Tightwads

People have all kinds of personality and psychological quirks. Some folks are more likeable for them, and others, not so much. Few people like a tightwad, though the definition varies. There have been a few that accused me of that, but I’d disagree. I try to live within my means, and since I’ve rarely earned much in my lifetime, I have to be sensible on my spending. That’s different from hoarding money, for it’s own sake.

I already wrote a post about George of Aberdeen, so I won’t rehash his story. In a nutshell, he is old, living in a car, and eating at soup kitchens. But he has loads of money in the bank, owns property, and has a great income from a union pension and SS. That definitely classifies him as a miser.

My oldest brother had a brother-in-law named Chuck, who got in trouble with the IRS for failing to report income. He would open bank accounts in his nephews and nieces names to hide money in. After a stint in federal prison (the same time and place as Jim Bakker), he returned home and went back to hiding money from the government. But now, he would put the money in coffee cans and bury them on his property. Some of it, he hid in old cars, of which he had dozens parked on his land. My mom was visiting him once, and he pointed out some of his hiding places to her.
Chuck was known as a dangerous kook by his neighbors. He often sat on his porch with a shotgun across his lap. My brother went to check on him one day because the family hadn’t heard from him for awhile. He had died in his recliner a few days earlier and was all bloated up. A sister was his executor and didn’t know about the hidden money. She sold the old cars to be crushed for scrap, even though most were classics, like Mustangs and Firebirds. Worth way more than scrap! Plus there was money hidden in many of them. The property got sold by the same sister, without looking for the buried money. That sister just wanted quick money and didn’t ask advice from her siblings, and tried to cheat them out of their fair share of the estate. I wonder how much of the hidden money has been found?

I was chatting with David yesterday, the Canadian that is staying across the courtyard from me. He said that his best friend is a tightwad. He spent his whole life being a dishwasher and is now 66 years old. He lived with his parents until they died and inherited the property. He does little maintenance and David said the place is rotting away. He doesn’t trust banks and buries cash all over his place. He told David and offered to show him where it is all hidden, in case something happens to him. But David is well-off and didn’t want to know. The friend has always kept his spending to a minimum, except for two vices, drinking and smoking. David said that if he his friend ever quits his dishwashing job (where he now makes $19 an hour), he will probably die of alcoholism or lung cancer soon after. Because he would be doing both all the time, instead of just on weekends and evenings.

There was an old man that lived by Gary’s Market in Woodburn, the town where I grew up. He was friends with Gary, and told him about hiding lots of money in his books and walls of his house. One day, the old man died. After a couple days, Gary checked with the executor about buying the house, which was in really bad shape. But he was too late. A Russian man bought it and bulldozed it, building two new rental houses in its place. He didn’t know about the hidden money, so everything went into dumpsters and was hauled to the landfill.

I had a friend named Don. He was always kind of an asshole, and I grew tired of his constant badmouthing of women and minorities. So we don’t speak anymore. We used to work together on some construction jobs. Don was a miser and money-hungry, always looking for easy money. He would go to garage sales, looking for things to make money on, especially jewelry. He tried to never pay more than 10% of something’s true value. He had a big, heavy safe in his home to store his cash, guns, and valuable jewelry.  Once, he talked to me about building a large secret compartment in a cabinet, to have another place to hide valuables. But he couldn’t decide how he wanted it done and didn’t want to spend the money to have it built, so it never got done.
The one thing that Don was willing to spend money on was food. He was a good cook, but was also willing to pay for restaurant meals on occasion. He was super picky about quality, though, and wasn’t afraid to send food back or criticize the cook if he didn’t like it. He didn’t like to pay for anyone else’s food, whether a date or a friend. Only his own. He’s getting quite fat and has trouble with gout, making it painful to walk. I think he’s about 57-58 years old. He gets a big union retirement payment each month, so I think he’s pretty much quit working, other than scouting garage sales each weekend. 
His brother is also a miser. He lives in a dumpy apartment that he shares rent on with roommates. He had over $200k saved up years ago, and likely has much more now. He is into gaming, comics, and watching TV; but spends as little as possible on anything else.

I’m too much of a hedonist to be a miser. Money is to be spent on things that one enjoys. Right now, I’m spending money on traveling, which is far from a waste of resources to me. That’s been one of my favorite pursuits my whole life. I get to explore a place with interesting people and architecture. I’m living on a tighter budget, and in more primitive lodgings than most of my friends and family would put up with. But that enables me to stay here longer. And it really is not much hardship. I’m eating some great food, seeing some awesome sights, meeting interesting people, enjoying warm weather, doing a lot of book reading, going to a few movies, etc. That’s far from deprivation. Money is meant to be used. Not thrown away senselessly, but spent on what is of value to oneself.