Last Updated Feb 2023 – Whether you’re moving to a new place or just trying to upgrade your kitchen, it’s always tough to find appliances that fit your needs and your budget. Whether you’re looking at dishwashers, ovens, refrigerators, or microwaves, there are dozens of tradeoffs to be made with each decision.
Do you want a new appliance with a warranty and a service contract or do you want to take a chance on a used one?
Are you interested in convenience features or do you want to save some money?
How much interior space does each unit provide?
Adding insult to injury, it’s tricky to find reliable information about appliances on the internet. One of your biggest concerns is longevity, and there are very few reviews written by people from a decade in the future. As a result, you’ll never read that your favorite brand-new refrigerator will conk out on you in five years, or that one of your other picks has lasted a full 10 years with no service calls.
To help combat this, here are three budget options to increase your cold food storage space on a fairly tight budget. Truthfully, it’s pretty darn hard to find side-by-side refrigerators under $1000 in today’s market.
As a result, the picks here are more about bending the rules a little bit in order to give you the freezer space you need without breaking the bank. Each of the three picks here utilizes a different rule break to do this, giving you lots of choices. So without further ado, let’s check out your best options.
Increasing Your Freezer Space For Less Than $1000
– Kenmore 41153 25 cu. ft Side by Side Refrigerator
While this is one of the cheapest side-by-side refrigerators on the market, it lacks one key feature. Without a water and ice dispenser, this unit is actually pretty comparable to a freezer-on-top or french-door model. Still, it’s got the vertical alignment you’d expect from a side-by-side model and plenty of room on the inside.
When it comes to durability, Kenmore has your back. As one of the most reputable appliance brands on the market today, they’ve got a long history of producing products with durability and longevity. One of the key selling points of this fridge is the fact that you can look forward to owning it for many years to come.
There’s quite a lot of storage space in this unit. I mentioned the lack of a water dispenser above, but it’s certainly not a downside if you’re trying to fit more things in the freezer. Because the door doesn’t have to have a bulky water filter or ice storage tank, you can store a lot more frozen foods. 25 cubic feet of storage space is nearly twice as much as you’ll find in a smaller freezer-on-top fridge.
If you’re deadset on getting a side-by-side fridge, this unit is probably your best budget option. You’d be hard-pressed to beat the storage space, reliability, or the price.
– Frigidaire FFHT1514QW 28″ Top-Freezer Refrigerator
Before we start: this is not a side-by-side refrigerator. Instead, this is a fairly nice top-freezer model that’s priced rather modestly. It has about half of the storage space as the 25-cubic foot behemoth above, but it’s also about half the cost.
This produces a rather neat solution to the kitchen storage problem. Rather than spend a lot of money to replace your old fridge, spend half as much and place a second fridge somewhere in the house. Without the need for a water line, you can place this in a pantry, your laundry room, the garage, or even in a spare corner of the kitchen. This allows you to store bulk frozen food and other things in your house without taking up space in your proper refrigerator.
While the freezer side has obvious advantages, the fridge portion might be a tougher sell for some people.
That’s totally okay.
Check out the standalone freezer below for an option with even more storage space for frozen foods. Before you do, however, consider that you can store a LOT of drinks in a second fridge. Whether your go-to beverage is iced tea, juice, soda, or something alcoholic, you can put quite a lot of it in a second fridge and always have a cold beverage ready to drink while still having plenty of space to store food in your primary fridge.
This Frigidaire is totally ready to be installed in your garage and will tolerate some pretty extreme temperatures. It’s a fantastically inexpensive way to give yourself more space to store cold food and beverages.
– Frigidaire FFFH21F6QW 34″ Upright Freezer
This standalone freezer is quite a bit bigger than the Frigidaire refrigerator above. While it’s a bit pricier, it’s a much better option for households that only need additional freezer space.
It’s also got a lot more interior space. With 21 cubic feet of dedicated freezer storage, you can load up on your favorite frozen foods without having to worry about running out of room in your freezer.
Again, this offers a fairly cheap way to give yourself a lot of extra storage. You can place this unit in a basement, attic, pantry, laundry room, or garage. It’s got an (admittedly somewhat quiet) alarm in place that will go off if the door is open or the unit loses power. Best of all, Frigidaire sells additional door bins to enable you to store frequently used food items in a convenient place in the front of your fridge.
Due to the size and power of this freezer, it often competes with much more expensive industrial models. If you want to save a lot of money, give this Frigidaire a shot and give yourself an extra 21 cubic feet of cold storage area for less than $1000.
The Best Side-By-Side Refrigerator For Under $1000
While it’s pretty hard to find an actual side-by-side fridge for less than a grand, these three options give you plenty of choices to increase your cold food storage space on a budget. The Kenmore offers reliability, a huge interior, and a true side-by-side design and is perfect for people without an existing refrigerator.
The top-freezer Frigidaire is very inexpensive and offers plenty of room for storing cold beverages and other refrigerator foods, while the standalone freezer Frigidaire has a colossal amount of freezer space for storing frozen goods.
Both are great options as a second fridge to increase your cold food storage and can be placed in your garage, attic, or basement safely.
