In “Moving House: Follow These Tips Before you Start Packing Part 1” we covered a number of tasks that you can complete before you start with the intense job of organising and packing the belongings in your house.
However, because there were too many to cover in the one post, we discuss more tasks here that are essential for your successful house move and can be done over a period of time leading up to your move rather than in the couple of days before.
1. Parking permits
Some streets require you to have a residential parking permit for you to park there for more than a couple of hours, are you moving into one of these streets? If the answer is yes, don’t leave applying for your permit till the last minute otherwise parking your car could be a big headache.
2. Internet and cable TV
Contact your Internet and cable TV provider to change addresses. Depending on the type of service that you have you may need servicemen to come to your house and deinstall/install equipment. This may take a few weeks to arrange depending on the time of year.
3. Daily travel
It is handy to check out the best way to get to work before you move. Rather than trying to figure this out at the time you have to go to work. Spend an hour or so looking at maps, finding the locations of stations or even driving the best route so you are prepared.
4. Change external locks
If you have bought a house (it is more difficult when renting), change the locks when you move in. It is a small expense to pay for the security of knowing that nobody has a spare set of keys that they can use to get into your home.
Even if you are renting you may want to consider a lock from your local hardware as a replacement, you can easily take it with you when you move out.
5. Time off
Consider taking a few days off, more if you can, to complete your move without having to do it at night or over the weekend. Make sure that you speak to your workplace manager as soon as you know that you are moving to arrange leave so they have time to cover for you while you are away.
6. Eat
Of course you are going to eat in the lead up to your house move. What I am talking about though is emptying your fridge and freezer. This reduces the amount of food that you will have to throw out when you turn these appliances off 48 hours before your move.
Now that you have our 12 tips for getting things done before you pack we hope that your house move will go smoothly. Try using them in the weeks before you say hello to your new home to reduce the stress on you the final few days in your old one.
