My experience is that it's pretty difficult to anticipate what props any given season will need, and we usually acquire on a production by production basis. However, there are some things that are pretty common- dishes (tea/coffee service); telephones; rugs, curtains, doilies and other set "decorations," umbrellas or walking canes; towels; purses, suitcases, backpacks, trunks; clocks, radios, old television sets; extra cloth (especially black); Old books/magazines/newspapers; lamps, lanterns, and candles...Most of these things can be obtained for free pretty easily or cheaply if not. One thing we did in high school was to make a list of harder-to-obtain items, send it home with the cast, and when people came back with items we'd put masking tape on them with the person's name on it and the prop manager would be responsible for returning the items. Another easy way of acquiring things is to encourage your potential future theater members not to throw anything away- if that old TV with the busted tube is headed for the dumpster, send it to the prop room instead! Also, if you have a small budget, yard sales, thrift stores and flea markets are good places to acquire items. The same with old clothes, scrap wood, tools, and other similar items- our theater is full of hand-me-downs. Good luck!

I have to confirm with alot that's been said so far on this topic, but there are a few other items that I've found common props that always are needed in most plays. End tables, hard bound books, ice buckets, wine decanter, area rugs of various sizes, coffee table. Some of your older plays call for rotary dial phones, so if you find one of those at a garage sale or such latch on to one of those. You can even rig a rotary phone to ring during a show. [I believe this website even shows how to do this.] Same with a door bell. It's much easier to have these type of props workable as opposed to relying on a sound effect cds. A prop gun, either a starter pistol [although this can be too loud] or a cap gun [we've found the cap guns that use round caps to be the most reliable to fire on stage.]

The list can be endless, but these are at a least some of the common props I've found we are always using in plays, particular mystery plays.

Well, speaking from experience, furniture is a must. A table, some chairs.... when you get in the green as far as money goes, you can add to the stock. Hope i could help!