How are you furnishing your first place?

sessionswedding

I thought this would be an interesting question.  I'm sure there are a lot of us on here (more than other boards I go to at least) who either live with our parents or live in a dorm room.  So when we all get our first house or apartment with our future husbands, we're going to need a lot of stuff!  I thought it might be fun to create a poll for those who are getting married and will need furniture (or those who are already married and came from this situation).

sessionswedding

My FI and I are saving up money like crazy to buy new furniture and appliances ourselves.  I already have a recently purchased queen bedroom suite, so I'll be taking that with me to our first apartment.  After that we'll just need living room furniture, some barstools for the eating bar, and a washer and dryer.  It's actually not that bad.

iamjoesgurl

I've been on my own for more years than I care to admit, but have a piece of advice.  Craigslist or Pennysaver type newspapers can be a great source for deals on furniture.  I would just avoid mattresses, sofas and other upholstered furniture.  And don't be shy to bargain.  Most people will accept less than the asking price. 

Spend money on a good mattress.  It is a great investment.

Borrow furniture from family members who don't need it now, but would like to keep it in their immediate family.  That will give you time to save up on good furniture that you can have a long time.

My sister has had wonderful luck with ordering furniture direct from factories in North Carolina.  They often have catalogs and their delivery charges aren't crazy.

And finally, if you can find Amish or Mennonites who live near you and make their own furniture to sell, I can almost guarantee that it will be better built than anything you'll find in a furniture store.

Hope this helps!

JoyMatt424

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/cultural-wedding-boards_christian-weddings_furnishing-first-place?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Cultural%20Wedding%20BoardsForum:464687ae-7bc1-4360-9aea-999e11f1e1adDiscussion:a030ade7-580f-45be-a7d6-01c995d0a97aPost:10709068-6497-48db-998f-26cde7de0a7c">Re: How are you furnishing your first place?</a>:
[QUOTE]I've been on my own for more years than I care to admit, but have a piece of advice.  Craigslist or Pennysaver type newspapers can be a great source for deals on furniture.  I would just avoid mattresses, sofas and other upholstered furniture.  And don't be shy to bargain.  Most people will accept less than the asking price.  <strong>Spend money on a good mattress.  It is a great investment.</strong> Borrow furniture from family members who don't need it now, but would like to keep it in their immediate family.  That will give you time to save up on good furniture that you can have a long time. My sister has had wonderful luck with ordering furniture direct from factories in North Carolina.  They often have catalogs and their delivery charges aren't crazy. And finally, if you can find Amish or Mennonites who live near you and make their own furniture to sell, I can almost guarantee that it will be better built than anything you'll find in a furniture store. Hope this helps!
Posted by iamjoesgurl[/QUOTE]

I've been living on my own for 2 years now. I bought my furniture through a vintage thrift store where there was perfectly good furniture waiting to be polished and loved. I bought my couches new (I don't recommend buying couches through thrift stores) as well as my mattress from Sleepys. The Mattress was my big ticket item - I paid about 800 bucks for it, but it's just as good as the day I bought it.

Everything else is from a thrift store and I have to say it looks pretty good if I do say so myself. Also, I saved a LOAD of money.  There are lots of ideas on HGTV.com and I would also recommend going to places like Pottery Barn and Pier 1 to get inspiration, then going elsewhere for the actual furniture purchases, because you can accomplish the same thing.

lkm2006

This is a great idea!  I love getting to see what other people have done.

We both still live with our parents.. at least for two more days!  We are young and have been out of college for a year so we basically had nothing! 

We bought our first home at a really good price so we were able to do some major updates to make it more "ours".  We had money saved up to buy some new furniture at a really nice discount shop.  We really needed a kitchen table and then some den furniture, we are going to use FI's bedroom set that he bought a cuople of years ago.

We have been fortunate and have received lots of very useful wedding gifts that have now made a place in our house.  I have to say, one of the best things is getting to bring in our seperate "stuff" and see it become our home!  I can't wait until we get back from our honeymoon and live there together!

GJones27

There's no option for "merge" furniture.  My FI has stuff from his place, and I have stuff from my place.  Each will get rid of the broken or really cheap stuff in exchange for the nicer stuff that the other may have.  We're also having a gift registry for cooking appliances, as neither one of us has major things like a blender or a food processor.

katanne9

Ditto Joe.

There are a lot of great deals on Craigslist. Until you can REALLY afford furniture, I would buy used - with the exception of mattresses, rugs and (usually) couches.

The furniture we did buy new, we bought from Christmas Tree Shoppe. To us, It's not worth putting the $$ into new furniture until we've bought a house.

SuMmErKuTiE

Ditto pp who mentioned Craigslist. I was able to make money by selling a lot of my stuff on Craigslist when I moved in with DH. I had purchased a bunch of my furniture for past apartments off Craigslist and it's a great moneysaver. Just be careful when using Craigslist, don't ever go alone to pick something up or have someone come pick something up from you while you're home alone. 

DH and I both had purchased brand new queen beds around the same time and financed through Sleepys. So when we combined households, we had a nice new bed for the guestroom as well. Both bed sets were paid off pretty quickly. 

Our kitchen table and chairs were a hand-me-down set from my aunt which is great. Our couches are financed and the rest of our furniture was stuff from IKEA. 

I highly suggest staying away from Walmart and Target furniture.. you get what you pay for and it will fall apart very quickly and not be good quality. All it does is make you have to go out and spend more money to replace it so soon. 

