Storing Your Own Furniture

 
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Owning your own furniture can seem attractive. You can save clients money by not restricting them to the three-month minimum. You get to pick pieces which appeal to your design sensibility, and you'll save on the actual furniture. In fact, the "don't pay a cent" offers can make you think you'll make a tidy profit. But consider the additional work and costs involved – which cut heavily into your profit. You need to rent storage space. You need a truck to move it – as well as a driver (and all the costs that entails, including insurance.) You bear the liability for moving the furniture into people's homes (as well as the aching muscles). And if a piece isn't being used, it's costing you money to store it.

 

Before you start purchasing a ton of furniture, and getting a warehouse to store it all in, you want to understand your commitment to your staging career. Do you want to spend 10+ or 20+ years doing this? Because then, you can justify the expense of purchasing your own furniture to rent out to your clients. However, if you are doing this as a side gig, or are adding it to your portfolio as a real estate agent, it may be a smarter decision just to rent. When it comes to purchasing your own furniture, you do have the liability of insuring your products, finding the right warehouse so it's well protected, and always figuring out pick-up and delivery dates. Where as with rentals, delivery comes with your rental.

Before you start purchasing a ton of furniture, and getting a warehouse to store it all in, you want to understand your commitment to your staging career. Do you want to spend 10+ or 20+ years doing this? Because then, you can justify the expense of…
 

But as mentioned above, you don't have any restrictions on being stuck with bland content that you may get with rental warehouses. Purchase furniture if you are in the design business long term. But don't get a line of credit and run off purchasing a whole warehouse full of furniture. Start off slow, with small pieces here and there, complete your collection with rental pieces, and grow slowly. That way, you have first-hand experience with the process and can form a better opinion if you want to be a furniture owner or renter. In the meantime, you can start a small collection of decorative pieces. It takes much less space to store and isn't as expensive of a commitment like furniture is. If you do decide to purchase your own furnishings, be sure to use a storage unit that offers indoor storing. You don't want your stuff to risk getting moldy.