Question #178 Penny Pinching
What are some of the more creative ways that you have attempted to save money?
Bonus: What are some non-typical ways that you have earned money?
The more embarrassing the better.
What are some of the more creative ways that you have attempted to save money?
Bonus: What are some non-typical ways that you have earned money?
The more embarrassing the better.
19 comments:
Practicality is nothing to be embarassed about. In my family it was considered shameful to waste, to buy what you don't need, etc.
I saved money by only buying food in bulk. If you are willing to cook for yourself, you can live very cheaply. I even bought beans dry and soaked them instead of canned ones, doing that is the dividing line between the frugal and the fakers.
The cleverest way I ever earned money was in high school a local grocery store gave out giant stacks of flyers that gave $7 off the price of admission at an amusement park. I went to the outside of the amusement park and sold them for $5 each and made a big wad of money.
Is not saving money at all a creative way of saving it? Because that's been my technique since 1974.
In college Joe & I briefly tried selling weed, but our habit of ridiculing potential buyers for being stoners kind of kept us from making any real profits.
Back in the stone age, when I lived in SF, I remember trading my pot seeds to my roommate in exchange for his army rations. I would happily eat vacuum-sealed stroganoff while listening to him hack in the other room.
I have the same money saving plan as Jake- only since 1976. I find it very creative.
I've had a lot of weird little jobs. One was selling coupon books over the phone (before computers did the dialing)in a sucky little room at the south end of Ukiah. With a scary man as a boss who would yell and yell.
I accidentally found a number that would give me the pressure conditions of the Dam. I called the Dam all day long- it kept me busy.
Also, I've done voice work for a video game- but don't ask me which one, I can't remember.
I am not always great at saving money, although I have probably saved a ton of money by drinking at work every night instead of going out and spending that money at a bar.
I have never been good at pinching the pennies but I like to think I help keep the economy moving along by freely dispersing the Yahoo! coffers to local resteraunts/bars/comic stores/aquariuses/green apples/etc.
My mom, on the other hand, is a different story. Things like: baking bread from a big sack of wheat berries, growing majority of vegetables, watering down milk, doing odd jobs in exchange for children's schooling and various other tricks of the single mother trade.
i ran out of money the last week of my first semester of college sophomore year so i had to eat nothing but gingerbread houses for a week...took them home from a christmas party.
ive always wanted to charge my work for cabs and then just take the bus instead but i never end up trying this.
I tried working at a strip club one night as a cocktail waitress. Around the fifth time the naked strippers asked me if I wanted any coke every time I went into the bathroom, I just about had it. I quit.
I don't actually *save* money, but I am always discovering money in my pockets of dirty clothes I throw on the floor. I'm so damn forgetful and find anywhere from $5 to $40 at a time when I decide to wear said dirty pants.
Oh yeah, and never doing laundry works, too.
I started grocery shopping for eating at work. I've got lunch down to about 10-15.00 a week now.
Other than that, for me to answer any question that even remotely approaches fiscal responsibility is fucking stupid, because I am the worst.
my attempts at saving money border on the ridiculous. i have attempted quiting smoking and only going to the bars on weekends to only be met with failure. i have also tried to not go to san francisco every weekend, at that, i have also failed. i can live like a poor (i can eat only rice, beans and corn tortillas for months on ends), however, only when i really have no money. if i have twenty bucks in my pocket, i'm going to sushi.
as far as non-typical ways of making money, i once embezzled a large sum of cash from taco bell when i was seventeen. i spent it all on weed and beer at bargain basement prices. some things will never change.
Uhh... i used to be good at not spending money when i was younger by like never eating out and i used to not drink...
but then i got tired of that and started drinking... so now i am kind of trying to save money cuz i am going overseas in a month and i need it. My strategy lately is just to avoid bars, drink cheaper beer, eat out less....
avoiding bars and eating out can really hamper ones social life though...
most ridiculous way i earned money:when i was a kid my mom had her own little sewing operation...she like made stuff for kids at Montessori schools and stuff...I used to trim excess thread off of like these squares... it was okay cuz i was a kid and any money was good and i could watch tv while i did it.
i drink tall cans in the alley next to bars with the bros instead of actually going in.
I do all the coupon clipping, make 90% of my meals at home, mail in every rebate, and hunt for bargains, which are standard ways of saving money...I guess the most creative thing I do is cut up old dresses to make them look like new blouses. They rarely look nice though, and every few months I have to splurge on new (really cheap) clothes.
I like to spend my money as fast as possible, saving it from having to spend too much time out of circulation.
My favorite way of making money would have to be doing it the old-fashioned way, xerox.
I forgot to mention that a while ago I penny pinched by not buying a gas powered RC helicopter. I have been regretting that sad decision ever since.
i saved money in an empty fish bowl with a stuffed monkey sitting on top of it and put it in my closet because if it was in the bank, i'd spend it. i saved enough to but a 2002 grand vitara.
balance transfers make me feel good about life.
i had an art yard sale recently in my front porch and sold a painting for $3,500 and a ladder for $30. my dog shit in front of the pottery table and a wealthy chinese boy who was translating the bargaining for his mother stepped in it and was so mad. she still bought something and made her son take a photo with me.
When I was doing my stint as "college girl abroad" in London and Dublin, I was ridiculously broke. When I COULD afford food, I bought these little teeny baguettes of bread at the 7-11 (yeah, they have 7-11) because you'd get free butter with them. That and a couple bananas and I was good for a whole day.
I'd go to Bewleys, a tea house, and get the pot of tea and sit and refill it with hot water until the water turned clear, and then I'd still put cream and sugar in it.
But the best thing (worst thing?) I ever did was I'd go into McDonalds at the lunch or dinner rush. You go in when the lines are reeeeeally long and sit around, near the lines, looking antsy and impatient. Then after, like, 10 minutes, and several dozen customers, you go up and say "Look, I've been waiting for my order for, like, 10 minutes". THE KEY to this trick is to say you had a special order.......like a quarter pounder with no onions or something......because the cash register folks of COURSE wont be able to recreate it because the keyed it in wrong, right!? yeah. And ALWAYS I got a fries and coke for free for "the hassle".
I used to be good at saving money. It always worked for me to think, "I have to work this many hours to afford that. If someone asked me to work that many hours in exchange for this, would I do it?" If the answer was no, I wouldn't buy it, haha.
I don't often go out to eat, and I don't drink, so that's a plus. I go to the dollar movies, and clip coupons when I'm not too lazy. I buy a lot of stuff you have to cook at home, but then we never cook it.
I learned to like beer. Cocktails are expensive. I cannot save money, but I am good at budgeting so I have just enough to make it to my next paycheck.
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