Removals company vs doing it ourselves?

GaleSF63

Wyndham said:

We moved from rented to our first bought house, and it was six houses down the road.

We used removers, who did take most of the stuff. But, at the end, there were 'a few bits' which I told them to leave, as I would sort them (rented to bought, and we had an overlap).

Those 'few bits' took one and a half car loads, as well as a few walks up and down the road. Lesson learnt for me, and I would never do that again.

You always have more stuff than you think you do...!

Good luck, whatever you decide.

It's not the furniture or kitchen appliances or ornaments, but things like mops, brushes, vacuum cleaners, contents of the understairs cupboard, all the awkward shaped or delicate pieces like lamps, even shoes... and it's very easy to  under estimate how much space the contents of the kitchen cupboards take up once out of their lair.

Last time it was friends with a truck, friends with a car, my car - never again. It seemed to take forever after previous moves with professional movers had gone smoothly and quickly.

youth_leader

I'd also pay for packing.  It took me over three hours to pack my kitchen, even though I'd ruthlessly decluttered.  

pinkteapot

My first move was from a rented 2-bed flat to a purchased 2-bed flat. I'd completed a few days earlier so already had the keys. It was in the next road. 

I hired a van and bribed mates with pizza and beer. I had very little furniture. It still took all day! And getting things like mattresses up stairs is not fun.

As others have said: if you're selling and buying, so are mid-chain, you can't do it as you can't be going back and forth all day long*. If not, you can do it but it won't be a fun day. For the sake of £100-200 I wouldn't do it, but only you know what that amount of money means to you. 

* We once bought a 4-bed house where the vendor decided to self-move out. We completed at 10.30am and didn't get the keys until almost 5pm because they were going back and forth. Luckily, we were coming from rented and not moving in that day. If we'd been waiting with our removals lorry we'd have been raging!