Things you should know before buying a mattress from a first time mattress buyer

I recently bought a mattress that my girlfriend and I really, really like. She likes it so much that she's referred to it as "heavenly". I notice myself tossing and turning much less when I try to go to bed and I feel like I'm getting much higher quality sleep. The process of finally buying this mattress, however, was a bit of a headache and I made a few mistakes along the way. I'm not an expert, but here's a bunch of things I learned as a first time mattress buyer that you'll find helpful if you're looking to buy a great mattress.

1. If you don't sleep alone, buy a mattress with motion isolation.

I really can't stress this enough because it's so important. I actually exchanged my first mattress for the one I have now because any movement that me or my girlfriend made were really noticeable and it hurt our sleep the very first night.

Without motion isolation, it only takes one persons movement on the mattress to ruin the others sleep. If you're buying a mattress with a spring support system, make sure you buy the ones that specify "pocket springs". In a pocket spring system, every coil in the system is independent of one another and that prevents the motion from one part of the bed from transferring over to another.

2. Support vs comfort (softness). Go for both but know that support is more important than comfort.

There are different "comfort" categories such as "firm", "pillowtop", and "plush". The industry calls them comfort preferences but that's a little misleading because they don't mean how comfortable the mattress is (since that's subjective), they really just describe the softness of the mattress. Namely, how far any part of the mattress is able to sink down when pressure is applied.

The softness of the mattress is what you'll immediately experience when you try a mattress for the first time. The feel of the softness is important, but don't make the mistake of buying a mattress just because it feels great when you're lying on your back for the first five minutes. Don't let it fool you. What you're feeling is the upper layer of the mattress. What's more important is the middle layers, which are the support layers.

The job of the support layers is to primarily to support your spinal alignment by contouring itself to the shape of your body as if it were standing up straight. You can have a really soft and seemingly comfortable mattress, but you'll wake up with awful back pain if the mattress has poor support.

It's hard to tell whether or not a mattress has good support from lying down on it for a few minutes, so the best thing to do is just to ask. You can change the softness of your mattress but you cannot change it's support (which is what you're paying the most for).

3. A mattress that has a solid support system, comfortable surface, and motion isolation will probably cost more than $800.

I've tried many, many mattresses (20 - 30) while I was shopping for a mattress and I rarely came across one that I really liked that was only for a few hundred bucks. Assume that if it's less than $800, it's likely compromising on one of those three features. Either it has poor support, no motion isolation, or cheap surface fabric. If you're not sure which one from trying it, ask directly. I'm not getting paid by a mattress company to say this - you really do feel the difference. The prices are not arbitrary.

4. Don't be afraid to test the mattress at the store.

Does it claim to have motion isolation? Does it say it has a great support system? Test it. Don't be afraid to try the mattress. When you buy new clothes at a store, you try it out in the fitting room don't you? There's no mattress fitting room, but don't let that stop you from rolling around on the mattress. When I was showed a couple of mattresses that supposedly had reduced motion transfer, I asked the sales person to lie down next to me and and then roll off the bed. I tried this with a few different beds - all promising the same thing on paper but delivering different results - until I found one that I was satisfied with. Don't just take their word for it - try it and experience it for yourself before you decide to fork over your money.

5. Know your budget.

There are some incredibly expensive mattresses. If you're not careful, you could end up spending a whole lot of money for very slight marginal improvements in comfort. For me, the mattress I settled with was within my budget and was good enough for me. Were there better ones? Yes - but it was only slightly more comfortable for twice the price and I wasn't willing to spend more than I allocated no matter how much more comfortable.

Pick a price range and then stick to it. This will prevent you from spending more than you have make your search much more efficient. You can always find a better, however slightly, mattress if you do not budget and that can eat up a lot of your time. By sticking to a range, you're able to compare mattresses in a similar quality spectrum and make a faster decision.

6. You can get a discount if you do your research.

After you've tried a number of mattresses in person and found a few that you like, check the price online with the exact specification. I did this but made the mistake of leaving out one crucial detail and ended up buying a mattress which I had to exchange because it was not the same mattress. A lot of them look the same and have very similar names so you have to be very specific.

Try to get a range of prices for each one. If they're less than the in-store retail price, go back to the store and ask for a discount. I suggest going back to the store because:

1. If it's really the same product and it's cheaper elsewhere, they'll likely sell it to you at a discount because they want to earn their commission.

2. If it's not the same, you'll know because they'll tell you that it's not and refuse to budge on price.