Three Frugal Things from One Bitchin’ Free Pile!
by Katy on August 24, 2025 · 27 comments
I was out and about running errands today and came across this post-garage sale “ALL FREE” pile. (It’s hard to read the sign, but I assure you that everyuthing here was free!) I pulled the car over without a moment’s hesitation.
What did I grab?
Seven IKEA Sortera bins. Normally $14.99 apiece. Our basement is in great need of a round of organization, so these bins will be put to great use. They were in perfect condition, but I still hosed them out and set them in the sun.
I also took this new looking Honeywell ceramic heater. I’m a fan of heating the room you’re in instead of the entire house, so this’ll come in handy come winter time. It looks like it originally sold for seventy-some dollars.
This North Face rolling suitcase with backpack straps. I can’t find a similar one online, but will research it further. One of the wheels is a bit busted, but I like a repair project. Otherwise, it was in excellent condition. The price was definitely right, especially since similar suitcases sell new for $350!
I later returned to find nothing other than the twin bed frame. This was a bummer as I’d decided to take this green wooden shelf if it was still available. I realized it would slot perfectly in my youngest’s childhood bedroom. Oh well . . . you can’t take everything without crossing a line into hoarding.
How did I do? A win for what I brought home or a loss for everything I left behind?
Katy Wolk-Stanley
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{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
Our little town of 6500 seldom has FREE garage sale leftovers
Hubby went to So Cal for celebration of life service. Even using airmiles for plane fare, it still cost about $600 for rental car and motel.
1. Sold $80 on FB marketplace and delivered item locally
2. Organized linen closets. DS-E has finally moved after 3 years living with us. I gave him some mismatched towels. We still have ample for our bathroom and guest bath
3. Gathered up dingy whites hoping to brighten in the laundry
4. Inventoried cleaning supplies (all good). Broke out furniture restorer to oil furniture.
5. Threw way a bag of Covid test kids which expired in 2023. Found 3 hairbrushes that I’ll clean.
Look at it this way: anything you sell from the free pile, you’re going to make a 100% profit on! I’d call that a big win. (This assumes you can find a free wheel or do a free repair on the suitcase.)
And those storage bins are really, really nice.
Just make sure there is no electrical short in the ceramic heater. It’s not a frugal win if you burn down your house!
I don’t know if my offerings are all that frugal, but this is what’s happened in my world:
I went to Ollie’s after I got off from work last night, and it was dark when I came out. I usually don’t drive after dark, so I don’t know how long I’ve had this problem. But en route home, I discovered my regular headlights are not working; luckily, the bright lights did. The tail lights are also not working, just the brake light, so I’ve got to take the car into the shop. Bummer! (Luckily, I didn’t get a ticket or get into a wreck.)
Shopped at Aldi and they got my favorite (Southern Pecan flavored) coffee pods in, so I bought 3 boxes (=36 pods). I’ll have good coffee at home for a while. (They’d sold out the last couple of times I was there.)
Found a good book at a Little Free Library. It was a paperback copy of historian Doris Kearns Goodwin’s “Leadership in Turbulent Times.” She writes about Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR and LBJ in it. Looking forward to reading it!
@Fru-gal Lisa, Good call on checking the wiring on the ceramic heater!
I have a question for fellow frugal minds! A memory foam mattress/frame is posted in our local free section of Craigslist. The listing describes it as “very good clean condition from a non smoking home”. I asked by email if I could look at it one day this week, and the response was yes. We live in a small house, the extra bedroom has been occupied 3 to 5 days/week for 3 years by our grown son who works here, but he and his family live 100 miles away. It would have to be placed in our unfinished basement, but I would try to make the area as hospitable as possible. It would be nice to have an extra unoccupied bed. I would also have to hire someone to haul it home. Our cars are small, husband is in poor health, and son also has a small vehicle. I know about the concern over bedbugs etc. Is this a good idea??
I think it depends on how frequently you have house guests who are not your son/overlap with your son’s use of the extra bedroom. I think it would only be worth the hassle and risk of bed bugs if you need an extra guest bed.
I would also make sure that if you put a bed in your basement, that there is an egress window big enough for safety escape.
I would go with an air mattress. Why waste the space for a bed rarely used.
You got some great things! I never see free piles here in Texas. Only the occasional piece of broken furniture set out for trash pickup, which I have neither the skill nor the desire to fix.
I have one big frugal win and one big frugal fail this weekend.
