It’s important to save money these days. Going without a little here and there will really help us when we’re having trouble making ends meet.
There are, however, people who go too far with saving money. These people go from being thrifty to being cheap. Kids are sometimes stuck in the middle.
These stories come from kids who had to live with big jerks. If your parents were cheap, I’m sure some of this will hit home for you.
1. A clever trick my dad used to get a free bar of soap
As soon as my dad moved in, he had someone over to show him how to use a water filter that fits under the sink for free. The man showed how to do it with a bar of soap and then left it.
Dad called at least four other businesses to get a free lesson just to get the free bar of soap. He never planned to have a water filter put in. This is something he does that gets worse as he gets older. I didn’t stop him, though.
2. The way my dad feels about paper towels
My dad saves all of his paper towels. Even though I’m 21, he still wants me to ask for permission before I use them. He doesn’t want me to waste them. At the time, I thought it cost $100 for a roll because he was worried I would waste them.
He always buys the cheapest thing, even if it breaks or doesn’t work as well. This means he ends up spending twice as much on everything. I spilled a gallon of milk all over his house while my girlfriend and I were there. She got a roll of paper towels and used them all to clean up the mess.
When my dad found out we used a whole roll, he looked so shocked that it made me feel like a bad person for helping her. Because he was too nice to yell at my girlfriend, I knew he wouldn’t yell at us. But it was clear that he was trying to hide his hurt, anger, and sadness over the “wasted” roll.
3. The unique way my dad saves every penny
Oh my God, dads are so bad. My husband hates paying for power, so he hangs his clothes outside all year. That would be fine if he didn’t do it when it’s below zero outside.
When my sisters and I cleaned out our rooms, he would go through our trash to find “valuables” like money or cardboard that we had thrown away. He is crazy about petrol prices. One time, I sat in the car with him for thirty minutes while he drove around town looking for the cheapest petrol.
His favourite way to drive down a hill is to put the car in neutral, open the door, and push himself down the hill with his foot. We went to a Burger King one time, but I could only get chicken fries because a burger was “too expensive.”
4. Learn about the return policy, Maestro
My dad did crazy things to take advantage of Costco’s return policy. He gave us back a set of outdoor chairs that we had had for eight years. It was worn down from the weather, and a few of the pieces were broken. They took it, and he bought a new patio set from Costco with the money from it. Not believable.
5. Revealing My Grandmother’s Smart Money Savings
When I was little, I spent the summers with my grandparents. Every night before dinner, one of my jobs was to set the table. I was told to use “the good napkins” whenever we had guests over for dinner.
That meant the napkins that didn’t have names of restaurants on them. My grandma only took us to restaurants when she thought she could get something good out of the deal. There were many ways she could do this.
Of course she cut out coupons, but that was just for kids. She always asked people to take her out to dinner to “return the favour.” She carried around a huge purse that was always full of napkins and food from the table.
For her, going to a place that didn’t have a salad bar wasn’t very important. After driving for over an hour, my mum and I were able to find a Sizzler that she wasn’t banned from going to for her birthday.
6. Putting savings to work
My dad found a store that sells the big industrial rolls that you see in some shopping malls and moved us there. It’s like a big roll that has the toilet paper from three or four regular rolls. I’ve never felt so bad about having friends over.
7. My grandmother’s unbeatable guarantee from Sears for life!
My grandparents set up their wedding gift registry at Sears. This was in the late 1940s, when most of the things they sold came with a “lifetime guarantee.”
Since then, my grandma has moved nine or ten times, but she still has every flattened box and warranty for every appliance she bought when she got married.
About two years ago, I took her to Sears to get a new iron. To get a new one, she brought all the boxes and papers from the 1940s. They surprised her by keeping their promise and giving her a new iron!
She’s so cheap that she hasn’t had to buy a new device in over 60 years, which I think is funny! She came to Canada from Ukraine and always says, “Lifetime guarantee means lifetime guarantee.”
Our family is known for having very long lives (her father lived to be 104). I feel bad for Sears. I sometimes wonder if this is why Sears is doing so badly: a lot of cheap old women are taking advantage of their lifetime promises.
8. Fixing up my dad’s cheap house turned into an adventure
My dad is too cheap all the time. It’s hard to choose which story to tell because I have so many. My dad doesn’t look at anything else besides the amount of money. A six-pack of toilet paper costs $5, and a twelve-pack costs $7. He will always buy the five-dollar pack.
You can already guess how any big buy with him goes. He bought a house when I was about eight years old. Back then, something pretty good could be bought in my area for $110,000. The cabinets, floors, trim, doors, windows, and other internal features should all be newer.
He bought a bad house for $89k in the end. It was built in the year 1947. The person who built it was just as cheap as my dad. Each and every door and window was unique. It still had the asbestos siding that it came with.
There was no finish on the inside. There were no doors inside except for the bathroom door, which did not have a lock. There are no kitchen drawers or counters.
The living room floor was just plywood, and the bedroom on the first floor had linoleum that had been unrolled all over the place. In a way, my dad “saved” $21,000 when he bought the house, but he’s had to spend a lot more on it since then.
9. Cheap Ways to Beat the Heat
Georgia is where I’m from, and it’s steamy and hot there. My dad wouldn’t turn on the air conditioning until it was more than 100F outside. He bought some Styrofoam pads with metal foil on one end.
When the AC was on, we had to put those in all the windows and doors that led outside to “keep the heat out” and save money on the AC. Besides that, our city has a spring. You can drink the water, and it’s free.
Let me set the scene. There’s a queue in front of it. It was hot, and kids wanted cold water. Moms came with a pitcher to get some, and there was my dad with 32 empty milk jugs and water to fill them all up “in case the spring dries up tomorrow.”
10. Gift certificate
My grandfather was the world’s most cheap person. I got a $30 gift card from him after he died. For some reason, I chose to use it instead of giving it away.
There was a time in my life before and after that event. When I gave the checker the card, her face turned pale.Cashier: That’s not possible, where did you get that?
“Uh…” My grandfather owned it.Cashier: “STOP EVERYONE!” IN FRONT OF US is the winner of our store’s secret contest that has been going on for ten years! The cashier was very excited to tell the customer that the gift card was a special promotional item that had a million-dollar prize that had been unused for years.
I stood there stunned as the store manager came over to confirm what I already knew to be true. My grandpa’s “stingy” gift turned into a fortune that changed my whole life and my future in an instant.
The story of how we got to have noodles with a flavour packet collection
My dad likes ramen noodles, but he likes to add other flavours to them, so he saves the flavour packets in a Ziploc bag that is too big. I’m sure we have a hundred of those. It does help when you run out of your favourite flavour of ramen!
Every fast food sauce packet my dad gets, he keeps it. They’re in a bag in the fridge, and we use them sometimes.
12. My dad’s brick work that stays strong over time
As we tore down our brick garage, my dad made us clean all of the bricks and line them up around our house so they could be used again. After eight years, they are still there. The $500, the year of work, and the hard, back-breaking work were all worth it.
The value of our cars is $2000. My dad buys similar cars and takes them apart to use the parts inside. He takes the engines out of the cars and stacks them under the garage just as you think he’s done. They’ve been driven 300,000 miles.
These are where we eat dinner on them. To save power, our TVs are only 20 inches wide. A lot of our furniture is found on the street. Shave cream and shampoo are made with soap.
There are cabinets and couches stacked up to the roof in our granny flat, making it hard to get through. The weight is so great that the ground has settled and cracks are showing up everywhere.
I thought that letting out the space would be a better use of the money, but it turns out that keeping broken treadmills, lawnmowers, fridges, ovens, and washing machines for spare parts is more important.
13. How we reused bath water to cut down on gas and water costs
We used the same bathwater. First my brother, then me, and finally my mom or dad. When my parents did it, they were really poor and wanted to save money on their gas and water bills. It makes me feel gross to think about it now.
14. Dog bed vs. bassinet
It evened out because my dad is cheap and my mom isn’t, but this story makes me laugh every time. Dad didn’t want to get me a cot or baby bed when I was born. Instead, he wanted to get me a dog bed.
15. Cheap Christmas wrapping paper is here
I always thought that Christmas wrapping paper looked funny, like a cheap 3D picture. They were all at least 0.5 centimetres off from their faces. I found out later that my mom always bought cheap wrapping paper with wrong printing.
I just don’t feel like Christmas when I see pretty paper these days. Even after 30 years, I still think the cheap, badly printed paper feels more like Christmas.
In the same way, my aunt and dad would count the boxes they used to wrap gifts before Christmas. So, if my aunt brought 16 gifts that needed shirt/clothes boxes like you can get at Sears or JC Penney, she would say, “I came here with 16 boxes and I’m leaving with 16 boxes!” on Christmas morning.
Funny thing is that back then, the boxes came free with the items you bought. These days, you usually have to pay extra for the boxes. Friends and family of mine were stuck on boxes they got for free.
There are still boxes with old tape on them that are falling apart, but my family is more likely to agree that it’s okay to throw them away now.
Back then, you put them away for next year in boxes and taped up the big tears. We even had an old box from a store called Structure that held up much longer than the shop itself.
16. The “perfect bed” my dad bought for my newborn daughter turned out to be a toy cot.
So I ‘didn’t have to buy a cot’, my dad tried to give me the ‘right bed’ for my new daughter. It was my childhood doll’s bed, which had been in their basement for more than 20 years and wouldn’t have worked, even if that wasn’t a completely crazy idea.
17. Mom’s Magic
Spices last longer because my mum adds water to them. It feels like drinking water with ketchup in it sometimes. It’s funny and a little strange. Every drop counts in our house, and she turns meals into quiet times of “thrifty love.”
18. What a poor girl
My parents had a lot of nice things, but I didn’t. After my grandma died, they stole my inheritance without telling me. They only give me a $50 Walmart gift card every year. It’s so bad that I don’t even have a phone.
Once a year, they buy a bunch of fancy cars and take holidays in the Maldives. Things changed one day, though. I got a letter while my parents were on a cruise. “Do not open when they are around” was written on it.
After taking a quick look around, I tore open the envelope and started to read right away. “Hi Mary, this is your real dad.” It’s been years since I last saw you. I’ve been working hard to get back the money your grandma left you as an inheritance. Please meet me at the address given. It’s time to take back what is properly yours and make your life better.
