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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Moving companies - Clicky poll
DH and I are having a disagreement about whether we should shell out the money and use a moving company for our big move in August or whether we should just get a bunch of our friends to come help and rent a U-Haul. He thinks that his buddies and him can do it themselves and we can save money that way. I think it's not worth the hassle or the potential for broken/damaged things by using his friends. His friends claim they are willing to help, but I'm worried they'll fall through on the day of.
[Poll]
Re: Moving companies - Clicky poll
How about a combo. of the two? Maybe have the friends lined up for one day to get boxes, smaller furniture, anything that wouldn't be heartbreaking if it got a little dinged up...
And then line up some movers for the next day (if possible) to get any really big furniture or "priceless" stuff that you want well taken care of. That would save you money.
I think most of the moving companies I called charge a flat rate and then per hour so we'd be paying the same amount regardless of the amount of stuff. I could call some of them back to see if the flat rate or hourly rate changes if we need a smaller truck. Thanks!
Do you have a lot of nice (read: valuable) items to move? Do you have the materials to properly pack/protect everything? How far are you moving?
If you are willing to take the time to properly pack, wrap, and protect your valuable items, then moving on your own shouldn't be a big deal. If you have a lot of large hard-to-pack items, a lot of valuable things, or don't have time to do it yourself, then maybe hiring someone is a good idea.
If you have your friends help you move, I would be very careful to supervise the loading of the van. Make sure you have lots of things like moving blankets to pad your furniture, and don't let them put wood-on-wood. There are certain types of friends who will just throw things into the van however they want, and there are other types who will treat your items with respect and make sure it is done right (even if it takes more time). You want people from the latter group to help (which probably isn't your DH's beer buddies, no offense).
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My thought was that you wouldn't have to hire the movers for as long, and in essence could probably just get away with the flat rate. When we moved, it was a flat rate for the first two hours, and then they charged for every 15 minutes on top of that. So in essence, if you only needed movers for two hours (For the big stuff) you could save money.
We hired movers thinking "oh, it'll only be a few hours" and it ended up being about a 7 hr. day. We had everything packed and ready to go too. We paid a lot more than we anticipated because there was no way of knowing how long it would take them.
The only reason I would hire a moving company is if I had a bunch of heavy, PITA things to move that I didn't feel like bothering with. For example, we had such a hard time moving our friend's king size mattress up these narrow stairs when we helped her move, I told her to just hire someone the next time. Those things are worth it IMO.
As for breakables, the things that I'm worried about I would just pack myself and take it in my own car, unless they are huge items, you run the risk of breaking things whether you use a moving company or not.
If you have a lot of bigger stuff, hire a company! My H and I didn't and we took soooo many trips back and forth it felt like it was a waste of time!
And if they break a dresser or something, they are covered by insurance....my H and his friend broke 2 things
no insurance covered that! haha
We just moved and I'd TOTALLY recommend a moving company, especially if you have a lot of larger things and furniture. Friends won't work as hard or as fast as movers and they're not professional at loading the truck so there's bound to be damage during transportation.
It took our movers a full day to move our things. I'm sure it would have taken our friends two days and I'm not even sure that we could have gotten them back for a second day.
I will say that moving is hard on furniture so I think you'll have a little damage even with a mover but probably less damage overall and less damage to your walls.
We used Cherokee based on a recommendation from this board. I'd recommend them also. And I think there's a lower rate for moving on a weekday.
Good luck!
Do you mind me asking which company you hired?