Today I have a serious question that I’m hoping you can answer: am I being frugal or cheap?
It all starts with the photo to the left: tiny, ugly, landscaping rocks.
When we bought our house we knew we’d have a number of projects. We plan on going the DIY route whenever possible, and landscaping is one of those things we will try to do ourselves.
While there are many things we can do ourselves, hauling thousands of pounds of landscaping rock is not one of them. So we have to get rid of them somehow, but it would be expensive to have someone come and haul them away.
I’ve seen countless people giving away landscape rock for free on Craigslist (I’m assuming you’ve seen the free section of Craigslist??). Problem is, this is not landscape rock that anyone would want, especially not one that they would come and dig up and haul away themselves.
So we are stuck with having to pay someone to haul away the rocks. Let’s be honest: no one wants to pay someone $1,000+ to haul away landscape rock.
Here’s my (frugal or cheap?) solution: put it in the trash can.
You may be wondering how I plan on putting a ton of landscape rock in the trash can without it getting too heavy. After all, after even a couple buckets of rock would make the trash can heavy.
Well…we’ve been putting rock in the trash can every week for months now, and will continue to do it until all the rocks are gone. Yes, this could take months and months…if not years.
Being a type-A personality I even checked with the garbage company to make sure they were fine with me putting landscape rock in the trash can. They were fine with it as long as it doesn’t get too heavy.
For now I’m moving all the rocks in the front of the house to the back. That way we can put mulch in the front and work on that. Eventually we’ll deal with the backyard, but hopefully by then we would have siphoned a decent chunk of the rock pile out through the trash.
Here’s a big section I’ve already cleared. Next step will be to lay down landscaping fabric, spread a bunch of mulch on top, and then pick out some new plants/shrubs.
It’s going to look great!
But this blog post isn’t about how good my landscaping will look when it’s all said and done, it’s about whether I’m being frugal or cheap by slowly getting rid of rocks through our garbage pickup?
Let me know: am I being frugal or cheap? I’m also curious to hear what the most frugal – or cheap – thing you’ve ever done to save money.
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We already decorated our Christmas tree and I can say that we had a frugal decoration because we used the same decorations last year. We only bought a new set of Christmas lights, my mom also used her old large pot as a Christmas tree.
Frugal all the way! My boyfriend has been throwing away things through his trash every week for the last 6 months as he redoes his entire house, including large pieces of furniture and wood from outside. I think if they’ll take it, why wouldn’t you do it this way if they’ll do it for free?
At first blush I’d say you’re just being frugal. The question that would come in for me is if the delay in just getting rid of it all would delay you from other projects you were wanting to do due to still having some of it around. If it were, I *might* be inclined just to pay to get it removed, but if that’s not an issue then I’d likely do the same as you.
I don’t think that you’re being cheap! If you can do it yourself, then why not? I would hate spending money to pay someone to do something like that.
I don’t think you’re being cheap either. Have you tried Craigslist though? One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. :-)
I think your idea is full of all kinds of awesome…..because I’ve done the exact same thing. Although not with landscaping rock. We did a complete home declutter a few years ago and had bags and bags and bags of crap that we wanted to toss (not in good enough condition to sell in a garage sale or donate). It would have cost us money to take to the disposal site ourselves, and extra to have so many bags picked up by our garbage company. So…I threw away one extra bag a week for 3 months. Eventually they were all gone, and it didn’t cost me a cent. :)
As long as there are know huge environmental impacts (and why would it, it’s rock!) then I think that’s smart. I’d hate to pay that much too. But have you tried CL? You’d be surprised at the things people want! Or freecycle if it’s available in your area.
I mean, seriously, $1k for that? I would do the same.
At $1K to haul away, I say you’re just being frugal. Did you have to haul it to your backyard first though? That is a lot of work. And that is ugly landscaping rock. Don’t blame you for wanting to get rid of it. If it was nice riverstone rock, it would be a different story. Do you have a friend with a truck? You could load up wheelbarrows and then dump it all in the country. Or pay someone who has a truck to help you for $50 or something if you want to get rid of it quickly.
Do you not have any friends or relatives with a pick up truck? If not, rent a pick up truck for a day, borrow a couple shovels (or buy them at HD), get those couple friends over who owe you a favor and load the truck up and dump it off at the local landfill. Including beer and pizza payment, this would be done for less than $200. It’ll be a long Saturday, but think of it as a workout… Good luck.
I think that it is being frugal, although, I would probably make sure to tip my local garbagemen during the process so that they wouldn’t hate me. $1,000 is absolutely unreasonable, though.
I bet if you piled it all up in a pile, someone would want it. Even if it’s ugly, people can’t resist free stuff. Otherwise, I would probably do the same thing. I don’t know if they do it in your area, but here, you can have the garbage company bring a big dumpster to your house and they will haul it away when you’re ready. I don’t know how much it is, but it’s way less than $1K.
Frugal 100% especially since the city gave you the ok DC. I would not want to pay $1K+ to haul away rock!
