Extreme cheapskates!! What's the most extreme thing you have done to save money?

dekaspace

Lynplatinum wrote: »

Daksapce - learn the lesson - money is always out of sight rather than put temptation in people's way ditto things that I do not want consumed so, for example, only half of a batch of flapjack will be made available for my son's friend's consumption!
Rooms you rent are your space - its your rules - feel free to tell scroungers not to come round again! I do! there is being kind and generous but there is also being a mug - I took the decision long time ago not to be a mug.

I was in a bedsit the first 2 time so nowhere to hid the drink as it was in the sink full of water to cool it.

At the same property I had a guy who had a factory job earning like £8 a hour(and double for overtime) ask me to buy another phone off me, and whilst my back was turned did a runner, the phone again was worth like £100 and I was on benefits at the time (what was happening was I had contracts that ran out and so sold my old phones) I was ripped off so many times at that age as was only 19 and autistic and if I remember correctly at least a few times when the guy who nicked the drink from me must of gone into my drawers as thats where the change was, the one time I did leave it on the side the fiver note and the large coins like pound coins and 50ps vanished only the pennies and 5ps remained.

It hurt that much more when each person was far better off than I was and knew I was struggling to even eat and still stole.

Even remember one time buying a kebab and he wanted to "share" it, cute him eating 90% of the meat and leaving me like 1 small piece of meat, the bread and salad and again never paid me back.

I had enough of him when one night I met a girl who wanted me to go back with her and he demanded I give him the keys to my room and physically grabbed me and shouted at me until I gave him the keys, came home to find he helped himself to food out of my fridge, and forgot to turn off the oven and was having a nap, also had a game of mine in his trouser pocket, and my drawer where I kept the spare change was open and no cash in it.

He still played "he is skint" card despite owning expensive gadgets like a minidisc player and being so lazy he got taxis 5 minutes walk, latest phone etc.

Spendless

thisuseridistakenagain wrote: »

I think the saddest thing I've done is take home sachets of ketchup. Bet I saved myself 2p by doing that as I buy Aldi's own anyway!

That's not sad. Always handy to have sachets in for when you run out. I took both my kids out for breakfast this week. Back at home when DD asked for ketchup with her meals and our bottle being almost empty, I was pleased to find some sachets in my bag though I didn't remember picking them up. Turns out DS did it when I'd gone to the loo. I have trained them well, despite their protests. I also used to pick up sachets of salt and pepper, these were so useful when kids were having cookery lessons and the ingredients list asked for a pinch of salt/pepper to be brought in.

VfM4meplse

midnight_express wrote: »

I don't really understand why so many of you seem to be eating out with people you don't even like.

Its not that! You don't choose your friends based on their ability or willingness to pay for stuff, I would hazard a guess that for most of us it's not what attracts us to others.

I think eating out magnifies differences in attitudes to money: not a problem until you get personally hit in the pocket because someone you thought knew better is quite happy to take advantage without batting an eyelid. Cheapskate behaviour in my view is odious; yet cheapskates themselves somehow do no see this.

melanzana

Cheapskates, free loaders, moochers, whatever do not have a moral compass at all.

Brazen hussies the lot of them. They need to be called out.

They rely on the embarrassment of others who might be called cheapskates themselves if they object. That is the game.

I never play it lol.

Mr.Generous

really great to read this thread, the split the bill thing really gets me. I eat and drink what I feel like, others have extra drinks of something expensive and a starter and desert. I have one or the other. They then talk about splitting the bill. The mean bast*** s are the ones who want to pay less than their fair share by splitting, not the ones who don't want to.

Lynplatinum

I agree with you Mr G but if you hang about long enough in their lives you find out that their free spending eventually leaves them in a pickle of one kind or another!

Another sad tale is that of a young man who was a friend of my DS who rarely paid his was and also ran up several CCs and then defaulted on payments. He lived at home with Mum, owned nowt and earned little. He didnt care - even taking him to court the CC companies had nothing to get money out of to repay the debt! However, Mum met a new man he hated and then found that as his credit score was not only in the pan but round the U bend he could not get anywhere to rent - even once he had saved the deposit and has to live in a house with Mum + new boyfriend whom he dislikes!!
What goes around eventually comes around! LOL

misty6

I have no problem with anyone who only wants to pay for what they've eaten when we go out in a group. But when I was working we used to all go out now and again and there was this one person who always used to get up and leave before everyone else saying that's for what I've had, leave the money on the table and off she would go. Trouble was she would conveniently "forget" to leave money for her drinks or coffee and sometimes we would go to a place that charged a service charge and she said she wouldn't pay that so it would fall to the rest of us. We solved the problem by never asking her to come out with us again!


My most cheapskate moment was when I'd saved and saved and finally managed to buy my own place - a studio apartment. It had a water meter and I was so petrified of using the water that I wouldn't flush the loo if I'd just had a wee. My friend came round and she said "do you mind if I just use your loo before I go?" I said "can't you hold it til you get home?!!" So off she went with her legs crossed!! When I got the bill for the first quarter my water usage came to £4 for the whole quarter so after that I mended my cheapskate ways!

Anne_Marie_2

misty6 wrote: »

My most cheapskate moment was when I'd saved and saved and finally managed to buy my own place - a studio apartment. It had a water meter and I was so petrified of using the water that I wouldn't flush the loo if I'd just had a wee. My friend came round and she said "do you mind if I just use your loo before I go?" I said "can't you hold it til you get home?!!" So off she went with her legs crossed!! When I got the bill for the first quarter my water usage came to £4 for the whole quarter so after that I mended my cheapskate ways!

:eek: Good grief, please tell me you are joking.

Spendless

misty6 wrote: »

I have no problem with anyone who only wants to pay for what they've eaten when we go out in a group. But when I was working we used to all go out now and again and there was this one person who always used to get up and leave before everyone else saying that's for what I've had, leave the money on the table and off she would go. Trouble was she would conveniently "forget" to leave money for her drinks or coffee and sometimes we would go to a place that charged a service charge and she said she wouldn't pay that so it would fall to the rest of us. We solved the problem by never asking her to come out with us again!

That's been my experience too. We went out with a big group and one woman didn't have a main course, at the end of the night her partner paid for their share taking into account they had one less meal but conveniently 'forgetting' that the pair of them had sat all night drinking double whiskys.

BEAT_THE_DEBT

Great answers. I agree money saving is not being a cheapskate they are two very different things. Regarding meals I don't think it's fair if people split the bill if someone is just drinking tap water or having one course.