I'm lazy. Once I find a pair of shoes that fit, I hate to have to go find another pair. I really just don't like shopping all that much.

I do buy some clothes new, of course, but only when they are on sale.

 

[FinanceDude]

Ok..........I am embarrassed to admit this, but:

When I was in college, and working my way through school, there was a pizza place about 8 blocks from where I lived. At the end of the night, whatever pizza slices that were not sold were thrown in a dumpster. Thankfully they were still in the little closed carton they sat under the heat lamps in.

We used to do "dumpster runs" about 1:30am, after the place was closed.........

How desperate is that??

 

[Empty Pockets]

I raided the neighbor's garden years ago. Not real proud of that, but he could sure grow tomatos.

 

[youbet]

That fuzzy line between cheapskate and thief seems to be getting even more blurred!

 

[John Tuttle]

Here is someone you can all look up to

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hetty_Green

 

[JustCurious]

Some people call me cheap (although I call myself frugal), but I can't compete with you guys. Wow.

 

[Payin-the-Toll]

Suprised no one has mentioned it and I don't do it, but on the Frugal Money site they're always talking about "If it's yellow, let it mellow; if it's brown, flush it down." Sorry, but those hotel extras and the fast-food condiment packets--it's stealing, although a lot will disagree.

 

[TromboneAl]

Here's a conversation I overheard between DW and the homeowner at a garage sale:

DW: How much is this?
Owner: 25 cents
DW: How about 10 cents?

She was embarassed about it later -- she just automatically bargained without thinking about it.

 

[Sarah in SC]

Okay, I'm torn between the story about the rabbit and the shower in the eyewash station....that is a pretty funny to imagine!

Um, I've bought more than a few used tires, borrow from the library instead of buy books, drive an old car, etc, but the cheapest was building our house.

I dismantled everything I could get out of a house that was being demolished to use in building my house. I got shower stalls, toilets, vanities, all the interior and several exterior doors, all the kitchen cabinets, stove, sink, dishwasher, water heater, and a firebox for the fireplace.

It was a bunch of work to take out, and a bunch of work to install, but worth the savings. Oh, and I salvaged a whole load of free cotton insulation to use in the interior walls (used the $$ stuff for the ceiling) and took a week's vacation to put it up--in July! We saved countless thousands doing that, but people thought it was weird that I got used toilets.

Yeah, I'm known as very cheap.
Sarah

 

[Eagle43]

Does taking those small soap bars from every motel room I stay in count? Those and the shampoo and the lotion and the needle and thread and the shoe shine rag, etc.

I've got a stack of 'em.

 

[TromboneAl]

Not only do we sometimes get free samples at Costco without buying anything, we save the little cups the food comes in!

It's not quite as bad as it sounds. Those cups are perfect for starting fires in our wood stove. I put about two tablespoons of cheap vegetable oil in the cup, and add a crumpled up third of a paper towel. I light that with three logs around it. I’ve been doing this for years, and have never had any flare up. The oil starts burning slowly, through the paper towel that acts as a wick. The oil burns cleanly—there’s no buildup .

 

[lazygood4nothinbum]

what a funny thread. i guess the cheapest things i did in my life--that i'm not all too proud of--were from my college days: buying better cuts of meat utilizing food stamps and smoking bong resin.