Clarisse @ Make Money Your Way I think re-using Christmas decorations is a great way to save money. We do the same thing.
As long as it’s not breaking any local laws and not preventing you from doing any other projects I say definitely frugal. I would actually do the same thing myself you pay for garbage collection with your taxes so you might as well use it to the max.
theFinancegirl My thought exactly. If I’m already paying for weekly trash pickup and I verified that what I’m putting in the trash can is fine, why wouldn’t I slowly get rid of stuff?
FrugalRules That’s an interesting variable that I’ve actually thought about quite a bit. I currently have the rock pile in our backyard where ideally I would add a deck down the road (or I should say demolish the current one and extend it). I can’t do much until that pile is gone, though. But with that being said, there are other parts of the house I want to invest in before paying for a deck, so I should be fine on that front.
Holly at ClubThrifty I knew you’d agree with me, Holly! I think it’s the right way to go. Plus, with Winter taking up half the year here I have lots of opportunities to get rid of rocks before the thaw next Spring.
Laurie TheFrugalFarmer There are a lot of landscaping rocks on Craigslist, almost all that are nicer than ours : / I don’t think anyone would take these unless we paid them.
Seems frugal to me – that’s a huge chunk of change to move it, plus I think you’ll get some extra satisfaction for yourself once you finish the job.
As for my own similar situation, I once was moving from one furnished apartment sublet to another. Not much stuff to move — probably about three suitcases’ worth, plus some other random stuff that wouldn’t fit in the bags. Could I have fit it all in a cab? Sure. But money was tight at the time and I would have hated to spend probably $50 (including tip) on the cab when I could have….that’s right, I lugged the suitcases one by one on the subway up to the new place. It took a few hours and I was totally exhausted at the end (and let’s be real, it probably fell closer to ‘cheap’ than ‘frugal’) but I still felt pretty good about it!
DebtChronicles Yeah I think I’m doing the right thing here. There’s no reason to pay extra for someone to haul them away. After all, I’m in no rush to have them cleared out. That’s awesome you did something similar!
Beachbudget I’ve looked at CL but unfortunately these rocks are in honestly the worst condition. They couldn’t be used for landscaping and I’m not sure it’s recommended to use rocks like this when grading. So I think I’m out of luck there.
brokeandbeau Landscaping can get expensive quick! I think it’s mainly because of the difficulty of moving stuff that’s that heavy and the fact that to make it worth someone’s time they’d have to get a bobcat or some other heavy machinery to speed up the process.
debt debs Well we’ve been putting it in the trash for quite some time now so there wasn’t TOO much we had to move to the back, but yes it’s been a lot of work moving it. We are almost done with the front yard, though, and then we’ll just throw a couple bucketfuls in the trash each week throughout the Winter. Those are two good ideas but we just aren’t in a rush so we’ll probably just stick with our original plan.
kjurz Hmm that’s definitely a possibility, and something I’d consider if we weren’t so far along. I guess if it takes too long to get the pile down and we want to landscape back there I’d consider it. I might have to do this when I rebuild our retaining wall and have a lot of dirt to get rid of.
blonde_finance Well, like the garbage rep said, as long as you don’t fill the garbage too heavy we should be fine. So we don’t put too much in there and it’s an automated lift so the garbageman isn’t lifting it himself.
Eyesonthedollar Hmm I would consider the dumpster for sure if I was doing my retaining wall project. I might go that route for that. With this I think we are far enough along that I don’t have as much motivation to go alternative routes, but I appreciate the tip!
Kassandra @ More Than Just Money : ) It IS a lot of work moving the rock, but I think it’s worth the $ savings, especially because we have so many things we want to do to our house.
thebrokeprof Yep, and we have a big garbage bin so we want to get our money’s worth. There was one week I thought I filled it too heavy but they took it all and didn’t leave a note. So far so good!
Molly at FeeX Hey, if you have the time why not? I did something similar when moving. When my wife and I got our apartment and I moved out of my parents (I was there for a 2 month stint transitioning between places) I would fill up my car the night before, go to work, and then swing by the apartment and unload. I did this a number of times. It was a bit exhausting and definitely felt “cheap” but it worked out well for me.
It seems frugal to me. You checked with the garbage company to make sure it was okay and are following their rules. $1k is a lot of money to pay to get someone to remove them. Are you absolutely sure no one would take them from free from Craiglist? I know you said they not the nice landscaping rocks but I am often surprised what people are willing to take for free. Knowing you, you are already looked into it, but I just had to throw it out there because people love free stuff. :)
I vote for frugal. You’re being responsible about it and aren’t breaking any laws or endangering yourself or others. Maybe you could try and pass them off for free on Craigslist as “rocks for craft supplies” or “lots of pet rocks” or “free paperweights” :)!
