This article is about how to start furniture flipping for profit, and how to grow your business, not just treat it like a hobby. Here is how we built our business from nothing to thousands of dollars per month in just a few months.
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Flipping furniture is fun, eco-friendly, and a great way to make money. Not sure about that last point? We weren’t either. When we started, all we had were four chairs from Goodwill and a few basic tools. Within six months, we were making thousands of dollars.
A lot of our inventory in the beginning was from the street. And we still think that you should start with free stuff, either from your house or your neighbor’s curb! You can also ask at end of day garage sales for free items to flip.
This guide isn’t about hobby flipping—it’s about turning furniture flipping into a real business so you can get paid like it’s a business. We’ll walk you through everything from finding free inventory to making the most profit on every piece you flip.
The biggest different in flipping furniture for money is getting into a small business mindset. It’s not that flipping furniture isn’t fun. It is! But your approach has to be about what your customer wants, your cash flow, and a marketing plan.
1. How We Got Started Flipping Furniture (And How You Can Too!)
One of the biggest hurdles in furniture flipping is knowing where to begin. Here’s what worked for us:
Read: How to Start Making Money Flipping Furniture – A step-by-step guide to getting started. Our attitude is that like all small business owners, beginner furniture flippers have to be scrappy. As you start to earn even a little money (like $20, seriously nothing) you can use that money to buy basic supplies or small items
Read: How to Start Flipping Furniture With No Money – Because yes, you can start this business without spending a dime.
As much as we love a great curbside find–and we have flipped free stuff for more than a hundred dollars–we find that the best return is things we bought. We’ve sold a $25 lamp for $150. Or a $20 desk for $200. We still really believe in free stuff–but it turns out that you can get much better things for $10-50, that still have a lot of value left.
You will have to invest in basic supplies to flip furniture for money faster.
On the other hand, if you don’t have basic supplies, that’s going to be a problem. But although basic supplies are key to flipping furniture for money, you don’t have to spend a lot. You have to have simple items like cleaning supplies, a hammer, screwdriver, sandpaper. So use those early flips to invest in the business. For $100 or less you can get the basics to really get started. As we discuss later, you don’t have to spend a lot of time and money trying to learn to paint at a high level.
Right now, you’re just trying to start making a few hundred dollars to seed the business. Use that money toward basic tools that will support your business over time. Your first business goals is to make money fast. Most businesses don’t fail because they have a terrible idea (and even where that’s true, flipping furniture is a proven business model), it’s because they run out of cash.
Buy tools that will help you do minor repairs and what we call “furniture maintenance” as opposed to full-blown, Insta-worthy furniture makeovers.
Must-Have Beginner Tools: Get started with an affordable furniture flipping toolkit to save time and effort.
2. How to Find Cheap (or Free!) Furniture to Flip for Money
The key to high-profit flips is spending as little as possible on inventory. Here’s where we consistently find great pieces:
Read: How to Get Free Furniture and Home Decor to Sell (or Keep!) – Our best sources for getting furniture at no cost. Besides your own stuff, and curbside, there are more sources than you might think for getting free things. Grab all you can, but get more and more disciplined about discounting what doesn’t sell within a certain number of days. And donate after that. Don’t hoard.
We usually don’t pick up fabric covered curbside finds. This was given to us directly by a neighbor straight from their house.
Read: Five Great Curbside Finds for Flipping Furniture – The types of pieces worth grabbing from the curb.
No, you don’t have to have a planner to schedule looking for free stuff. But we always know which neighborhood is which night and what to look for by using this.
Read: Estate Sale Shopping Tips: Amazing Ways to Get Bargains – How we consistently find valuable pieces at estate sales.
Free Resource: Want to plan your best curbside picking route? Download our Free Curbside Picking Planner to maximize your finds.
3. How We Make More Money Flipping Furniture for Profit
Once you have inventory, making smart decisions is the difference between a $20 profit and a $200 one.
