Admit it. You're cheap. Maybe you'll spend $300 on an Ipod, but won't pay full price for toilet paper.

So tell us: what are your most ingenious ways to save a buck here and there?

(Just make sure they're legal )

I try to pay for entertainment as little as possible. On rainy days when there's nothing else to do, I try to avoid Chuck E Cheese or the theater, and take my kids to the toy store instead. They can spend a couple hours running around and playing with "new toys", and it doesn't cost a thing!

I save gift cards that I get for my birthday and Christmas, and use them to buy gifts for other people later. Hey, it's still shopping!

Once every couple weeks I take my kids to Wendy's. Instead of getting them their own kids' meals, I buy one adult size chicken nuggets meal and they split it when we get home (except the drink- I get that and they get water!)

Anyone else have any bright ideas to share? I may just use them!

I do that ALL THE TIME!!! That's not being cheap--that's being smart!

Great ideas Muffy!

I'm going to start using them!

I watched my Mom be a cheapskate, (I'd call it thrifty, whatever. . . ), all my life. She grew up poor, and then she and my Dad had 4 kids so . . . . . But even now that they have plenty of money, and no one else to take care of, she still behaves the same way. She buys in bulk, (remember, there are just 2 of them), then freezes everything, including milk, bread, etc. All cars, furniture, clothes are recycled in the family through her. The joke in the family is that no car ever escapes. While all of this is commendable, there's a darker side. I've never seen my Mom splurge on herself, treat herself, show she really feels she deserves some luxury she really wants, (and could afford). That's left an impression on me from an early age, and I'm afraid I've gone the other way. No one would ever come to me for advice on being thrifty or cheap. Just remember, the kids are watching, and learning the good stuff and the bad stuff. That goes for my own kid. . . .

I rinsed out my plastic bowls and reused them at school this past year even though they were the disposable ones. I can stretch a $25 gift card to Barnes & Noble and buy six books, including a book I needed for school. And can you say coupons? I learned that one from my mom. Oh, and for movies, go to matinees or bargain days. Tuesdays usually. Near my school $4 Tuesdays, at home, one place is $3.75 all day Tuesday and all matinees (but they get movies later). If I want more recent movies there's another theatre where matinees and Tuesday night are $5.25. It is possible to see a movie for under ten bucks, you just have to shop around.

The public library is my friend.

I was trying to post and lost my connection... But here are some of the things I do:

All diapers, wipes and formula are from Sam's Club - their Member's Mark brand.
90% of my maternity clothes are from EBay (just about everything but underwear.)
Ebay for a lot of kids clothes.
I just got a new cell phone/PDA combo. Its a refurb, so I only had to pay the upgrade fee.
I've never had a brand new car - I always buy used.
I buy lots of Kroger brands.
Husband was paying someone to mow our lawn. I talked him into mowing it himself - for the excercise.

I get almost all of my girls' clothes at consignment sales. Our church began these sales in our area about 20 years ago, and now they are all over our city. You get clothes that are in great shape (we don't take anything that has stains, rips, is worn out, missing buttons, broken zippers, or has weird odors), great name brands, and you pay about 1/5 of what it would have been brand new (and if you go on half price day --- even less! ) The biggest plus with these sales is that I sell the clothes my girls have grown out of and use that money to buy their new clothes. (Our church only keeps enough of the sale proceeds to recoup their expenses - which ends up giving the seller back like 85-90%). All of my friends buy their kids clothes this way. It saves a lot of money. Even more than EBay.

For example: I just went to a sale this past weekend. got my three year old 14 outfits for Fall/Winter (ended up being 32 items, because some outfits include pants/skirts and top, or have jackets, bows or pantyhose with them). I spent $80. Everything is Gymboree, GAP, Old Navy, Ralph Lauren, green dog, etc.

I had a friend who used to get all of her clothes this way, and then she moved to TX, and there are no sales like this in her area. She comes to visit us twice a year -- the Spring sale and the Fall sale!

When my kids are babies, I always buy their stuff at consignment stores. They wear them what? 1-2 times before they grow out of it???? There's no way I'm paying regular prices for that! Now that they're getting older, I don't mind buying retail because I know they'll last longer (my four year old can still fit in most of last year's clothes), but I still usually only shop at Target, and I usually only buy the cheap mix and match stuff because they're good for playing in.

Great thread, muffy!

