9 Big Moving Day Mistakes To Avoid

There is one single day during a residential move whose mention alone can send paralyzing chills down any home mover’s spine.

The day that must not be named!

This day’s true identity should never be spoken out load but only pronounced in an almost inaudible whisper late at night as a spooky bedtime story to frighten seemingly fearless children.

Moving day.

The road from your old residence to your new home can be as smooth as silk (perfect organization) or as rocky as The Rocky Mountains themselves (not so perfect organization), but your relocation journey will always make one stop to welcome aboard the most unpredictable period in any house move.

To steer clear of the potential pitfalls on the way to your new life and to make your moving trip much more manageable, get familiar with the most common moving day mistakes and learn how to avoid these moving mistakes skillfully.

1. The Late Bird Catches The Strongest Headaches

Hitting the snooze button and going back to sleep on the morning of your move is probably the worst possible start of your Big Day. As a rule, being well aware of what’s waiting for them in the morning, most home movers will probably find it extremely hard to get a decent shut-eye. However, you may think that you’re fully prepared for what Moving day has to offer you and decide to be the exception that proves the rule – that is, to sleep in so that you have the physical energy and mental strength to face and survive the most stressful and exhausting 24-hour period during a residential move.

Moving day oversleeping is never a good idea – it is clearly one of the numerous rookie moving mistakes you can easily commit in the course of your local or long distance relocation. Unless you want to be woken up by your movers banging on your front door, you are expected to go to bed relatively early the day before Moving day and set your alarm clock for an advantageous head start. All your weeks’ worth of organization efforts boils down to that single pivotal day, so you must make each minute count.

Make sure you have constant and easy access to your fully charged and operational mobile phone in case your moving company wants to contact you with an important update or you wish to sort out any last-minute details with them.

2. “I Have Enough Time To Pack A Few Boxes Before My Movers Arrive”

It’s a clear moving day mistake to delude yourself that you will have enough time on moving day to finish up the packing process.  According to your detailed moving calendar, you should be done with packing at least a few days before your movers arrive to load your belongings into the waiting moving truck. Of course, this is all true if you have decided to take the DIY approach to moving house, and therefore to pack by yourself. Basically, you won’t have too many packing related issues to worry about if you have requested the additional service of packing your household goods from a full service moving company. Equipped with quality packing supplies and considerable experience, professional packers and movers will arrive at your home at a pre-arranged time and will, hopefully, redefine the term quick and safe packing.

To avoid the extra dose of moving stress that comes with late packing, you’d better start sorting out your household items and personal possessions, and later placing them in suitable moving containers, as soon as humanly possible. To prevent unnecessary clutter from building up as moving day approaches, start packing from the rooms you use least frequently – preferably from your storage areas /garage, tool shed, basement, attic/ because they are the premises that always require much more packing time than initially planned. Also, to speed up DIY packing, take care of your large and heavy items before getting down to packing your odds and ends for safe transportation.

3. “Knock, knock!” “Who’s There?” “Mr. Disorganized Packing”

There’s another packing-related moving day mistake that is arguably even worse than late packing, and that’s disorganized packing. Packing your household items for moving is a highly successive process that follows logical and consecutive steps whose strict observance always leads to satisfactory results. In reality, the most time-consuming and tedious pre-move task will require all the organization skills you’ve acquired over the years, together with all your patience, persistence and consistency you can muster.

Disorganized packing can come in various shapes and sizes, the most common ones being:

