Meanest/ thriftiest thing you’ve ever heard of

DH is not at all mean but he will keep commenting on the price of petrol wherever we go!

"Oh look, it's 2p a litre more here than at that garage we passed earlier" etc ad nauseum 😁

I remember a neighbour say “ I can’t wait to see my friend’s faces when they see how much money I have left”
She couldn’t believe why we looked at her with horror.

I’m following this for tips👍😁

I remember as a teenager going to stay on a farm in North Wales with our ‘gang’, strapping girls and boys. Every morning for breakfast we had a cup of tea and one boiled egg.

I do get two cups out of one teabag…

My MIL left an estate of nearly a million pounds - 40% of which went in inheritance tax. She was loathe to spend any money and downright mean when it came to birthdays or Christmas. The only pleasure she seemed to get from it was totting up how much she'd got. I think she would have liked to withdraw it all as cash and just sit looking at it

My friend always has the cheapest thing on the menu, not the food she really wants. And more recently she now eats at home beforehand and sits with me in the café or pub with her glass of free tap water. She gathers up sugar, ketchup and other condiment sachets to take home. At a recent get together for another friend's birthday in the pub my friend and husband shared one glass of lemonade and passed it between them all evening.

Most of these examples seem to me to be thrift, rather than meanness. Many people in the past could not manage without these economies, when every penny, and I do mean penny, counted. Then it becomes a habit that is hard to break.
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I had a couple of dates with a chap. He then invited me back to his house for coffee. His house was large and very impressive . I thought I was on to a winner. However, after coffee I needed to go to the bathroom . On the plastic rack over the bath was a very large assortment of small end bits of soap. They looked awful. I asked him what all the bits of soap were in aid of. He intended melting them down to make several big bars and said he didn't believe in wasting anything and that every penny counted. I knew then that I wouldn't be seeing the tight devil again.

I just remembered, my cousin lived next door to a woman who had a husband and two children. When either of them went shopping they would ask the other if they needed anything and one day my cousin was asked to get a quarter of a pound of sausages from the butcher’s for the family’s evening meal. My cousin was so embarrassed she told the butcher they were for an old lady who lived next door to her.

I have a friend,no mortgage she works part time,no kids,no mortgage. Her husband sits outside of the shop,while she goes in shopping,so he can charge his electric car for free.

I absolutely cannot bear miserliness. Or people free loading off others. I knew someone who would join a group going for an Indian. She wouldn't order anything, just asked the waiter for a plate and then helped hetself to 'a little bit of this and a little bit of that' from the shared dishes. When the bill came it was split betwen the people who had ordered. Drove me mad- but she wasnt my friend and I was a newbie.
Another one is occasional guests who bring a bottle and take it back home with them..!! Seriously.
Others..reading the newspaper in the shop. ....watering down the milk....squuezing the life out of the tube of toothpaste... knicking loo rolls from pubs....as already mentioned- not leaving tips 'on principle'
Hideous. Ironically none of the above examples are poor people..!!

Oh and one final example. An acquaintdnce who only ever has a cup of hot water in a cafe. When I am with her I feel duty bound to buy myself a cold drink, a hot drink and a bun to compensate.

Inheriting a 6 figure sum in the UK is not that unusual. Sell the house, divide in it 2 or 3 and most people will have 100 000 if the house was good value.

Good for the sisters for eating what they want. I don't eat expensive stuff and absolutely love soups and breads, plus eggs. Ready corn breakfast is not for me and tinned soup not always but it would be my own choice what I do and yes, my child will inherit a good sum, and perhaps will have inheritance from 3 different people. Good for her.

I once had a ‘friend’ who would buy a large latte at a motorway service station and then decant half of it into a mug for her husband. On the odd occasion they joined us for a pub lunch they would order one lunch and two plates. They both had good, well paid jobs. The meanness got to us and we haven’t seen them for years.

Why do people have this mania for reusing slivers of soap? Soap cost about £1.50 per bar and I buy perhaps 2 a year, plus I get given a couple for Christmas.

We did a city break in Paris years ago with another couple . Went B & b in a hotel and at lunchtime my dh had checked out some places on trip advisor. Our friends said let’s have a picnic and produced bread , cheese and meat from the breakfast buffet . Which had been sweating in their rucksack as it was quite warm . We said no way . It was our last trip with this couple .

A woman I used to go to a craft group with was SO mean but lived in a huge house which she sold for £950,000 before buying two cheaper ones in different counties.

When the group all went for a meal she always chose the cheapest meal on the menu, never a dessert and never a drink.
She asked for her 50p back after I suggested we all round up to next £ so we could leave the waitresses a tip.

My grandmother used to put ends of soap in a jam jar with some water. It would turn into a gooey mess that she then used for laundry and washing up. It was before the shops were full of Washing powders and washing up liquid.

Waste not, want not!

In the 1960s when my son was small I cleaned for a couple who lived in a big house. My wage was 19 shillings and sixpence for 4 hours work 2 days a week. She used to give me a pound note and I had to give her sixpence change. At Christmas she told me to keep the sixpence as it was Christmas. Then she asked me if I liked raspberries. When I said yes she produced 2 big bags from her massive chest freezer. She carefully weighed out 2 ounces on her kitchen scales. A few too many fell out so she took them back. She told me I needn't worry about them having been sprayed as they had been given to her by her neighbour. So my Christmas present was sixpence and 2 ounces of somebody else's raspberries! I once cut my hand quite badly before going to her house. I put plasters on. I said I was sorry but it might impede me a bit doing the work, but I would wear a rubber glove. She said "make sure you don't bleed on my furniture".

Like BlueBelle I reuse pretty wrapping paper and stick my old thin soap onto the new bar.

Using soap "ends" for hand-washing delicate fabrics is a good idea. You can grate it in a mouli grater if you have larger chunks.

...maybe I'm odd but I don't have a problem with this sort of thing. It's not even really "thrift" surely?

Thrift is making new gloves from the leather of old jackets/boots and side-to-middling your sheets - surely.

watermeadow

Why do people have this mania for reusing slivers of soap? Soap cost about £1.50 per bar and I buy perhaps 2 a year, plus I get given a couple for Christmas.

Quality soap is much more than this and is totally lush!

I suppose we use quite a lot (and different types)- two washbasins, shower, bath, kitchen sink...

I love soap. Why waste it?

Occasionally John Lewis give a voucher to loyalty card members for a regular sized drink and a cake in the cafe.

I saw a well dressed couple sharing their purchase. I could understand sharing a cake, but not a drink!

nanna8

Someone we used to go out to restaurants with used to collect everyone’s cash,including all the tips and then pay the exact amount owed on his credit card, pocketing the tips. A couple of us worked out what he was doing so after that we all paid separately. It really wasn’t worth it for him- he lost his reputation and the trust of the rest of us. He was, needless to say, the richest person in the group !

We knew someone who did that, it grated even more when we found out as she and her husband would always seem to be the ones who benefited from dividing the bill.
We now all paid separately too.

Littleannie. I think the woman you cleaned for was beyond mean!

* pay not paid. Duh!