# What to pay people to move a big sofa across town?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-pay-people-to-move-a-big-sofa-across-town/462562>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [September 8, 2008, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-pay-people-to-move-a-big-sofa-across-town/462562 "2008-09-08T01:58:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\
**Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-pay-people-to-move-a-big-sofa-across-town/462562/1 "2008-09-08T01:58:14Z")

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I may hire some friends of my daughter to move a big sofa from her house to mine. I wonder what to pay them.

I’d like to be generous. It’s hard work and they certainly deserve the consideration. I’m the one with money; they’re the ones with good backs.

So, the job is to pull the sofa out of her house, drive it in their truck about 25 minutes, and bring it into my house. Her house has maybe 3 steps out front and a pretty clean shot to the driveway. My house has a long front walk with 4 steps up and then an elevated entrance deck with 6 steps up. It’s a big leather sofa but it’s not a hide-a-bed. I can lend them an excellent hand-truck with big pneumatic tires, ropes, tarps, and the like. But I don’t have the truck.

We live in a rural mid-Atlantic area.

What’s the range of amounts to offer?

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**Author:** ![vetbridge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b5e925/32.png) [@vetbridge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vetbridge)\
**Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-pay-people-to-move-a-big-sofa-across-town/462562/2 "2008-09-08T15:24:26Z")

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I would offer $20 bucks a person, as well as some gas for the truck.

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**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\
**Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-pay-people-to-move-a-big-sofa-across-town/462562/3 "2008-09-08T19:13:35Z")

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The going rate on Craigslist is $25/hour per person. Two burly guys should be able to do it in an hour. If it’s a sleeper couch, you’ll need two burly guys minimum.