I have to move in about a month and am looking for advice on hiring a moving company. When I moved in my biggest pieces of furniture were new and were delivered by the companies I bought them from, so I have no experience with moving companies. I would just rent a truck, but I think it might take a professional to get my couch through the door. Any advice?
Posted Jun 21, 2012, 3:54 PM UTC
I thought http://www.movingscam.com/ was a good resource for reviews and general moving information.
I recently rented a truck through Penske (that and Budget were the 2 cheapest truck rental companies I found). Penske then had a deal where you saved a (small) amount of money hiring movers through http://www.simplemovinglabor.com/ . I used their "Helpers" option to unload the truck into my new place. If I were using them to help load the truck, I might use "Pro movers" option, since they are licensed/insured movers that know how to pack a truck. Helpers are just day laborers they hire (which they did a find job unloading, though).
Leaders Moving. I have used them for two moves and they were great each time.
I've never used them myself, but I know of quite a few people that have used "Two Men and a Truck" and have raved about them.
You could try movinghelp.com. I work for a truck rental company and we refer a lot of people there who seem to have found good help.
All American Moving is great, I've used them twice already & would use them again.
They may be decent, but I had such a bad first impression of them I actually canceled my moving reservation with them. My problem was that their online reviews are clearly fake, which I find completely unacceptable.
They may be the best company in the world, but when my first interaction with them is a straight up lie then I'm not holding my breath that they are honest in any other respect either. If they are willing to lie to you right off the bat, I'd rather not find out what it would be like to resolve any issues that may come up with the move.
Two men and a truck does some damn good work. Make sure you estimate on the high end for # of boxes. I wasn't sure, and the guy placing the schedule ran me through what we had, and estimated about half of what we needed. Ended up needing a whole extra truck sent out 3 days later
I'm mostly just worried about the big stuff. The little stuff I can pack up and drive to my new place on my own. I have a couch though that I'm really not sure how I'm going to get through the door without professional help.
I felt similarly when I did my move, but just let them get all the boxes. It will take you forever to truck small loads of boxes back and forth, and a good amount of what you pay for with movers is the time it takes them to show up. You'd be surprised how quickly guys that do this every day can load a room full of boxes in and out of their truck.
not to be a downer but i saw this in the dispatch today
Fortunately, the two companies I've talked to both said they have the dates I need available still but thank you for the heads up!
In my experience moving companies are all pretty sketchy. I've always had better luck just renting a truck and getting some friends to help. If you do go with a moving company, make sure they give you an accurate estimate up front with all charges included. One company I hired to move a piano once wouldn't take it off the truck until I paid twice what their "estimate" was due to "fuel surcharges".
One company I hired to move a piano once wouldn't take it off the truck until I paid twice what their "estimate" was due to "fuel surcharges".
This is extremely common, and that's the reason I would never go with a company other than Two Men and a Truck or someone similar with a solid reputation.
Don't use online reviews as a measure of reputation either, unless you can trust in your ability to spot the fake ones. It's easy to fake online reviews, and the shady companies always do that. Look for real reviews that were clearly written by a person, with both pluses and minuses about their experience. It's very rare for somebody to rush to a review site and post a raving review about their experience, and a company that has 10 of these for every bad one is hiding something.
Yeah this was actually well before online reviews were a "thing". I had basically chosen the first company I found in the yellow pages.
I have some advice about movers. I knew a couple movers. Some are good, some are shady. Tip them. Let them know you are tipping them at the beginning. Doesn't have to be a lot, but just tip them. Give them food for lunch. You would be appalled at the stories I heard. Some of them were entitled jerks. Some of them had just become a little bitter from being treated poorly over a long period of time due to their lowly jobs.
I guess the point I am trying to get across is that treating the people who have access to your valuables, and know how to pack them so that things break on "accident", like basic human beings will get you far.
Lowly job? What do you do?
Sorry, I reread that and realized it came across wrong. I meant that people treat them as though their job was lowly.
Where do you live? I could grab a couple of my friends, a truck, and we could move you for case of beer. Haba
Two Men and a Truck's estimate was too expensive so I used Miphi a couple years ago. The guys were very nice, did a great job, wore gloves, etc.
I used Two Men and a Truck a couple times, and they were always great.
I went with them after I canceled my move through All American Moving because of their fake online reviews. I had a good experience with them as well.