What to Buy First for a New Apartment, and What Can Wait
A buying order for when you cannot, and should not, buy everything in week one
A new apartment makes you want to buy everything at once. The budget usually says no, and that is lucky, because the things bought in the first week are the ones most often regretted. You have not lived in the rooms yet. You do not know where the light falls or where you will end up sitting.
So buy in stages. This is an order that works for most people, whether it is your first apartment or your fifth.
Before you buy anything
Three things cost nothing and save the most money:
- Measure the rooms, and mark the doors, windows and radiators.
- List what you already own that is coming with you, with sizes.
- Set a total budget, and split it roughly per room.
Then put what you own on a plan of the new rooms. The gaps on the plan are your shopping list, and they come with sizes. The method is in Will my furniture fit in my new apartment?.
Stage 1: before the first night
What you need to sleep, wash and eat. Not much else.
- A bed and a mattress. Do not save too hard here. A mattress on the floor is fine for a week.
- Bedding and pillows.
- Something on the bedroom window. A temporary blind or a sheet will do.
- A shower curtain and towels.
- One light per room. Some apartments come with bare wires.
- Kitchen basics. Pan, pot, knife, cutting board, plates, cups, cutlery.
- Toilet paper, soap, trash bags and cleaning basics.
- A basic toolkit. Screwdriver, hammer, tape measure.
Stage 2: the first two weeks
The pieces daily life runs on.
The curtain calculator gives you the size to buy.
These are the large purchases, so they are the ones to check before ordering. A sofa that is 4 in (10 cm) too deep for the room is an expensive mistake, and a cheap sofa that does not fit costs more than a dearer one that does. The sofa size checker is a quick first test.
Stage 3: the first month or two
Things that are better chosen after living in the rooms.
- A rug. Size it to the furniture standing on it, so wait until the sofa is in place.
- A coffee table and side tables.
- Shelves and extra storage. After a month you know what has no home.
- A TV stand or media unit.
- Lamps. You now know where you read and where the dark corners are.
- A bedside table.
Stage 4: whenever
Art, mirrors, plants, cushions, throws. These are the pieces that make it feel like yours, and getting one wrong costs little. There is no deadline.
What to buy second-hand
Good second-hand buys are things that are solid, simple and expensive new:
- Solid wood tables, dressers and bookcases
- Dining chairs
- Desks
- Mirrors and lamps
Usually better bought new: mattresses, and upholstered pieces unless you know where they have been.
The fit rule matters even more here, because second-hand furniture rarely goes back. Ask the seller for width, depth and height, and check them against your room before you arrange a van.
Keeping to the budget
- Spend most on what you use for hours every day: the mattress, the sofa, the desk chair.
- Price the whole room, not the piece. A dining table is a table plus four chairs.
- Count delivery. Large pieces often carry a delivery charge that changes which option is cheaper.
- Keep one list for every shop. In Nooked, each piece you add from a shop link goes onto one shopping list with its price, and you tick it as Bought when you order. The list shows what is still to buy against the budget you set, per room and for the whole home.
See it together before ordering
When a new piece has to live with things you already own, put them side by side first. Upload a photo of the armchair you are keeping to a furniture moodboard and add the sofas you are choosing between. You decide what goes together. It is just easier to decide when you can see it.
For the weeks around the move itself, see the moving apartment checklist.
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