Do You Ever Feel Embarrassed By Your Frugality?

For the first time, in a very long time, I felt embarrassed last night as my husband and I entertained a few friends in our home. Our living room consists of a hodge-podge of mismatched furniture. Our TV stand, one of those old heavy wooden ones, was a hand-me-down from my in-laws. Our large and lumpy plaid sofa was purchased eight years ago for my husband’s first apartment.

The green, red, and yellow stripes clash with the soft blue paint on our walls. The sides of the couch have been shredded by the claws of our two cats and we keep sticky tape on the edges to prevent further tears. The coffee table in front of the couch was a hand-me-down from my husband’s cousin and the top of the table is full of large marks and scratches. The chairs in our living room are a mismatch of IKEA furniture and almost every piece of upholstered material is covered in cat hair despite the fact that I am constantly vacuuming.

Lots of people have visited our house in the last seven years and strangely enough this is the first time I’ve been embarrassed by the disarray of furniture in our living room. Up until now most of our friends have been in similar housing situations. Less than ten years out of college they too have a hodge-podge of hand-me-downs scattered across their bare apartments. But last night as our friends entered the living room I felt a small surge of embarrassment swelling inside of me. Compared to the immaculate homes of our friends, our house suddenly felt like a run down shack.

I was a bit surprised by this feeling, but oddly enough, I was even more surprised that this initial sense of embarrassment quickly converted into a strange sense of pride. For the most part, I like to think that my husband and I spend our money exactly the way we want to. We carefully consider and discuss the major purchases in our lives and more often than not we decide to hold off spending on things that just aren’t urgent. There is no need to rush to buy new furniture when the IKEA furniture works perfectly well for our two spoiled cats. There is no need to buy a new television, when in reality we hardly ever watch TV.

Before heading to bed I thought long and hard about the disarray of our living room in the context of the larger vision of our lives. Lately, my husband has been trying his hand as a semi-professional photographer and we’ve spent a large sum of money on new cameras and photo equipment. I’d much rather invest the money in his dreams then in furniture that fills our living room. In all due honesty, there are a million ways I’d rather invest the money.

I want to retire early, pay off our homes by age 40, pursue my passions and enjoy every day with my husband. In that moment, just before falling sleep, I found myself smiling at all that I have in my life. In all the joys in my life. The state of my living room furniture, is in fact, one of the last thoughts on my mind.

22 thoughts on “Do You Ever Feel Embarrassed By Your Frugality?”

  1. We have a $20 couch from a thrift store — it's actually the most comfortable couch I've ever sat on. What we did, though, to improve upon its country blue & mauve colors is to buy a nice couch cover for it. For about $120 you can get a suede-like stretch cover w/ the separate section for the pillows at BB&B. The bonus is that it's totally machine-washable (we have dogs) and the cat doesn't like to scratch the soft when the cover is on it.

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  2. Sometimes I do. We live in a double-wide right now, though we could qualify for over $200,000 of house if we wanted one. But we’ve bought four acres on which we plan to build the perfect home, and not many people get to do that in their 20s. We want more than 20 percent paid down on the construction loan, too, so that hopefully when we have kids, I will have the option to work part-time or maybe from home.

    Sometimes it can be embarassing, even though we’ve made our home very nice with new floors and such. But when I start feeling that way, I open up our “idea book” for our home, or I do some research on the next trip to Europe we’re planning. None of our friends are doing those sorts of things right now, so I just have to remember what WE value.

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  3. I feel embarrassed about being frugal sometimes too. I used to have Pottery barn furniture, games, and other more expensive items. I like have money in my retirement and savings account better now. Good for you.

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  4. The things that embarrass me are what I can’t afford due to NOT being frugal before recently. (Some home repair I can’t do or a sorely needed paint job.) Had I been frugal from 18-38 I could take care of those things without a 2nd thought now at 39.

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  5. Very occasionally I do feel embarrassed…but mostly, I don’t. I have more of the weird sense of pride.

    And fortunately, with some creativity and some careful shopping, a lot of times I don’t live with less stuff/poorer quality stuff than spendthrift people do.

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  6. I’m glad you remembered what your true values are. If you (and the cats) are comfortable that’s all that matters.

    If the end tables and chairs begin bothering you a very inexpensive solution is sand paper and paint (checks the oopsies at hardware stores) or fabric and glue (or sturdy stapler). Fabric is such a cheap solution – garage sales, flea markets, craigslist, surplus stores – even poor quality but attractive sheets work!

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  7. Sometimes it’s hard not to feel defensive. When I feel weird about the fact that I live in a mobile home, I just think about how even in these hard times we are pulling ourselves out of debt, while our friends who looked down on our choice to live more modestly are working 16 hour days to pay for their giant house they bought with no down paymentright before the market crashed.

    They never see their children and only have time for sleep in their new house full of new electronics and furniture they bought on credit. Who should really feel embarrassed??

    We’ve still got a million choices in front of us, they have spent their way out of choices.

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  8. You know what, I used to have a complete mismatch of styles and furniture and be a bit embarassed when one of my friends came over and mentioned my home looked like her grandparents lived place. Yeah, Owch.

    I started a housing dream book, where I’d cut pictures of out of magazines that spoke to me and put it in a binder. I was able to figure out what my house style was, and through the magic of thrift stores and craigslist, I have a home filled with pieces I love and the joy that comes from knowing I purchased my glorious china hutch for $40 and my beautiful mahogany baby grand piano for $450 plus $100 for the movers. Best of searching.

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  9. I’m very frugal and take pride in the fact that I can decorate most any home or dress most any person by shopping at thrift stores and garage sales. It just takes persistence and a good eye. Bargains galore can be had on Craigslist. Freecycle is worth checking out as well. A word of caution – just because something is cheap or free doesn’t mean you need it.

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