All of the best home gym equipment to create a well-balanced workout for a $100, $500, $1500, and $4000 budget.
This week, when I shared our home gym shed makeover, I had the idea to sit down with Robert and pull together a budget breakdown of the best home gym equipment for all kinds of budgets.
Because, let’s face it, it’s not typical for someone to just up and decide to spend $4,000 on workout equipment without a little thought behind their goals and the space they have available in their home.
It’s not often that Robert gets to tap into his Exercise Science degree these days, but we thought, since our situation of owning SO MUCH gym equipment is not typical, that we could share ways to create building blocks for gradually starting your own workout setup at home.
We have gradually built our workout equipment over the past decade, and working in a certain order has helped us reach our goal of a large, well-equipped gym.
You don’t need to have an entire dedicated shed like we made. Just a small corner of your bedroom or family room can do the job, if that’s all the space you have.
Robert researches the heck out of this stuff, so I really let him take the reins on recommending all of the best home gym equipment.
Start with the bare essentials of just a good pair of running shoes, a jump rope, and some resistance bands for around $100 to get in strength and cardio. Then, work your way up from there.
Home Gym Equipment Setup Under $100
This setup is basically all we had when we were totally broke newlyweds living in our first apartment together. We has absolutely no room for a dedicated home gym, but supportive shoes and some resistance bands could give us a full body workout just the same.
YouTube and Amazon Prime have endless workout videos to choose from.
Home Gym Equipment Setup Under $500
When we moved into our first house a couple of years into our marriage, we added mirrors to check our form, a pull-up bar, hand weights, and a little bit of storage just to get us by in a small corner of our garage.
Adding in:
Home Gym Equipment Setup Under $1500
Once we moved into our current house 4 years ago, Robert found a used adjustable weight bench, a dumbbell set, and an interval timer to increase the intensity even more and give us more workout options to target different muscle zones.
A rubber mat can help reduce impact on joints, and a fan came make working out in a garage in the summer more bearable.
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Home Gym Equipment Setup Under $4000
Now that we have our gym shed, this is mostly our set up, except for the rowing machine that is the last piece of equipment on our wish list (and a portable air conditioner).
Buying used helped soften the blow of that big budget, but gradually building up to it over time made that large gym setup much more attainable.
Adding in:
Shopping local classifieds and used sports equipment stores is a great way to stretch the budget even further if you can find great secondhand gym items in your area.
The home gym setup thing is so overwhelming starting from scratch, but I hope this helped give you a guide if you ever want to gradually build yours into a large, well-equipped workout room over time. It’s one of those things you can continually grow for decades.
Do you have a piece of workout equipment you absolutely love? Anything you would add to the list? Add them in the comments, and we’ll keep this post as a helpful, growing resource.
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