The Complete Tightwad Gazette
by Amy Dacyczyn
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Book Reviews of The Complete Tightwad Gazette
Book Review: wish I had this book years ago!
Summary: 5 Stars
This book really changed my life. I never was a 'spendthrift' but my tightwaddery career really begun with this book. I live in the Netherlands but many tips are universal. I bought this book 6 months ago and have already saved hundreds of euro's. Not everything is applicable, some because I don't want to (dumpster diving) and some because they are specifically for Americans. I disagree with the comments that the book is too extreme: if you are financially challenged, you will try anything. I had to laugh at some comments from readers on possible child abuse: if Ms Dacyczyn is abusing her children, than so is the majority of the world's population. The USA is by far the richest country in the world, one should think in a wider perspective than `mainstream america' before making such serious accusations.
My husband and I started a business two years ago. We don't make a lot of money yet. Last year we had to withdraw some money from savings (savings made a few years ago in orde to buy a house in the future) to make ends meet. But now we manage to get by on a very low income - and I feel richer than ever before! We live in a rental house with 3 kids and we are even able to own a car, which in the Netherlands is very expensive to own due to taxes and fuelprices. We are not only making ends meet but even saving on a minimum income. We would like to buy a house in a couple of years. I can now actually see it happening, where a year ago we felt bad about not being able to make more money with our business.
The real change is about changing your behavior and your attitude towards money. We started to feel good about buying second hand clothes. I live in a relatively rich area, where real-estate prices are high, but the market for second hand clothes is very good. I am able to dress our family of five almost completely from thrift shops, including designerclothes. I have read the book three times from cover to cover in the past 6 months and I have just started all over again. Each time I reread it I see new things that I missed earlier. I wish I had this book years ago, I can't bear to think of all the money we wasted!
Book Review: Guerilla frugality for the masses
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is the culmination of six years of Amy Dacyczyn's "The Tightwad Gazette" newsletter, a paper dedicated to all things thrifty. The book is organized into three sections (each section was originally its own book), that each cover two years of the newsletter's run, as well as some extra bits here and there. The structure is loose - reading like a huge stack of back issues of the newsletter, and includes feature stories, editorial-style comments, and letters and tips from readers.The author's tone is friendly, practical, and logical, and the book goes far beyond simple tips for living a frugal life. In fact, Dacyczyn extols the merits of living life on your own terms, instead of on society's terms, using frugality as a vehicle to get fulfillment out of life. On the way, she dishes out some sound suggestions for things like quality of living, child-rearing, and of course, tons and tons of demonstrations of HOW to cut costs in your own life.
I was amazed at how detailed some of Dacyczyn's comparisons and plans were - some demonstrating how you could save a few pennies (they add up), or some larger and more dramatic strategies for saving a lot more money. Through all, Dacyczyn's committment to complete ethics within the framework of frugality (never practice frugality at the expense of others) is emphasized.
Although reading the entire book in a few sittings may feel a bit overwhelming (it is six years' worth of info, after all), there are some core strategies that are very worth the price of the book. If nothing else, this book will cause you to evaluate how you spend your money, what you spend it on, and what you could be using it for, as well as perhaps motivate you to tighten up your budget a little (or a lot).
This book is highly entertaining, very inspiring, and extremely motivational. And although I am making it sound rather theoretical, the book is actually mostly hands-on and practical.
Frugality is an extreme art, but one that has afforded many people with the means to truly live and enjoy life the way they choose to. Both the book and the lifestyle are definitely worth taking a look at.
Book Review: I laughed and laughed, but did not get many good ideas.
