If you’re a first-time buyer currently living at your parents’ house or in a fully-furnished rental property, you probably have everything provided for you. Your current living situation is almost like being in a hotel except you don’t get room service and your bedsheets changed every day. And if you do, why are you moving out? Quick, call the sale off! 

Joking aside, buying your first home is wonderful and exciting. Whether you’re buying outright with cash or a mortgage, or the rapidly rising property prices in the capital means you’re joining a shared ownership scheme in London, you’re going to need to furnish your new home. 

You would have received a fixture and fittings form in the documents you received from your vendor outlining anything that was included in the sale price or available for you to buy. 

However, if you’re starting out completely from scratch, here are five items you need to buy for your first home. 

Curtains or blinds

You’d think window coverings would come with the property and a lot of the time, previous owners do leave them behind. However, unless you’ve arranged for curtains or blinds to be left, don’t take it for granted. 

If you do need to buy something to cover your windows, unless your windows are a standard size and you can easily buy what you want from your local high street, make sure you order your window coverings in plenty of time, as made-to-measure curtains, blinds or shutters can take weeks, if not months, to be delivered. 

Bed

Unless you want to spend the first few weeks in your new home sleeping on the floor, you’ll need a bed. Again, unless you’re picking one up from Argos or somewhere handy like that, a bed can take a long time to be delivered.

Don’t forget to buy a mattress, pillows, duvet and linen too. 

Kettle

A kettle is the type of thing you forget you need until you wake up on your first morning in your new home and go to put the kettle on, then realise you don’t actually have one. If you did forget to buy a kettle, they’re easy enough to find in your local supermarket and you can get one while you’re buying the tea, milk and sugar you also forgot to buy. 

Cleaning supplies

Unless you’re a Mrs Hinch devotee, cleaning is really boring but, unless you’ve got aspirations to be the new Quentin Crisp who famously said, ”There is no need to do any housework at all. After the first four years the dirt doesn’t get any worse” you’re going to need cleaning supplies. 

Trust us, in a few years, your kitchen cupboards will be bulging with cleaning supplies as you search for the holy grail of cleaning products but, for now, at the very least, make sure you have some bleach, cleaning cloths and multi-purpose cleaner. You’ll also need some washing up liquid, laundry detergent and dishwasher tablets (if you’ve got a dishwasher). 

Smoke alarm and carbon monoxide detector

A smoke alarm and carbon monoxide detector may sound even more boring than cleaning supplies, but these things could save your life. They’re inexpensive and easy to install, so make sure you have them on the day you move in. 

These are just five of the items you need to have in your new home. They’re not the most exciting things to buy but they’re definitely necessary.