by Alison Ringland

Created on: November 16, 2009

If you are living on a budget buying the things you need can be difficult. There are other options to buying brand new and the standard of the furniture can be much higher than the standard you can afford to pay brand new.

Auctions both online and offline you can find incredible bargains on second hand furniture. I saw a couple of years ago in one of the major furniture stores here in the UK a dining room suite that I fell in love with, it was retailing at 800, far more than I could afford! This year I saw on ebay the same table and chairs which were being sold second hand. I did notice that the wood on top of the table had been scratched and after asking the seller to confirm that the wood was solid wood decided to bid and purchased the whole set for 55. It took me one afternoon to take the wood back to natural and then wax it. Everyone who enters my dining room comments on how nice it is.

Having always wanted a leather three piece suite for my lounge, I purchased second hand and in immaculate condition a settee and chair at a cost of 50. I had one problem though I needed another settee and it needed to be cream like the one I had purchased. Hunting on the internet I came across a site called Freecycle. Yes, it is exactly what it says free! Excitedly I joined my area group and hunted to see if there was one, there wasn't although there were a couple of leather settees in a different colour to what I was looking for. Over a two week period I kept checking and then one morning whilst I was listing things on there that I didn't need, someone listed a leather cream settee which was a ten minute drive away. I quickly responded and collected it that afternoon. It blends in extremely well with the settee and chair I had already bought, the condition was very good. Since then I have acquired several items of furniture from there that have been solid and in good condition. The Freecycle group operates both in the USA and UK.

I do recommend when acquiring second hand furniture, other than three piece suites you make sure that they are solid wood, this is for several reasons:

Wood is extremely solid and will last for a life time.

If it is scratched or doesn't blend in with your colour scheme then you can easily rectify or change it by stripping off the finish, lightly sanding it down, clean with white spirit and apply new varnish, wax or paint.

The appearance can also be changed by new handles or knobs.

By obtaining second hand furniture you not only gain high quality furniture at very little cost or no cost but you can also have great fun revamping it to fit in perfectly with your colour scheme. Another plus is you are keeping it out of landfill.

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