How to safely move your furniture from point A to point B

You’ve recently viewed your dream home and as you entered it you could already envision which room would be your bedroom and where you’d like your lounge  or  study areas to be. The next thing you know you’re signing on the dotted line for your dream home and it's finally time to move in, or you could be sitting in your lounge looking at the same old scene from the last decade with thoughts of renovations going through your head. As thoughts of moving in swirl through your mind you may be wondering to yourself, how do I make this easier? Wonder no more!

We’ve got 10 tips on how to safely move your home furniture from one location to another: 

Create a checklist   

While shifting items around may not seem like a difficult task, keeping track of these items is quite tedious. Creating a checklist of the furniture items you own helps to ensure that you know exactly what furniture items you have and to manage where they are being moved to. An ideal checklist should begin with items that are high priority such as your beds, mattresses, storage, drawers, tables and sofas – these are items that you would be using daily – and should then descend on to items of lower priority such as side tables, rugs and decorative items. 

Plan and prepare accordingly.

The big MOVE requires lots of planning and preparation so that things go smoothly. Some elements to take into consideration when planning and preparing to move your furniture are the time factor, size and quantity of the furniture that is to be moved, packaging materials that will be required, as well as external factors such as bad weather or traffic conditions that may affect your moving process. Some of the ways you can alleviate these problems are creating a schedule to manage the times in which your furniture will be moved and measuring your furniture before they are being moved. Having a contingency plan in place for when things don’t go according to your initial plan is vital.

Create a layout of your required set-up

When viewing your dream home, you may have already envisioned the furniture set-up that you would like to have when you finally move into your new home. Perhaps you would prefer the largest room to have your dining room set or lounge suite set up in. Selecting the location of your priority furniture and sketching a detailed floor plan of where you would like your furniture to be placed can save time and assist you, as well as your helpers or moving company in knowing where to place them, even if you may not be present when they are moving it in. Providing your movers with a copy of this layout or sticking it onto the walls of each room can make the moving process less complicated.

Packaging Materials & Tools

Once you’ve planned your moving schedule and have a checklist of all your furniture that needs to be shifted you can move forward by getting all the packaging materials and tools that you would need to securely pack your furniture. If you are using the services of a moving company, they may already have these available. However, if you are doing all the heavy lifting yourself then here are some materials and tools you may require: different-sized boxes, packaging tape and packaging material such as bubble wrap, padding or polystyrene, rope, a utility knife, scissors, markers & labels. You will be able to find these materials at your local supermarket or hardware store. 

Empty your furniture

Moving furniture safely requires precaution. To ensure that little objects or drawers do not fall out when being moved, ensure that your storage furniture is emptied before being packaged. In addition to this if you have keys on your furniture ensure that these are labelled and removed from your furniture  before being packed as they can get lost or damaged in transit.

Dismantle extra-large furniture items

Extra-large furniture items such as wall units, shelving units, dining tables and bed frames can be difficult to move in one piece and should be dismantled before moving them, if possible, as it makes it easier and safer to move them when they are dismantled. 

Slide your furniture instead of carrying or dragging it

Carrying heavy furniture takes a toll on your body and dragging it can damage both the furniture and your floors. A more efficient way to move your furniture about would be sliding it, using furniture sliders or appliance rollers which can be purchased in stores or you can create your own sliders, using plastic container covers. Blankets, old towels and carpet remnants can also be used as furniture sliders and to protect your furniture. When moving furniture across carpets use hard plastic sliders or soft padded sliders when moving furniture across carpeting.               

Use the “L” method when moving chairs through doorways or entryways

Large chairs, such as occasional chairs, can be manoeuvred through small doorways and entryways by rotating them on their side and moving the long end of the L shape through and then rotating them to bring the other end into the entryway.

Make use of ramps

Ramps allow you to move your furniture from a lower position to a higher position (such as up or down stairways) and vice versa. Using lumber, scaffold planks or blocks to create ramps for moving your furniture up or down allows easier and faster movement of your furniture.

Move your furniture using the High and Low method

Furniture items that you may have trouble with moving around, especially up stairways, are those such as bed frames, mattresses, tables, dressers, drawers, storage unitsand sofas. If it is possible, the easiest way to move these items in areas with stairways is by using the high and low method. For example, if you are moving a dining table, the person standing higher up on the stairs will carry it from under the top of the table and the person standing at the lower point on the stairs will carry it from the bottom of the table, where it meets the floor. Ensure that you move along very slowly and carefully, this is because the person on the higher end will have to go up the stairs backwards or at an angle. The high and low method helps to keep the item balanced better and keeps it relatively upright. This method works for many furniture items such as bookcases, storage boxes, sofas, desks and mattresses.

 

We hope that these tips help to make the process of moving into your dream home much easier and safer.