Make Your Relocation Easier With These Ingenious Moving Hacks

There are many reasons to move. You may be relocating for a job, or moving in with your girlfriend. You’ve made it through the decision and you’ve found yourself that perfect place you want to relocate to. But the moment you think about planning, organizing, and packing, the unavoidable anxiety kicks in. Don’t worry, we’re here to help you avoid it, with some simple, yet awesome relocating tricks so that relocating may go easier.

Start Early

First and foremost, you will most likely be better off by starting early. There are several things that you can get done early on, and here they are listed:

• Create a checklist – This will help you keep everything organized and in check, so you’ll be sure you don’t forget anything.
• Call utility companies and figure out when they should come to shut down everything.
• Find a reputable long-distance moving company. Hire them for their long-distance moving services. The best way to choose is to get referrals, call several cross country movers, and decide after getting quotes and comparing them. This will also help you with the next step.
• Set a relocation budget.

After you’ve completed these preparations, you can get right on to packaging and reorganizing inside your home.

Declutter Your Way Through

It’s time to go around your household and decide which of your belongings are not coming with you to your new home, and which ones to pack. We advise you to start with the closets and get rid of all the unwanted stuff. Be honest with yourself when you start rummaging through your clothes. Everything that doesn’t fit and is out of style should be donated or sold. The same goes for shoes.

There’s a high chance you own pieces of furniture that you think won’t fit into your new home, or are too worn out. So think about donating them, too, or throwing them out if they are unusable. If you opt-in for a donation, you can donate to charities like The Salvation Army. Decluttering will ease up this whole process, and should be a part of every moving to another state checklist. For all of those belongings you’re not sure you want to get rid of, or take with you, you can invest in a storage unit, and store away those belongings for a short or a longer period, whichever suits you best.

Start Packing the Boxes With These Moving Hacks

Packing everything up for moving is the most time-consuming part of a relocation. But, with following up on our advice, you should be able to save on time, energy, as well as money. You can cut those expenses down by searching for free cartons. You can find them at a local retailer, such as a liquor store, or a bookstore. Or you could look them up on Craigslist – there’s plenty of people there giving them up for free.

Leave the Drawers Full

You don’t need to empty the drawers at all. What you need is to pull them out of the dresser, and properly secure all of your belongings in them by wrapping the drawers in plastic wrap. If the dresser itself is not too heavy, you can leave the drawers inside, and just wrap the plastic all around it, to be sure it’s nice and secure.

Clothes Stay on the Hangers

Group the hangers with your clothes on, and secure them with a rubber band. Then, take a plain garbage bag, pull it over, and tie it up, so it doesn’t let any dirt in. You can also hang your clothes in a wardrobe box, but remember that it’s quicker and much cheaper to store them with garbage bags over them.

Pack Two Things at Once

While packaging paper is a great technique to protect your more fragile belongings, you may want to put your soft household items to use. That means you can provide cushioning for all those delicate stuff, like vases and lamps, with towels, blankets, and even clothes. Another one of those moving tips and hacks is to secure glasses and bottles of perfume by putting them into your socks. Kitchen dish towels can also be used to wrap up knives and other sharp objects. By doing this, you’re storing two things at once, your soft items, and those fragile ones. And don’t forget to mark the packages with breakables with a label saying “fragile”, so everyone can pay extra care when transporting them.

Have Know-How on Packing the Dishes

Kitchen towels can be used as cushioning between the plates. You can do this with packaging paper, but those towels are something that’s already coming with you. Besides, it can save you up on packaging supplies. After you’ve padded the boxes, place the plates vertically, like you would place records. Even pots can count as a storing place, and that is one of those packing hacks for moving that is both money- and space-saving. Open your pots, and fill them up with smaller kitchen utensils and bottles. That is a perfect technique to take up less space when packaging.

The Best Way to Pack Heavy Stuff – Fill Up Your Suitcases

We bet you haven’t thought of this. Your suitcases are coming with you anyway, so put them to use. Fill them up with books, or some other heavy stuff, like serving dishes, and the fact that the suitcases have wheels will spare you from lifting heavy boxes.

