From making 713-mile commutes overseas to secretly living out of vans, people do crazy things to save money.
We aren't recommending you do the same (there are plenty of other, less extreme, tactics to save money) ... unless you're ready for a lifestyle change of the biggest kind.
Read on to see some of the more creative ways people all over the world have found to live on the cheap.
SEE ALSO: 8 refreshing insights about money and happiness from people who 'live tiny'
A Google employee lives in a truck in the company parking lot and saves 90% of his income
Google employee Brandon (who asked to withhold his last name) lives in a 128-square-foot truck in the company parking lot. The 23-year-old software engineer's one recurring cost is truck insurance for $121 a month — and he's saving 90% of his income by avoiding an overpriced San Francisco apartment.
He's used the savings to pay down student loans, get a head start on investing, and set aside money for his goal of traveling the world in a few years.
You can follow the live-updating "savings clock" he created on his blog to see exactly how much he's saving.
http://instagram.com/p/ngOboxR5iq/embed/
Width: 658px
One couple took on a fixer-upper home with the mind-boggling price tag of just $13,000
Paying off a mortgage can be a long and stressful process, so Justin Craig, 35, and Alia Polsgrove, 33, decided to forgo it altogether by purchasing a 103-year-old fixer-upper in cash and renovating it.
They're doing most of the renovations to the Detroit home themselves, which is saving them about $66,000, and they expect the finished product to cost a total of $120,000.
In a couple of years, they could be sitting on a nice profit margin — currently, homes on their block are listed around $215,000, and Craig predicts they'll start selling for $300,000 in another three years.
Read more about Justin and Alia.
A Los Angeles man spent 500 days secretly living in his office and saved over $20,000
In the summer of 2012, "Terry K." (the pseudonym of the writer who tells his story on Salon) rented out his Venice Beach, California apartment and moved into his office.
He used his cubicle as a bedroom for over a year, which saved him more than $20,000 and freed up the time and money to travel and pursue his interests. Today he lives in a slightly more traditional setting: a tiny home attached to his truck.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider