Free Treasures

Posted by Kristin Abraham Aug 15, 2007

Every college town has a move in/move out day, where I live it happens to be today. This means that traffic downtown is absolutely painful, especially for someone as high strung and impatient as I am. But it also means there are hundreds if not thousands of little treasures curbside.

College students are an interesting breed, they'll scrape together coins, sell cds and blood to get enough money so they can have a few beers but they'll also throw out perfectly good furniture, sometimes valuable antiques, just because they don't want to move the heavy piece to their new residence.

The frugal and knowledgeable person will take advantage of this weakness and scoop up the discarded furniture. If you don't it's just going to land in a dump somewhere, lost forever.

I previously have done a little bit of dumpster diving; I once picked up a great antique coca-cola sign and a fouton. I've seen other items and meant to go back and pick them up but forgot, and often regretted it. I not only don't see anything wrong with rescuing something from the trash but I think its the "green" thing to do. If you can use something or need an item, why buy new when you can get it for free. Even if you have to expend a little elbow grease to spruce it up it's still better than paying a lot.

My only word of advice would be to stay away from upholstered items, bedding, carpets, clothing and other fabrics that can hide bed bugs and other creepy crawleys. I'd stick to things like solid furniture, mirrors, artwork, bicycles, musical instruments, and other items that can be easily cleaned and wouldn't have infestation issues.