How many moving boxes do I need?

trailingspouse

You've been nagging your husband to get boxes? Get them yourself. They're only boxes - it's not an exclusively male preserve.

Your husband thinks removal companies will be too expensive? What's his evidence? What's your budget? Get quotes (they're free). Then decide if they're too expensive. Factor in the cost of hiring a van, fuel for the van, bubble wrap, how many people you have available to you to help move stuff, and the cost of physio after you wreck your backs.

zagubov

Got to say that doing without a professional packer is a false economy, and if you don't believe me, ask anyone who's done both.

But hey, some people like to learn lessons the hard way, so let's all repeat the same moving mistakes forever.

volare11512

I am moving from a 3 bedroom house to a 2 bed flat and it's been about 30 boxes so far, plus numerous bags plus sofas + furniture. I am moving tomorrow and to the otherside of the country so I only have one chance to get it done.

I'd love to have a professional packer, but that's a luxury I canoe afford right now.

toc25

There's no way I would let a stranger come in my house and pack my stuff. I can't be the only one that would hate that.

We are planning on hiring a van that is big enough to get everything in to it in one go, So we can fill up the van and just wait for the call saying the keys are ready. Ive been collecting boxes for a while but still plan on getting more as I need them. I also have a load of plastic storage tubs which I find better that cardboard boxes.

I'm planning on using either black bin liners or those reusable shopping bags for clothes and putting them in my car along with duvets and pillows.

If the way this house sale/purchase has gone so far is anything to go by though my plans will probably not go as predicted.

kerri_gt

We moved from a 3 bed to a 3 bed and used the packing service of the removal company, it was only a couple of hundred £ more than the basic cost to do the move.
They came the day before and packed most stuff, then did the rest of the stuff on the day of the move. Far easier and meant I could concentrate on cleaning the house we were leaving, getting into our new house.

SuboJvR

Our last move was the first time we used a removal company. We were moving 200 miles so doing it ourselves wasn't an option.

The move before that we did ourselves, 35 miles each way, and I had taken some stuff to the house already (I worked locally so would take a full back seat/boot's worth routinely).

We hired a long wheel base van for that and I think it required three round trips plus two cars. That was from a two bed flat and by the end of it I said I never wanted to move house again.

I'm relatively fit, more so then, but I found it so tiring and so stressful and we didn't even have pressures of people moving in or anything as we had some overlap.

I had to do most of the packing as I had more free hours in the day than my husband. Therefore in the weeks leading up to the move I was exhausted and grumpy.

With the moving company, we had selected a few things we wanted to do ourselves (garage, again we hired a long wheel base van) and anything of sentimental value or a delicate nature (yeah, removals guys plus my underwear? I wasn't too keen on that!) that came in the car. But in terms of stress levels on the day and the weeks before it was night and day.

I would much much rather work some overtime for a few months to afford to pay someone else to do it. I'd never do t again ourselves nor do I think we could (now we have big furniture of our own).

SuboJvR

I would definitely recommend getting someone to come and quote and then decide from there if you think it's worth it or not.

phoebe1989seb

We've moved about seven times over the years - eight if you include my first rented flat - and have done DIY - local and long (200 miles) distance - and had professionals move us.

The long distance DIY move took seven journeys in the largest lorry we could hire, moving from a five to a six bedroom house with several hundred boxes and loads of furniture. We also had a hot tub back then :o and had a company move that. For household stuff/furniture/garden items the hiring of the lorry plus fuel still cost well in excess of £1k - a saving of about £1.5k on the professional quotes we'd received. Luckily we had the keys between exchange and completion so did the move over a - very arduous - week.

Even after serious decluttering/ebaying, the (professional) move before that cost over £4k as we had way more stuff in our 3500 sq ft house.

We had quite a few pieces of antique furniture that required export wrapping, but apart from that we did all the packing ourselves as I didn't want to risk fragile, irreplaceable items getting broken. Most of those were moved in the car.

Boxes were provided and we've had mixed experiences with the removers collecting them afterwards. In most cases they have. Probably because there were so many, lol!

Our most recent move - also long distance - we used a small local firm. They loaded lorries over three days and unloaded over another two. Cost was just over £3.5k. The cheapest quote we received was £3k, but they were booked by the time we were ready. Several hundred boxes again, despite having offloaded a ton of stuff to a storage unit prior to selling

We hope to move again soon and have already started getting rid of things as I plan to spend no more than £1k on removals. I'm organising it like a military operation but even though I've estimated a certain number of boxes, you can guarantee that'll need to be doubled!

Slinky

toc25 wrote: »

There's no way I would let a stranger come in my house and pack my stuff. I can't be the only one that would hate that.

Strangers handled almost everything you own, at some point before you owned it.

dancing_star

Last time I got the removal guys to dismantle the furniture where required - sofa and bed.

I really wish I'd double checked under the bed first, and removed the box of 'adult toys'.

:rotfl: