#MiserLife: Craigslisting

How to Refurnish for Next to Nothing

We moved last summer and quickly found that our new house felt quite empty with our few belongings. We also found that some of our old furniture pieces didn't work as well here as they did there. So off to Craigslist we went, in search of new and interesting pieces on the cheap!

The biggest eyesore and first item to go was our beloved striped couch whose bold blue hue didn't blend with our newly painted, grey-green walls.

We came across an area rug that incorporated all the right colors, but it didn't do enough to make that couch fit in.

We found a real treasure five too many towns over but luckily, the seller agreed to meet us half way at no extra charge! $150 bought us a smoke-free, pet-free sofa, over-sized chair, and ottoman set which was moved in and arranged not five minutes before the females in the house began sneezing, wheezing, and turning red.
Apparently "pet-free" doesn't mean the same thing to everyone.

Hours of vacuuming did nothing to relieve our allergic outbursts, so out to the garage it went.

Thankfully, we were able to re-list the set and it sold the very next day for $50 more than we had bought it for! It was almost enough to cover pain and suffering.

We liked having a set that matched for a change (something new for us misers that until that point had just accepted free/cheap furniture pieces and embraced a mismatched style) so we continued to look for a sofa/chair combination and found one in no time. The set we settled on was a couch, and two over-sized chairs set for $200.

If you can take your eyes off the cute baby, you'll see the couch in the background

Life-long couch stats:

futon: free from family (trashed)

faux leather couch: $300 (resold for $200)

settee: free from friend (still in use)

striped couch: $115 (resold for $75)

love seat: $0 (trashed)

green sofa/chair set: $150 (resold for $200)
brown sofa/chairs set: $200 (still in use)

= $290 spent on 7 couches/sets

(I think we'll be sticking with what we have for a while now)

But we're not finished yet.

The next item that was no longer working for us was our breakfast-nook bench table.

It's adorable, but not as functional as we'd like.

Ah, the memories of our first apartment. My parents lent us this table. It was one of the only pieces of furniture we had when we first moved in and we assembled it ourselves.

We wanted a table with a leaf and chairs, but this one ended up being too much for our space

This is what we've settled on and we love it. It has a leaf stored underneath the table (can you say convenient!?)

What we learned: 

Chairs are better than benches at defining personal space for toddlers
Benches make getting in and out complicated

Round tables = revolving chairs that are always out of place

One or two smaller leaves are preferable to one massive 2 foot leaf (for our space, anyways)

Table stats:

Bench table - free - borrowed & returned

Round table - $100 (resold for $165)

Current table - $75

= $10 spent on dining furniture!

Other furniture we scored to fill our house:

$10 - end table & 2 lamps 

$50 - area rug

2 book cases (free from family)

corner stand (free from family)

piano (free from family)

small dresser (free from family)

And that, friends, is how it's done.

Top tips for Craigslisting:

- negotiate the price lower

- don't be afraid to ask the seller if they're willing to meet

- triple check that pet-free means no pets

- it's okay to make a profit by reselling an item!