What's the grossest thing you've done to save money?
It used to be that doing gross, desperate, unthinkable things to save a buck was reserved only for penny-pinching students.
Squeezing ketchup packets into a bottle. Using paper towels as coffee filters. That kind of thing.
But come on, this is 2010. Not only have we just endured the greatest financial pullback of the last 80 years, but the Internet age has made making or saving cash a common – and often anonymous – enterprise.
For instance, let’s say you can play Beethoven’s 7th in farts with your armpit. Or you can fold a dollar bill into a butterfly. Or you can paint your flabby gut to look like John Goodman and rap Roseanne lines out of your belly button. There’s a site for that.
On forums like Fiverr.com, users can post whatever services, tasks or random acts they can perform and sell them for $5. Other Fiverr surfers check up on your weird posts, see if your bizarre talent or offer warrants their five bucks and “buy” it off you. And people actually do this.
Or maybe, in your state of fiscal disarray, you’ve taken to selling your body in the least sexual way possible. Brand tattooing – having a company’s logo or slogan tatted on your body – is a well-known custom now. And so is “body mining,” the act of selling your blood/plasma/sperm/hair for quick cash.
Few all-natural entrepreneurs have made quite the splash a U.K. mom did earlier this month, when it was revealed by the Daily Mail she’d been selling her breast milk for $22 a bottle.
What’s weirder? That, or the fact the 26-year-old actually had a number of customers forking it over for 4 oz. containers of the stuff?
In any case, creativity is the greatest attribute of man, so it’s worth celebrating the odd, perhaps disgusting things we’ve done to help our finances.
So whether it’s stealing toilet paper from restaurants, re-using other people’s Laundromat dryer sheets or making that last piece of dental floss last four or five days, we ask:
What’s the weirdest/grossest/sickest thing you’ve ever done to save a buck?
By Jason Buckland, MSN Money
Posted by: Normskies | Jun 27, 2021 5:23:36 PM
why waste time & money (Shannon & hubby will like this)
just jump in the outside drop off bins before the clothes reach the store!
Posted by: Saarah | Jun 27, 2021 5:55:35 PM
Wow guys! such priceless advice! I wil be sure to do that. I was just going to say when you go mall shopping go to the 50-90% off rack first, but I like Shannon's advise better.
Posted by: nope | Jun 27, 2021 6:54:03 PM
"What comes around goes around" If you steal then other areas of your life will pay for it!
Posted by: coupon_queen | Jun 27, 2021 6:57:23 PM
i use coupons and walk away from the store legally taking tons of stuff for free or very very cheap
Posted by: tex mcoy | Jun 27, 2021 7:12:20 PM
how many of you people have rummaged through old furniture ie couches and chairs; looking for change???
Do people still check telephone booths for lost or forgotten change.//
I fear they are becoming a lost art.
Posted by: sniper | Jun 27, 2021 8:14:03 PM
Every penny saved is a penny earned, sell everything you dont need cars, toys, clothing, collectables, furnature, if your realy hard up, disconnect the internet tv phone etc. cut all costs you can. get rid of the freezer, especialy if its empty. Ur loosing green every day when you have anything ur not using or dont need pluged in.Dont use ur hot water. fill up the tub or a bucket a day b4 and wash with cold. it sucks but it aint as bad as freezing cold water pouring all over you. and stay away from restarants and bars.
thats how you save money.
Posted by: StaceyGirl | Jun 27, 2021 9:02:58 PM
This is the funniest thread I have read in a while lol
you guys crack me up - especially Shannon :p
One time I went to Mandrin with my ex's mom and she brougt ziplock bags and filled them with food and all the desserts, took everything home for next days lunch :p I was so mortified hahahaha
I need to save money for some upcoming trips and a wedding not sure if that will happen but you know I have everything I really need in my little house you just need to make an effort to stop buying things :) All I need really are a few cloths but ya thrift stores near Toronto and all the richy places sounds good I will do that next time :)
StaceyGirl
Posted by: A | Jun 27, 2021 10:34:08 PM
For the poster joeblow, they have breast milk at Vancouver Children's Hospital. For mothers who cannot make their own milk.
Posted by: Wife Beater | Jun 27, 2021 11:56:18 PM
Date really fat girls cuz they pay for everything...Shannon what you doing this weekend?
Posted by: bigd | Jun 27, 2021 11:59:46 PM
I already sell my wifes breast milk! She pumps so much and freezes it so i just dethaw it then sell it to people on kijiji! I also make mad cash selling her used panties!!
Posted by: Questionable Saving strat | Jun 28, 2021 12:23:12 AM
You want to know how to save save money.Stop showering.....You're only going to get dirty again anyway.
Posted by: shannon's trailer park cousin | Jun 28, 2021 7:04:47 AM
I shave off my ass hair every other week, dye it white with lots of bleach, stuff it in pillows and sell them as goose down. Nobody knows any different! Except if they cut the pillow open and realize it is ass pubes
Posted by: melanie | Jun 28, 2021 7:30:13 AM
Some of these are just plain stupid, for example get a job if your busy shop lifting products you need help... The easiest ways to save on money, is to switch to cloth diapers, if your in an apartment, get a drying rack and a wonder washer as seen on tv. They cost little and they work super well i should know i have 1. You can also do cloth baby wipes so that your not buying a fortune into them. Make your own products from cheap things and then sell them. Cut back on stupid things such as junk food. maybe try and grow a garden in summers and dehydrate the foods in order to have some for winter, or u can freeze them. Make your own baby foods. Breast feed instead of formula. OH and to people who are buying breast milk, im sure urs is just as good as others so use your own, if you cant then use formula but other peoples breast milk cant be healthy for your poor baby as u dont know what they have. Think smart to save smart people. A bottle of ceasar salad dressing and sum chopped peppers in pasta makes great cold pasta, even other salad dressings. oh or eating left overs i know can be sick but its possible.
Posted by: #1 Fan | Jun 28, 2021 9:51:15 AM
Good job Jason. Excellent article.
Posted by: Sprawiedliwy | Jun 28, 2021 10:50:40 AM
Don't buy window curtains, just hang old newspapers.
Posted by: Eve | Jun 28, 2021 11:03:55 AM
There is nothing gross about breast milk. There are many new mothers who cannot produce their own (mastectomies, multiple births, adoption, undergoing treatment for various illnesses including cancer and don't want to pass the drugs to their children through their milk) and who are delighted when they can feed their babies milk instead of formula. There are breast milk banks which are charities and do not pay the mothers who donate, but in order to have access you need to demonstrate a need greater than all the other mothers lined up. The demand far outstrips the available supply. If private entrepreneurs can make up some of that demand, good for them. That said, milk banks test for illness and treat their milk to make it safe, so I'm not sure I would just take her word for it.
Posted by: Shannon's long lost Father | Jun 28, 2021 6:53:23 PM
Shannon, I taught you not to steal... I only live at homeless shelters to save $400 on rent a month, go to the library to use their internet and computer so I don't have to purchase one. I do line up at events with your for free food though. You just keep lining up until you can stack up a week or 2 of food, it is all good as long as it doesn't go bad. At work, I lock myself up in the washroom to wash my clothes and dry them. After a HARD, LONG day, you can relieve some stress and sell the sperm to the sperm bank.
Posted by: lmfao | Jun 28, 2021 8:15:54 PM
lmfao wow am joe really? xD
Posted by: breastmilk | Jun 28, 2021 8:42:23 PM
i will sell my breastmilk
Posted by: Donor | Jun 28, 2021 11:47:39 PM
I can donate my sperm for free if your mouth is warm.