• Failure to acquire adequate moving boxes. Not only will you need a staggering number of moving containers /most often cardboard boxes/ in good overall condition, but you will also need those containers to be in various sizes as well. Oddly enough, one safety packing rule states that you should use small-sized boxes for packing heavier items, and medium to large ones for packing lighter goods – packing books when moving house is a good example of this packing guideline.
• Failure to pack a survival kit. A survival kit is another name for an essentials box – a container or two full of absolute necessities that you will surely need while you don’t have normal access to your possessions. Fundamental items to consider placing in your survival kit: prescription medicine, toiletries, plastic kitchen utensils, a change of clothes, basic tools /a set of screwdrivers, an adjustable wrench, a hammer, etc./, a flashlight and other lifesavers.
• Failure to observe the list of non-allowables. Moving companies are not allowed to transport any goods that can compromise the safety of the people involved in the move or can endanger the integrity of the property to be moved between the two homes. Such prohibited items fall into 4 main categories: hazardous materials /flammable, corrosive, explosive/, perishable foods, pets and plants, and valuable and irreplaceable items. Make sure you acquire the list of non-allowed item from your mover well in advance.
• Failure to label your packed boxes. Packed boxes with not one written word on them will only mess up your unpacking process to the point that you will waste valuable time guessing the content of each moving box. Don’t make this easily avoidable moving day mistake but take a minute to mark each moving container with its exact content, destination room and set of special handling instructions /FRAGILE, THIS SIDE UP, HANDLE WITH CARE/. Remember that a minute here can save up to an hour there.

4. “Dear Movers, Please Take Good Care Of My Valuables!”

Speaking of moving mistakes to avoid when moving house, one of the costliest moving day blunders is to entrust your moving company with any valuable items you possess. Regardless of how trustworthy a moving company you have chosen as your relocation partner, you should never hand over to them any possessions of high monetary or sentimental value simply because you know – anything can happen on the road.

Furthermore, there are specific items which are downright irreplaceable (for example, old family photos) and which no compensatory payment can bring back.

Remember that it’s your responsibility to relocate your valuable items, such as cash, bank cards, jewelry pieces, family heirlooms, expensive equipment, important documents, etc. to your new home. However, if that’s just not possible, discuss the issue with your moving company and do purchase additional insurance for your valuables before you see them taken away from you. Another viable option to move possessions of great value to your new residence is to ship them by a specialized courier service provider /USPS, UPS, FedEx and others/.

5. “Who’s Going To Pay For My Broken TV?”

Another big moving day mistake is not to know what type of insurance your selected moving company offers when the movers come to your house and start packing and loading your stuff into the moving truck. It’s definitely not the right approach to simply assume that nothing will get damaged or broken during transportation. Again, it’s a universal truth that anything can happen on the road and even the best cross country movers might happen to have a bad day, and this is exactly why you should be well aware of what insurance options you have in order to choose the one that works best in your case.

First of all, contact your home insurance provider and double check with them what your policy states about moving house instances and your household items in transit. If it turns out that you’re not covered, then it’s a good idea to purchase additional adequate insurance either through your mover or from a third party insurance company. It’s important to understand that the moment you sign your moving contract (aka Bill of Lading), you receive Basic Limited Liability Protection for free. Also known as Moving Valuation, this coverage redefines the term “basic” and offers up to 60 cents per pound per article. In other words, get ready to receive approximately $18 as compensation if something really bad happened to your brand new 30-pound flat screen LCD TV.

6. Moving Day Is Not a Toy

A residential move can hide plenty of hidden dangers for all participants involved in the relocation and as an unwritten rule, the time frame when most of these dangerous accidents tend to occur is none other than Moving day. Undoubtedly, you’re going to have to go into overdrive in order to be in par with all the overwhelming tasks, puzzling issues and split-second decisions your brain will be forced to process all at the same time. And being in overdrive for a prolonged period of time will increase exponentially your chance of making a moving day error. And a costly error at that!

Thus said, one of the most serious mistakes to make on Moving day is to turn your back on safety. To provide a high level of safety for your family members is your top priority, especially when it comes to keeping your children and pets safe. And the best way to keep your loved ones safe is to keep them away from the relocation epicenter on Moving day. Hire a trusted person to come and look after your young children and animals friends /especially highly sensitive dogs and cats/ somewhere far, far away from heavy boxes, overweight furniture and busy movers. This way, not only will you guarantee the well-being of your little ones but you will also keep their vital routines fairly unchanged, which automatically leads to lower moving day stress levels and much happier faces.

