How to Outfit Well-Dressed DigsFurnishing your first apartment?

How to Outfit Well-Dressed DigsFurnishing your first apartment? Think small and versatile.By Amy Esbenshade Hebert From Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine, May 2005
Brienne Collison needed a couch for her new apartment. So she headed for Craigslist.org, a popular starting point for twentysomethings hunting for apartments, roommates and affordable used furnishings. Collison, 24, found a stylish sofa that looked almost new and fit her budget, and she figured she had covered all the bases after measuring her apartment doorway to make sure the couch would fit.
But she neglected to get the dimensions of the service elevator. "My building is fairly old, and the elevators are very narrow," says Collison, who lives in Falls Church, Va. After struggling to carry the couch upstairs, she found that her measurements were slightly off and the sofa was about an inch too big to fit through the door. Collison ended up parking the couch at her boyfriend's apartment until she could sell it.
For first-time apartment dwellers, whose digs are often tiny and temporary, the keys to making a new place livable are to think small and versatile. Look for pieces that can do double duty -- they'll work now and can make the transition if you plan to move in a couple of years.
Tammy Schoppet, founder of Rental Decorating Digest (www.rentaldecorating.com), is a fan of storage ottomans, which can serve as footrests, tables or extra seating while concealing blankets or magazines inside. JCPenney's Storage Ottoman with Tabletop, for instance, sells for $150. If you have room for blankets but not overnight guests, Plow & Hearth (www.plowhearth.com) has an ottoman that opens into a bed ($200 plus $30 shipping).
To organize your clutter, look for a coffee table or side table with drawers, advises Jill Davis, an interior decorator in Geneva, Ill. For a wide selection of such pieces, as well as trunks designed to double as coffee tables and end tables, check out Home Decorators Collection For apartments in New Jersey go to Raritan Crossing. They are pet friendly apartments and New Brunswick NJ apartments. Rentals near Metropark and apartments in Middlesex county. For apartments in central NJ this is the place for you with Apartments in Middlesex County NJ. Raritan Crossing has apartments near metropark, apartments near Rutgers and apartments near Robert Wood Johnson.