Moving oversized items: useful tips

Moving Day TipsApril 14, 2020

The moving process involves doing many things. You will need to transfer your utilities, pack your belongings and so on. You will also need to be moving oversized items. When it comes to this particularly difficult task, you will need to get as much help as you can get. If you want to make the process easier, you will measure all such items carefully before you do anything else. After that, you might want to ask some of your friends or family members to help you. You can definitely use more hands on deck, so to speak. Finally, you will need to disassemble the items, to the best of your ability and item limitations and carefully wrap and protect the pieces. Or you can simply hire Columbus moving services and have professionals take care of everything for you.

Whatever you decide, it is always good to know about some:

Tips and tricks for moving oversized items

Here is a list of things to do if you want to make your moving of large bulky items easier:

  • Measure every item that you want to move
  • Ask your friends to help you move oversized items
  • Disassemble whatever you can
  • Take the door off its hinges while moving oversized items
  • Wrap and protect all the items
  • Hire professionals
measure
Measuring every item before moving will make your moving process easier.

Measure every item that you want to move

The first thing to do is to get that measuring tape ready and start taking some measurements. Start with taking the regular dimensions (length, width, height) and then proceed to measure specific points, depending on the item in question and where it needs to go. You will also need to measure the hallways, corridors, and anything else that you are planning on moving your items through. The point of this is that you know, beforehand, whether an item is going to fit through and how much leeway you will have. This is something that you must do for any items, regardless of how it might look to you. These measurements will also come in handy if you are planning on acquiring self-storage Columbus Ohio, as you will be able to precisely determine the size of the storage unit.

Sometimes you are absolutely certain that an item will fit through, which might not be the case. The only way to be certain is to have accurate measurements.

Ask your friends to help you in moving oversized items

Oversized items are usually quite heavy and bulky. They are not something that you can safely move on your own. It is usually a 2-4 person job. For that reason, you may wish to enlist the help of some friends, or family members, for this particular task. Having friends around, even if they are not helping with anything, is always a fun thing to do, anyway. A group project is something that any group of friends enjoys and moving of these items definitely counts as one. You and your friends will surely have some fun during this process. However, you should also check on what are the downsides of friends helping you relocate!

And if you don’t really want to bother anyone with your issues, consider this: Would you want to come and help a friend in his time of need? If the answer is anything but yes, you need to reconsider what you consider to be a “friend”. In that case, you can ask your acquaintances for help, some of them may want to help you, too.

friends
Ask your friends to help you move your oversized items.

Disassemble whatever you can

The best practice in these situations is to try and remove as many pieces from the item as you can. It may make an oversized item into a perfectly sized one. By removing some components you are making it easier for the item to fit through openings, reducing its weight and making it much more manageable overall. A perfect example of this is a study table. There may be a lot of drawers that you can remove before moving the table. They would otherwise add quite a bit of weight to the table.

Don’t try to disassemble everything, however. Some items are simply “as is” and will not tolerate any disassembly. Make sure that you always know what you are doing. If you are not confident that you can put the item back in its original condition, once the moving process is over, it might be best not to disassemble it.

Take the door off its hinges while moving oversized items

You will most likely need additional space for your items to go through. Some space can be gained by taking the doors off their hinges. This will give you a couple of inches, which might prove to be all the difference you will need. This task does not require much effort, most of the time, but it is still a 2-person job at least. Make sure that you have someone to help you before you start with this. You will minimize the risk of an injury and maximize efficiency. If you don’t really know how to remove a door from its hinges, ask Google. Google knows everything.

door
Doors can be an obstacle. Removing the door in advance will make moving your oversized items easier.

Wrap and protect all the items

The most important thing in this process is that you protect your items before you start moving them. By their very nature, bulky, oversized, items are prone to be dropped or to bump into things. And when a big item bumps into something, there might be damage. Try to make sure that the risks of any damage to both the items and the environment are minimal. You can do so by carefully wrapping all the items in blankets and such. While this padding might add extra weight and girth to the item, it is paramount for the item’s safety. It is always better to be safe.

If you can’t wrap the items then make sure to at least protect the exposed parts somehow. Cover at least the edges, if you can’t cover everything.

Hire professionals

Finally, if you decide that this process is simply not worth your time and effort, or you have no one to help you, there is another solution. Simply hire professional moving services and call it a day. You will not need to do anything but relax and oversee the effort.

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