Saki Tamogami, a 37-year-old real-estate agent, is known as Japan’s most frugal woman for her commitment to spending as little money as possible on things like food, clothes, and self-care.
“Never buy anything that isn’t on sale!” This has been Saki Tamogami’s motto for the last 15 years, and she claims it has helped her save enough money to buy three houses, a goal she set for herself when she was only 19 years old. The first thing she did was stop buying new clothes, instead accepting handouts from family and friends and taking better care of the clothes she already had. She then started cutting down on food expenses, relying mainly on cheap dishes like udon noodles, toast, and discounted radishes for sustenance. After 8 years of frugal living, Tamogami was able to buy her first home, and by 2019, she had already achieved her goal of owning three homes.
In 2019, Saki Tamogami, 37, appeared on the Japanese television program Happy! Bomby Girl where she shocked the whole of Japan with her extreme frugality. She went into detail about her passion for saving money, revealing that she rarely exceeded her self-imposed budget of 200 yen ($1.4) a day for food. To make this happen, she relied mostly on cheap ingredients, with the occasional slice of salmon bought on sale, cooked her meals at home, and even ate directly out of cooking pots to save money on dishes.
Instead of paying for makeup, or getting her hair done, Saki Tamogami actually turned her hair into a source of income, selling it for about 3,100 yen ($20) when it grew long enough. This covered her food budget for half a month. It was tough, but the Japanese property agent claims that she got used to it and found comfort in saving money and watching her bank account grow in size.
At age 27, Saki Tamogami managed to save enough money out of her salary as a property agent to buy a house in Saitama, north of Tokyo, for 10 million yen ($69,000). She immediately rented it, using the monthly rent to pay off the mortgage, and continued living as stingy as possible. In a couple of years, she bought a second house for 18 million yen ($124,000), and five years ago she reached her goal of buying three houses, buying her third property for 37 million yen ($256,000).
Despite having reached her goal, Saki continues to live frugally and save money in order to help rescued cats. She has already opened a cat cafe at the ground floor of one of her houses and plans to invest in other properties in the future.
Saki Tamogami’s story has received mixed feedback from the public, with some people praising her for her dedication, and others warning that she is putting her life at risk by consuming low-quality foods and neglecting her daily needs for material gains.