Yup, that's us, too. We drive them until they get towed to the junkyard. And we buy used cars also - we bought the last 2 from Enterprise rent-a-car.

I never buy any clothing that is not on sale. No, that's not true. In May, 1986 I bought a dress that I loved at Lord and Taylor for $98. Bridesmaid dresses don't count, but I alter them myself.

Cereal is the biggest ripoff - my parents eat a lot of it, and I will either buy a)generic b)on sale c)with a coupon or d)on sale with a coupon. Some of the cereals they eat don't come in generic so I have to stock up when they are on sale. And remember how my dad wanted ice cream last week and there were no brands on sale so I told him he could only pick one flavor?

We also have Fuel perks here so I never pay full price for gas. And I get my stamps by mail (it's free) so I don't have to drive to the post office.

And yeah, I have an iPod.

i'll be back to share once I count all the coins in my couch

hmmm...let's see, ways I save...

- go clothes shopping only when starting to look homeless - several hundred $$
- instead of buying a new computer, took an old one home from work - $2000
- don't own a cell phone - several hundred $$
- get the cheapest basic cable TV package - several hundred $$
- don't make a decision on new furniture for 20 years: several thousand $$
- put off summer vacation until it's too late to take one: several thousand $$

of course, if you want to have fun and look nice and have some connection with 21st century, these ideas aren't much use.

but, we do have a fun "cheap date" routine:
- grandparents babysit
- we eat a snack beforehand
- we go to a little local Italian restaurant, order antipasta salad and bread, a caraf of the house wine, and split a dessert. On weekends they even have a guy playing the piano. Delicious, romantic and cheap.

My mom bought a lot of my dresses and things from consignment stores when I was little. I actually had a lot of really cute dresses. As soon as I outgrew them she would give all of the clothes back to the consignment shops Talk about recycling.

I love movies- but I usually only go in the mornings when they are $5 and I only go to Starbucks when I have giftcards (which I seem to get a lot- so win win )

My advice, have friends who work in food service. Other than free food from my place of work I can get free food at Jack in the Box, Port of Subs, Round Table and a great mexican place here called La Fuente. I also have a friend who works at Mervyn's so I get all my clothes from there for really cheap.

Connections, they're golden.

I buy store brand items whenever possible, unless they've proven to be so tasteless or useless that they're really a waste of my money.

When I have time, I shop at thrift shops. I've found some great bargains there (but there's also a lot of junk )

When I do laundry (there's a coin laundry in the basement of my apartment building) I time the dryer so I can dry more than one load for $1.25.

I use washable cleaning rags with my Swiffer instead of buying the disposable paper ones.

Great idea! I have a Clorox Sweeper, and I don't buy refill Clorox solution for it- i just mix a little dish soap with water. This is also the same solution I use on our cars.

Frugality runs in our family. Words of wisdom from my parents:
1. Save up, rather than borrow;
2. Bargaining is expected, and
3. EVERY part of a chicken is edible.

And from my mom-in-law: Day old is gold.

Another thing I've been doing lately - I bought two big jugs of windshield washer fluid because I thought I would use them up last winter - I didn't. So I filled a spray bottle with some and that's what I use to clean the vinyl floors with.

When my son was born we had just bought our first house and had two new car payments so money was non existent. We lived in a nice neighborhood that bordered the millionaire mansion subdivisions. A few times a year the million dollar babies had yard sales. WOW we cleaned up like no tomorrow! OshKosh, Nike, Gap, Nike for my son. And then when my daughter was born we did the same thing. 90% of the things we bought were probably only worn once or twice at most and some of them still had tags on them. My bro-in-law who i cant stand has older teen girls who go thru clothes like water,everthing is hardly worn and again tags on clothes. 3 or 4 times a year they clean out their closet and pass the stuff to my MIL and my girls make out like bandits.

When my favorite soda or diet soda is on sale for a 24pack less than $4.50 I will buy as much as I can fit into my car/truck. The going rate now for a 24pack is $6/7.98 wtf?

I buy the new Wonder white whole grain bread at the Wonder Store. It is .89 aloaf instead of 3.29 at Walmart.

When butter is under $2.00/lb I buy ALOT. I dont use margarine, only butter.

I have a moderate size pantry filled with soup cans, veggies in cans, spaghetti sauce(Classico brand, ONLY sausage & peppers-doctored up) boxes of orzo, thin spaghetti. I buy store brands of most canned stuff unless there is a serious taste difference.

