If you are an antique lover and want to make your antique shopping stress-free, you need to learn few tricks that will ease the hunt. Whether antique shopping at garage sales or at specialized French antique shop, make sure you learn more about the historical period of the antique piece you want to purchase. This way you will know just how valuable certain antique is and how much it is worth. Your antique shopping will surely be less stressful. And here’s another useful tip: consult with an antique appraiser before you go antique shopping in your favorite French antique shop. Here are few stress-free antique shopping tips.

Buy On Wednesday – Yes, if you go antique shopping in the middle of the week, you will save a lot of money on certain antiques. Apparently, by Wednesday antique vendors and dealers want to display new items and are ready to significantly lower the price of older pieces just to get rid of them. Therefore, if you love antiques, but do not like paying fortune for them, go antique shopping on Wednesday. Visit your favorite French antique shop and negotiate with the owner and not the sales person.

Master The Art Of Mixing And Matching – One of the ways to skip stressful antique shopping is to actually stick to one historical period. Instead of mixing pieces of different styles and from different time periods, buy antiques from certain period that you favor the most. This will make your antique shopping less stressful because you will know exactly which piece can be matched with the ones you already have at home.

Know When To Restore And When To Buy – You can not decide what to do with the antique pieces you bought in the past. They are not fashionable as they once were. Instead of trowing your investment in the garbage, you can try restore the piece with a new coat of paint. However, know which pieces to restore. For example, if you paid a high price for certain piece you bought from a French antique shop, rethink twice about repainting it. Yes, it may get back the old shine, but will it still worth the same. Before you begin any restoration, consult with a professional antique appraiser.

Don’t Get Carried Away – Antique lovers usually get carried away when antique shopping. Make sure you don’t. To avoid spending a lot of money when antique shopping and feel stressed about it later, set a budget and stick to it. Even if you plan to bid to a certain price, you can easily get carried away in the process and spend more money than you’ve originally planned. You will end up overpaying for the item that might not be worth the money.