Moving checklist by week: eight weeks before to a month after

Pick the moving date first, then count backwards. The weeks below are the usual shape of a household move. If your date is closer than eight weeks, start at the top anyway and work down; what is late is still worth doing, in order.

Eight weeks before: decisions and bookings

• Set a budget and start a moving folder for quotes, contracts and receipts.
• Tenants: give notice to the landlord in writing and ask about the deposit. Owners: agree the completion or handover date before fixing the moving date.
• Get written quotes from movers, or book a van and the people who will help.
• Contact the new school or nursery and ask what paperwork they need.
• Moving abroad: check passports, visas and permits, and choose how your belongings will travel.
• Decide what will not come with you. Fewer boxes is the cheapest decision of the move.

Six weeks before: people and paperwork

• Book the movers and get the confirmation in writing.
• Order boxes, tape, markers and labels.
• Measure the new place: doorways, stairs, rooms.
• Photograph valuable and fragile items and put the important documents in one envelope that travels with you.
• Ask the vet, the doctor and the school for records; find their counterparts near the new home.
• If you have a car, note what changes: registration, licence address, parking, insurance.

Four weeks before: start packing, start telling

• Pack what you rarely use, and label every box with the room it goes to and a number.
• List every company and office that has your address, and decide for each: move it, cancel it, give the new address, or set up new.
• Arrange electricity, gas, water and internet at the new home; installation slots fill up.
• Sort home insurance for both addresses and for belongings in transit.
• Arrange childcare and pet care for moving day.
• Set up mail forwarding.

Three and two weeks before: confirm and plan the first night

• Pack the rooms you use least; return borrowed things; use up the freezer.
• Cancel or move memberships with notice periods.
• Confirm the date and time with the movers, and arrange parking at both ends.
• Tell the bank and the insurers.
• Plan the first-night box: bedding, towels, kettle, chargers, medicines, a change of clothes.
• Decide who cleans the old place and how keys are handed over.

The last week and the last day

• Pack everything except daily essentials; take apart furniture that will not fit through the door and bag the screws.
• Defrost the fridge and freezer.
• Confirm the switch-on dates for the new home.
• Charge phones and print the plan. Walk through the old place and photograph each empty room.
• Keep some cash ready.

Moving day

• Read the meters at the old place and photograph them.
• Walk the movers through the house before loading; the first-night box goes in last.
• Hand over the old keys. Check the new place before the boxes come in. Read the meters there too.
• Make the beds and set up the bathroom first. Everything else can wait.

The month after: where things slip

• Confirm every service at the new address is in your name and give the opening readings.
• Tenants: ask for the deposit back with readings and photos. Owners: change the locks.
• Update your address everywhere else, and update the car registration and licence within whatever deadline applies where you live.
• Register with the new doctor and dentist.
• Check the forwarded mail: every letter is a company you still have to tell.
• Check the first bills against the opening readings and close the accounts at the old address.

A list like this is useful. A list with your dates on it is better, because a date is something you can put in a calendar and tick off. That is what the planner does with the same tasks.

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