I buy industrial amount of trashbags via smartbargains.com I throw everything away as much as possible.

I go to St. Vincent dePaul thrift store to stock up on National Geographics for the kids upcoming school projects(.15 each!)



I actually keep an extra in my truck b/c I use SO much in the winter time and hate being stuck in a storm or nastiness and running out

Oh another thing, not sure if its cheapskate but we travel 3 states to buy car/trucks from my BIL who sells cars. For the past 17 years we have bought from him and never paid full price, public price at all. We end up getting the dealer/wholesale price and I give my BIL an extra $500 for helping us out. We tell him exactly what we want he finds exactly that.

Oh about 12 vehicles later, we have never had a lemon from him at all.

I re-gift any lotions/fancy soaps I get as teacher gifts. That way, I know they don't know they're re-gifted.

I'm like muffy in that I don't get the kids meals at Wendy's. But I get them off the dollar menu. 3 nuggets and 1 fry feeds 3 kids for $4.

I did consignment shops for a long time, but now that the girls are getting older, it's hard to find stuff in good shape.

I buy Kilz paint at WalMart. The stuff is actually REALLY good, and much cheaper. (And I know what I'm talking about. I've painted TONS of rooms, some of them multiple times.) Plus, it goes further than other brands, so less to buy.

I shop the Goodwill and garage sales for furniture, then fix it up with spray paint or slip covers.

I sew all of my drapes rather than buy. And half of the time I don't use curtain rods, but other, cheap, techniques to hang them.

I recycle fabric like nobody's business. Right now, I'm making tie-backs from fabric left over from flower girl dresses that I made for someone else. I didn't even pay for the fabric! (She did tell me I could keep the remaining. I don't steal! )

Before my parents retired and moved to Oregon, they would travel from So. Cal to Oregon to buy a new vehicle. No sales tax.

Haha, I just started doing this!

So, I guess you'll have to keep in touch with her a coupla times a year.

My shower leaks, I have a big bucket in there and I have been using it to water the flowers.

My parents were like this to a certain degree when we were growing up. There were four of us (and a fifth one came along when I was 14). My mother never worked outside the home and there wasn't much money. She knew how to shop well (plus my dad worked at a grocery store), and she knew how to make just enough food to feed us for one meal so there weren't usually any leftovers and nothing gone to waste. We didn't have very many clothes (I had to share some things with my sister). So when I started making my own money, I went a little crazy. But I eventually went back to doing some things the way I was raised. Not everything - when I need or want something bad enough, I get it - but I'm pretty frugal most of the time.

And my parents are not so frugal anymore either. My dad is retired. Both of my parents have received pretty generous inheritances from their own parents, and they're enjoying themselves. I'm glad to see it. I want to see them have a good time.

I'm like this, too. My parents got divorced and my father basically abandoned us. It was so bad that when my mom filed her taxes one year, they sent her an additional check because technically we were below the poverty line. Anyway, now I don't have a ton of money, but we have some, and I spoil my godchildren to no end. But I will not lend money out. I want to spend my money on who and what I want to spend it on. I can spend a fortune on a child, but I have been wearing the same shirts for ten years because I cannot spend on myself. I am a cheapskate to myself!

We regifted a couple of our wedding presents, because they just weren't "us". The recipients were happy with them .

I saw a "Moving Up" episode (TLC) where a woman made pillow covers out of all her bridesmaid dresses. They were really cute and very cheap! I'm thinking about doing the same...




YES!!!!! I miss that soooooo much. When I started going to school in Idaho, they charged extra (sales tax) and I couldn't figure it out until my roommate told me. Why can't we just pay the price that's on the tag?! Now I'm in GA and I think it's 7% at most places. I miss having no sales tax .

No sympathy here--New York is 8.375%, plus the payroll taxes are incredible. But you're right--if the item is $100, I shouldn't have to pay $108.38 or whatever. Those who live in states with no tax are so lucky!! In fact, New York State added a line to the state income tax form for online purchases. You can figure it out yourself or you can use a chart where they assume that if you make 100k, x amount was for online purchases and therefore you owe NYC x dollars.

It's some racket, I'm telling you.

Everyone is making me feel bad !!!

I'm an anti-cheapskate when it comes to musicial instruments! I shudder at the thought of NOT having the top-of-the-line guitar!

