Moving to a new home can be exciting. It cal also be a nightmare. According to some surveys, it’s right up there with divorce and the death of a loved one. But the good news is that you’ve got the power to make moving day far easier, and it’s all down to thinking things through ahead of time and having plans in place to deal with any issues that might come your way. With that in mind, let’s take a look at how you can make moving day easier on yourself and everyone around you and. It still might not be fun, but at least you can be less stressed out by it. Or feel guilty asking your friends to help.
Start Early With A Plan
The key to a successful move is starting early, so as soon as you know you’re moving, it’s time to create a plan, even if you think you’ve got loads of time before moving day – time moves fast, and if you don’t start planning early, you’ll just be causing yourself all kinds of avoidable problems.
Start by listing all the tasks you need to complete before, during, and after the move, which could include decluttering your home, gathering packing supplies, scheduling movers, and telling whoever needs to know (including utility companies) that you’ve got a new address.
If you can break the move down into manageable steps, you’ll be much more organized and much less stressed, so although it might seem like hard work at first, ensuring you make a plan and perhaps a moving timeline so you’ve got deadlines to work towards is definitely the way to go.
It is also a good idea to assign roles. When my wife and I moved into our house, she was pregnant with our first child, so I knew my role was going to all the lifting, carrying, assembling, and panting. Her job was organzing. Pro tip: don’t move when your wife is 7 months pregnant. But if you can’t plan around that, you should still plan as much as you can.
Declutter Before You Pack
You know that think that is tucked away in box somewhere that you haven’t used years and probalby forgot about? Spoiler alert, if you move it to your knew home it is going to stay tucked away in a box somewhere and you’ll forget about it. Moving is the ideal opportunity to declutter, and it’s a great idea to go through each room and decide what to keep, donate, sell, or recycle. In that way, you’ll only end up packing the things you actually want to take with you, which not only saves time, but it makes your new home much more pleasant when you’re unpacking too.
Of course, moving is an emotional time, no matter how excited you might be to live in your new place – you’re going to have memories in your current home, and that’s what can make leaving it harder than you expect in some cases, and that feeling is probably why a lot of people don’t declutter; adding more emotions on top of what you’re already feeling is a real challenge. However, you can see that the final results would be much better if you are able to declutter, so if it’s hard for you, why not get help? Friends and family will be much less attached to things and they’ll be able to help you see the more practical side of decluttering, which can help offset those pesky emotions.
Gather Packing Supplies Ahead Of Time
Of all the things you have to do when you move, packing is the biggest job and the one that you can’t delay. No one wants to have things that still need to be packed when the time to move arrives or when you have to hand over your key to the new owners or tenants. So, to avoid those awful last-minute scrambles, you need to gather all your packing supplies well in advance, and that includes sturdy boxes in various sizes, packing tape, bubble wrap or newspapers, and markers for labeling the boxes.
You can buy these things online – just search for packing supplies and you’ll come across plenty of options – but you can also save some money by picking up boxes from your local grocery store or asking in the local area if anyone has any moving boxes they need to get rid of. You’ll often find people are more than happy for you to come and collect the boxes they don’t need anymore because otherwise they’ve got to get rid of them themselves, so it saves a job.
Something that could actually solve all these issues and decisions is to hire a packing service company to do the job for you. This is ideal if the thought of packing is causing you to feel stressed and overwhelmed or you’re short on time, for example, and since professional packers are efficient and experienced, they’ll be able to pack up your stuff far quicker than you can, and, if they’re also your moving company, they can put it straight into the van and take it where you need it to go.
Label Your Boxes Clearly
When you’re in the midst of the chaos of moving, it’s easy to lose track of what’s in each box, which means you’ll lose things or have trouble at the other end when you want to find something – and in general, it just makes life harder because you won’t know where to put the boxes and you won’t know which ones to start unpacking first.
So, to make things easier for everyone, including future you who’s unpacking in the new house, label each box clearly using a marker pen so it doesn’t rub off. And make sure you’re specific; rather than just writing the name of the room the box needs to go in, give a description of what’s in it. That’s going to save a lot of time when it comes to unpacking as you’ll know exactly what to expect when you open a box and you’ll know where it all has to go.
Pack An Essentials Box
Most of the boxes you pack can be left until a day or even several after you move in because after all that stress and physical activity, the idea of unpacking immediately can be a pretty awful one. However, there are some things you’re going to need on that first day and night in your new place, so it’s a good idea to have an essentials box with all that stuff in it so you can be comfortable until you unpack everything else.
Your essentials box should include a change of clothes, your toothbrush and toothpaste as well as any other toiletries you might need, medication, important documents, snacks, phone chargers, basic kitchen items, and probably some beer. And remember to keep this box with you during the move so you’ve got easy access to it – if it goes in with all the other boxes you’ll have to spend time searching for it and that defeats the object of having it in the first place!
Above all, try not to stress and try not to rush. You know what you’re in for, so you might as well try to enjoy it. And really, even if your moving day (or days) is stressful, it will soon be dwafed by the joy of being in your new home.
I Think Therefore I Dad 