Frugal win: I have been getting free items from Chewy as part of their test and review program, Pawsibilities. So far it’s been small things like cat toys and treats, but this time I was offered a Tineco Go Pet Pro vacuum cleaner, which sells for $280 online. It just arrived and I haven’t tried it yet, but the reviews look very good. I’ve been wanting a new vacuum for a while because the one I have is very cheap and doesn’t work well. This one is nicer than anything I would have bought for myself.
Frugal fail: my cat Butterscotch was so cantankerous at his vet visit that no one could do anything with him. I had to pay extra for a difficult exam, plus buy a sedative and some extra good treats to get it into him before the next attempt. He goes back this Thursday so they can hopefully give him his vaccinations and finish examining him. A double vet visit was not in the budget and I will have to take from my emergency savings to pay for it. I’m just glad that I do have the money. A few years ago I would have had to go into debt for something like this.
Same thing happened last time I took my cat to the vet. They had to sedate her to get a blood sample. It ended up costing $500. She has thyrhoid problems and is on meds, but she has gotten wild and is waking us up during the night.
The Commodore (our cat) also gets spicy when they try needles on him. When I had to take him to the emergency vet, they had to sedate him to do a blood draw. One wonders how they manage that if the cat doesn’t like needles to begin with!
I will be interested to see how you with repairing the wonky wheel! I faced this problem not long ago and ended up replacing the suitcase. It is frustrating that the wheels disintegrate long before there is wear on the suitcase itself.
I think you did just fine. You took what you knew you could use and left plenty for others. It’s too bad the use for the bookshelf didn’t instantly spring to mind, but that’s how it goes sometimes.
1. It hasn’t been long since I reported my frugal five, but I’m always on the case. This morning I used up the last of my blueberries in pancakes. They are rather sparsely disseminated in the batter, but still good. There is enough batter left over for at least one more day, maybe two.
2. I have eaten chicken fajitas for lunch for three days now and there is still a little left. My plan for today is to use it up in a street taco, and since that is small, go big on the sides — probably corn and black beans.
3. I am reading a book from a LFL called Behind the Beautiful Forevers. It’s nonfiction about a shantytown in Mumbai, and if you ever feel like you have it hard, this will cast a new light on what it’s like to live in poverty. Hard to believe that people survive in such conditions!
4. We are experiencing a taste of fall, and now it’s so cool that even fans are unnecessary. I love it when things cool off. Nice on the electric bill!
5. I scanned my receipts to Fetch. I think I’m going to enjoy this app. I have often seen receipts discarded on the sidewalks. I hope this continues now that I’m actively looking for them.
1.
Beth, thank you for putting that book on my radar.
@Beth W: Beyond the Beautiful Forevers–she won the National Book Award for that in 2012. I haven’t read it: is it inspiring, depressing, or some of both?
That is an awesome free pile!
1.) I went swimming in my Mom’s community pool yesterday. Zero cost.
2.) We have to go to treatment for my husband three hours away tomorrow. I wil pack lunches and snacks. Better for our health and our wallet.
3.) I cleaned the car yesterday. There was a special for $9 and I used the vacuums and the cleaning fluid. It may not seem super frugal, but it’s easy and I am able to do a pretty deep clean.
4.) Using up leftovers before a couple of trips.
5.) Changed the air filters and cleaned inside the air return. We use the cheap green filters as my husband swears that air flows through them better.
…and I am so jealous of those free piles. They are not common where we live. I get everything at thrift stores, garage sales, and from Facebook Marketplace.
Storage containers are a common find in my neighborhood free piles, and that’s where I got most of mine. Those ones would be tempting since they’re all the same size!
The rug is temping, but there are pet feeders in the pile, and that would make me hesitate!
It’s important (and frugal!) to be discriminating so I call this a win. Sure, a few things get missed, but you don’t load up your house with more to get rid of later.
On that note, I congratulate myself on passing up three free piles this morning. After checking them out of course!
Win!
You have got some great objects and you left some for other people to enjoy.
Good for your karma!
Wow, if that’s what was left AFTER the garage sale, they must have had a lot of amazing things.
So much temptation. I would have taken the storage bins also. I don’t like to spend money on things to store other things, so free is perfect. You might have regretted grabbing the shelf anyway. In a room you don’t use often it would have been another thing to dust.
I would have grabbed the dog water bowls. I got one years ago from a free pile. I keep it upstairs. You got some great stuff.
