Frugal Furniture?

[locolorenzo24]

Hey, anyone have any good frugal home decor/furnature shopping tips for a 25yo renter? I'm trying to lose the whole bachlor pad idea, but my walls are white, I have ugly white miniblinds over all windows, bad furniture...read, not comfy...., and sleep on an airbed...
I've come into a little cash, and figure it like this....

1. Bed(Queen size or so along with a nice matress to sleep on....
2. Bedside table/lamp.
3. Couch
4. Chair
5. Dining room table
6. Entertainment center to hold my massive CD/DVD collection and my 4 consoles plus 17" TV....
7. Wall art
8. old travel postcards to decorate a wall...

Any tips/suggestions??

[shengmei]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

Check the dumpsters beside colleges when students move.

You won't believe the kinds of stuff they throw away!!!

People throw away old TV stands all the time. If you get enough TV stands you can virtually make any furniture out of them.

If you want nice furniture, however....IKEA has a clearance section of 75% off furniture. They are usually slightly dented and scratched. However, IKEA sells their own furniture finishes in little tiny containers. 10 minutes of polishing saves you hundreds of bucks.

[Broken Arrow]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

I second IKEA, although I'd eventually like to try my hands at building my own. I know, furniture building is a labor of love, not an exercise in frugality. Still, my needs and goals are simple. Just simple power tools and MDFs. Also, I'm not planning to do it anytime soon yet. Just something that's sitting in the back burner for the moment.

[shengmei]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

You know IKEA actually has cheaper MDF boards than everyone else? Sometimes their packages burst and they end up with all those boards that they don't know where they belong to. So they just have a huge pile of boards in the clearance section for $2 apiece.

I love IKEA. We went there for honeymoon

[Broken Arrow]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

I love IKEA. We went there for honeymoon

ROFL!

Now that's funny. Cute too.

I hope I meet a woman as quirky as you someday.

[tgavin71]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

My advice is to get furniture that serves more than one purpose. If you get a good quality sofa bed you can use that until you have the money to buy a bed. Plus when friends or family visit they have somewhere to stay. As for a bed get an ensemble. I find them a lot more comfortable than the bed plus mattress set up. Also you can change the look of the room just by changing the colour of the bedding. You can get some wall art if you want to put at the head of the bed if you don't like the bare wall look.
Huge old style wardrobes with a bit of modifications make excellent entertainment centres. Best thing is that if they have locks you can close the doors and lock it for extra security.
Buy a decent dining table. Get the biggest one that you can fit. Extension tables are great space savers. If the seats match the sofa it means you don't need to buy a chair.

[shengmei]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

ROFL!

Now that's funny. Cute too.

I hope I meet a woman as quirky as you someday.

Guys always say that.

Women always want to hurt me because they are jealous (This is not meant to be a serious post)

ROFL!!!

[locolorenzo24]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

Wow, keep em coming...great to see all these tips, especially since I posted only an hour ago! I was thinking IKEAish, due to going with my brother while on vacation and seeing the selection of many different items, a lot of them seem great.
What do you think about the philosophy of buying at more than one store, as in "If I buy all IKEA, I might as well live there"?

[shengmei]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

I don't know.

I personally like the Euro look. It all depends on what you like. Most of my furnitures are from the trash so I just call my style "ecletic"

[kealina]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

we don't have IKEA
we would probably look at yard sales, (military people are always moving and some of them have nice furniture which they are willing sell affordably)... check out craigslist, furniture store clearance areas, etc...
don't forget swap meets/thrift stores/vintage stores for the smaller items like rugs, curtains, art... we actually haven't had to buy furniture yet although we did get a recliner (2 yrs old) at a yard sale... guy was selling it because his wife hated it ... $30 and he went down to $20... yay...
we've also bought curtain panels for anywhere from $1-$5 each....

[jodi]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

I'm surprised no one mentioned freecycle.org yet. Free is better than cheap

People post things that they are giving away for free - but you can also post for items you are looking for.

[lrjohnson]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

For couches, Slip covers are a possibility (pieces of cloth that go over a couch and are form fitting). They are reasonably priced, and can make a unacceptable plaid monster match any room, if the frame is good and the it feels good to sit on. Surefit. com is one place to look, even just to get an idea of what they look like. I'd peek before I went shopping, because it might make you look at "ugly" couches differently. They are washable, too. And to "redecorate" you can get a new cover instead of a new couch.

Being patient helps. You may see a couch you love at the right place through IKEA/Freecycle/Thrift stores, etc., but you may see nothing that you like at all for a coffee table. Get the cheapest acceptable item, and then be on the casual lookout for that love of your life coffee table. Give yourself time.

(I've experienced having cash burning a hole in my pocket and not seeing anything "out there" but then two months later-there it is. This has happened with a lot more than furniture.)

Anything framed instead of unframed just classes a whole wall up, even if it's a KISS poster. Get cheap frames at thrift stores, other sources.

[poundwise]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

Freecycle is clearly a good idea.

Also, shop rummage and second-hand shops. When I first moved to this area I purchased a La-Z-Boy recliner for my grandfather that cost $399. About 6 months later I found the exact same chair in a different color at a used furniture and appliances place. It was in very good condition and I ended up paying about $50 for it.

[sakigt]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

Ebay : Use the advanced search feature to search for furniture in a 50 mile radius. This helps you find the "local pickup only" stuff. I managed to snag a tan leather sectional with pullout bed and recliners for $400!

Craigslist : Keep searching, keep emailing. I ended up in touch with a guy who was moving. I took half of his living room away for $200!

[cschin4]

Re: Frugal Furniture?

Think AUCTION! Look around for local estate auctions. You can get great furniture at bargin basement prices. But, you need to bring a truck with you or know someone that could go back later that day and pick it up because they want the stuff out by the end of the auction. Alot of the stuff goes cheap because people don't have the means to move it. So, be prepared. But, my advice is to go to a few auctions and don't buy anything or just bid on something small until you get the feel for it. It is great fun, an entertaining way to spend the day also. If you are planning to buy, then get to the auction early, examine the stuff you are interested. Some of it may be scratched, dinged, even broken so be careful because everything is sold "as is". Then, if you find something you want to bid on, have a set maximum price in your mind BEFORE you start bidding. It is easy to get caught up in a bidding war and the "must have" thing in your brain overrides any commonsense! I know, cuz been there, done that!
At auction, you can get a whole matching bedroom set. Sometimes they will sell the set in it's entirety. Or, they may sell each piece separately. They also usually include the mattress. An old mattress sounds gross, but sometimes the mattresses included are newer, new or rarely used so you may get a good mattress as well. Try it and have fun.