We’ve used movers 3 times.
The first time, we paid for and we tried to go cheap.
The movers were kind of iffy. Once of them was trying to get high during the move by scribbling, with a magic marker, on the carrying strap right over his forehead. They did get things moved, but were running late, which will give you a nervous breakdown when you have to be out that day. I learned that they were basically day labor.
Second and third times were new job moves, and the new employers paid. I loved both of these moves. It was obvious that these guys worked together often and were long term with the company. They were much better at what they did and more careful of my stuff.
So my suggestions - don’t use the cheapest bid, unless it comes highly recommended.
Ask the moving company if they use permanent crews or if they hire temp labor. Avoid the temps if you can.
I’ve had better luck with using a moving company from a small nearby town, rather than from a big city company. They just seemed more professional and more interested in their reputation.
Get a flat of bottled water, a couple of cases of soda and consider buying pizzas for lunch for the crew. $40 worth of lunch is cheap insurance.
As far as the move itself?
Be organized ahead of time - Spend a couple of weeks collectings like things in the same area of your house. All of the books, CD/DVDs or maybe clothing together.
Painter’s tape is your friend - We put an X of painters tape over any cupboards, drawers, appliances or closets that we didn’t want them to pack.
Put a note on the outside of each room in both the new place and the old place, labelling the rooms and then make a list of where they will go. "The contents of rooms “A” and “B” go into room “1” of the new house
If you can do it, have lots of the boxes moved into the garage or basement. It’s so much easier to place furniture and unpack boxes if you have just a few of them in the room. If you move in June, the winter sweaters can live in the garage for a couple of months until you get settled.
I think this is a case of not just “you get what you pay for” but also “what kind of stuff do you have?”.
So I have bedroom furniture and living room furniture and kitchen-ware, books and several suitcases of clothes and some computer gear. I don’t have a flat screen TV or art or antiques or paintings or mirrors or anything breakable, other than some nice kitchen stuff which I’d carry myself. My furniture is from Roomful Express, purchased at a going out of business sale. So it’s all pretty cheap stuff.
All of my stuff can fit in a medium-sized 1 bedroom place essentially.
So it would be a waste of $ for me to hire an insured, bonded big outfit company.
Hiring based on recommendations or Yelp helps, 2 or 3 guys who move people a LOT and can give references but aren’t part of a big company and so forth.
For some reason I always seem to move in the height of summer heat; I’ve done it myself, with help from friends, and I’ve done it with professional movers.
I will never do it myself, ever again.
We paid $300 for 4 hours, from an upstairs apartment to another upstairs apartment (across town), and these three guys were awesome. Polite and quick and pleasant. I made sure to have lots of bottled water for them, and I tipped each of them $20 bucks. They were referred by a friend and I will definitely use them again the next time I move. Moving all your crap yourself is an exercise in utter misery; moving is enough of a pain in the ass even WITH help.
Movers are a necessity!
Like others have said, make sure to pack up all the stuff you can yourself; that way there’s just boxes waiting for them. Saves money and time and you don’t have to worry about anybody packing fragile stuff incorrectly. Cuz I’m sure I am far more zealous than I need to be, but who wants their stuff broken? I’d rather pack all that stuff myself.
(And it doesn’t hurt that one of the regulars at my bar is an executive at a box company and gives me an unlimited supply for free… :-D)
not bad – I always carried my own musical gear and any precious audio gear in my own car, because I didn’t want anybody touching my shit. I can’t speak to people who have lots of nice shit in their apartments, like paintings by Klee and pianos by [insert name here].