My Furniture Won’t Fit Through the Door! Now What?

What if your furniture won’t fit through the door? How will you get your couch through a narrow hallway? And what if your large furniture won’t fit the stairs as well?

One thing should be clear from the very beginning – moving huge pieces of furniture such as couches, tables, dressers, and so on is no fun. In reality, it’s the opposite of fun.

If you own oversized furniture such as a large sofa, a big table, an enormous dresser, or any other type of huge piece of furniture, the first thing you should do is consider hiring professional help to get them packed up and moved to your new residence with the minimum amount of hassle along the way.

On the other hand, if you can’t afford to pay for furniture removals, or if you can spare the money but still don’t wish to do it for a valid reason, then you shouldn’t make the rookie mistake of thinking that moving your furniture out of your current home and into your new one is something you can do with your eyes closed and both hands tied behind your back.

However, it won’t have to be a disaster either. Be proactive and get familiar with these tricks and tips for moving oversized furniture before you get stuck.

You may also like to read: How to Move Heavy Furniture. From furniture moving equipment to safe lifting techniques, this is an invaluable guide if you are thinking of moving your furniture yourself.

Furniture-won’t-fit moving scenarios? You’ve got options!

It’s not easy to know right away if a piece of furniture will fit through a door, hallway, or staircase, you’ve got so much going on in your mind while trying to organise your move that seemingly logical steps, such as measuring up your furniture pieces and measuring up the openings they should go through, can easily slip through the cracks of your crazy busy schedule.

But the good news here is that no matter how it all happens, you’ve got pretty decent choices to turn things around in your favour.

• Furniture Won’t Fit Scenario 1: You have your furniture pieces packed up and you’re about to move out of your home. And then, when you’ve started taking out your large belongings one by one, all of a sudden – SURPRISE! – your oversized sofa is too big to fit through the door, or if it does go through the doorway, then the hallway turns out to be too narrow for it to pass safely. And to make things worse, you just can’t get the kitchen table out of the front door. What should you do?

Furniture Won’t Fit Scenario 2: Having serious problems fitting furniture through a doorway is not something you can only experience when getting out of your current and soon-to-be-old home. Things could become even trickier if you face that undesirable situation when you’re trying to get some bulky pieces of furniture into your new flat or house, and you then fail to do so due to their large dimensions. This moving scenario can be even worse because you’ll probably be stuck outside your home, struggling to get through the front door in the first place.

You did not see any of those unfortunate scenarios coming, did you? Luckily, you still have some good options before you:

• You call up your friends and get more helping hands to tackle the problem.
• If that fails, you dismantle any detachable parts from the furniture piece and try again.
• If that fails, you attempt different fitting techniques and various approach angles to get that large furniture piece through the opening safely.
• If that fails, you consider removing the door temporarily to get a bit more breathing space.
• If that also fails, you contact a professional removal company and ask them to send an expert or two to your residence to solve the problem.
• Trust us, that last option shouldn’t fail.

You may also like to read: How to Protect Furniture When Moving Home. To prevent any damage to your furniture during your move it is essential that they are properly packaged. In this guide, we share some tips on how to pack furniture so that they do not get damaged during their relocation.

How to avoid any furniture-won’t-fit-through-the-door problems

It’s important to remember that the best way to avoid getting stuck when moving a couch through a narrow door when moving house is prevention.

A few simple preliminary steps are all you have to do to never have to deal with such moving day complications. And, as you can already guess without a doubt, the initial step is all about measuring up your large furniture pieces.

Important note: Below, we will turn our attention to sofas as they are, by far, the most common pieces to cause headaches on Moving days.

But the following practical tips and problem-solving tricks can be applied successfully to other oversized furniture pieces as well – armchairs, tables, wardrobes, dressers, beds, desks, and even household appliances such as refrigerators, washing machines, dishwashers, and so on.

You may also like to read: How to Make a Simple Floor Plan. In this guide, we show you how to make a simple floor plan for your new home to ensure that the furniture you want to take fits in the available space and that you can get it into the available space.

Step 1: Measure your sofa

Yes, take out your measuring tape and measure up your big sofa before you think about getting it out of your home. There are several essential measurements you should complete:

• Height (H): to learn the height of your sofa, measure from the floor to the highest point on the backrest of your sofa. Keep in mind that this height measurement includes the legs and feet of your sofa as well (see below);
• Width (W): to determine the width of your couch, measure the two widest points on the sides of your furniture piece;
• Depth (D): to get the depth of your piece, measure from the front part to the deepest section of the back of your sofa;
• Diagonal Depth (DD): this is an important measurement that can get you out of tight situations, literally and figuratively speaking, as it proves to be extremely useful when you’re trying to go through a door at an angle. While standing from the side of the sofa, measure the distance from the top left or right corner of the armrest to the opposite bottom corner of your couch.
• Diagonal Height (DH): this measurement can help you figure out whether your sofa can be carried inside a room while it’s standing up. Measure from the front corner of an armrest to the opposite back corner of your big furniture piece.