1. I am making sauce with a little over 50 pounds of tomatoes from my garden. It was time. I have one quart left from last year. I have been up since 6:30. It is going to be a long day because it needs to get canned. I am also frying several eggplants. Some will be tonight’s dinner. Some will be frozen for future meals. If I have time I will start making pickles with the 2 dozen cucumbers from my garden. I was in the garden all day yesterday.
2. Hubby is refreshing our firepit area. The base are blue stones. Dirt has come from under our fence into the area. He made a large sifter with stuff he had. He shovel’s the dirt rock mix into it. It sits on our garbage picked wagon that hubby fixed. The dirt is going to an area that needs it and the rocks are going back into the firepit area. He is also trying to figure out a way for it to not happen again.
3. I did laundry on the short quick cold cycle. It then got hung outside.
4. I made pizza dough and Hubby turned them into a chicken roll for me and a sausage and pepper roll for him. With our homemade sauce of course. They were delicious.
5. We went for a ride in Hubby’s corvette with the top down. We love to go at night in the summer.
6. My sister gave me her old iPhone. It is a newer model then the one I had. I am watching her dog for the week while she is away. I will keep my old cellphone in case anyone needs it.
A bitchin’ free pile is an absolute delight!! In the past few months, I have made over $500 on eBay and Facebook Marketplace, with items acquired from Free Piles. Hard to pass one up.
I love a good free pile! Our free pile “season” is in June, when the college kids migrate from one apartment to the next. The locals call it Hippie Christmas.
My frugal five from yesterday:
1) I made blueberry scones using up a leftover jar of homemade blueberry jam.
2) I planned a date night, and the only purchase was a $4 wheel of brie. I made baked Brie with homemade pepper jelly on top, served with crackers I made in the morning using a Tasha Tudor recipe. I also served it with breadless cucumber sandwiches — I sliced up a cucumber from the garden, topped it with a mix of mayo, shredded sharp cheddar, and onions, then added crumbled rashers (lean bacon) from the two slices left over from a dinner last week.
3) For the date itself, we played a few hands of cards and then moved over to playing darts until bedtime. It was lovely and we didn’t need to leave the house in this heat!
4) Our son helped the neighbor dig out a stump. Not necessarily frugal for us, but frugal for the neighbor as he now doesn’t have to hire someone to do it. Plus, this is the neighbor that allows us to pick his orchard, so exchanging favors tends to pay frugal dividends for all involved. I consider it part of the social contract.
5) I dehydrated more zucchini and green beans for winter use. It’s been a bountiful year for us, which will help offset grocery costs due to stupid tariffs this winter.
I think you did great! I never see free piles like that in my town. We have a FB page where people post things to give away, but never things that awesome, and it seems like some people stalk the page and snatch everything up. LOL Which is fine – I’ve never asked for anything from the page and don’t plan to; I just like looking.
Frugal Things – Vacation Edition
1. Our only cost was the $50 for this week and our next vacation in September as this is a time share, and we pay our maintenance fees with our income tax return. The $50 is the $25 per week increase that went into effect after we paid our fees.
2. We ate at the timeshare every meal except for one picnic-y type lunch – sandwiches from a little gas station deli. Delish and fun to eat in the car when we were caught in a rainstorm.
3. Hiking at state parks.
4. Free entertainment – doing a puzzle, playing cards, hiking, playing in the pool, watching football (hubby), cross stitching, journaling, and reading (me). My hubby is also an extrovert, so he makes friends with other vacationers while I hide in the condo and avoid people. In my job, I talk to people 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, so my social battery needed recharged!
Today, I was back at work, earning some overtime hours.
You scored a big win! Stuff is put into use again and avoids the landfill. And the shelf you left went to someone else who needs/wants it and it also avoids the landfill. I’m envious of those crates!
I keep thinking that I’m going to keep track of what I save by buying used or picking up free things, but I always feel too busy. If I did it, I’d keep a simple list of the item I got, what I paid for it (could be zero) and what it retails for new.
You did well. Since we moved to a senior community, I’m missing the thrill of checking out people’s trash every Thursday morning. We do have a free bench near the dining room. On Monday I picked up two boxes of Refresh eye drops/ 100 ampules each box. I had suggested to my husband that we get our flu shots at CVS so we could use the coupon (10 off 20 or more) for eye drops. Now we’re set for a year and can get the flu shot here.