7. High Heels On Moving Day? Good Luck!

When talking about moving day safety, we can’t help but mention the importance of what you wear on moving day – the most unpredictable period when moving house. It’s the time when even perfectly organized moves have the tendency of becoming a bit chaotic and moderately dangerous, so how you are dressed is yet another guarantee that troubles will not be welcome in your home.

When it comes to moving day fashion, your only thought should be about being and feeling both comfortable and safe. Forget about what you saw on Fashion TV the other day but choose weather appropriate clothes that are flexible, breathable and fit you well. Ideally, your garments will have plenty of deep and safe pockets where you can have essentials pretty handy, such as money, keys, mobile phone, a set of hand tools and so on. Also, it’s a good idea to wear something which you wouldn’t mind getting dirty or even damaged during the house moving process. Avoid baggy clothes which may become hooked onto something and endanger your health in any way.

As far as moving day shoes go, select your most comfortable pair which also happens to have good traction, and preferably an ankle support as well. Always go for an enclosed pair of shoes for maximum protection of your feet because you never know which box might land straight on your poor toes. Hopefully, you will have already packed away all your high-heel shoes, flip-flops or sandals by the time Moving day comes around.

8. “Excuse Me, Can I Have A Glass Of Water?”

Another mistake to avoid on Moving day is to be inconsiderate towards your movers’ needs. Even in an imperfectly balanced world like ours, the conscious decision to show kindness and understanding towards your fellow citizens often gets rewarded by a warming feeling of satisfaction if not by the expected return of the act of kindness itself. Or in short, you should treat your moving crew the way you want to be treated.

First of all, be there when your moving team arrives at your door and make them feel welcome by providing free access to the bathroom and offering them cold or hot non-alcoholic beverages in accordance with the climatic conditions outside. Also, providing some type of snack, such as sandwiches, crackers, biscuits or even a slice of pizza for each of your hired laborers will only do you good in the long run as their motivation and energy levels will be, supposedly, fairly high throughout the long and exhausting day.

Secondly, as any good host would do, try to be open to good advice on their part as to how to increase the overall moving day efficiency but don’t forget to voice any concerns or worries you might have regarding the successful outcome of the house moving operation either. Having found a trustworthy and upstanding moving company in the first place, things should go smoothly from start to finish. However, should any problematic situations arise in regard to your movers’ professional performance, do your best to resolve the matter in a diplomatic way before you jump the gun and call the moving company. Maybe it was just an unfortunate misunderstanding on both sides?

In the end of moving day, if you do feel like your hired help did an outstanding job, you may as well reward their individual efforts by offering them well deserved tips. Remember to give each mover their share instead of handing the lump sum to the foreman.

9. “Why Is It So Dark In My New Home?”

Oops! Did you forget to have your utilities switched on in your new residence when moving across town or moving across the country? This is a common moving mistake that even the most organized home movers commit due to the extraordinary number of pre-move tasks urgently waiting to be scratched off from their moving calendars. There’s nothing like arriving in your new house or apartment late on a Friday from a truly exhausting moving day trip only to find out that the lights won’t turn on and you’ll have to wait for 2 entire days before you can contact your new power company first thing Monday morning. Yes, unpacking in the dark does seem like loads of fun, doesn’t it?

Make sure you arrange for the disconnection of all the utilities and services in your old home a few days after your moving date and then supervise their re-connection at your new home at least one week prior to the Big day. Your most urgent communal services include electricity, water and gas, while the ones that can wait until you get back on your feet include but are not limited to telephone, Internet, cable TV, domestic waste collection, etc.

If you manage to avoid all of the above big moving day mistakes when moving house, then you’re nothing short of a moving ace! And yet, probably the most detrimental error you can make on moving day is to lose faith that things will be alright in the end. The depressing feeling of discouragement will only make your relocation task harder, so you need to stop for a moment and think of why you’re moving house in the first place. Think of all the great things that await you around the corner and feel the thrill of the exciting newly opened path ahead of you. Just surround yourself with positive thoughts and don’t let any moving day mistakes, minor or major, slow down your moving inertia.

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