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You’re thinking of updating your wardrobe this year, which means that you need to get some new clothes. Well, what if you got new clothes that weren’t exactly new? What if they were second-hand? Instead of browsing your favorite online stores for the latest items to hit their digital shelves, you should see what your neighborhood thrift store has.

Your thrift store is bound to have something that will grab your interest. It could have the perfect leather jacket in your size. It could have retro sweaters in loud, multi-colored patterns that survived the decades completely unscathed. It could have a pair of designer shoes that need a little shining to get back to their former glory. You’d be surprised at some of the exciting thrift store treasures people have found after browsing the right store at just the right time. You just might get lucky and find the clothes of your dreams!

And that’s not the only benefit of thrifting. If you’re still not motivated to put on your coat and head over to the thrift store, here are three other benefits of thrift shopping that you will appreciate.

1. Saving Money

Shopping for brand-new clothes when your budget is tight can be difficult. If you’re not careful, you could easily spend beyond your means.

This is a major financial mistake that you don’t want to make. You could put your account into overdraft and have to pay penalties. You could lose out on money that’s reserved for important bills. At the very least, you could leave yourself vulnerable to any surprise expense that crops up before you get your next paycheck.

In that case, you could charge the surprise expense to your credit card or apply for a personal loan online to take care of the urgent problem right away. See whether you’re eligible to apply for personal loans through CreditFresh — you just might meet all of the qualifications. If you’re approved, you could use the borrowed funds to handle the surprise expense in a hurry.

One of the biggest benefits of thrifting is that you can save money on clothes. The second-hand items will be listed at lower prices than brand-new pieces that just showed up in stores. This will come in handy when your budget is really tight.

2. Making Money

Thrift shopping can also help you boost your tight budget! If you want a side-hustle, you can do thrift flipping to add more money to your wallet. Thrift flipping is when you buy a cheaply priced item at a thrift store that you think has the potential to be sold at a higher price. You spruce it up, increase its value and re-sell it.

3. Helping the Environment

Another benefit of thrift shopping is that it’s more environmentally friendly than shopping at the hottest fast fashion brands. Fast fashion is responsible for a lot of environmental damage. It adds pollution to landfills because it asks consumers to throw out last season’s clothes and buy low-quality replacements. It also creates a lot of greenhouse gas emissions. In 2019, textiles production created 1.2 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions — that’s more than what the airline industry produces.

Thrifting is a much more sustainable alternative. You can avoid buying into fast fashion, and you can extend the life cycle of clothes, keeping them out of landfills while they’re still wearable.

So, what are you waiting for? It’s time to put on your coat, grab your wallet and head over to your neighborhood thrift store.