Part 3: How To Get Twenty Pieces of Furniture {for under $200}

And we’re off to our third and final day of how to furnish a whole house {well} on the cheapy cheap! If you missed Wednesday or yesterday’s posts, you can read them here and here. Okay, so we’ve discussed (1) considering free stuff & hand-me-downs and (2) looking for used items on CraigsList, in thrift stores, and at yard sales, so today…

3. Keep Your Eyes Peeled: Be Patient (But Be Ready To Jump)

Okay, so you’re gonna laugh, but one time as I was picking up clothes at the dry cleaners drive-thru, I saw a stack of random stuff, including these two chairs, that looked like it was heading to the curb, so I asked if they were getting rid of them. They said they were cleaning out the place, so I asked if they’d sell them to me, and they said yes! So for $2 each, I got two great chairs. They had a funky-colored worn finish and could definitely use a coat of paint, but they came home to a girl with a paint sprayer, so they got a new lease on life. One went navy blue and pairs with big Bro’s desk; the other went creamy white to go with our desk.

Sometimes furniture pops up in the most unexpected places! Our desk (um, not the one we got from the gym–of all places–in part 1’s post, but before that) was a folding table. We were willing to wait patiently for the right piece in our price range. And before we had our glorious refinished CraigsList buffet in the front foyer, we had a piece of beveled glass spanning two plaster half pillars for years.

…And I’m certainly not opposed to a curbside pickup or dumpster dive every once in a while, too, when a treasure presents itself!

4. Peruse Damaged & End-Of-Season Closeouts

Umm… while you might think of buying end-of-season furniture at a more traditional spot, my husband picked this rocking chair up from the grocery store, of all places. They had these porch rockers in as part of a summer display (then dark brown stained, about $80 originally), but when the end of the season came, he got it for $25. Nice! A little coat from my pal the paint sprayer, and it filled in a spot and rounded out our conversational seating set-up in the family room just perfectly.

And when I saw this then-black (now sprayed navy) headboard on clearance at HomeGoods a few years ago, I noticed it had a scratch and dink in the finish. [This was nothing to me since I knew I would be painting it anyway.] I asked a manager if he could discount it further since it was damaged (never hurts to ask!), and he said YES! So this came home with me for $22, originally marked $100! I love that it has the beadboard accent–it reminds me of the Pottery Barn Kids camp collection… which costs a WEE bit more…

5. Reinvent

There is, of course, one last place you can hunt for new furniture: in your own home. You can reinvent old pieces for a new purpose. Cut down the legs on a dining table to make a coffee table or kids play table… Or rebuild an old crib into a new bench…

Alrighty-then, if my math is correct, that brings our grand total to twenty pieces and 199 bucks. SUCCESS! Wheeeeee!

Okay, so I hope this three-day bonanza of furniture thriftiness has inspired you to furnish your home for less! If it has, share! We wanna know!