Moving into your first real place of your own is exciting and wonderful. The first few days, the fact that you have your own place is all you need in the world. Then a few more days pass and your legs are cramping from sitting Indian style on the floor. What to do? You probably can’t afford to run out and furnish your apartment and chances are you can not even afford to purchase some used furniture either. While you have entertained the idea of financing some furniture, you know that really isn’t a great idea. You can sit you floor hoping for a furniture fairy or a relative bestows you with a sofa or you can go out and find some free furniture yourself. Find Free Furniture? Yes, you can easily find free furniture. It may not be show room quality, but you would be surprised to learn that you can find decent free furniture. There are three ways to find free furniture: Dumpster Diving, Curb Surfing, and Freecycle Groups.
Dumpster Diving
Whoa there! Dumpster Diving is a viable way of finding useable free furniture. And no, chances are you will not have to actually climb inside a dumpster to land that free furniture. Hear me out before you say no way. This is the fastest way to get free furniture in good condition.
The best places to go Dumpster Diving for furniture are apartment complexes. Frequently, people ditch their apartments moving in the middle of the night at the beginning of the month and end of the month. This is the best time to find free furniture.
I have seen quite a few nice sofas and entertainment centers get ditched by the dumpster due to a hasty move. You will find something useable if you go to several apartment complexes at the beginning or end of any given month. With several trips you may be able to furnish your living room and your dining room in one night. Since the people throwing away this furniture are sneaking out, search for these items between 9PM to 12AM.
Curb Surfing
A little more public then Dumpster Diving, Curb Surfing is more of a hit or miss activity. Curb Surfing requires you to be on constant look out for useable items sitting on the curb in residential areas waiting to be picked up by waste management. Occasionally, you will find a nice table or a few decent chairs. It is a rare occasion to find decent sofas.
To help increase your odds of fruitful Curb Surfing, find out the schedule for big item pick ups for the neighborhood. If they pick up large items on Tuesday, chances are you will find those items out on the curb on Monday night or early Tuesday morning.
The down side of curb surfing is that you can expect to be stared at as you pick through someone’s garbage in front of their lawn. You could also run in to a co-worker or friend while loading up and old dresser. It also takes longer to fill your new place with furniture this way. You can spend weeks looking for something suitable to sit on.
Freecycle Groups
Freecylce Groups are the lazy man’s version of Dumpster Diving and Curb Surfing. People in Freecylce Groups post items on the inter-net that are free and items that they would like for free. The person offering the free item gets to choose who it goes to and the person who is receiving the item just has to go out and pick it up. It is socially and environmentally responcible to give items away that would other wise end up in landfills.
Unfortunately, there are more people looking for free items then posting free items so the competition is fierce. Many of the people searching for free items also post short sad stories about why the need them. After spending a few hours searching the messages, I have come to realize there is an epidemic of displaced men needing household furniture due to divorce and pregnant unmarried mothers needing mattresses from non-smoking households due to relocation. As I said, the competition is fierce.
While it is worth a shot to try Freecycle Groups, it may take a while for you to actually get some furniture. The owners get to choose who gets it from a list of emails; you need a really sad story to come out on top. I mean think about it, you are competing with a pregnant woman sleeping on the floor for a sofa or a mattress. Freecycle Groups are great in the aspect you can search for a specific piece of free furniture without ever leaving your empty house.
Finding Free furniture is easy, if you know where and when to look. There is nothing to be ashamed of by getting free furniture by Dumpster Diving or Curb Surfing. Many people throw out perfectly useable items because they purchased new ones. It makes no sense to run out and buy new furniture if you can not afford to do so. And it is pointless to go purchase used furniture if you can find it for free. When you do go Dumpster Diving, bring an extra set of hands along to pick up heavy items. If you are picking something up from a Freecycle Group, bring someone along so you’re not alone at a stranger’s house. It may take a little effort but in a week or so you can have your place fully furnished for free.
