www.iva.co.uk

Hi,
Having a bit of a dilema at home at the moment.
Our sofa is about to pack up the ghost (same as the bed) and was wondering does anyone know the best way of getting a sofa and bed thats going to last but not cost any money.

I was thinking of going into DFS of somewhere and seeing if they can help at all (without getting credit obviously)

Just wondering how you go about replacing items in the home on the budget we are left with?

This isn't a major issue for the bed and sofa but what if the washing machine dies etc.

Hope to hear from you soon
Paul

The allowances are quite tight and do not leave much room for replacing necessities never mind consumables. One option would be to ask for a payment break of two or three months to replace goods and have the payments added on to the end.

Most stores use credit companies for the finance and you would almost certainly fail a credit check so borrowing would not be an option even if your IP agreed. However, if a third party was to obtain the finance and you could afford the payments your IP may allow you to replace items as your IVA would be unaffected. If in doubt you should speak to your case manager.

A payment break is often the answer(i am taking a 2 month break to fund a replacement car purchase after mine died!!).

You could try freecycle and see if anyone is giving away anything(doesnt make you a tramp or anything like that),just gives you an option.

Paul

Yup - Freecycle is the way to go.

A sofa's ok, but I wouldn't want a second hand bed!

Must admit a second hand bed doesn't really appeal.
I am going through a payment restructure at the moment so my have to sleep on the floor until I have had it all approved with my creditors.

Don't really like asking for payment breaks as I had a 3 month payment break at the start of the year as my car died a horrible death and I needed to save for a deposit to get a leased car.

Will have a look at freecycle

May go with the 3rd party getting one for me and repay the amount each month. Or try to see if they can get one on a 12 month delayed payments and try to pay them back in 12 months. Not sure how possible that could be given my remaining money each month

If you get a bedstead which you can see and easily clean I dont see any harm in that, I would just steam it and get a new matteress. I know that Harveys are throwing out a lot of sofa's right now, there are some pretty good deals to be had if you dont mind haggling.

I did actaully mean that by bed I took it to be the frame of the bed and am not suggesting to anyone that they go and get a flea ridden mattress off freecycle!!!Feeling itchy anyone???

The bedstead isn't a problem, but when we were looking for a bed earlier in the year we found it was the mattress that really pushed the price up.

It might be worth having a look on Tesco's or Argos's website as you might be able to get a reasonable deal on there.

I didn't realise that Harveys were getting rid of sofas - it's a shame they weren't doing that when we bought ours!

john lewis have a double mattress for £80 free delivery.

That's a good deal PD.

We ended up getting money off of ours as the morons that delivered it damaged the bottom of the bed. Dreams wanted to give us vouchers but Dave told them in that case they could come and collect it as we didn't want it and they gave in!

Thanks for the replies - keep them coming
I live very close to a Harveys so may nip in and haggle like I have never haggled before

Good shout on the mattress and thank you for letting me know about that.

Will count the coppers in the jar tonight

I had a corner unit here and since I just moved house it didnt really fit, looked hidieous actually so I sold everything, including the mexican style wooden furniture that didnt fit either. With the cash I went to harveys, they had all sorts upstairs in their clearance range, the price you see is by no means the price you pay. I got a 3 seater and a two seater leather sofa for £250. After a few trials of trying to get a van big enough to pick them up. (they look so much smaller in the flippin shop). Anyhow we managed it. They were going to deliver on Sunday, just when I had 14 people and a one year olds party going on. So I had to collect really. Then when we were having our meal in the pub. (you didnt think I would be cooking for that many did you?) they phoned to say they were on their way with my sofa's. The whole table said, hey, dont tell them, they obviously dont know that you already have them, have them, you can sell them. But I couldnt do it. So I almost had 4 sofa's for the less than the retail price of 1.

They need to get them out, so go for it hun.

Excellent Lily, what a bargain!

A word of advice to anyone buying a new sofa - make sure it fits through the door! When we bought our sofa we chose a really nice corner unit that was in the DFS sale. We were really pleased until they came to deliver it and it wouldn't fit through the door. They had to take it back and we ended up paying twice as much for one that came in 3 pieces!

Awww Skip what a shame.

I had a sofa once, supposed to be a bargain, it wouldnt fit in and we took the window out. I paid something like £80 to the glazers that did the job. I wasnt ever liking the sofa, it was too big and I couldnt wait to get rid of it. Then, no way was I paying a glazer, so we popped the window out ourselves, only to break it trying to put it back in after we had our new corner unit, got everything tidy and sorted. Some of those in DFS are mashusive, I dont know why they make them that big.