Frugal Living - Furniture

Today was a really big day for us! In terms of bargain hunting and savings! My son has been really needing a new bed, but we kept putting it off until we found the perfect price. He had been sleeping on one of those Little Tykes car beds and it's been just fine up until a couple of months ago. Caleb must have went through a growth spurt because he was beginning to get too tall for it.


We wanted to get him a loft bed. One with the bed on top like a bunk bed but with a desk underneath. We looked all over Craigslist and the discount furniture stores. My husband found one at Big Lots for $150, but it didn't include the mattress and we'd have to get it delivered, which would be another $50. It was our last resort because it was the only loft bed we could find that wasn't $300+.


After deciding we just couldn't wait any longer to find a better bargain, we called Big Lots to make sure they had some in stock. It turns out that they sold the floor model that day. We called all the Big Lots within an hour away and they all said they either don't carry it anymore or they're out of stock. We were pretty disappointed because this meant starting all over in our search.


Just yesterday I found on Craigslist an Ikea loft bed for just $50. It had a few scratches and some marker on the bottom, but it was simply, sturdy design with a nice big desk and even a place to hang clothes! Of course we jumped on it and this morning we picked it up! It even fit in our Vibe perfectly!


Now that we had the bed, we needed 3 more things: a mattress, the correct size allen wrenches and directions for putting the loft bed together. Even though we bought a used bed, we weren't up for buying a used mattress. I don't think I have to go much further on that one! After searching at 3 different stores for a decent mattress for a good price, we found one at Boscov's! Everywhere else were discount mattress stores and mattress factories! They all wanted over $100 for a cheaply made mattress! At Boscov's we got a Tempurpedic mattress on sale for $79 plus 20% off! It only cost $67 with tax!


The next was allen wrenches. We needed 2 different sizes, none of which we had. My husband did a search online for a set of allen wrenches in a bunch of different sizes so we could have them for future use. Every place he looked was for over $40 for a set. He decided to check out Walmart before anything else and he got 20 for only 96 cents!


Lastly, was the directions. The family we bought the bed from said they couldn't find them anywhere and they even looked online. I thought the bed looked simple enough to put together without instructions but my husband wanted the reassurance of having the original directions. He did a search online and found a pdf file for the bed!


So with just a little searching around and some determination, we were able to get a loft bed, a good quality mattress, tools and the directions for less than the bed at Big Lots that we originally wanted!


Cost breakdown:


Ikea Loft bed - $50.00
Tempurpedic mattress - $67.00
Allen wrenches - $.96
Instructions - $0.00

Total cost - $117.96