You probably want to have a nicely furnished home, but the prices can be insane.
If you wanted to spend all your savings (you do have savings, right?) on furniture, you could.
And not only new furniture– old furniture can break the bank, too.
Is there no way to get nice, comfortable furniture without destroying your finances?
Of course there is! Here are three ways to buy furniture on a budget.
To Craigslist You Go!
Craigslist is a crowd-sourced, local platform that can be a fantastic way to find good, solid furniture.
It’s especially good if you can be a little strategic about it.
For example, if you live in driving distance to a college town and are willing to make the drive, check the Craigslist for the area toward the end of the school year.
Around that time, many students are getting rid of great furniture for fantastic prices, because they have yet to learn the value of a good piece of furniture.
Craigslist is also awesome because the furniture owners are often trying to clean out their home or apartment as quickly as possible.
Once you find a piece of furniture that you’re interested in, you can always try to negotiate and talk the seller down on the price.
Second-Hand Shops
The next stop? Your local antique circuit.
Local second hand shops are a great next stop on a search for furniture.
And since you don’t have to leave your house to scope out Craigslist, one second hand shop might be the only stop you need to make!
Another reason that second hand shops are a good place to find furniture is that you can get furniture that is older or that comes with a few stains.
For just a little work and a relatively small investment, you can redo the furniture to make it look like new!
(For extra inspiration, just check out Pinterest or popular renovation blogs!).
Large Retailers (Carefully!)
Finally, you can shop at large retailers so long as you do so carefully and on the large scale.
Large retailers such as IKEA offer a staggering amount of furniture at surprisingly low prices.
In addition to mega-furniture retailers like IKEA, more ubiquitous retailers such as Target and Wal-Mart have upped the quality of the furniture that they offer, at prices set to compete with IKEA.
These are great places to include in your furniture search because they have large selections in their store for you to view, and even larger selections in their online stores.
If you accent your second hand pieces with store bought pieces, you’ll be able to put together a collection of furniture that represents your personality but doesn’t break your wallet.
So check Craiglist and second hand shops to see what your community has to offer when you set out to find new furniture.
If you don’t find what you are looking for there, visit larger retailers like IKEA, Targer, and Wal-Mart to broaden your search to find the furniture you want at a price that works for your budget.
I bought my sofa set from a second-hand shop. It was like gold mine because I was lucky for getting it in lower price. My friends got envy whenever I told them how much I bought it. I have checked craiglist, it seems like it offers good deals.
IKEA also has an “as is” section where you can get slightly damaged or returned furniture for much less. Some can be easily fixed while others need some woodworking.
Lots of stores also have floor model sales when new merchandise comes in and offer significant discounts to get rid of old stuff.
You can find some good stuff on Craigslist. We probably sell a lot more than we buy. But I have friends that have gotten some killer deals on stuff that was practically new for pennies on the dollar.
Great tips! My wife and I have found the CraigsList and Facebook swap shops are the best, but you have to be careful. Some people want what they paid for the furniture 10 years ago. But most of the time you can find great prices. 🙂
I must say I’ve bought a lot of furniture from Big Lots, I’ve always found good prices there. After shopping around, I’ve most recently bought a couch, a recliner and table and chairs from there. Craigslist is a hit or miss, and when you really need a piece of furniture, sometimes you’re pressed by time. But if you’re not in a hurry, I definitely think you can find good deals on Craigslist.
When we first started out we bought a lot of our furniture used at auctions. We pretty much supplied our whole apartment that way.