molesey

We have recently moved to Sydney and have found somewhere permanent to live, but we don't know where to go to buy house furniture and electrical goods.We don't want to spend a fortune as we have quite a bit being shipped over from the U.K, we just need a few things to get us buy but not spend too much money as we are still looking for jobs.If there is anyone that can point us in the right direction i would reall appreciate it, thanks, Molesey

jayr

If you don't want to spend much then use IKEA for furniture and Kmart/Target for all other bits and pieces.

If you can manage, get inflatable camping mattresses for about $40 if waiting for beds.

Rent TVs and white goods if necessary until yours arrive

molesey

Thanks for the tip, but where are all of these places, where do we find the addresses?? Do they have local papers in sydney like they do in the U.K

gedge

hi, it might help to know whereabouts in Sydney you are, save you travelling too far
and what sort of bits do you want?
we bought a load of $10 electricals - kettle, toaster, iron etc from Big W. plus other bits such as 'manchester' (read linen) you'd find similiar in KMart or Target if you only want stuff to last till your shipment arrives
for furniture, i hesitiate to say it, but Ikea is the go

ps. font shmont

Vash the Stampede

From the same you'd find them in the UK; Yellow Pages or local community newspaper.

Yes.

gedge

www.sensis.com.au has links through to yellow pages etc.

Hutch

You can find a list of Harvey Normans in the Sydney area here - they do both furniture and electrical goods. There's a list of Kmarts (all purpose 'cheap' shop selling everything from kettles to shoes) here. You can see the locations of the Sydney Ikeas here. The Good Guys are another 'white goods' store - locations in NSW here . Fantastic Furniture are kind of like MFI (fairly cheap furniture - but quality varies) - find them here. You might also find Bunnings useful (like B&Q or Homebase) - find them here . Good luck with it all.

DunRoaminTheUK

For God's sake, do not go to Harvey Normal (Norman) as they are a complete let-down and their level of customer service is very bad. I could go on about the quality of the crappy Chinese furniture but that would be too long a response...

Hutch

Not bought any furniture in Hardly Normals, but since they're a franchise I expect the level of the service you receive would depend entirely on the specific store you visited.

DunRoaminTheUK

We visited about five, bought from two and to be honest they both let us down. We were promised our Ariston washing machine and yet, 4 weeks later, when the delivery date started to creep up on us we were told it hadn't arrived. We then agreed, in person, with a salesman that we could have the one from the shop floor. On the day of the delivery, guess what? I had to phone the store and get shitty with them before they released the shop-floor unit to us.

As for the furnitire store, where do I start? We bought a $2,000 glass dining table and we found one of the chairs was damaged on the leg. So far, I have rung the store 4 times, threatening fire and brimstone on the last call, then to to be fed a new lie/deception and we are still waiting for it to be fixed/replaced. We initially informed them of this 4 weeks ago.

northernbird

Slightly off topic Hutch but how much did you pay for your TV. WendyC (see another thread about bringing TVs from UK) recently bought the Panasonic HDTV 42" for $2000 at Hardly Normals in Adelaide. I paid $3100 for mine. Even the standard def was more expensive here in Perth than Wendy paid for her high def.

Hutch

Similar price as you missus. I shopped around and there was nowhere anywhere close to that price. Is Wendy 100% sure her's is the real hi-def deal? Only reason I ask is, I was eyeing up the other near-identical looking 42" Panasonic plasma - I noticed the HDMI ports round the back and assumed it was hi-def, but it wasn't. You can see them both on this page - standard def one 2nd from top left, the one we've bought bottom right. I paid $3000 for mine in The Good Guys. Here's Harvey Norman's catalogue - standard definintion one top right, our one bottom right.

northernbird

feel better now, thought the bastards had ripped me off! Mine is deffo the one on the bottom right.

DunRoaminTheUK

So, your TV has a built in HD-tuner? The HDMI inputs merely allow the TV to take an HD input, though respectively the TV needs to be able to support the relevant number of lines to provide an HD image.

We use a Topfield box to provide us with the standard channels in HD. It beats the image we get from Foxtel hands down (I would have thought that a digital signal, even if it is not HD, would be fairly clear).

northernbird

the panasonic that Hutch and I have just bought is a true HD TV, ie the correct number of lines to receive the signal. I don't use it to its full potential right now because we have foxtel iq who I believe don't transmit in HD. Saying that my picture is the dogs wotsits as far as I am concerned and far better than my last TV.