Best deal you've ever gotten?

[Inaya]

We Mustachians love ourselves a good deal. So what's the best deal* you've ever gotten?

Mine was when my husband was working for Sears. His store was closing, so they were liquidating everything. This included the floor model mattresses. So with the liquidation price and his employee discount, we managed to snag a practically new Queen-size Tempurpedic mattress with box spring for $400. Not sure which model it is, but according to Tempurpedic's website, their cheapest model is $1800 without a base of any sort.

*I'm going to exclude free stuff for the sake of this discussion. Freebies are the best, but I'm more interested in discounts, trades, negotiations, sales, etc.

[snshijuptr]

We just moved into a house after living in a townhome. We doubled in size! In the last couple weeks we've gotten for free:
- Some moving boxes
- A sectional
- A kitchen table
- Bar stools
- Cubby boxes
- A love seat
and best of all
- A HUGE deep freezer

I've also received a free desk which I sold for $100 and sold one of the cubbies for $20. I'm going to turn that money around to buy side tables that match our new bed (which we actually paid for) then sell the old side tables. I've been all over Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist lately. Patience and minimalism really is the key to consumerism.

[Bicycle_B]

A house at market price.

It was long ago in a city that was then cheap.  Market price for the entire property was $16,000 below the insurance's replacement cost of the house.  I was getting paid 16k to take the land!  Plus it had lots of bedrooms, and people were renting by the room in that neighborhood, which was a cheap neighborhood anyway.  I converted the former "family room" to bedroom with a stroke of the pen and got a 4 bedroom house.  Rented out all the rooms and had positive cash flow living for free, except for repairs. 

Fast forward 20+ years.  House value up 600% or more, still living there.  Equity from that purchase is more than a third of my stash!  Add in a few investments from rent, it accounts for almost half.

[Duke03]

Being a hardcore negotiator I've gotten a lot of good deals in my life.  One that sticks out the most is the time I was paid $500 to not buy a car lol.  I had made a deal with a guy to buy his hot rod from him and at the last minute his wife nixed the whole deal cause she didn't want him to sell the car.  I explained we had shook hands and the deal was made if he was a man of his word.  He then offered to pay me $500 to walk away...  I took the money and walked.  A week later he asked me if I was still interested as his wife had changed her mind and now wanted it gone.  It was hard not to laugh and explain that not only did he save me $15,000 he paid me $500.  I took it as an omen on that car and said no thanks.

[SwordGuy]

Got paid by my employer to do hourly work for clients.   Sold the creation of the same custom program to two different clients in the same week.  I got to bill both clients for the same hours that I worked.  I got paid overtime because the payroll system couldn't handle billing different clients for the same hours, so I had to double-enter the hours.

I volunteered to write documentation for both clients so their staff would be able to look up how to use the utility when they forgot (or there was staff turnover).   Then I turned the utility and documentation into an article and published it in a technical journal for $250 a page for a $1,250 bonus.       That was a good week. :)

Got a raise, too, because the customers were so happy. :)

[Lady SA]

DH and I are paying $500 below market value for the rent on this apartment, all because we religiously pay our rent on time and don't wreck the unit, so our landlords love us. Who'da thunk it was that easy to become a tenant all-star?

We live in a 10 unit building, in the most recently renovated unit. It's gorgeous, hardwood floors and a great kitchen, with lots of windows looking out at leafy trees. Other equivalent apartments in the area are going for $1400-$1600/mo, but after not raising the rent a penny in 3 years, our landlords finally raised the rent by just 2%, and explicitly told us they hope to have us in the unit for as long as possible and that's why they are keeping our rent so low.

The other 2 br apartment in our building, that is much less nice than ours (not updated, no view), was advertised a month ago for $450 MORE than we are paying.

Every month when our rent check is sent off I feel like the richest person in the world :)

[Step37]

I'd have to say our house. Paid $145,000 in 2001 in one of the best neighbourhoods in the city. We did the interior improvements ourselves and hired out the windows/doors/roof and landscaping, so maybe put in another 50K total over the years. Similar houses in the neighbourhood are selling for 5-600K (1200 sf bungalow) for the past 10 years. The best part is that we put in a basement rental unit, which has been occupied all but two or three months of this time and bringing in 10-12K per year. That alone nearly covers property taxes, utilities and insurance.

[Rural]

$50k for 19 acres and an unhabitable singlewide in 2009. We put another $1k and a lot of sweat into stopping roof leaks, replacing the floor so we wouldn't fall through, and installing cheap a through-the-wall heat pump to replace the missing furnace, and moved in a month after closing. We lived in that trailer for five years while we cash flowed our dream home (plus bought the adjoining 6 acre lot).

[Laserjet3051]

A completely free, brand new, Yakima roof rack for my car, with towers, cross bars, AND bike rack. Went into REI to look for a replacement of said equipment as I had damaged mine stupidly driving into a low parking garage, where it was forcible torn off my roof. In the REI, a rep from Yakima happened to be standing by the Yakima displays and engaged me in conversation. She stated she was surprised/delighted that I wasn't trying to use the Yakima or REI warrantee to get a new/free equipment and on the spot offered full FREE replacement of ALL rack components. Despite the fact that it was my stupid negligence that caused the loss.

All in all, it must have been over $600. Spectacular deal IMHO.

[The Maritimer]

When I first graduated university and moved to a new HCOL city, I rented a room in a beautiful victorian house with a few random people. I could walk to work and it only cost $550 (under priced for the market). My other friends rented one-bedroom condos that cost $1,600+. I saved tens of thousands early in my career and my old roommates and I are still really close years later.

[Guide2003]

I've gotta say my first house as well. After 1400 hrs of my labor and help from family and friends over three years I went from uninhabitable structure to doubling my money, selling it the day it hit the market to the first people who looked (I know, shoulda listed higher). The craziest thing is that when buying it I originally offered $165k, and a month later the bank asked what my highest price would be. I came back with $185k but a week later the contract came back with $165k listed on it! Doing the math later, I realized I wouldn't have had enough capital for the down payment on the $185k, and even with what I got it for I had to take a loan from my parents for the initial months worth of renovations. It was a huge learning experience and kickstarted me towards financial independence. I even credit it with helping me find this community because once the check cleared with the house in the rear view mirror, I realized I had better do something smart with it ans started googling.