Budget Living Room For Under $1000

I’ve moved over 20 times in my lifetime, at least 10 of them in the last 15 years. Sometimes you are financially prepared for a move and sometimes you are not. When you aren’t it might be necessary to sell some furniture to make the move easier, physically, on you.

About a month ago we got word that our landlord was not renewing our lease. Of course the movers we planned to hire were booked during our move time. So we were stuck needing to move ourselves and our sleeper sofa.

With a long distance move and a lack of help we made the decision to sell most of our old furniture and buy new. This made the move a lot easier on us.

We decided it was time to go home to Pittsburgh. As beautiful as central PA is it just never felt like home to my Pittsburgh raised husband. Being from the highly populated Chicagoland area central PA never felt like home to me either.

Pittsburgh offered our family more in the way of activities and walkability for stores and shopping. We sat down and decided to move home, to Pittsburgh, a city we all love dearly.

Knowing the move was going to be physically intense for us we minimized that by getting rid of the furniture we no longer wanted anyways. The rental we were moving into is light and airy and in desperate need of new furniture.

Getting Rid Of Old Furniture

When we got the news that our landlord wasn’t going to renew our lease due to her selling the property to her daughter who wanted to move in we were pretty devastated. While we didn’t love the house we were in we weren’t ready to move just yet. But we took this as a bit of a sign that it was time for us to go home.

So we sat down as a family and took a good hard look at our furniture. Rob and I knew that we would not be able to lift or move the sleeper sofa so we instead opted to sell it and buy new when we arrived in Pittsburgh.

We also sold our dining room table, a chest, and several other pieces of furniture opting to get new in our new home over the next several months.

The Move To Pittsburgh

The move to Pittsburgh went very smooth packing everything we owned in our 3 bedroom townhome into a 15’ Uhaul. Despite a change in pick up for the Uhaul and some physical aches and pains we got to Pittsburgh safely.

After unloading and unpacking what we owned Rob and I started the search for new furniture.

New Living Room Budget and Requirements

Right off the bat we set a $1000 budget for our living room. We had other requirements in addition to the budget though.

We have two cats and a preschooler in the house, this means our furniture needs to stand up to the abuses that will be inflicted on it.

Finding furniture that can stand up to abuse can be a bit difficult. I’ve learned that furniture is only going to last about 3-5 years when you have kids and animals in the house.

We knew at this point we would be doing our furniture shopping at Big Lots. It just made sense to not spend loads of money on furniture that would get scratched by cats and possibly stained by our child.

Additionally, Big Lots has this amazing 3 year warranty that covers a lot of the issues we could have with furniture in a house with kids and animals.

Color Palette Of Existing Floors And Walls

The flooring throughout the entire house is extremely neutral which allows us to do almost anything with the decor. It’s a gray beige wood laminate that can stand up to almost anything while giving us a clean palette to work with.

The walls in most of the home are a light gray and the trim is all white. The neutral palette that was already in the home gave way to a lot of options for decorating the room.

Keep The Room Large

Our living room is pretty large and I wanted to be sure to keep it that way. This meant sticking with lighter colors for our larger pieces of furniture and using pops of color in our accessories.

Lighting isn’t much of an issue as we have a large window in the front room. However, I do need some height in this corner of the room.

Matching grey sofa and loveseat with blue pillows, grey rug, and matching end table and coffee table

We were lucky to find a light grey sofa and loveseat set over at Big Lots for less than $800. It was perfect to keep the room light and looking large.

Wanting to add a bit of warmth though we opted for a 7×9 geometric rug in a darker grey. The diamond pattern keeps the room modern while adding a break between the light flooring and the light pieces of furniture. The rug was $120.

Matching grey sofa and loveseat with blue pillows grey rug and modern coffee table

The coffee table and end tables were about $200 and finished off the major furniture pieces easily.

Right now you are probably thinking to yourself that we went over budget, actually we didn’t. You see Big Lots had a furniture sale where if you spent over $1000 you could get $200 off. So our total so far came to $920.

Our Blue Accessories

We have a small Tardis from Doctor Who and a blue pot for a succulent. We knew that we would end up using blue as an accessory color in the room.

Lucky for us these sofas already came with blue pillows. I fully believe in the psychological effect of colors on the brain and blue is a very calming color.

We Aren’t Done Yet

We have some major wire management that needs to take place in this home and that will get done in the upcoming weeks when we are able to switch out for a white network wire instead of a blue one.

I also need some height added in the corner of the room so I will be getting a table lamp for that table.

Unfortunately, my grandmothers painting does seem to look a bit off on the wall above the loveseat. This painting will instead get moved to another wall.

Side picture of grey sofa and loveseat with blue pillows and grey rug

To replace it I will be adding staggered shelving on the walls above the sofa and loveseat to hold books and other trinkets.

Now I’m not big on trinkets so there won’t be a lot of those added. I prefer to use books to decorate because at least books are used for more than just looking at.

On the other side of the room we will be adding a blue chair and using the other end table.

Living Room Updates To Come

As I continue to complete this room I will be adding updates on the blog and link to them here. Our living room will be a place to gather and watch the games, hang out with friends, or cuddle in for date night.

My goal is to make it as inviting as possible while not breaking the bank entirely. Make sure you bookmark or pin this post so you can check back for more updates as they come.

What do you think so far? Let me know in the comments below. Follow me on Pinterest for more like this and pin this to your living room and decor boards.

Related Posts:

Apartment Decorating Ideas On A Budget - Living Room Decor On A Budget - Under Budget Decorating Tips For Living Room

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