I am no longer FRUGAL!

I'm with ya! I ALWAYS ALWAYS find a deal on my room, because it's stupid to pay 3x as much for the same thing with 5 minutes of googling can turn up a better rate. But when I'm there, screw it. Compared to almost any other travel destination if I'm staying in a fancy 4 star hotel for $39 instead of $179, I have more money to spend on my trip. Also frankly. I don't want to eat at Subway, or it requires going to a much crappier hotel that I don't want to be in, to eat. For dining, I go with what is the best meal I can have for a certain price. Like why would I eat at Planet Dailes when I can have Gordon Ramsay BURGR or eat at St. Louis Cafe when I can have Mon Ami Gabi..

I still do self-park. Frankly, because the valets are slow in Vegas (unless I'm at PH were their self-park sucks worse so I valet), I carry my own bags.. I mean never in Vegas long enough to have a ton of stuff.

Or I'm saving money on some things, to spend more money on other things like dining and gambling.

 

I can afford things but when I know I can spend 2 minutes to get a decent deal I will do it. I do pay for the ease of havings things at hand. I will pay $3 for a soda in the gift shop instead of $1 at 7-11. But what I hate is getting nickle and dimed like a crappy Jersey toll road every 5 miles. That really makes it feel like a shitty experience. I order room service but looking at the $5 delivery charge, 15% service charge, 18% gratuity, $3 Pedro spit in your soup charge - it gets annoying.

 

I consider buying stuff at other than rack rate to simply be smart, not frugal or cheap.

The internet has made it instantaneous, too, so there's no more arguing about the opportunity cost of doing research and shopping.

 

I do have a limit of what I will splurge on. And I have pretty much splurged on every major facet of my trips relative to my normal spending--from gambling to dining to hotels and transportation. In this way, I have seen "the other side" and frankly the value is not as high for me. Learning also how to navigate Vegas so that I am getting complimentaries for what people might be otherwise paying full price for or playing large sums of money towards, makes me quite contented by this lifestyle.

I am not certain if I have gone out of my way to get or do something frugally. Perhaps I have but I do not think much of it because I was having that much fun doing it. That is to say that I would only stop what I was doing when it begins to get tedious--when it is no longer fun. For example, I may
hotel hop quite a bit because it saves me money. At the same time, I have stayed at one hotel for 8 straight days when I was supposed to stay there for 11 days, and it was not fun at all. It became so boring. The minute I switched hotels that trip, I felt that much better about the entire experience. Now, what would otherwise be a grave inconvenience is direly needed to sustain a certain level of enjoyment on longer trips for me. I plan for months before my trip and that is part of the fun as well.

At the same time, this thread does remind me of luxuries I have never even considered...like someone taking my bags for me. Hmm...perhaps one day this could be fun all on its own. I love little luxuries. Just to be surrounded by such luxurious surroundings in Vegas is fun for me. But then again so are the divey places. I'm a little proud of my frugal lifestyle...it does make you stick out like a sore thumb sometimes.

But every frugal person should know when they are denying themselves enjoyment, opportunities, and convenience. When it gets to a point where you are "sacrificing" your own needs and desires rather than "optimizing" the value of your needs and desires, it certainly is time to reevaluate.

 

I think most dutch are frugal

Well im dutch
Does that make me frugal?
Well to a certain point.

i always tip the waitress or people at restaurant when its good
I always want a nice room for almost less and love all the freebees and comps as i think i payed for it ( being diamond certainly is nice)
On food and drinks i dont care so much i know i pay a bit more for quality, but yeah i do some groceries at wallgreens
Too fancy overprized restaurants is not my thing
Going out having a real drink( at some bar/ carnevalcourt/magaritaville/club) yeah its more expensive but so what u are there to enjoy and yeah occassionally i do order free drinks when gambling but that becomming rare now as i found out that gambling and no drinking gives better results not only money wise but also belly wise
Shows yeah sometimes i check tickets4tonight if they have special offers but if i wanna go i go, i felt like seeing shania( twain) and i did justfew hours before the concert pretty decent seats(150$ and i had to pay 130), only 20$ but i take it)

 

In some ways I am very frugal when it comes to Vegas. I try to fly for free or as cheap as possible (use miles, credit card offers). I try to get a good deal on the rental car. I try to use comped rooms. I use a lot of coupons. At the same time I do spend money obviously (even with coupons you spend money). And of course I like to play and watch shows (with coupons obviously).

Anyway, life in NY is really expensive (especially with real estate taxes, old homes with lots of maintenance and hurricane damage 2 years in a row).

But very well put: a vacation is well deserved so I am already looking forward to it and do not feel guilty spending a bit of money on it.

 

Well sayd Peter thats what vacation is for never regret either

 

I'm a cheap bastard and proud of it! To me it's much more fun and a challenge.

 

i bet your a couponguy hahaha
i saw that program once awesome

we dutch dont take home doggiebaggies after dinner (although we know we pay for its not in our culture...so in some things were cheap and some things we aint)

 

Honestly I don't use many coupons. I hit a lot of Vegas travel sites and going to Vegas for 23 years, I've learned a lot of things. I've even learned a couple of new items just this year from this site. So it's fun doing it on the cheap. Coming in June, with my four boys and four nephews and two cousins. Staying at Bally's and doing it cheap. So this up coming trip is a challenge and will be quite interesting. Viva Las Vegas!

 

Frugal is relative. Flying back from the islands last week, we upgraded to First Class. It was so worth the relative pittance it cost us.

50 bucks at Riviera is not frugal. 129 at Wynn is.

Relative. And personal.

 

separated at birth

soooo true, especially on a long flight-first class it is!

I have read every post in this thread and i think some of us might be long lost relatives! Or maybe our parents were around during the Great Depression. Recently took my 85 y.o. Mom to Vegas
Ironic : we toted a mini coffee maker all the way to MB so we could have our coffee in our room every morning. I filled the ice bucket twice a day to keep the milk cold.
Then paid 5.00 at Bellagio and Caesar's, for One (bottomless) cup of coffee during two different meals-and the service there was great and we enjoyed it immensely!

 

This trip out we are flying Southwest because they have direct flights and are reasonable prices with free bags. We did opt for the early bird check in fee which to me is frugal because we are getting a good flight price, not paying the add on for bags and seat choices, but spending just a part of those savings to do something that will make us enjoy the trip more and take away some of the airport trip hassle.

We buy liquor for the room and save some money there but more importantly can mix a drink the way we like it (Captain Morgan or others rather than well rum) and enjoy it as we go out to walk the Strip rather than searching for a bar and waiting for service for a small drink. We also save up our 32 ounce plactic cups from the local barbeque chain and use them in Vegas just throwing them away once they are empty. That said when we are at the pool and feel like buying a $15 frozen drink we do and do not feel bad as we saved some earlier int he day when it was easy to do so. Frugal is not being cheap, just making your money go farther for the things that have value to each of us.