A lot of our kitchen stuff is new from wedding gifts which was great because we replaced all our miss-matched pots and pans, dishes, silverware, etc.. from past apartments/dorm living. 

fpaemp2011

This is my 3rd year living off campus, so I have a *few* pieces to take with me.  I have a kitchen table & chair set mom got at a yard sale, and my aunt gave me my great-aunt's dining room set and a queen headboard & bed frame when she downsized earlier this year. 

All we really need are a couch and a mattress set for the bed, as I have a twin bed right now, and FI is living in his sister & BIL's guest room this semester. If we don't receive them as a gift, some of the wedding money will go towards that.  Neither BB&B or Target carry mattresses or living room sets...that I know of.

 As far as appliances, we're hoping we can find a rental property that has appliances included at first, and then save up for whenever we move on.

rachelea

We're going a slightly different route. FI already purchased his bedroom set and the guest bedroom furtniture through an auction for RIDICULOUSLY low prices. They have tons of great stuff at our local auction from estate sales so its high quality and low priced. We had actually planned on going there today after Bible study but FI was too tired from soccer practice then the gym.

kellya01

I actually am a homeowner, so I spent $$ when I moved in on a nice bedroom set and mattress.  Bought a kitchen table on clearance from Pier 1.  Got counter-height chairs for that table from BB&B.  My FI actually knew that we'd be getting married a while ago and he bought nice living room furniture and uses borrowed bedroom furniture from his family.  We're fortunate -- we were able to kind of divide up the stuff we bought, knowing that eventually we'd be all together.  I am a HUGE kitchen / cook/ baker person, so I have spent $$ on kitchen stuff.  He loves patios, so he has 2 patio sets (front porch and back porch) so we're set there.

I guess living separately can be hard if couples want to eventually combine things because they don't want 2 of everything, but for us it was relatively easy --- "relatively".... hahah because our family let us borrow the items we weren't ready to buy yet.  I borrowed a hand-me-down living room set that my mom added to on craigslist since she was looking for a loveseat for my uncle's living room.... I got to use the couch! 

azdancer8

We're also merging. We each have our own place, which means we're pretty well stocked already. His bed is bigger, so we'll use that one, but my current furniture will be the bulk of what we will keep, since it's in nicer condition.

sessionswedding

FI and I are 100% anti-home-buying (long story, lots of reasons, no you won't change my mind because FI's realtor mother and mortgage officer sister haven't yet) so we are spending a lot of money on good furniture up front that we can keep for a long time.  Since we aren't saving for a down payment, all of the money that we ARE saving is going towards making our place as nice as possible.

jonigringa

DH already had an apartment before we got married, but he didn't have an actual bedroom set or dining room table with chairs, and his living room furniture was not my taste at all.  However, we didn't have a lot of money up front to buy all new, so I started stalking craigslist and ended up finding some really great deals on almost new/barely used items.  We did buy a new table with 6 chairs for the dining room, but that's because the owner of the furniture store is a client of DH's and gave us a really great deal on the set.  Even though the pieces we bought came from all different sources, they all look like they go together, so we're really happy with what we found.

Jeffie86

I had hand-me-down furniture and a cheap, new couch.  I had a kitchen table from a garage sale.  My parents gave us their old mattress (only 5 years).  The rest of our furniture is Target and Walmart stuff that has so far lasted me over 6 years.  We registered for small appliances, dishes, etc, and received or bought most of it. 

We're really in no hurry to have a "Better Homes & Gardens" home.  A new car is a much bigger priority, as is finishing grad school for me and getting a teaching job for him.  

Craiglist is great....unless you live in Wyo.  One area for the whole state--which I am not willing to drive across for a dining room table!  Although to NoCo one isn't too bad. Still, not a lot of ads.

RNShellyF

FI & I will both be living with our parents until the wedding. FI parents graciously offered to buy us our living room set and bedroom set with mattress (king size, woo hoo). All we really need is a dining room table (we will be renting one of my mother's houses so all the appliances and what not are already there). We are planning to build our dream house, so we will be saving for the furniture to fill that house as well, and will be apying in cash (Dave Ramsey style lol).

sessionswedding

I was WAITING for someone to say Dave Ramsey!  Lol.

Ready2BMrsWade

I have an apartment I live in alone right now, luckily my parents helped furnish this one so much of the furniture is moving with us. I have a couple of handed down chairs and an amazing futon that hopefully will last a long time. The dining furniture is actually about 30 years old that my grandfather made. Our bedroom furniture is actually mine from growing up, we get to share a double bed until we can afford new stuff. All our things will be used or gifts, luckily I already have most of it. It is going to very much look like that stereotypical "we are student newlyweds and broke beyond belief" look, but it will help to allow us to save up for when we finally get an actual house so we can get lovely matching stuff.

jenn.daniel

FI and I both have a lot of hand-me-downs.  I actually had a used couch for a while, but I did know and trust the person I got it from. 

FI's parents are holding on to some things for us.  FMIL redecorated a few years ago, but she kept the old things for us.  She's also found a few nice pieces at yard/estate sales for us.

When my parents got a house a year after they got married, they had whole rooms that were empty!  The paperboy saw once when he came to get paid, and he thought they'd been robbed!  They just didn't have any living toom furniture.

KA2

We just bought our first place, a flat, back in May and are still in the process of furnishing. 

My FI had pretty much paid for the bulk of it from his savings and I've contributed as well. It's a 2 bedroom flat and for now, we've furnished the living room and the guest room. Our bedroom has no furniture yet. His SIL offered to buy us our bed, but we haven't picked out what we want yet so hopefully the offer still stands when we do