Some More Tips for Packing Heavy Items Into Boxes

If you’ve decided to load some of that heavy stuff into a carton, remember not to overload it, because it will be too heavy to lift. So, fill them up to 50 pounds at most, and then fill the box with much lighter items, such as toilet paper, and paper towels. Then don’t forget to reinforce the box. And another one of those awesome packaging hacks to make moving easier is to cut handles on the sides of each box, for easier carrying.

Make It Easy on Yourself – Label Everything

One of those smart tricks that you can do to make the whole packaging process swift is to label all the cartons, so you can avoid headaches when you come to your new home, and start unpacking. Whichever method you choose for labeling, the important thing to remember is to put those labels on the sides of the boxes. When your cross country movers start loading your belongings into the truck, they will stack them on top of each other, and the same goes with unloading. So, you need to see those labels on the sides, to avoid any unnecessary rummaging through the boxes.

Color Coding – a Smart and Fun Way to Do It

The first step is to assign a color to each room and get yourself some colored tape, or colored stickers, and start labeling those packages. You should also color code the doors in your new place, so the long distance movers can have an easy job of unloading your stuff directly where it should be.

Number Each Box

This method has its benefits, too, as you can easily detect any missing packages by the number. It would also be a great idea to write down what each and every package contains, or (even easier way) to take your phone and photograph every box. Of course, not all items inside would be visible in the photo, but you can have a general idea of where something you need is.

The First Day Bag or the Essentials Box

Another hack that will make your life so much easier is packaging a bag or a carton with all of those essentials that you will need when you enter your new place. This essentials package should contain basic toiletries, your pajamas, a few towels, medications, basic kitchen utensils to prepare a quick meal, and a cup of coffee, chargers, documents, and alike. This essentials package should travel with you in the car, so it’s super easy to grab once you arrive. Even if you have chosen to use auto shipping to transport your vehicle, the essentials bag should travel with you to your new place.

Bring the Cleaning Supplies Package When Moving Into a House

Another important package you should have in your hands when arriving at the front door of your home-to-be is a package with all of those supplies needed to clean your way through while unpacking. These supplies were probably the last thing you’ve packed when you were leaving your former home since you needed to clean the toilets once more and run over the floors with a mop when the movers left the place.

What Goes First Into Your New Home

One of the first things you’re going to unload when you arrive is those essentials bags that you’ve transported with you. And those cleaning supplies, to make a really clean start. When you go through the house to reconsider where to exactly start, it’s a good idea to start with bedrooms. When the exhausting first day in your apartment or a house comes to an end, you’ll be glad to have a place for resting. It would also be considered an awesome hack to put one set of linens together with each bed, so you don’t have to search through the packages, when you’re already too tired and just want to rest.

Other Awesome Hacks

With all these useful packing hacks, moving will be made much quicker, and here are some more that you can use:

• When you’re packaging bottles full of liquid, always remember to use plastic wrap to seal them, so the liquid doesn’t get spilled everywhere during transport. Remove the lids, put some plastic wrap over the bottle, and then close the lid.
• You can make packages for separating your cables out of cardboard tubes left when you’ve used up the toilet paper.
• Put a rubber band around your doorknob, to prevent it from latching every time you pass through it carrying boxes with your belongings.
• Use pool noodles for protecting picture and mirror frames.
• With a bit of painter’s tape, you can safely secure mirrors and paintings that have a glass cover. Just tape an “X” over the glass, and you’re good to go. Avoid using plain duct tape or packaging tape, as it leaves a residue, that you will have to remove.
• Make a goal of eating up all the groceries you already have at your house before the relocation day. For everything else that is unopened and unexpired, you can do some good and donate to a charity like Move for Hunger.
• If you are moving with kids who are too young to help out, or you have pets, make a plan of leaving them with family, so you can organize without all that moving stress and move free through all the tasks.

To see how to use all these tips and tricks, and find out about some more, take a look at the following video.

DIY or Packing Service

Now that you know everything (or almost everything) there is to know about hacking your way through the relocation process, and you find doing this all by yourself an energy and time-consuming work, you can always ask your cross country moving company if they offer any packing services. It may cost more, but it can be a life savior, if you’re in a hurry, and don’t have time to do it all by yourself.