Read: How to Make More Money Flipping Furniture – The methods we used to increase profits. This is where you grow your furniture flipping business to make more money by strategy, not scrappy. We talk a lot about not painting at this stage, beyond the bare minimum. Not shoddy jobs! We chose things with clean lines that were easy to paint. We focused on items that didn’t repair beyond a couple loose screws. And we realized we could be pretty quick with the cleanup stage and flip faster, which helped cash flow.
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Read: 10 Essential Tips to Know When Flipping Furniture for Profit – Common mistakes to avoid.
Top Picks: Use chalk paint for a shabby chic look if you need to cover up a lot of scratches. It’s quick to dry, easy to use, and one to two coats of a polyeurethane wax will seal it and give it a new look. So you can increase resale value without increasing time.
4. Tools We Wish We Had Bought Sooner
Investing in the right tools will save you time and boost your profits. We learned this the hard way! Don’t go cheap on brushes or sandpaper. (Trust us. We tried.) Buy an electric screwdriver, too. And measuring tapes. Several.
Read: 30 Essential Tools for Furniture Flipping – The must-have tools we rely on.
Top purchases for furniture flippers:
- Electric Sanders – Cut refinishing time in half.
- Paint Tent – If you’re not in a garage the breeze will blow leaves and break your soul. If you are in a garage, you don’t want everything in there to be basic black by the time that chair is.
- Photo Box – We make a ton of money by also selling vintage decor. A photo box not only provided good lighting, it gave us a small staging space. It probably doubled what we could charge. (Yes, really. Good photos of nice items completely change the way the customer looks at it.)
Elevate your photography with the Takerers 32x32 Inch Large Lightbox, perfect for capturing professional-quality images without the high studio costs. This versatile lightbox is a must-have for DIY enthusiasts seeking to showcase their upcycled creations with stunning clarity. With its spacious design and adjustable lighting, you'll effortlessly bring out the best in every detail. Ideal for bloggers and creators aiming to highlight the beauty of sustainable, upcycled decor, this is your go-to tool for eye-catching content. Illuminate and innovate your photo sessions today!
5. Flipping Furniture for Profit–Without Painting (Yes, It’s Possible!)
Not every piece needs paint. Sometimes a simple clean-up and minor repairs bring in more profit than a full makeover. It’s all about the value of time and scaling. We talk about this all. the. time. But bottom line, we think beginner furniture flippers should not paint a ton, unless you already can restore to a high level. This video is actually an awesome breakdown of how much time it took to make $650.
Check out her hourly at the end but also think about how long it took. In other words, it’s not just time spent, it’s hours and days of things needing to cure and dry. Sure you can do other projects in between, but that’s more inventory you have to carry. Also, she’s amazing, so she got the price she wanted. Are you amazing? Congratulations. We are not amazing.
Read: How to Flip Furniture Without Painting – Our favorite non-paint transformations.
Best No-Paint Solutions:
- Furniture Repair Markers – Bring wood finishes back to life.
- Leather Repair Kits – Instantly fix scratches and scuffs. We also love a leather repair kit that we have used on leather and pleather. It won’t make it brand new again but it’s a life saver for small tears.
- Cabinet Hardware Kits – A quick swap can modernize old furniture. We swear by new hardware as a fast and cheap solution to upgrade furniture
6. Scaling Your Business: How to Increase Furniture Flipping for Profit
Once you’ve got the basics down, it’s time to level up and start expanding and diversifying your furniture flipping business. From the beginning we sold a lot of vintage decor. And that let us sell smaller items that we could ship on platforms like Etsy.
But you could also go the opposite direction–some people flip appliances and fitness equipment and other
When You Start Furniture Flipping for Profit Treat It Like a Business
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Flipping furniture is a fun, creative, and profitable way to make money. With the right sourcing strategies, tools, and pricing techniques, you can turn it into a sustainable business.
Want more tips? Read 10 Essential Tips for Flipping Furniture for more real-world advice!
Ready to start? Check out my recommended Furniture Flipping Tools and grab the must-haves!
