Moving News and Relocation Advice

It can be difficult to estimate how much it will cost to move large, heavy furniture items. Usually it is quite expensive yet necessary as it can be hard to move these items yourself, depending on the weight, shape and how many need to be moved.

Local moving companies typically charge based on the amount of time, employees and truck space needed for your move. Larger or heavier furniture in a local move will not raise the costs of your move as long as they do not require more than the average number of employees to move them.

In contrast, long-distance moving companies calculate their charges based on the weight of your goods. Therefore, should you have larger or heavier furniture, the costs of your move will be higher. Long-distance moving companies charge based on the cubic feet for your move. For a typical household, the cubic feet of your move will be converted into pounds, usually within the range of 1 to 7 pounds. Therefore, the heavier your items the more cubic feet the company will anticipate to need, raising the cost of your move.

The size of your furniture will affect the amount a company charges, but only if your move is local. To anticipate the cost of moving a larger piece of furniture, compare it to regular-sized pieces. If your piece is much larger than other items, it will require more employees to move it, which is more expensive. While removing drawers and shelves may make the item lighter, it may not make it less bulky, meaning you will still need the same amount of employees.

It is nearly impossible for you to place large items on a scale, but again comparing it to the typical size of the item will assist you in estimating the cost. As mentioned above, a company will convert the pounds of your move into cubic feet. A particularly heavy item, therefore, means more cubic feet. For example, the typical weight of a five-drawer chest is about 125 lbs. If a moving company converts using a ratio of 5 cubic feet, this means the chest will require 625 cubic feet. However, a ten or twelve drawer chest could easily weigh 250 to 300 lbs, meaning it would require 1,250 or more cubic feet inside a moving truck.

Using this conversion, you should be able to get your estimated moving costs on your large and heavily bulky furniture.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 28th, 2010 at 6:40 am and is filed under Full Service Move. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.