I did only find bad furniture before and after I´ve became queen (two characters) On my male character, I bought the ugly broken furniture and then after a while better and better furniture showed up. In the end luxury furniture came up. This was before I became king.
Anyways, a another way is to buy the houses is Millfeild and change their luxury furniture to the damn broken furniture. In that way you gain some luxury furniture but loose some money.
If you want nice paintings, try to dig up or earn the portraits of Ben Finn, Major Swift,Logan,Sir Walter,Theresa,Eliott/Elise,Sabine and so on. And must truly think they count as an better painting than the small random paintings you can find everywhere else.