Guide to Moving
After you have completed the process of buying or selling your house, it would be nice to sit back and relax.
Unfortunately there is still the stressful house move to contend with. See below for a checklist of things which should help the big day go smoothly!
Two to four weeks before you move
- Start changing your address. This list below should give you a head start but is by no means exhaustive!
- Utility companies (water, electric and gas)
- Communication companies (telephone, mobile and Internet)
- TV license
- Banks and building societies
- Council (Council tax, electoral roll and parking permits)
- Health professionals (doctors, dentists and therapists)
- Work (HR, Inland Revenue)
- Passport office
- Blood and other donor clinics
- Insurance (medical, travel, car etc.)
- Newsagent (subscriptions and milk delivery)
- DVLA (driving license and vehicle registration. It is illegal to have the wrong address on your license)
- Set up a mail re-direction with royal mail (www.royalmail.com) to send you on any correspondence from people you may have forgotten about.
- Start thinking about packing. Make sure you only pack items that you aren’t going to need again before the move. Label your boxes carefully with which room they are going into in the new house.
- Start getting quotes for van hire or removals. Make sure you get at least three quotes and book early enough – you don’t want everyone to get booked up!
- Buy your packing supplies – bubble wrap, boxes, parcel tape, marker pens etc.
- Talk to the owner of your new house and see if they can give you (or let you come round to get them) the measurements for curtains and carpets.
Three days to go
- Get your overnight/emergency bag ready with a couple of changes of clothes, important documents, toiletries etc. This is the bag that the removals company won’t take, you can take it yourself in your car – that way you know that if the worst comes to the worst you have everything you need to hand.
- Defrost and clean out your fridge and freezer
- Call your new telephone company to set up the account in the new house. This should mean that you have a working line straight away when you move in.
- Make sure that the estate agency don’t cut off electricity, gas and telephone. You don’t want to be paying any reconnection charges!
Moving day
- Note down all of the items and boxes as they are loaded into the van. When you get to the other end, tick them off as they come back out. You need to make sure that everything that goes into the van comes back out again!
- Take your final meter readings and phone them through to the suppliers. Once you get to the new house, take the meter readings there and set up your new accounts.
- Find out where all of your local amenities are (police station, hospital, vet, newsagent, supermarket etc.)
- Find the kettle and congratulate yourself on a successful move with a nice cup of tea!