Can we safely buy used furniture from a hotel?

December 26, 2011 2:05 PM

We're about to run off and peek at a hotel liquidation sale, but I'm paranoid about bedbugs. Is this a bad idea? Would quarantining the furniture for a time solve any potential problems?
posted by moira to Home & Garden (7 answers total)

What type of furniture are you looking to buy, and for what purpose? That is, are you thinking of buying a box spring and mattress from a hotel sale for home use? Yech. I would advise against that. Bedbugs aside, you're purchasing a mattress that thousands of people have slept on, many with cleanliness or incontinence issues.

As far as things like upholstered furniture, you're probably safe if you either clean the pieces yourself with one of those rented carpet cleaners, or hire Stanley Steemer or a similar concern to clean them for you. Again, aside from bedbugs, such pieces have had the tushies of hundreds of people on them....think of it like an airline seat. People release, um, gas into the cushions, some women laugh too hard and have accidents.... If you plan to use such furniture in your home you'll want to clean each piece very thoroughly first. As far as non-upholstered items (like dressers and nightstands), I think a good go-over with household cleaner would sufficiently disinfect them despite whatever nastiness they've endured.
posted by Oriole Adams at 2:17 PM on December 26, 2011

Response by poster: We're looking at headboards, bedside tables, and upholstered chairs.
posted by moira at 2:22 PM on December 26, 2011

Best answer: I would actually argue the opposite of what Oriole Adams said. I have read that infested upholstered furniture is practically impossible to treat in some cases, since there's no practical way to get steam, freezing CO2, or magic insecticide powders into every nook and cranny of it. A lot of PCOs advise that heavily infested upholstered furniture needs to be discarded.

On the other hand, mattresses and boxsprings can be enclosed in bedbug-proof covers, which keeps any bugs that were already present from escaping.

I've heard that headboards often harbor infestations, so I'd be careful there. Bedside tables, maybe not so much, but how are you going to treat them? Quarantining won't work, because bed bugs can survive for very long periods without eating. You'd have to isolate the furniture for at least a year, I think, but even then, there's no good way to know whether there are any viable bugs or eggs left.

Thorough steam cleaning will kill bed bugs, but can you get the steam into all parts of the furniture? That's the key question.
posted by Maximian at 2:58 PM on December 26, 2011

Response by poster: Eep, it sounds like the immediate savings may not be worth a costly risk that's not easy to sidestep.
posted by moira at 3:34 PM on December 26, 2011

Once you have bedbugs, you will likely have them forever. Getting rid of them is very, very difficult. And recent studies have suggested that many infestations start from as few as two breeding pairs -- evidently, bedbugs are exempt from the deleterious effects of breeding large populations from tiny gene pools. So, "Yipee!" for them, huh?

On the other hand, given the way things seem to be going, you will probably be getting bed bugs eventually anyway. They seem to be getting everywhere. So, maybe getting yours by saving some money will at least make it slightly more worthwhile.
posted by driley at 4:15 PM on December 26, 2011

Best answer: Yeah, I wouldn't do this. Quarantining your new furniture will work - but it will have to be serious quarantine, as in you cannot even visit, for 9 to 24 months. Yes, months. Many people say two full years to be completely safe. I've had bedbugs. It is possible to get rid of them, but the process is an expensive, lengthy nightmare. I am now terrified of used furniture, most particularly upholstered furniture, because that's what bedbugs like to hide in.

If you must go, though, I'd say stick to wooden furniture like tables and chairs. No headboards, no, absolutely not - that's just tempting fate. You can clean out wooden furniture if you're diligent enough. Before you bring it into the house, wipe down every single inch of it with rubbing alcohol. Spray rubbing alcohol and/or potent insecticide into every crack, crevice and join. If a corner of your credit card will fit into a crack, then a bedbug can fit into that crack. Follow that up by dusting pyrethrin laced diatomaceous earth into the cracks. You might want to caulk the joins and cracks as well. Leave it outside overnight and hope it gets really cold - they're hard to freeze, the little bastards, but they don't really like cold either. Your new furniture is almost - and almost is as good as you will ever get, I'm afraid - certainly bedbug free.

So, yeah. Now imagine doing that with every single object in your home. That's how you get rid of bedbugs, well, that and putting every single piece of fabric in your house through a hot dryer for 25 minutes and spraying chemicals everywhere and then repeating the whole nightmare every three weeks or so for months. I've had bedbugs and because I have been through this process I would not recommend ever buying things from a motel sale.
posted by mygothlaundry at 5:41 PM on December 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

I used to work for a hotel company, a national chain that has 4 and 5 star ratings, with a name you would recognize.

Never, ever, EVER take anything that's been in a hotel room for more a week. The things people do in hotels would make your hair stand on end and it's making me want to take a hot shower with lots of soap. The hotel should just burn it all with fire.
posted by lootie777 at 7:45 PM on December 26, 2011 [2 favorites]