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Packing Mistakes to Avoid
With a task as complex as packing your belongings, it’s a good idea to have a strategy. Avoiding these packing mistakes should help smooth your moving experience.
Failing to get enough packing supplies
Plan ahead and make sure you have all the boxes, tape and other packing supplies you need. When you run low on supplies, you are more likely to over-pack boxes or pack delicate items poorly. It’s better to allow for more breathing room for your things than to overload fewer boxes and risk them splitting mid-move.
Not labeling boxes with valuable items
Properly labeling boxes will help whoever is moving them — professional movers or friends and family — know what is in a box and how it needs to be handled. You don’t need to remember what’s in every box, but if something’s irreplaceable, you’ll want to mark it as such. You might want to use a color-coded labeling system to keep track of these items as you move.
Throwing out something you wanted to keep
Make time to purge items you don’t want to pack well before your move. But if you’re not able to do that, or you have to move in a hurry, err on the side of bringing the item to the new place. You can always decide to get rid of something once you have arrived.
Loading fragile items first
Think like the person who bags your groceries: you wouldn’t want to put eggs below canned peas, and you don’t want the box containing your gorgeous glass lamp packed on the van too early, where it might end up being crushed by folding chairs.
Waiting until the last minute
The more you can pack early on, the more room you’ll have for dealing with hard-to-pack, hard-to-organize items. If you wait, you’ll be more likely to just throw a bunch of items together into one box, making unpacking a bigger headache.
Failing to take care with difficult-to-pack items
The more difficult an item is to pack, the more time and care you should take packing it. You can be careless with paperback books or old jeans, but when you’re packing valuable electronics or something like an aquarium, you’ll need to budget extra time and care.
Thinking you’re closer to being completely packed than you actually are
You look around a room, and it’s almost bare except for a few items here and there. Congratulations, you’re almost done! Unfortunately, those last few items are usually the most awkward to pack, and will probably take far more time than you expect.
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Readers Poll
Do you plan to move yourself or hire a moving company to assist you?
- Move myself by renting a truck (63%, 15 Votes)
- Move myself without renting a truck (21%, 5 Votes)
- Hire a moving company to help (16%, 4 Votes)
Total Voters: 24
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