Tips for using Craigslist and our best ever CL Trip

I’ve used craigslist, ohhh about 341 times. I’ve bought and sold and driven to different cities all in the name of an awesome deal on CL. This, my friends, was the best ever craiglist trip. Let me tell you a little story…

It all started because of this fun little website called Thou Shall Craigslist. CL Tip #1: See if you city has a blog like this. It’s an Austin based blog, where each morning, a list of 10 or so items are listed that the author deems to be good CL deals. I go on streaks of obsession with this site, and one morning I saw this… A big ol’ mirror listed for $100 bucks. I emailed the dude, and scheduled a time to come and see the 8 foot beast. I know I needed it.

5 days later, Andy and I take the 45 minute scenic drive from central Austin to Lake Travis. CL Tip #2: Far away places= no one else wants to drive= good stuff and good deals. We drive down dirt roads, open gates, twist and turn through the woods to find out this is the backyard of owner of the beasty mirror.

We get to his house at 11:30am on Saturday morning, and he gives us a tour of the cabin filled with treasures. He says hes’s moving to Hong Kong in less than a month and everything has to go. He told me to make an offer on anything in the cabin. I said how about $50 for this pretty little painting…

He said, “That’s a $200,000 painting, I think that one is coming with me.” We find out the mirror was a custom made floor length mirror and it has never been hung on the wall. We loaded up the mirror into the truck and I even got $20 bucks off. CL Tip #3: Never hurts to ask for a discount, worst he could say his no!  At the last minute, we decided we needed these 2 brown leather chairs. He was selling both for $300.

I’d never heard of the brand, Mitchell Gold, but the chairs were clearly real leather, and Andy thought they were comfy. Plus, we do have 2 living rooms, and one basically sits empty. Where else can you get an oversized leather chair for $150 bucks?  We had to get ’em. CL Tip #4: Google brands you’ve never heard of to make sure you’re getting a good deal. Which meant we had to come back. We drove the 45 minutes back to our house, unloaded the mirror and turned around and came back to pick up our new to us chairs.

The mirror just barley fits in the house! It’s going to (fingers crossed) live horizontally on that wall. See more deets about the living room in yesterday’s post! UPDATE: How to hang a really heavy mirror on your wall. 

We drive back out to find a few more friends at Roger’s. By friends, I mean more CL’ers. He’s got lots of stories and he’s very hospitable. This time he offers us an iced coffe, and we hang on the couch sipping our cup of jo until the next customer arrives. This family of four is here to look at his dinging room table. This was an awesome diamond shaped mid century modern table complete with 6 chairs. Diamond shape ensures that everyone can see everyone at dinner! For $500 bucks the sweet family buys it, and Andy helps them haul it to their car. By now, it’s 4pm and Roger asks us if we want to see the property. Of course we do! We stroll down the windy path to the lake and meet this guy:

Here are 2 more of this friends…

We walk to the end of the path, and find this gorgeous space… I dipped my feet in the lake, and we chatted on the dock. This tree is begging for a rope swing!

We walked the 15 minutes back up to house, and Roger starts showing us what is still left for sale. I’d been eyeing this pretty little Eames chair in his bedroom. I’ve always had a thing for designer chairs. I bought my first white Verner Panton chair in college when a friend interned at a fancy furniture store. I bought my second, after I got my first real job as a teacher. (You can see them both in these pictures of our Florida living room.) He tells me he’ll sale the Eames chair for $100… sold! She’s on sale for $832 at DWR, yikes! And here she sits in our living room.

We take one more look around and spotted this metal desk. Andy needs a desk and we already had to make a trip to the bank for more cash, so what the heck! We picked up an extra $50 and got the desk too! CL Tip #5: Bring extra cash, just in case. And there is one of my Panton chairs! We’re using them as office chairs right now.

We took the desk apart, loaded up the leather chairs, out the Eames in the back of the truck, and drove it all home thinking about how me made a new friend AND got awesome deals, all because of a little things called Craigslist. Thank you, CL!

And here are the Craigslist tips in list form:

CL Tip #1: See if you city has a blog like Thou Shall Craigslist.
CL Tip #2: Far away places= no one else wants to drive= good stuff and good deals… take the drive!
CL Tip #3: Never hurts to ask for a discount, worst she/he could say his no!
CL Tip #4: Google brands you’ve never heard of to make sure you’re getting a good deal.
CL Tip #5: Bring extra cash, just in case.
CL Tip #6: When searching CL, use the “pic view”… this will change your CL life!

And just for fun, here are the prices on our CL goodies:

• 8 foot mirror: $80
• Eames chair: $100
• 2 Brown leather chairs: $150 (x2)
• Metal desk: $50

Grand total: $530

Yikes! I guess I hadn’t added it up yet!  But, that’s a good lead into my last Craigslist tip, if it’s a really good deal, and you really like it, don’t pass it up! You probably won’t find that same awesome deal again. And that, my friends is the beauty of Craiglist! Have you found any awesome deals on CL lately? Have you made a friend because of CL? I’d love to hear…