Summary: 2 Stars
I read this book and shared it with a friend. We both thought that it was an interesting and often hysterical look an alternative lifestyle, but that it was not terribly useful to us.First of all, the author and her family live in the-back-of-beyond rural Maine, where being a little "eccentric" is perhaps less problematic than for most of us in the real world. Also, the author's hard-nosed approach to saving money at all costs struck us as very cold sometimes, such as when she said she tried putting Desitin ointment on one-half of her baby's diaper rash to see if it healed faster with the cream. It didn't, so she concluded that she didn't need to spend money on it. However, she didn't consider that perhaps the treated rash FELT BETTER to the baby as it healed. Same with her attitude about meals: her kids are "disciplined" if they don't clean their plates, and they MUST eat whatever she puts in front of them, whether they like it or not. She claims this prevents picky eaters, and I'm sure she's right -- but what other eating problems might that cause down the road? In another section she devotes several pages to "dumpster diving" -- I thought I'd hurt myself laughing -- is she serious? She also devotes endless pages to describing how to calculate the cheapest meal ingredients, down 1/10 of a cent in some cases. She says this is fun! She also says she gets a thrill from wearing socks with holes in them, and testing to see how little detergent she can use on diapers before they seem to bother the baby. Of course, it's her life and she's entitled to her choices, but I think for most of us these are not choices that make sense. Unless, of course, you think it's fun to spend 30 minutes with a calculator to find out that one muffin recipe is 4/10ths of a cent cheaper than another. I also found it annoying that references in the text often sent me to pages that did not contain the promised information.Book Review: Good For A Laugh
Summary: 3 Stars
Overall I enjoyed this book as a comedy piece. It seemed on every page there was something my husband and I could giggle at. There were a few good money-saving ideas in here, but some of it was downright ridiculous.
This might be a good book for you if you are absolutely desperate to find new ways to save a penny or two here and there, and don't mind looking tacky in the process.
In her defense, the author warns herself that some of these suggestions are unsanitary if not downright dangerous. Re-using styrofoam containers from raw meat comes to mind, as well as the whole section on dumpster diving. In short, you have to read through a lot of junk to get to any helpful advice. (Hopefully most parents would opt to go on welfare before digging through other people's trash for food!)
As we are looking for a new house I had hoped to find some good advice on that but her advice is dangerous; old houses can have anything from lead paint to asbestos to gas leaks or lead in the pipes and so on. Some things are simply not worth the savings.
Many of the other ideas were very outdated and no longer true. For example nowadays with the rising price of cheese, a homemade pizza will run you at least $8.50. Several of her other tricks I calculated myself and did not come up with any savings. So on most things you will have to do your own math if you want to know the true cost with today's prices.
The only other complaint I have with this book is that it's very unorganized. It's not broken down by subject at all, just short newsletters on various topics which I found irritating.
I reccomend you check this book out at the library before buying. You might find some gems amongst the muck, and you WILL at least have a good laugh. But if you want to buy a more useful book on this subject, I reccomend Miserly Moms as it is much better (and smaller!!).
Book Review: Well worth it...
Summary: 4 Stars
I am leading a frugal life these days after getting out of the rat race and finding that I have a great desire to not be a working stiff. Working part-time means an iron fisted budget. "Your Money or Your Life" is what got me started on this path, and "The Tightwad Gazette" was published with people like me in mind. I had heard about the newsletter for years, and finally thought to read this book.
As other reviewers have noted, frugality isn't a religion. You can pick or choose how involved you want to be. For me, the crucial discovery has been that there are many things I can abstain from without noticing a huge difference in the quality of my life. I will never give up travel... it is an essential part of my life. But there are other day-to-day things I don't miss at all. Since reading this book a few months ago, I have started making my own pizza and bread (VERY good suggestion; it cuts the price in half and is surprisingly easy to make, even without a food processor), I'm more conscious of turning off lights, and I've assembled a price book. None of this was difficult and it was fun. In the first two months, I managed to save $300 from an already meager budget.
What is difficult about this? Like any habit, it is a discipline. I have lost hours making bread dough, bargain hunting, and making my own tomato sauce. But I find that I enjoy the feeling of taking care of myself and not wasting money. I had great fun assembling the price book. I now know the lowest prices to expect for a lot of items, and it's fun to be on top of things.
As a single person, a lot of "The Complete Tightwad Gazette" did not apply to me. I skimmed over sections on kids' craft projects and clothes issues, of which there are a lot. I would say I picked up only a few ideas I'll implement over the long term, but it was still fun reading about others' habits. This is a fun book, well worth the price.