Moving home can be extremely expensive; not only because of the cost of your new home itself and the new mortgage, but the solicitors, stamp duty, medium house moving boxes and removal company too. You might be looking for ways to reduce the cost of moving if you are on a tight budget, or if it is a smaller house move or flat move that you feel might be doable yourself.
How to move house without a removal company
Firstly you will need packing materials; cardboard boxes, bubble wrap, strong tape, tissue paper, wardrobe boxes and a marker pen. Order these at least two weeks before the completion date, so that you have plenty of time to pack up your household belongings before the moving day. Do not leave packing until the last minute, as it will cause unnecessary stress.
Next you will need to hire a removal van or lorry, if you don’t own one. We recommend renting a Luton van, which are small box lorries. They have a tail lift at the back which helps with lifting large and heavy furniture and they have plenty of space inside for stacking lots of medium moving boxes. They are easy enough to drive without being too large to manoeuvre.
You will need friends and family to help you with your move. Decide who you want to help and book them well in advance to ensure that they are free on the day. Moving house can be an enormous task, especially for an entire house move with lots of items. You will need to start very early in the morning to be entirely out of the house by the time you need to be, which is usually around mid day. The more friends and family you can get to help you, the better and easier it will be. Our tip is to pick strong friends, as lifting boxes and furniture all day is no easy job.
Always use bubble wrap for protection when packing up your belongings, especially for the most delicate objects. Secure the boxes shut with strong adhesive tape to ensure that the boxes cannot split open while being transported. Always write on the boxes to say what is inside and which room they belong, also which boxes contain fragile objects. This will help to organise your move.
When it comes to packing the removal lorry, pack the largest furniture first, followed by medium cardboard packing boxes around the furniture. This way you can fit more into each load of the lorry, which will save you trips back and forth.
Always use rope or string to secure the boxes and furniture in the lorry. This will prevent them from moving around while you drive and will prevent breakage.
Drive carefully and slowly to your new property. A heavy lorry will take a long time to stop and slow down if another car pulls out in front of you, so take this into consideration and be very slow near junctions and corners.
While packing the lorry, use a sack truck to help transport moving boxes near me and furniture. They will save you carrying all the boxes and really will make life a lot easier for you.
The most challenging part of moving is the furniture. You may need to take apart certain types of furniture so that they fit out of the door frames. This might include bed frames for example which are very large. To do this, you will need a screw driver and Allen key sometimes. The screws are at the corners of the bed frame. Make sure you keep hold of the screws safely so that you can put the bed back together in your new home.
