Are movers worth it?
Sometimes no. A straight answer about when a crew is worth it, when labor-only is enough, and when you should just rent a van.
Hiring movers is worth it when the move involves stairs, heavy or awkward furniture, a tight schedule, or anyone who should not be lifting. It is usually not worth it for a small studio on a ground floor with a flexible date and friends who genuinely turn up. Between those two is labor-only help, where you supply the truck and we supply the lifting.
When it is genuinely worth it
The honest list, in rough order of how much difference it makes.
- Stairs. This is the big one. A second or third-floor walk-up is where a self-move goes from tiring to genuinely risky, and it is where a trained crew is fastest relative to an untrained one.
- Heavy or awkward pieces. Sofas that have to turn a corner, appliances, safes, a treadmill, anything with a bad center of gravity.
- A fixed date. If you have to be out on the 31st and in on the 1st, a crew removes the risk that a self-move runs into a second day it does not have.
- Anyone with a back, a knee, a pregnancy or an age that makes lifting a bad idea.
- A whole house. The volume in a three or four-bedroom house is more than most people picture, and it is the point at which borrowed help stops being enough.
- A move you have to be functional the day after.
When it probably is not
A studio or small one-bedroom, ground floor at both ends, with a date you can move if it rains, is a rental van and a Saturday. If that is your situation we would rather tell you so than sell you a crew.
The same goes for a move where the real problem is that you own too much. If half of what you are paying to move is going to the curb within a year, the cheaper answer is a cleanout first and a smaller move after.
The middle option people miss
Labor-only, sometimes called loading and unloading help, is the option most people do not know exists. You rent the truck and drive it. We bring the crew that loads it properly at one end and unloads at the other.
It suits a lot of moves: the driving is the easy part and the lifting is the part that hurts. It is particularly good for a move where you are going a long way and want to keep control of the vehicle, or where a container is being delivered to the curb and someone has to fill it well.
Loading is also more of a skill than it looks. A badly packed truck needs two trips, and things break because they were free to move rather than because anything hit them.
The costs people leave out of the comparison
When people compare a self-move to a crew, they usually compare a truck rental against a quote and stop there. The self-move side of that comparison is missing a few things.
- Mileage and fuel, which on a rental truck is charged separately and adds up
- Insurance on the rental
- Equipment: a dolly, straps, blankets and pads are all rented separately or bought
- Your own time, and the time of everyone helping you
- The second day, if it runs over, plus another day of rental
- Anything that breaks, and any damage to either property's floors, walls and door frames
- The risk of an injury, which is the one nobody prices and the one that actually matters
None of that automatically makes a crew cheaper. It just makes the comparison a real one.
How to decide in about a minute
Walk through your place and count the things you could not carry down the stairs alone without hurting yourself or the wall. If the answer is none, you are probably fine with a van. If it is one or two, labor-only will cover it. If you lost count, book the crew.
And if you are not sure, tell us the actual situation on the phone. We would rather point you at the smaller thing and have you call us again in three years.
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Common questions
Are movers worth it?: the short answers
Often on paper, less often once truck rental, mileage, fuel, equipment and a second day are included. For a small ground-floor move it usually still is. For a house with stairs, it usually is not.
You provide the truck or container and we provide the crew to load and unload it. It suits moves where the driving is easy but the lifting is not.
Yes. Dollies, straps, blankets and pads come with the crew, which is one of the hidden costs of a self-move that people forget to count.
It depends almost entirely on stairs. Ground floor with a flexible date, probably not. Third-floor walk-up, yes, and it is the situation where a crew saves the most.
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