Moving to a new house involves making important decisions, and choosing the most suitable time of year for your relocation is one of them. Some people try to avoid Christmas or other festive holidays and go with a summer move, but is this always the best choice? It’s worth considering more than one option before you commit to a removals booking.
At Anthony Ward Thomas, we like to offer a helping hand wherever possible. We have a treasure chest full of knowledge to open from our many years of providing the best removals and storage in London. We relocate people during every season, and we see pros and cons to each time of year. Here’s our guide to moving house at different times of the year and some of the key factors to consider.
What’s the Best Time of the Year to Move?
Working out the best time of year to move isn’t as easy as you’d think, with every positive having an equally valid downside to consider. From various studies, it’s apparent that the favourite season for relocations is summer, centring on the month of August. The first impressions of why summer is the moving season could be the longer, warmer days make it easier to relocate. Plus, the long vacation time is ideal for people with young families.
However, relocating is a chain of events scenario that makes things trickier to predict when a completion date is set. It will help if you are in a position to sell your house first while also submitting a successful offer for your desired property. This can take anywhere from one to several months to come to fruition. And this will affect when you can move.
With this in mind, if you want to move during the summer months, you’ll need to start looking at properties in the springtime or earlier. The more time you give yourself, the easier it will be to find your perfect new home and thoroughly scout the area. And it’s worth contacting the Anthony Ward Thomas team for advice on the best day to book your removals service.
For similar reasons, the end of spring and the beginning of autumn are also favourable times of the year for relocating. Conversely, winter ranks the worst, with shorter days and hazardous weather amongst the chief complaints. At Anthony Ward Thomas, we have a fleet of vehicles, and we can accommodate relocations all year round. Nothing stops us from getting the job done, and we have all the right tools to undertake any relocation.
Should I Use a Moving Checklist When Relocating in London?
While choosing what month or season to book your relocation is subjective, preparation and planning are critical components to a successful move. Creating a moving checklist is crucial, and this will act as your blueprint and guide to keep you on track throughout your relocation. You can read our moving checklist here and amend it to suit your specifications.
If you want to move into your new home by July or August 2022, remember that it’s time to start arranging viewings no later than February or March. You should contact an estate agent and discuss your requirements. Additionally, you need to get in touch with your bank or mortgage broker to see what loans are available and determine your maximum budget.
You can work backwards to today’s date when you have a rough idea of the moving date. These are your deadlines and the number of weeks until your relocation. You can then use a calendar to assign weekly duties. And the most vital task is one you can do now – contact Anthony Ward Thomas to book your relocation.
The Pros and Cons of Choosing Friday to Relocate –
There are two conflicting resources for us to consider when balancing the pros and cons of Friday relocations. Compare My Move has an excellent article covering a broad spectrum of facts on when people prefer to relocate. And it’s safe to say they’re fans of Friday moves. From their research this lines up with evidence to back their claim. The Hom Owners Alliance states a counterpoint that’s worth inclusion.
Fridays are the most popular day statistically. According to the HOA, this is also a negative because it’s oversubscribed, making it trickier to book a relocation on this day. Compare My Move posits a positive reason – you get the whole weekend to unpack afterwards. That said, they do note the difficulty in securing a Friday move.
On Fridays, there are also completion day problems that centre on transfer restrictions and closing times. If your payment doesn’t clear by 3 pm – it will cause a delay, and the seller isn’t obligated to let you move in. Then you’ll have to wait until the following Monday to sort things out and collect keys. We don’t’ say this to put anyone off – just to be mindful of this as a possibility.
Preparation Tips for Sellers with Busy Schedules –
At Anthony Ward Thomas, we achieve the best service delivery results by having a network of like-minded professionals who can offer our customers specialist services. That’s why we work with London’s foremost interior designers, property management experts and home staging specialists. There is no better way to highlight your home’s best features than with our professional referrals.
This brings us to how you plan to approach your project. What are you planning to do yourself, and what you’ll be outsourcing? Our advice is that you should only do tasks that you have undertaken previously, preferably with qualifications. You wouldn’t hire a builder whose only experience was watching YouTube. Please don’t make the mistake of trying to save money by doing it yourself.
You’re trying to do everything possible to make your home more inviting, as well as raise its value. It’s impossible to do this without creating a budget for quality building materials and decorating products. Enlist the best possible people to work with you during your home staging project. You get what you pay for, so make sure you take this seriously to get the necessary results.
If you want a better understanding of the impact of your home staging project, contact an estate agent. They will be able to assess the current value of your home, as well as how much it will increase after you complete your development. It will also help a lot to market your home if you’re already in contact with an estate agent.
How to Choose the Ideal Removals Service –
At Anthony Ward Thomas, we offer a range of removals and storage packages to ensure we can provide the right service for everyone who books with us. It’s all about attention to detail and finding out the exact needs of our clients. From your first contact, we can thoroughly assess your needs by using an evaluation process that leaves nothing to chance.
Anthony Ward Thomas’s standard removal services include our Small Moves and Large Moves packages. Small Moves is our premium version of a man with a van service. This is a service that people who have fewer items to transit and the distance between locations is shorter. Our Large Moves service has vehicles that can hold more volume of items, which is necessary for bulky furniture. This means we can move everything in one journey and is more suitable for longer distances.
No matter how much planning and organising is done, there is always a slight chance of a delay in moving dates. Rather than letting this cause any issues with the purchase of your new home, you can use our storage services. We have top of the range storage facilities which will keep your possessions safe and secure.
The Benefits of Storage when Relocating –
Self storage has several benefits that suit people storing for a shorter period. An example is if you’re going away from London for several weeks or months. This package has a slightly higher price than container storage, but several advantages are. You can access your storage room whenever you need to during our business hours without additional fees.
Anthony Ward Thomas has top-notch security features like twenty-four-hour CCTV monitoring of our entire branch. Each self storage room has individual access codes for additional security. Moreover, every staff member has security and vigilance training, and nothing gets in or out of our branch without permission.
Our storage units can free up a surprising amount of space, and a 100-sq-ft storage room holds the equivalent of an entire apartment’s worth of possessions. Many of our customers rent a self storage unit before their time away and end up keeping it once they return home.
Container storage provides the very best level of protection at prices everyone can afford. And this is perfect for domestic customers who don’t need regular access and require a longer storage period for overseas trips. We’ll bring the empty container to your address and load everything at your location. As we pack, we’ll create an inventory of your belongings for future reference.
Our removal’s team will then seal the container and transport it back to our depot, where we use a stacking system. This means we do all the hard work, so you can get on with organising everything before you leave. This is our most affordable storage package and tends to suit people who want a long-term rental service. We’ll transport the unit back to unseal it when your storage period ends.
Anthony Ward Thomas – We’re London’s Removals Company with All the Answers –
Anthony Ward Thomas relocates thousands of people every month in London and the neighbouring areas. Customer service is of paramount importance to our company, and it drives everything we do. Every removals and storage package provide more options for our customers. Furthermore, we’re here for you during every stage of your relocation.
The Anthony Ward Thomas team are experts who take a great sense of pride in their work. We provide them with the best tools and equipment needed to undertake any removals or storage job. Our company is BAR accredited, which means we guarantee to offer a high standard of service.
Every relocation comes with its own challenges, and there’s no exact science to choosing the right time of year for your move. You should write up a list of pros and cons to see which month is the best fit. And should this be during the summer, it’s worth remembering that the removal’s slots tend to book up faster.
If you would like more information on the best time to undertake your relocation, click here. Our team is available to discuss this and anything else about your upcoming move in London.
