Quality fine art can be pricey.  It can be downright expensive and out of your budget.  Since you’re on a tight budget but still building your dream home, this is a problem.  So, how do you build your dream home with quality fine art and still maintain your small budget?  Well, there’s a few ways you can do this.  We’ve got four of them for you.  Learn how to acquire quality fine art on a budget today.

1. Shop Yard Sales

Your best chance to find quality fine art at bargain prices is to shop at yard, garage, and estate sales.  Often times, the people running these sales are just looking to unload an excess amount of property and pocket a tiny amount of money in exchange.  In these cases, they often don’t know what they have.  This is where your advantage lies.

If you take the time to pick over these kinds of sales every season, you will eventually run into some artwork for sale.  Much of it will be of the cheap poster variety but some of it will actually be better quality art.  Many people are also willing to negotiate on price if they have a ready and willing buyer in you.

Taking this method will require time and for you to know what you are looking at but will ultimately be worth it to your tight budget in the end.

2. Dumpster Dive

This seems like a very out-of-place suggestion for us.  However, if you pick the right dumpster at the right time, you might find an office has cleaned out its old art in favor of new art for the walls.  They have thrown away the old art as they don’t feel it has any value to them anymore.  It’s up for grabs now.

My step-father managed to pick up a beautiful framed seascape painting for large wall space this way.  The office didn’t need or want it and the dump was happy to not have to deal with it.  Everyone got something they wanted out of the deal.  The best part, the art was free.  Just be willing to do some cleaning and refurbishing if you choose this method of decorating your house.

Dumpster diving is far more of a miss than a hit when it comes to finding any kind of art.  Dumpster dive at your own risk.

3. Buy Art Wholesale

There’s a reason why wholesale stores like Costco and Sam’s are popular.  You can buy things in bulk for a reduced price.  Buying wholesale is not something which excludes art.  There are art wholesalers if you can find them.  The rules will work the same for art wholesalers as they do for Costco and Sam’s: you can buy in bulk for cheap.

As art wholesalers tend to be more of a business-to-business company, you might have to do some digging to find one on the internet.  If you are patient and thoroughly check out the company, you should be able to order copies of quality fine art for your wall at a fraction of what you would pay in a retail setting.

Keep in mind that some wholesalers don’t sell directly to consumers.  You might find them asking you to buy in bulk or not granting you access to their catalog without a merchant’s account.  If that’s the case, then keep looking.

4. Buy Smaller Versions and Create a Gallery Wall

So, if you aren’t interested in the patience of shopping or internet searching, there is an alternative for you too.  You can buy smaller versions of the fine art you are wanting and use them to create a gallery wall in your dream home.  Gallery walls are popular and add flavor to your home in ways that giant single works cannot.

With this gallery wall option, you can have a greater variety of art and do so at a fraction of the cost of a couple of large original paintings.  You might not get to see your favorite fine art picture completely take over your wall, but at least you get to look at it.  This gallery wall option can also be built over time as you acquire more pieces to add to it.  It allows you to personalize your art and branch out into several different mediums at once if you choose.

Conclusion

In conclusion, getting quality fine art at an affordable price can be a challenge.  You have to know where to go.  Thankfully, these options will give you a place to start when it comes to decorating your home with fine art.  Timing is so crucial to some of these options.  However, if you are willing to put in the effort, your patience will be rewarded with quality art to display on your wall throughout your home.

Got any ideas for quality fine art on a budget which we’ve missed?  Please share them down in the comments section below.  We’d love to learn together.

So, next week, we’re discussing 4 places you should not be shopping at to find quality fine art on a budget.  Stay tuned.