7 Hacks to Help You Buy Quality Furniture Like a Boss

We all want the best furniture for our homes and offices. But, buying the best furniture is expensive. Often, you will see a small piece selling for thousands of dollars.

Here are 7 proven ways you can save money when shopping for furniture.

Compare Prices

Wayfair is the biggest online-only furniture company with a valuation of almost $10 billion. Wayfair owns brands like All Modern, Joss & Main, Wayfair, Birchlane, and Perigold. These brands target customers with different tastes.

What many people don’t know is that these brands sell similar products but at different prices. Consider the image below where the price of the same bed sells for between $94 to $112.

This does not happen in Wayfair alone. The image below shows how Amazon lists the same product but in different prices.

So, before you buy any furniture online, I recommend that you take time to do your research. By comparing prices, you can save a lot of money.

Ignore Brands

In fashion, companies like Louis Vuitton are known to sell simple clothes for thousands of dollars. In reality, these clothes are usually not worth that much. Most are made by underpaid workers in Asia.

The same happens in the furniture industry where brands like the Henry Collection sold by West Elm sell for thousands of dollars. In reality, those furniture are usually not worth that much.

So, when shopping, I recommend that you forget the big brands and go for unbranded but quality pieces of furniture.

Also, instead of shopping in furniture stores located in luxurious shopping malls, I recommend that you buy in a local furniture store. This is because when you buy in a luxurious shop, you pay for the rent, the staff, and other fees that the furniture shop pays.

Consider Shipping Costs

If you are buying furniture online, you should always consider the shipping price. Since furniture are bulky, they cost more to ship than normal parcels. However, you don’t want to pay hundreds of dollars in shipping fees.

So, you should always insist on buying furniture in websites that guarantee free shipping like Overstock and Williams Sonoma.

If you have paid the annual Amazon Prime subscription, I recommend that you use Amazon and buy products that are Prime eligible.

Ignore Upsells

When buying furniture, you will often be presented with other products that the seller thinks matches with the piece you have bought. While some of these upsells are good, I recommend that you ignore them if you are trying to save money.

Amazon offers a SmartGuard Furniture Protection Plan whose price ranges between $700 to $1000 for a five-year plan. The plan covers common accidents such as stains, punctures, burns and breakage. While the plan can come in handy, I recommend that you ignore such upsells. Moreover, you can buy an equally good furniture to replace the damaged one with this money.

Buy Used Furniture

You can save a lot of money if you opt for a used furniture. The common misconception is that used furniture have flaws. This is not always the case. For example, a neighbor might get a job transfer and opt to sell his house products instead of moving with them. In such a case, the pieces are usually not bad.

You can get used furniture from websites like Letgo and Craigslist.

When buying used furniture, I recommend that you try the furniture before you pay. Also, I recommend that you clean the furniture well after buying. This will help get rid of odors and other forms of dirt.

Consider Clearance Sales

 

These days, the retail industry is changing, and retailers are closing thousands of stores. This year alone, more than 6,400 stores are closing. Its always sad to see these retailers close shop. But, you can take advantage of such periods to buy quality furniture at a significant discount.

Alternatively, regularly, retailers and even e-commerce companies sell products that are not moving at a discount. They do this to clear their space for new products they believe will sell faster.

You can also consider waiting for the annual shopping holidays like the Black Friday where companies countrywide give huge discounts.

Also, you can wait to buy certain products in certain months. For example, research shows that mattresses usually sell at a bigger discount in May.

Buy Furniture that Requires Little Upkeep

The price of maintaining furniture is expensive too. According to Angieslist, the price of cleaning a sofa can be as high as $150. When you compound add the number of times when you will need this cleaning, the costs can be in the thousands of dollars per year especially when you have pets or children. To save on this money, you can opt for furniture that will require little upkeep. For example, a white sofa will always require more cleaning than a brown sofa.

Like I have written before, since you work hard for your money, you should live your life to the fullest. However, this does not mean that you should accept to be ripped off by buying expensive products that are not worth it. Since furniture is very expensive, I recommend that you follow the tips above and get yourself quality products but at a lower price.