Haha, quite the conundrum. That price tag you listed is certainly steep. Although I wonder if at some point, after having trashed enough of the rocks, if the price wouldn’t come down to haul the rest away? For a couple hundred dollars, it might be worth it. I say frugal here though. Not cheap. Funny, but not cheap.
As for the landscaping, make sure you have your plants ready before you lay the mulch. Moving the mulch, then cutting holes for the plants in the fabric will be a pain. We know, we made that mistake this summer :)
I think you are being cheap. Wouldn’t the “haul-away” price come under “things you have to pay for when you own a house”? You are already saving money by doing the landscaping yourself and I am sure if you looked around or put in a Help wanted ad in Craigslist it wouldn’t cost $1000.00 to haul away rock. Of course, to each his own but if my husband told me that was his game plan I would tell him to get a another job because no way am I going to wait for him to get rid of the rocks in the manner that you have described.
mallorysal while it is costs that go under owning a house, anyway to cut costs would help out, and $1K is a huge chunk of money that could go to a better project. I vote frugal, and i would probably do the same thing, although I’d most likely help my husband load his truck and we’d get rid of the rock faster.
I wouldn’t pay $1,000 for that, either. Plus you checked with the garbage collectors and they said it’s fine, so you’re good. Rocks are a pain – my parents had the same type in the front of the house, and often thought of moving it, but it was a bit too much work for them.
Mrs. Frugalwoods Uh, yeah. We are currently getting rid of old carpet for free, 2 4ft wide rolls at a time, each trash day. We definitely vote “frugal”.
Still think you should try to get someone to take them for free from Craigslist though. People want the weirdest things… It costs nothing to try!
Frugal! $1000 is a lot of money to pay someone to haul away rock. If you have the time and patience to wait for it to slowly be taken away I’d totally do it week by week and spend that $1000 somewhere else.
You’re being frugal. Save your money. I would do the same thing.
ShannonRyan I didn’t put an ad on CL, but the landscaping rocks I saw were in MUCH better condition than ours. There’s also quite a bit of dirt mixed in with them, so I don’t see them being taken.
Mr Frugalwoods Mrs. Frugalwoods I could give it a try! They are mixed with dirt and some are permanently gray from being near the dryer vent. I really just don’t see it happening : /
FIBigSky Pretty sure I’m making the same mistake : ) At this point I don’t really want to rush picking out plants, so I’m focused on getting the rocks moved and landscape fabric laid down. I realize it will be more work when we do plant, but oh well.
NewlywedsonaBudget mallorysal It’s a fair criticism, which is why I wrote this post. Granted I know most of my readers – especially those who comment – would agree that it was frugal ;) We are in no rush, really, and want to save money on our home upgrades. If we can get rid of the haul-away that’s a lot of money we could allocate to another project/renovation. I don’t mind sacrificing a bit of time in this case for the big $ savings.
JourneytoSaving I don’t blame them, it’s a ton of work! But we are in our 20s and willing to put in the work. Our next home I will really be looking for a lot of stuff to already have been done, but for now we’re willing to put in some sweat equity and have a little patience.
Jason @ The Butler Journal Thanks for giving your opinion, Jason! It’s definitely some $ saved for other projects – or just to pay down debt.
StudentDebtSurvivor That’s the thing. It would be really nice to have someone else do it, but honestly it just takes some work and patience. I’ll use the $1,000 to pay an electrician to do work that I don’t have the expertise to do.
Along with the majority of commenters, I think you are being frugal. Since the city says it’s OK to use your trash pickup, I don’t see anything wrong with what you are doing.
Do you have a Freecycle group in your area? I see stuff posted on there all the time that seems weird, but then later I’ll see a post that it’s been taken. It’s an organization dedicated to keeping things out of the landfill. http://www.freecycle.org.
I think you’re following the rules. If you wanted it faster, you’d pay for it, right?
AverageJoeMoney Definitely! We are willing to wait. I’ll take the $1k and put it towards some other home project (or savings…or debt paydown…etc.).
CariCook I haven’t heard of freecycle before, but it sounds like a good option. I don’t know if anyone want the dirt/rock mix that I have right now. I don’t know what it could be used for.
If you’re saving $1k by doing this I would definitely do it as well. I think it was a wise choice.
Have you tried offering it for free on craigslist? Sometimes people don’t need it for prettyness, they need it for other purposes. It might expedite your efforts, you never know?
moneypropeller I don’t really think this can be used for anything, not even for filling in land. There is better dirt and options available for free if you are trying to backfill a retaining wall, for example. But yes lots of people are suggesting this in the comments.
Practical Cents I am really happy with the amount of money I am saving by taking this approach. It’s going to take hours of my time, but ultimately it’s time that I wouldn’t be spending working. I won’t go so far as saying it’s relaxing, but it’s nice to do a different sort of work for once.
It’s crazy! We paid money to have rocks brought in and then you have to pay if you want them gone too. I say frugal. Who wants to spend money on rocks? It’s too bad you can’t sell them because people do pay for rocks. We did !!! Ugh. Don’t even want to think about it.