Paying a moving company worth it?

[JLDemo]

In the beginning stages of planning on a move around 700 miles and curious if anyone has paid a company to move or not?

Pro's & Con's?

Already started a cost comparison for diy vs a company. Have a few quotes in. If you have any suggestions on a company, I'm all ears and especially if they give a veterans discount! I did everything myself when we moved to Kansas, wasn't terrible but a massive pain in the butt and stress. Not to mention the plethora of chewings I got from the wife regarding scratching everything that was sentimental to her.

 

[Letthemgrow]

I've only had professional movers once, when the company I was working for paid for it.
Totally worth every dime I spent.

In all seriousness, it took away 90% of the stress of the move. They did a great job.
Every other time I've moved after that I got a quote and never felt it was worth it . . . until I was packing the moving truck.

 

[manitou1]

When we moved two years ago I got estimates from three companies that ranged from $18K to $21K.
I decided we could do it ourself as painful as it is.
Wife and I packed up the house, guys from work helped load the trucks for pizza and beer, and we hired five folks at $100 each to help unload at our new home.
We rented two 29' trucks (largest available). Moved 1000 miles.
Total cost including fuel, meals, etc was about $4K.

In hindsight, as with all unfriendly endeavors, the anticipation and perception are far worse than the actual job. It sucked, but was not near as bad as my mind anticipated.

 

[cedahm]

I've only had professional movers once, when the company I was working for paid for it.
Totally worth every dime I spent.

In all seriousness, it took away 90% of the stress of the move. They did a great job.
Every other time I've moved after that I got a quote and never felt it was worth it . . . until I was packing the moving truck.

my first gig after college required me to move frequently the first 4 years. I went WI->AL->TN->MI->CO->ID->GA

Naturally, company paid for the moves. Except for ID->GA, I always drove myself with what I considered essentials (so, back then, basically fly rods, shotgun, skis and camping gear) and we always got the service level where I basically didn’t have to do anything. I don’t think I even needed to be present. Caveat, I was a 23-25 year old single guy so I had basically nothing to move, but it was fantastic. If you leave a pencil on the counter, it gets wrapped, packed and manifested.

the last time I moved (12 miles as the crow flies), I rented a UHaul and engaged some buddies. It was, as anyone who’s moved themselves knows, miserable, but given we could be back and forth in 20 minutes, not as horrible as you’d think.

For 700 miles, and presumably a lot more stuff than a 24 year old, notably a wife , I have to think it’s worth the expense If only for keeping the domestic tranquility Index high.


Edit: Just saw the price tag in @manitou1 post. For $20K, the math pencils a lot differently. Wow.

 

[belshawelk]

Depends how much crap you have. We moved Sept ‘21. We had a large house with lots of stuff. Including gun safes. We filled a 53’ trailer to the brim. Worth every penny. We had very minimal damage ( a few scratches and knicks). We moved into a bigger house with difficult stairs and corners. Best money I spent, no hurt back

Best advice I got was to do homework and pick best movers. Other good option are pods. We had too much crap for them.

 

[WapitiBob]

they're great but expect broken and scratched stuff

 

[Sask hunter]

Last time I moved work paid for it. God it was nice not having to carry deep freezes and all that heavy crap.

 

[JLDemo]

I'm not paying 20k. That's just absurd, I know it'll be pricey but that's just not in the budget.

@belshawelk was the cost that high for you?

I've been pondering buying a used enclosed trailer and making the multiple trips over time. No hurry to sell here and already have a place there before we decide to buy. Very fortunate a family member has a vacant home we'll stay in for the time being.

We have a lot of crap for a 2800 sq ft house, but it is manageable.

 

[jeff_gibbons]

We’ve moved 4x for work. 3 of the times were paid by my company and full service deals. The last move we hired people out of pocket.
Here are a few lessons we learned:
1. Having other people wrap, pack and load is worth every dime.
2. Make sure to always get a dedicated container. No one else’s stuff at all. A lot of companies will try to maximize the load and put other jobs in with yours. They then pack it for max density and your stuff gets damaged. Also we lost stuff both times it was shared load
3. For a long move think hard on the stuff you bring. It is likely better to let some of the old stuff go and buy knew where you land.
4. Pay attention to delivery dates. Brokers will look for lowest rate truck and can leave your box in their warehouse weeks. Get a tight delivery schedule with financial teeth if they are delayed
5. Like most things you get what you pay for. Cheaper has meant more damaged stuff for us.
6. Movers don’t take ammo, reloading materials. At least the ones I ran across. They’ll take a safe for an extra fee and I was able to keep unloaded rifles in the safe.
7. Keep all the important stuff that can’t be lost, broken etc with you in a uhaul etc.

One option that I would entertain seriously if I had to move again - this pods and hiring mover packers and labor. I’d pay the movers by the hour and take our time. Piece rate guys move really fast and that’s when stuff isn’t wrapped well and gets broken

Good luck

 

[Scott85]

I haven’t paid out of pocket but I’ve been moved 4 times at the governments expense. They come in and pack up everything; we didn’t lift a hand. When they came to unload we told them what room to leave everything, then we called them to pick up all the boxes and trash.

 

[Ben Lamb]

If you hire it done, get a reputable firm. You'll pay more, but it's worth it.

We spent $12-14K in '20 to have movers move us. It was a bit sketch, but they did it all, and got to our new house before us. Only a couple of broken chairs. Biggest hassle was the middle man. They way under estimated the size needed to move us, even after we provided accurate accounting of what we had. I ended up having to get rid of our outdoor furniture, power tools & my grills, among a few other things.

If you can do it yourself, it's worth the sore muscles. If you can hire folks to just help you load & unload, you're still coming out way ahead.

 

[noisy]

Hire guys to load the heavy stuff when you're moving out. At your destination, hire guys to unload the heavy stuff. Everything else you can do yourself.

And oh yeah, take this opportunity to GET RID of a lot of crap you don't need!!

 

[Scott85]

Pictures of our move.

 

[belshawelk]

We paid about 17k. But that was a 53’ packed. Most would never fill that big of trailer. It included $800 to move 2 safes. One is over 1000 lbs. We did pack boxes ourselves.they charge a ton to box stuff up and you get charged by the box. We had 148 big Home Depot moving boxes. We packed them to the brim. I would pay again to have them move us. Again we have a ton of stuff. 4 bedrooms, bonus room, office, etc. 20 years ago I would have made multiple trips in a uhaul. Not worth taking a chance getting hurt at 50 as we have some really heavy furniture. Let alone getting help and all that crap. 2 companies couldn’t move us because we were too heavy. They didn’t have designated semis. Some companies will also back end load someone else with your stuff. Our company just did our stuff. It was my lock on the trailer

 

[Goodfish]

We’ve moved a slew of times, both by ourselves and with movers. The longest distance on earth is Greyhound. The second longest is U-Haul. I wouldn’t do it myself any more at my age unless it was close. One thing I can share is every time we have moved we get to the new house and end up taking a bunch of stuff to Goodwill or the dump after I have paid to move it! Get rid of your junk first!

 

[Beignet]

I’ve moved all over the damn place. Check out Old Dominion Freightline’s Household Services.

They drop off a tractor trailer for a few days. You load it up yourself or hire local hands. You only pay for the linear feet you use. Then you put up a dividing wall and they use the rest of the truck to haul other freight along the way. They then drop off the tractor trailer again (about a week later in my case) for a few days and you call to have them pick it up once you’ve unloaded.

Last time I used it I loaded up everything I own, including a motorcycle and big junk like that. They hauled it about nearly 2000 miles for just over $2000. Was marginally more expensive then hiring a big-assed uhaul and pulling my vehicle behind it.

Only catch is that you need the space to have a tractor trailer parked at both locations.

 

[LopeHunter]

I moved 18 times in my first 20 years after high school graduation. I did not have much but got very good at packaging things so they survived the move. I got very good at labeling boxes for which room In The New Place to set each box.

Sucks even if have a strong back and no knee issues. Why is it expensive to hire movers? Well, there is the truck, driver, loaders, fuel, meals and lodging. You can instead rent the truck, pay for fuel, be the driver, lodging, burn vacation days, load and unload and hopefully not take out a drive-thru lane or clip a car while changing lanes or parking and not get the truck broken into while sleep in a budget motel.

I have moved just 8 times the past 30 years. Hope to move only two more times before die. As with divorces, hiring movers costs a lot because it is worth it.

 

[manitou1]

When we moved two years ago I got estimates from three companies that ranged from $18K to $21K.
I decided we could do it ourself as painful as it is.
Wife and I packed up the house, guys from work helped load the trucks for pizza and beer, and we hired five folks at $100 each to help unload at our new home.
We rented two 29' trucks (largest available). Moved 1000 miles.
Total cost including fuel, meals, etc was about $4K.

In hindsight, as with all unfriendly endeavors, the anticipation and perception are far worse than the actual job. It sucked, but was not near as bad as my mind anticipated.

I had taken a trailer and the wife out six months prior and also towed a untility trailer loaded on the final move. We sold and gave away a lot of stuff. Large kayaks, grills, new wood stove, taxidermy mounts, riding and push mowers, chainsaws did not go.
Had a pretty large house and a 30'x70' shop and we downsized.

That being said both 29' moving trucks were fully loaded, as well as the trailer and my pickup.

 

[MaddH]

When we moved two yrs ago we packed our own boxes then hired a local company for $300 to load the Uhaul. We bought all new appliances since ours were starting to get old anyways and most furniture too. Drove the Uhaul ourselves. Moved my mom a year ago and had movers do it all. Worst part was after it was loaded it sat for a month at storage. Fortunately we hired a legit company and since they didn’t meet the date on the contract they refunded half of the bill. With no hassle at all

 

[Kaitum]

I've moved a bunch, the last three times on the government's dime including up to AK and back. I will reiterate what others have said, get rid of what you don't need before you move it. Seems in my case that outdoor items take up the most space. Certain items a moving company generally won't move, like a freezer full of elk meat. A couple of times we've had to place the entire shipment in storage as we didn't have a house to move into just yet. Then once we bought a house the items are delivered. That is, everything was handled twice on the destination end. Glad we had movers cover that. Also, at our current location the 52' semi could not fit into our driveway so the movers had to transfer everything from the semi to a shorter U-Haul truck and make multiple deliveries. Again, glad the movers covered that.