Step 2: Measure your openings

Now that you know all the essential dimensions of your sofa, it’s time to move on to step 2 – measuring all the openings you intend your piece of furniture to go through.

Follow the intended exit path out of the room and measure the room door, the front door of your flat or house, the hallway, the lift, and the stairwell.

Staircases with railings can be especially tricky as your space for maneuvering will be rather limited.

These measurements are pretty straightforward – determine the height and width of each opening and get down to figuring out your chances of problem-free passage.

It’s all simple math from here. Or is it?

If it turns out your sofa will not fit through the door because the width of your furniture piece is wider than that of the door (if the two measurements coincide or are very close), then you shouldn’t throw in the towel as you have a bunch of good options to solve the geometrical puzzle (read on to learn how to get a couch through a small door).

Step 3: Disassemble your sofa

The good news? The majority of sofas have parts that can be removed safely to ease the process of getting that sofa through tighter places. Remember that sometimes even a few inches will make a huge difference.

So, consider disassembling your oversized sofa if the initial measurements have not been very encouraging.

Remove any detachable sofa parts – legs, feet, arms, and cushions, and leave only the upholstered frame to make things much easier and safer.

Consult a specialist if you’re not sure how to dismantle your sofa.

You may also like to read: How to Move a Sofa. In this guide, we look in more detail at how to measure, dismantle, pack, and move various styles of sofas.

Step 4: Inspect your exit points

A bottleneck situation can occur even if your initial measurements have given you good news.

Moving large furniture is never a joke, so before you get down to that challenging task, inspect the area around your problematic door, hallway, or staircase.

The immediate space around your exit openings must be clear and free of any obstructions.

Unfortunately, some things in your home can be immovable (radiators, for example), so you’ll need to take those objects into account while you’re figuring out your sofa-moving strategy.

You may also like to read: How to Protect Walls, Floors, and Ceilings When Moving Home. It is inevitable if you are trying to move furniture yourself that you will end up damaging your home unless they are properly protected. In this guide, we look at how to protect your home to prevent any expensive damage from being caused when moving your furniture out.

What to do if your sofa won’t fit through the door

Finally, take a look at what options you have if, despite your careful planning and thorough preparation, you do end up stuck with your large couch, with no easy way out or in.

Yes, after all the efforts you invested, your sofa is still too big to fit through the door.

Makes you wonder how that huge piece was taken inside the home in the first place, right?

Step 1: Work the angles. Measurements seldom lie. If you’ve taken the right measurements and all the numbers agree that you shouldn’t have too big of a problem fitting your furniture piece through an opening, then you should be alright. It’s just a matter of figuring out the best angle to position your sofa just before entering the tight space. Your best bet? Place your sofa on its end, vertically, with the seat first, and then try to twist the piece slowly into the doorway. This trick usually works like a charm!

Step 2: Just squeeze it. Sofas are soft furniture pieces so they can often be squeezed through smaller doors and narrower corridors. Compress the soft upholstery for a second and the couch should slide through safely enough. Sometimes it’s a matter of gaining a few extra centemetres to get the job done. Watch your hands, and keep your fingers from being crushed. It’s best if you wear thick work gloves that will serve a dual purpose: improve significantly your grip and protect your hands and fingers from unfortunate accidents.

Step 3: Remove the door. Sometimes all standard steps to move your sofa through the door will fail, one by one. And if that should happen, then it’s time to resort to some unconventional ways to solve the bottleneck situation. Need a bit more space, right? Consider removing the door – only temporarily, of course. This sofa-won’t-fit-through-the-door trick can save the moving day, you know. If possible, simply have a friend help you take the door off its hinges to get that extra room you need. Removing the door frame until the couch fits through the door is another possible solution but you should think it through before deciding to do it.

Step 4: Get qualified help. You’ve heard so many times that you should never give up, that admitting defeat would be the last thing on your mind. On the other hand, being overly stubborn and refusing to call in the pros could lead to catastrophic results – ruined furniture, damaged property, or worst of all – personal injuries. After all, contacting experienced furniture removals is not about giving up, it’s about finding the best furniture moving solution under the presented circumstances.

You may also like to read: How to Pick a Good Removal Company. Hiring a good removal company is the easiest path to a stress-free home move. In this guide, we take you step by step through the process of finding the best removal company for your home moving needs.