cheap skate

Idioms  

1. A stingy person, as in He's a real cheap skate when it comes to tipping. This idiom combines cheap (for “penurious”) with the slang usage of skate for a contemptible or low individual. It has largely replaced the earlier cheap John. [Slang; late 1800s]

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Example Sentences

Some cheap skate of a private detective, eh!

From Shorty McCabe by Wilson, F. Vaux (Francis Vaux)

"With a feller like Kuhner," Marks Pasinsky declared on the following Monday, "you couldn't be a cheap skate, Mr. Potash."

From Potash & Perlmutter Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures by Glass, Montague

Close to the ground, says you," shouted McGuire, crunching Raidler's fingers in a grip of steel; "and dat's where I found it--healt' and strengt', and tumbled to what a cheap skate I been actin'.

From Heart of the West by Henry, O.

You're a cheap skate trying to put up a front!

From Broken to the Plow by Dobie, Charles Caldwell

You're too sweet and lovely to be the sport of a cheap skate like that.

From They of the High Trails by Garland, Hamlin