A MECHANIC has revealed that he saves around £15,000 a year by living in the garage where he works.
Larry Melvin sleeps in a car which is parked inside the garage, and bathes in a bucket.
Speaking to Extreme Cheapskates, the Texan said that he doesn’t care about haters who say he is eccentric because “they’re broke, and I’m saving”.
Larry said that he makes £80,000 a year, so could afford to live in a house, but prefers to save.
He sleeps in cars that have been left in the garage for long periods of time, using the boot as a makeshift wardrobe, and sleeping across the seats.
The mechanic can often be found walking around the garage in just a towel, and some of his employees have even seen him taking a shower using a bucket and a house.
He also cooks all of his meals in the garage, by using a camping stove.
Instead of plates, he puts his food on a hub cap, and uses plastic cutlery and plates, as he said they are cheaper than using proper crockery.
Larry has electricity in his shop but tries not to use it, instead choosing to save money by using card batteries to power his lights.
He also likes to save water, by re-using his bath water to scrub down cars.
“Larry making me use his bath water to wash cars has been the closest thing to making me quit”, his employee Mitchell said.
Another of Larry’s cost-cutting methods is to clean windows using sanitary pads and budget cola.
He said that this is much cheaper than using window cleaner, and claimed that customers are always happy with the result.
Larry first decided to move into his garage after getting divorced.
He said that after realising that all of his money had gone towards buying things for someone else, he was better of saving it instead.
Commenting under a clip showing Larry’s unconventional life on the TLC YouTube channel, social media users rushed to share their thoughts.
USING average house price figures from Zoopla, Admiral Loans crunched the numbers and worked out that each square foot of living space is worth £350 on average.
Typically, the size of a small single garage in the UK is 128 square feet making the additional space worth £45,000.
A standard conversion costs between £4,995 and £7,500 depending on what work you have done, according to householdquotes.co.uk, which will of course eat into your profits.
If the garage is attached to your home you won’t even need to pay for planning permission, which currently costs £206.
The work falls under “permitted development rules”, which allows you to make certain changes to your home as long as it’s within limits.
This is because you’re not really altering the outside dimensions of the building.
But you will need to apply to the local authority if your garage is separate to your house, you live in a flat or maisonette or in a listed building.
It’s worth checking before starting any work that there aren’t any planning conditions attached to your property – you can do this by writing to the local authority.
If you plough on with building work that actually required permission, you may be ordered to take it down.
One person said: “Imagine going to pick up your car from the shop and you find him sleeping in it.”
Another person joked: “At least he won’t be late for work”.
A third person said: “Imagine finding out that your car was cleaned with a mans bath water”.
A fourth added: “This guys is crazy”.
Fabulous will pay for your exclusive stories. Just email: fabulousdigital@the-sun.co.uk and pop EXCLUSIVE in the subject line.
