Creating a Great Home Office on a Budget

If you would like to have a great home office space, but don’t have the budget, with a little planning, creativity and physical effort, you can have a designer home office at low cost.

Repurpose and Reuse

A new desk can cost several thousand dollars, especially if it is a desk that you want to last. Instead of going into debt for a desk, consider creating your own desk. Find an old door that you like. If it is grooved or decorated, you will also want to purchase Plexiglas to cover it so that you can have a flat writing surface.

You can purchase table legs at your local home store. Paint or stain the door in whatever color you desire. Attach the table legs to the bottom of the door and in no time at all, you have a streamlined and budget-friendly desk.

You can also find two bookshelves at your local flea market and use those as the supports for your desk. If you would like to create an L-shaped desk you will want to support the middle of it with screw-on table legs.

Shelving

New bookshelves can be expensive, yet you do need a place to store your office equipment and materials. You can make your own bookshelves by heading to your home store. Purchase 1 x 6-inch and/or 1 x 8-inch pieces of plywood in the lengths you need; you can have them cut to size. (If you don’t like the look of plywood you can have laminated medium-density fibreboard (MDF) or a hard wood also cut to size.)

Paint or stain the wood however you wish. Purchase shelving brackets and install. You can stack the shelves vertically on your wall, or stagger them on the wall for a more modern look.

Do-It-Yourself Accessories and Organization

Simple items found around your home can be used to organize your home office and streamline the design. For example, you can use different size mason jars to store paper clips, pencils and binder clips. You can also keep shipping boxes and use them to store files. Simply decorate the outside of the shipping box with shelf paper or wrapping paper to add color and style.

You can also make your own wall art by framing your children’s art or by getting creative on your own. No one says you have to spend hundreds of dollars on wall art.

Finally, because electronics are often the most expensive part of any home office, consider buying remanufactured equipment. It often comes with an extended warranty, works just as well as a brand-new piece of equipment, and saves you money.

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Author: jm

Joan Mullally has been doing business online for more than 20 years and is a pioneer in the fields of online publishing, marketing, and ecommerce. She is the author of more than 200 guides and courses designed to help beginner and intermediate marketers make the most of the opportunities the Internet offers for running a successful business. A student and later teacher trainee of Frank McCourt’s, she has always appreciated the power of the word, and has used her knowledge for successful SEO and PPC campaigns, and powerful marketing copy. One computer science class at NYU was enough to spark her fascination with all things digital. In her spare time, she works with adult literacy, animal fostering and rescue, and teaching computer skills to women.