My grandmother who is about 87 years old is the most "thrifty" person I ever recall. Christmas time at Grandma's house involved surgically opening your present to save the wrapping paper. Nobody, no matter their age, was allowed to tear a package open. It would be cleaned of tape, folded and stacked for storage and use the next year. Alluminum foil was never wadded up and discarded if there was the slimmest chance it could be wiped off or washed and reused.

My mom says this all stemmed from going through the depression and the habits never died. It served her well because she has a nice nest egg she is enjoying in these later years of her life

 

Well, lets see, my grandma is a penny pincher(my grandpa is a retired postal service worker, and a current farmer, so they dont have but so much money anyways). She'll wash styrofoam plates, to use for later, and also like mentioned above, keeps Christmas wrapping paper/bows and aluminum foil to use again. And, she used to embarass me and my sister by going through the drive through at mcdonalds and asking for whatever is on special for the senior citizens.

I wish I was more of a penny pincher sometimes, but with trucks and living on your own, sometimes its hard

 

My grandmother does the same thing with those plates. I used to poke holes in them so she couldn't and I'd tell her they are disposable for a reason.

 

my grandfather...i have an entire garage full of tools and parts that came home from the county landfill where he worked for years as a truck driver...each day he would comb the piles for anything good and bring it home. some of our best tools came from there.

4 jackstands, 2 car ramps, a bead breaker are the ones we use most

 

My grandpa is a prime example!!! This poor old guy has more money than I could ever imagine, he's been saving his whole life and wont spend a stinking nickle on anything!!

1. He has a drawer in his garage filled with all kinds of crap, well when the car starts running bad he'll open up the drawer and pull out some plugs, take the old ones out and throw then in the drawer. He will do this over and over using the SAME dang plugs because he won't go buy new!!

2. The garage doors on there house are down right FREAKIN scary. Those things look like they are about 2 seconds from falling on your head. I asked him why he doesn't replace them and he said that they still rolled up and down so he didn't see the point.

3. Last summer it was hotter than a mother outside and there A/C quit working............so instead of spending a little on a new unit, he went out to my uncles farm and grabbed some fans from the stoneage to keep the house cool............which didn't work for crap!!

4. His yard is equivilant to almost 2 acres, in which he pays a neighbor kid $5 freakin dollars to mow that sucker w/ A PUSH MOWER!!!!!!! I had to mow it for him this last summer when I went to visit and it took me almost all afternoon and I felt like curling up and dying after I was done...........that is some stinkin grass man!!

5. My grandma had been driving the same car since I can remember, thing had a billion miles on it so they decided it was about time to get a new car. Well thinking he was going to be nice and actually buy a brand new car was a foolish thought..................he bought a Buick that had almost 100,000 miles on it and is a royal piece of crap.

6. When I was a kid I used to go there and stay during the summer to help my uncle on the farm. Well being a kid I always wanted to call home and talk to the folks and my brother. My grandpa gave me a time limit to be on the phone because of long distance and I could only call 2 times a week.

7. About 10 years ago him and my dad were driving through town and some lady pulled out in front of my dad and he blasted her. Well my grandpa never wore his seatbelt and flew into the windshield busting it all to crap. After the ambulance got there, one of the paramedics came over and asked my dad who hit the windshield so my dad pointed at good ol' gramps!!! The paramedic went over and said sir we really need to take you to the hospital to have you checked out.......................grandpa replies......" How much does that cost?"

8. In one of the pastures at the farm, one of the bulls got mad and completely ruined one of the gates. So instead of spending the money to buy a new one or build one, he parked his farm truck where the gate was for like 5 months.

I know there are lots more funny ones, I just have to try to think of them!!!

What a tight wad huh???

~Nick

 

what a funny topic, thanks for the laughs

 

Had a room mate that was terribly, stupidly cheap and dumb.

I come home one day and start to make a sandwich. I go to put the mustard on and out comes a ton of yellow water. I wonder what the heck happened to my mustard. He tells me he took half of it out and put it in his mustard and filled them both up with water so it will last twice as long. I thought he was joking...nope.
Then I see that the remainder of my bread is showing some mold and toss it out. He takes it out of the trash and picks out the molded areas and saves the bread.

Next thing is we are in the USA going to get cars with my truck and 3 car hauler. Its his turn to fill up the tanks. I look over and here he is holding the hose way up from the other pump letting it drip into the slip tank...says theres a few ounces in each hose and carries on.

