Oh.
It's very important for me to keep everything covered with plastic because I
want to try to keep that resale value intact when I try to sell the house.
Four years ago, locomotive engineer Todd Moriarty covered nearly his entire house in
protective wrapping.
He's lived this way ever since.
People laugh. I mean, they come into my garage, they come into my house or like, you
know, what are you, the bubble boy?
They can laugh. I don't care.
I'm laughing all the way to the bank when I sell this baby.
By sacrificing comfort for savings.
Todd estimates he's able to save nearly 95% of his $90,000 annual salary, spending only
$4,500 per year on necessities.
When I bought the house, it came with an electric garage door opener.
But you know what? I disconnected.
I thought, you know, why pay all this money?
If I kept that thing running every day, it would cost me a dollar 20 per day, up to $438
a year. I mean, that's ridiculous.
Following his recent divorce, Todd plans to sell his home and hopes his extreme measures
will pay off.
My ex-husband, Todd, is always constantly trying to save money every day, every hour,
every minute. It's always on his mind.
It's part of who he is.
I love Todd, and we're friends to this day.
But I will have to say that his cheap ways and cheap habits and quirks were a factor in
us getting a divorce.
One of the habits he has is collecting bottles.
Todd will collect bottles and cans anywhere, any time, and he doesn't even care like,
what's in it. Yeah, it's gross.
I mean, people just throw these things away like it's just trash.
But I see money later.
I see dimes all over the place.
One time we were driving and he stopped on the highway because he saw a bottle on the
highway.
On a weekly basis. I would say I probably find about 2 to 300 pop bottles and cans
around the city.
So yeah, I mean, it adds up.
Todd and I met on an online dating service.
Todd was not paying for it and I was paying for it.
Red flags. I realized pretty quickly that he was different from anyone else I had dated
before. One Christmas, Todd bought me Doritos and chocolate chips for Christmas and
I cried hard.
I think my habits did get to her.
After a while. She would sometimes joke and say that she was on the crazy train.
No pun intended. Since I drive trains.
She got off the crazy train.
But I'm running the trains.
I'm going straight down the track and I can do whatever I want.
Right now I've got some clothes in Ziploc bags.
I don't have to put them in the washing machine.
It actually kills the bacteria by having them in here.
That way I save on laundry detergent, I save on time.
I don't have to use electricity to run my washing machine.
I've had clothes since high school.
And you believe that? Okay.
This is a pair of jeans.
This pair here I bought these 15 years ago.
Look at that. Like brand new.
Yeah. It's like. Like I just bought them.
The average refrigerator uses around 350 kilowatts of electricity per year by tightly
packing his fridge with clothes, cookware and canned goods.
Todd cuts his energy use by nearly 10%.
The refrigerator doesn't cycle on as much, and it doesn't produce or consume as much
electricity. Just pack up your fridge with anything you can find.
I don't care. I don't care that some people might think that some of my habits over at
the tap now, I mean, I got clothes in my refrigerator, for God's sakes.
I mean, that's pretty cheap.
That's one of the things about Todd is he doesn't care about comfort.
He cares about saving money.
There's no need for me to use the washing machine because it just cost too much money.
I could just reuse the water right here.
There's a lot of wear and tear on your clothes in the washing machine.
I'm able to wash my clothes in here and my clothes.
My clothes last for years because my hot tub is not going to add any value to the house.
I decided to use it for multi purposes for everything that I can think of.
It costs about $15 a month to take a ten minute shower every day.
And that adds up by using my hot tub.
I would say I'm saving about 30 to $40 a month.
That way I don't have to use my appliances.
Could turn off the hot water heater.
This hot tub, I mean, this thing is a money saved.
I mean, this is like a cash cow for me.
I think it's a stroke of genius myself.
I think that all of Ted's free time is spent preserving the value of things that he has.
I'm planning on selling this car and I want to try to get the best deal I can.
This car is ten years old, and you would not know that by looking at it.
If I were to sell my car, I think I could probably get 3000 for fair condition and 6000
for good condition easily.
I've got plastic not only on the the dashboard and on the steering wheel, but I've
got it on the seats. I've got it on the floor mats.
Most cars get a lot of that weathered look and a lot of the sun just bleaches a lot of
the plastic. But I don't get that in my car.
My car is just perfect.
I mean, it's as good as the day I bought it.
I have no idea how Todd is able to drive in that car with all that plastic.
He has no pride.
I was drawing some clothes in the dryer and I thought, Why am I spending money when I can
just, you know, put them in the back of my car and drive them in there?
And I did it a couple of times and it worked like a champ.
I think the clothes line and the car is ridiculous.
I can afford to dry his clothes in the dryer.
Oh, I saw.
The average car in on a warm day can soar up to about 150 degrees.
It only takes about two or 3 hours for my clothes to dry in the back seat.
Air drying saves Todd $0.45 per load of laundry or approximately $100 a year.
I mean, to me, this is like really the only way to go.
Uh. Each of my stops each day is contingent on timing in order to get the best deals and
the best bargains.
Grocery stores usually discount near expired food toward the end of the day.
So Todd has this thing where he goes to the store and he peruses the fish and meats and
looks at the dates.
So he'll buy all the the fish that's on clearance that they're about to throw out,
and he eats that.
That's disgusting.
When I get something cheap, when I find a good deal, I feel really good.
That makes my day.
Canny, good deals on seafood today.
I do. What you're looking for.
Anything that's going to be past its expiration date.
Do you have anything that's old, anything expired?
You know, if the packages are broken open, I'll take a look.
There you go. Here's the deal.
See that one broken? Yeah.
You can have it for half price.
What about this one? This one's looking a little brown.
Yeah, go ahead. I'll take that for $0.99.
How's that sound?
Yeah, it's kind of. Kind of.
Kind of cheap.
What do you give me on that one?
I see a lot of that one.
Looks like it's been opened up.
That's cool. $0.99.
I'll take that for $0.99.
But it's this.
99 something that's back in the 1950s.
Well, I'm just looking for a deal.
How old is this? Is there an expiration date on this one?
You want $0.99?
$0.99. Go for it.
I estimate that I probably save about $75 a month on expired groceries that most people
don't want. And I save me up to about $900 a year when I'm satisfied knowing that it's the
lowest price I can get, then I buy it all, throw it in my freezer, and I'm living like a
king.