Unsurprisingly, bed bugs are found on mattresses more often than on any other household item, as bed bugs congregate in areas of a home where their human blood hosts are regularly and most often located. Coming in second to mattresses, new, used and rental furniture items are found infested with bed bugs most frequently. It is well known that bed bugs are commonly found on used furniture items, and many people rightly avoid bringing used furniture into their home in order to avoid risking an infestation. Naturally, furniture items that are rented by numerous people are also likely to become infested with bed bugs, but people rarely consider bed bugs when buying new furniture from reputable retailers. This is understandable, as there seems to be little reason for worrying about bed bugs infesting furniture that nobody has used. However, there are several little-known ways in which new furniture and mattresses can become infested with bed bugs before leaving the store, or even the warehouse.

Some major retailers pick up and discard old and used mattresses and furniture from homes before dropping off new products, and most retailers issue warranties or customer satisfaction guarantees that sometimes see recently purchased mattresses and furniture removed from homes after being used for a short period. In these cases, bed bugs can wind up on used, or briefly used mattresses and furniture that may be stored in a company warehouse or shipping truck alongside new and unused products that could also become infested.

Such incidents have not only occurred before, they are becoming more and more frequent. In fact, there are now lawyers who specialize in defending people who claim that major retailers sold them bed bug infested mattresses or furniture. If a consumer experiences a bed bug infestation within his/her home as a result of purchasing a new mattress or furniture item that had bed bugs, a lawsuit is likely to result. Mattress and furniture companies have lost a lot of money to disgruntled consumers in these court cases. For example, not long ago, a JC Penny Location in Cherry Hill, New Jersey was forced to pay out 49,000 dollars to a couple who purchased bed bug-infested furniture from the department store chain, and another resident in the northeast plans on suing Raymour & Flanigan after purchasing a bed bug-infested recliner that caused the pests to infest his home.

Have you ever found bed bugs within another person’s house?