Moving somehow manages to be simultaneously exciting and traumatising. You’ve lined up your new home, planned your removals and started packing your bags… here’s our checklist of 10 things not to forget when you’re planning to move house.
1. Notify your utilities
You don’t want to be lumped with someone else’s bill, so make sure you give your internet, gas, and electricity suppliers as well as your local council plenty of notice ahead of your move.
2. Change your address
Banks, building societies, mobile phone companies, credit card suppliers, HMRC… they all need to know about your change of address. Mercifully, most are quick and easy to update via online or phone systems.
3. Set up mail forwarding
Royal Mail has a very convenient mail redirection service, which will save you having to knock on your former home’s front door to pick up any mail from senders who aren’t aware of your change of address.
4. Declutter
Even if you’re moving into a bigger place, this is a great opportunity to streamline your possessions. It’ll make moving cheaper and easier, unpacking faster, and enhance your feeling of starting fresh in your new home. Sort anything you’re not taking with you into piles to be sold, recycled, donated/given away, and put as little as possible into the trash. If you don’t have time before the move, why not put all the stuff you don’t need into one box, so at your new house you can share on Olio and get to know your new community?
5. Sell, share, and donate
Items to be sold might need a longer lead time to get listed and sold on Gumtree, eBay, Facebook Marketplace, or whatever platform you’ve chosen to use, so start with those. Make sure you get some good pictures in a well-lit room and include plenty of details — a better listing generally leads to a faster sell and higher price. The rest can be donated to your local charity shop or added to Olio for someone local to collect from you. Try to avoid putting items in the trash unless they’re absolutely beyond use.
6. Empty your fridge and freezer
In the week or so before you move, it’s a good idea to do an inventory of what’s in your fridge and freezer that won’t survive the journey to the new place. Instead, plan your meals ahead of the move so that you can eat as much as possible that’s already there, leaving it close to empty come moving day. Satisfying!
7. Share or donate surplus food
Add your items to Olio for someone local to pick up. Remember you don’t even have to add each individual item — you can list it all together as one bumper giveaway. Easy-peasy!
8. Make plans for your kids and/or pets
Even as a grown adult, moving is prime territory for temper tantrums, tired outbursts and unsettled tears. It’s best for everyone if your kids and pets aren’t added into the equation, so make plans ahead of time for them to be taken care of elsewhere on moving day.
9. Pack an overnight bag
Nobody wants to be rooting around in cardboard boxes to find their toothbrush and pyjamas after a hard day’s moving, so pack a few essentials to make the first night or two stress-free. Think bigger than just a change of clothes — imagine how pleased with yourself you’ll be when you find you have fresh bedding and towels, toilet paper, teabags, a set of cutlery and any other daily essentials to-hand without having to hunt high and low. It’s also wise to include any valuables or important documents you don’t want to lose track of.
10. Think ahead
Do a mental walk-through of your first week or so at the house to figure out what you might need to set-up or research in advance. Will you be working from home, and if so will you need the internet to be set up and ready to go before you move in? Have you sussed out the nearest coffee shop so that you can wake up and caffeinate without delays? Do you have any questions about the property that the previous occupants could help you with?