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Furniture is increasingly being bought second-hand. The furniture is changing particularly lively on various internet shopping sites.
According to a survey commissioned by the University of Tampere, furniture and home furnishings are the third most popular second-hand goods market in terms of the euro-denominated market. Only hobby equipment and information and home electronics are more popular.
Acquiring used furniture has become an increasingly accepted form of purchase in all age groups and income categories, says Hannu Saarijärvi, Professor of Marketing at the University of Tampere.
– According to the study, the main reasons are saving money and the desire to extend the life cycle of products. Environmental reasons can also be estimated to be on the rise.
About 1,500 people responded to the survey conducted by the Economic Survey in 2018.
About seventy is paid for used furniture
Laura Kuusela, Marketing Director of the buying and selling website Tori.fi, says that in 2019, approximately 730,000 used furniture were purchased between private individuals in Tori. This was 13 percent more than the previous year, and the same trend seems to continue this year.
According to Kuusela, dining sets, shelves and storage solutions are the most popular and cover about 40 percent of all furniture sold. Used furniture costs an average of 68 euros.
– Cheap home decor items such as paintings and textiles are the hardest to sell. If furniture or home decor is given for free, they will change homes really quickly.
The purchase of used furniture in the stores of the Helsinki Metropolitan Area Recycling Center has decreased. Jani Sintonen, the store manager of the Nihtisilla department store, thinks that the strongest background is the online channels where furniture is provided free of charge, and presumably for the same reason less furniture is also brought to the recycling center than before.
According to Sintonen, clearly the most sofas and armchairs are bought from the recycling center. The best-selling products are new rough products and really old retro goods.
Home and bedbugs can move from one home to another
Buying used furniture is not risk free. For example, mold dust adheres particularly well to porous and padded materials, and in the worst case, furniture can cause symptoms.
According to Kirsi Säkkinen, the Respiratory Association’s indoor air expert, stinking goods should always be discarded. Säkkinen reminds that the official cleaning instructions have not confirmed that saunaing works for mold-damaged goods.
According to Oskari Hanninen, the Inspector General of the Finnish Safety and Chemicals Agency Tukes, used furniture should also be carefully inspected for bed bugs. The bedbug can be seen in its faecal marks, i.e. small black dots. Bedbugs thrive best in beds and sofas.
– Even if you do a careful inspection, there may be places in the furniture that are difficult to see. Detecting eggs and larvae can also be very challenging, Hanninen says.
Used furniture should be heat or cold treated before use. The temperature should rise to 60 degrees for several hours to destroy the bed bugs. Curtains and other textiles should be washed in the washing machine. Items that can fit safely on the benches can be saunaed.
Ventilation in the yard or balcony will not be effective for bedbugs unless there is a sufficiently long and severe frost period. Small items can be put in a sealed bag in the freezer.
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Corrected 6.8. at 1:12 p.m .: Originally on Saturday, Aug. 1. the published story has been corrected. Furniture changes ownership on various online shopping sites, not peer-to-peer networks. In addition, Tori.fi is a buying and selling website, not a peer-to-peer online store.