I just bought the cheapest mascara in the store because I always feel guilty spending money on myself. $1.72. It's about as good as you'd expect a $1.72 mascara to be.

Oh - I can relate!! I am guilty of spending more than I should on my daughter. I'm sure it will be worse when the little boy comes along, too. And I wear my clothes FOREVER... I swear, I think I still have stuff from high school - like jeans, shoes and sweatshirts. I usually get rid of my clothes becuase I'm tired of wearing the same ole thing all the time, not becuase its worn out.


Anyway - another cheap thing I do - I usually look thru the mail for stamps that did not get canceled. I tear them off and use them again.

That's sooo different though. My violin was pretty cheap and it's a piece of crap. I really need a new one, and I want a nice one this time.

I do the same with art supplies though. My pencils are almost $2 each, we won't even go into the cost of my sketchpads, and my acrylic paint is around $5 for a few ounces, sometimes more...I try and stock up while things are on sale for the most part.

However, I have been using the same pair of $2.50 flip flops from Old Navy for the past two years now, and i'm about to sew up my Converse slip ons so I don't have to buy a new pair. There's holes in them, and my mom accidentally got some bleach on the left shoe so there's these random peachy colored stains on them.

I like to say they have character.

yes!!! Was that the same episode they made dining room seat covers out of them? I love that idea!







You can't be a cheapskate when it comes to musical instruments. You can't get a Stradivarius at Sam's Club.

The quilt on my bed is made out of old blue jeans and other scrap fabrics.

Here's a pic

It wasn't quite finished in that pic, but it is now.

That's gorgeous sammy!

Check this out . . . Family of 7 living on $35,000 a year.
America's Cheapest Family (click on the video link)

That is really cool Sammy.

Sammy, that's beautiful! Did you make it?

Thanks! Yes, I did make it. I'd like to make another one someday, but it's pretty time consuming. I don't know what's worse, cutting up the squares or sewing them back together!

WOW!!!! You did a GREAT job on that Sammy!

We did too. A lot. And regifting baby stuff has proven to be just as necessary.

Try 9.25% in TN -- highest there is. It sucks! And we don't get a break for food either. Almost 10% on everything.


I still have a ton of stuff from high school. I just pulled out a pair of jeans that I wore to Homecoming in the 10th grade. They aren't so cute anymore. But they fit!


I have a pair of birkenstocks that I have had since 1995. They were seeing their last leg, and then they gave up the ghost while I was on vacation a couple of weeks ago. I was sad to see them go.

Goodness, 9.25%???? That is absolutely ridiculous! I was about to comment when Wedd said 8+% for New York but then I saw your post. Thats disgusting! Its 6% in Michigan which I guess, now that I'm seeing everyone elses posts, isn't too bad. But I'd rather have none. Price tags are very misleading when you add in the sales tax.

Wow, I always thought NY was the highest. What do you guys get for that money???? That's just un-American! Do you have income tax in addition to that? In Fla there is no income tax. Here in PA there is no tax on food or clothing.

I have a pair of white denim jeans that are well over 15 years old. They're slim fitting and not too un-stylish, and I think they still fit. But the fact that they're still white tells you how often I wear them

Yeah, me too! I apologize for b1tching. And now I know not to move to Tennessee!!

Fun jeans!

The other day I went to a gas station that I thought I had Gas Perks at. I scanned my card and I didn't have any discounts, so I drove to another gas station. No perks there either. I go to the 3rd station and voila! 60 cents off per gallon! I love Gas Perks.

I wore a broken shoe in Disneyland for an entire day because I didn't want to pay a ridiculous amount for new ones.

You can't wear them after yesterday, or is that just for white shoes?

Don't remind me, HCT.

I think the fashion police have redacted that rule

I'd probably wear them anytime as long as the weather wasn't nasty.

It has definitely been redacted, although I'm not sure we ever really abide by it in CA. It's kind of silly to stop wearing summer colors after Labor Day when we're still in 100+ degree weather.

Its always been pretty high. When I got my first job it was almost 8% - that was 12 years ago. BUT I guess the trade off is that we don't have a state income tax. But I still think sales tax ends up being far more - but I'm no accountant. I just wish we got a break on food (and clothes!). The only good thing that comes from it -- we just double the tax on our restaurant bills to figure the tip. 20% aint bad.