# Do You Keep an Ultra-Secret Cash Cache? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 15, 2004, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534 "2004-09-15T10:06:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2004, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/21 "2004-09-15T21:22:35Z")
I don’t cache money. But I have, um, quite a bit of 7.62 NATO rifle ammunition, and I do plan on caching much of it in the near future. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2004, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/22 "2004-09-15T22:40:32Z")
I did have about £1,500 in a cash ISA but realised it was stupid having cash in an account paying 4.5% when I still had outstanding balances on credit cards at 15% :dubious: There’s something psychologically reassuring about having “actual cash” as a back-up, but as **astro** said, if you have decent credit there’s little point having cash sitting around like that. _If_ I ever clear my credit cards, I’ll build it up again… Incidentally, I recently totalled up my credit limit on various cards – something like £26,000 of credit just like that, no questions asked. Scary. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2004, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/23 "2004-09-16T04:20:29Z")
I love cash. I fear that I might end up one of those crazy people who has a mattress full of cash. I do keep a little semi-secret cash fund in the house at all times, maybe about $400. We jokingly call it our “on the lam” money although we don’t anticipate being on the lam, but I wouldn’t trust our ATM and/or credit cards to get us through a real emergency. What if the emergency is that there are no ATM machines? ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2004, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/24 "2004-09-16T05:17:55Z")
> [@delphica](#): > > I love cash. I fear that I might end up one of those crazy people who has a mattress full of cash. I do keep a little semi-secret cash fund in the house at all times, maybe about $400. We jokingly call it our “on the lam” money although we don’t anticipate being on the lam, but I wouldn’t trust our ATM and/or credit cards to get us through a real emergency. What if the emergency is that there are no ATM machines? If we ever have social emergency so cataclysmic and dire, that all the ATM machines are put out of commission, I doubt those little green pieces of high rag content paper with the pictures on them are going to do you much good in that situation. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2004, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/25 "2004-09-16T05:37:05Z")
I have some cash hidden in a book (and I have a couple thousand books, I guess). On a whim, my friend and I cut the middle out of about 50 pages in an old paperback for a secret stash–that was years ago, but I still have it around. It’s probably only about $40, since my ideas of what constituted a good amount of money were pretty modest at the time. What it’s for, I don’t know, but it’s fun to have it. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2004, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/26 "2004-09-16T08:11:31Z")
> [@astro](#): > > If we ever have social emergency so cataclysmic and dire, that all the ATM machines are put out of commission, I doubt those little green pieces of high rag content paper with the pictures on them are going to do you much good in that situation. It hardly takes an emergency that cataclysmic. Remember the Big Blackout last summer? That night I used up all my cash getting shitfaced at The Village Idiot, and the next day, after sleeping at my office, the subways still weren’t running, despite the power being back on. And since it was the weekend, no one came into the banks to reset all the ATMs. It took me four hours to find a working ATM so I could pay for a cab-ride back to Queens. Ever since I’ve kept a few hundred bucks in a hiding place at my office and at home. ---
**Author:** ![Telperien](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/65b543/32.png) [@Telperien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperien)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2004, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/27 "2004-09-16T08:34:41Z")
I never have enough money to stash any away. I used to have a coin jar though. I sort of considered that stashed because it was kind of hard to spend that way. When I have enough money that I don’t need it all immediately for bills, I’ll start a stash. I hope I won’t forget where it is. ---
**Author:** ![Optihut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/edb3f5/32.png) [@Optihut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Optihut)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2004, 9:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/28 "2004-09-16T09:21:37Z")
> [@chatelaine](#): > > It’s not insane. While I haven’t actually done it, I’ve thought about making a little secret savings umpteen times. You know, **just in case**. Just in case **what** , I have no idea. > > Nuclear holocaust, American Revolution II, everyone I love being eaten by hordes of rabid woodchucks… those sorts of things, I guess. After a nuclear holocaust or similar event, people are probably not going to care about paper money anymore. It’s a better idea to invest in canned food and shotguns as a contingency plan. ---
**Author:** ![35340](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/8baadc/32.png) [@35340](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/35340)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2004, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/29 "2004-09-20T14:13:45Z")
> [@dangermom](#): > > I have some cash hidden in a book (and I have a couple thousand books, I guess). On a whim, my friend and I cut the middle out of about 50 pages in an old paperback for a secret stash–that was years ago, but I still have it around. It’s probably only about $40, since my ideas of what constituted a good amount of money were pretty modest at the time. What it’s for, I don’t know, but it’s fun to have it. Hahahahahaa a … I did that a few years ago to a bookclub hardcover edition of Grisham’s The Firm. (no longer have the book, don’t go raiding my library, folks) ---
**Author:** ![Walkabout](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/46a35a/32.png) [@Walkabout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walkabout)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2004, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/30 "2004-09-20T14:22:28Z")
I’ve been squirreling away money for years, but it eventually got too large to keep in my closet. I opened a bank account, which my husband knows about, but it’s only in my name, so he can’t get to it. Right now it’s at about $5700 and I just paid for airline tickets to Rome for me and my daughter from it. I call it my “vacation fund”, but I know I have to fall back on for other emergencies, too. I also keep at least $100 in my purse, just in case. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2004, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534/31 "2004-09-20T20:03:38Z")
Two tales…one me…one instructive… I don’t have a _secret_ account. But all of our savings goes to an account that I can’t access without actively speaking to my broker and getting a lecture on savings. And that’s painful. Second… Turns out my father-in-law believed in the ‘cache’ process. After he died we found $10,000 in $1,000 increments in envelopes, hollowed out books, old suit pockets, etc. We even found a cache of **gold coins** he had from his boyhood days. He never spent them. He’d probably forgotten they existed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-keep-an-ultra-secret-cash-cache/264534.md?page=1)