Then, when we are in Phoenix, he thinks he is putting his cars on my trailer for free and staying in my apartment for nothing. I tell him he needs to either buck up with some money or drive one of his cars back to Canada and come back for the others. He drove one back.
It gets better. I get to the border and the broker says I have a bill for the other car that came through earlier. He put it on my account. The broker adjusted my bill and called him up...LOL
Then, the next time I come through Customs is asking me all sorts of questions about a car that he cleared in my name. I knew nothing about it.
They tell me he falsified the bill to pay lower taxes but he said I paid in Canadian dollars...DOH! and then they called the previous owner, got the amount HE paid and then they did this...
Collected the money for the taxes and fees on what he declared and then charged him double on what he really did pay for it. The car was sitting there.
They said he hitch hiked back to the city to get more money.
Then I get a call from his dad yelling at me for not helping him out. Click.
I moved out that day.
Several months go by and an officer from weights and measures shows up at my door. Asking about a car that was brought across in my name with a mileage discrepency. Lets just say, daddy was angry at him again and he got what he deserved.

Cheap, dumb and dangerous all in one.

Scotty

 

Hearing the Grampa and Gramma stories really bring back the memories. They lived through some hard times and had to be frugal. Lost my Grandparents in the 90's. I sure do miss them.

 

You are an amateur My father in law has aprox. 10-15 acreas of lawn. He mows it every week (seems like he never stops...he has OCD in a big way). He uses an OLD riding mower that he bought used off someone. It keeps breaking and falling apart, but he patches it back together and keeps going. Last summer he bought a nice John Deere, with bagger, full cab, snow blower, tiller, etc. from a woman who just got divorced. He got a SCREAMING deal because he had helped her clean out her place. We thought he would be mowing in style. Well he brought it home, washed and waxed it, and mowed with it once just to try it. He assembled the cab and snow blower on it, and its sitting in his garage because he wants to sell it for a proffit. He finished up the summer using his beat-up old tractor, and won't run the new one!

His wife's car was an early 80's Grand Marquis. It finally crapped out for good after she was in an accident (when the throttle stuck). Now she won't drive again unless he buys a newer, decent car. He won't spend the money, and refuses to buy anything newer. He'll keep putting tons of money into the old beaters, but won't shell out a couple grand for something in the 90's. I won't buy new, but I at least buy modern!

As for the last one, I can relate. I was in an accident...rolled over my car. I told the police I didn't want an ambulance, but they called one anyway. I had to pay out close to $2000 out of my pocket for the ride and the ER checkup, just to have them tell me I would be fine. My insurance wouldn't cover it, since they only pay for ER visits if they are "life threatening", and since nothing was wrong, they didn't pay for the X-rays, ambulance ride, etc. I'll NEVER ride in a meat-wagon again!

Jim

 

Man I would have been thrilled to have done that on a riding mower!!!! That dang push mower is about as old as dirt and he wanted it all bagged not mulched. Well the bag on the mower holds about a farts worth of grass so I had to empty that pain in the butt about every 5 minutes!!! Plus I think the little kid he paid to mow it must have died from heat stroke because he hadn't mowed the grass in over 2 weeks so it was similar to the amazon!!
Next time he wants me to do that I'll drive to the farm and get the tractor with the bush hog on the back and it will take me about 10 minutes!!!

And then to boot, right after I was done, he asked me to fertilize the whole yard using one of them dang hand held fertilizer spreaders with the crank on the side....... YEAH FREEEEEEGIN RIGHT!!!


~Nick

 

Same here. Also Ziploc bags, egg cartons...

She won't write letters so she dosen't have to buy stamps. So one of her daughters bought her a computer so she can email and keep in touch, she learned to pay bills online to save money. (free dial-up)

 

My grandmother and her sister sent the same birthday card back and forth to each other through the mail for almost thirty years. It got to where there was almost no space left to sign it and the card was held together with a yard of scotch tape. Funny stuff.

I think we should be a little more like some of these older folks and not be so wastefull.

 

I am still laughing at this thread, and I remembered someone i had met who really takes the cake. This person was having septic problems, and instead of paying to have it fixed, he used to have guests "drop their load" in a paper bag, which he then burried in the back yard. The kicker is that this guy was an engineer for our company, and had plenty of money for the repairs. I heard this from several people who had been guests at his house, so that lowers the possibility that it was just a rumor. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that those guests didn't return for another visit...especially after a mexican meal.

Jim

 

My best friend hangs up his used paper towels to dry so he can use them again.

I think he fits the definition.

Steve

 

Hey I do the paper towl thing when working on the truck. Now my grandmother used to save coffee. I will turn the pot off and turn it back on after an hour or two as I drink coffee all day. She would make coffee and drink a cup, then put the rest into mason jars in the fridge. She also used to eat TV dinners. Half today and half tommorrow. My personal favorite was she refused to buy new clothing. Each winter she just added another layer. The last time I saw her before she died it took her half an hour to change for bed! She was a great woman but she was definatly stuck in her ways.