There is never enough time for all the things that you either wish to do or that you have to do, is there? There is always some deadlines to keep or time frames to fit into, and although time is considered to be a constant value, most of the times it feels like our mortal enemy is galloping tirelessly and mercilessly forward, and before we know it, seconds turn into minutes and minutes into hours.
They say that time is relative to the observer, and that principle of relativity is even truer when you get into a heart-stopping race with our everyday enemy – Mr. Time. There can be many instances when we are required to show our sprinting skills in order to cross the finishing line before our rival does. And without a shadow of a doubt, the perfect example for such an unfair race with time is when we have to pack house quickly due to a short notice house move.
No matter what you may have heard or read, packing for a move is definitely the most time-consuming pre-relocation task that you will meet face to face. And unluckily, when the period for moving house comes around, you may not be as fortunate as to have weeks and weeks, or even months to pack your belongings at leisure. And these are exactly the moments when you need a quick packing method the most.
How to pack to move house fast? Take full advantage of our set of quick and easy packing tips and let them do their magical trick – to enable you to finish packing up your entire house before the removal men knock on your door.
Be Quick Off The Mark
If your rival is pressing you hard against the wall and you only have a very limited time frame to pack up your house or apartment, then the last thing you would want is to have a slow start (or even a false start!) to your packing project. Our fast packing tips will help you gather the inertia you need to last you all the way until you reach your new home, but the very thing you need to do before you actually start placing your belongings into moving boxes is to prepare well for the occasion.
Get rid of useless and unwanted things
You want a packing experience faster than a speeding bullet? Then don’t pack everything you own but only pack what you will need in your new home. You may not realize it but there’s a big difference between the two concepts. Depending on the number of years you have spent in your current residence, time has surely rendered some of your household goods and personal possessions rather obsolete. The sad truth is that many articles become forgotten while being stored somewhere in your house or apartment, and their future usefulness to you is already in serious doubt. A good rule of thumb is that if you haven’t needed a specific item in more than a year, then you should consider getting rid of it in order to save some storage space, to possibly earn some cash and in your particular case – to pack fast for a move.
Have in mind that decreasing the number of things you have for transportation is the most efficient and logical way to bring down the overall moving cost. The process of purging your residence of no longer needed or wanted goods is a must do step even if your moving budget is big enough to pay for the relocation of your entire household. You do remember your ultimate goal, right? To finish up the arduous packing as soon as humanly possible.
Go carefully through each and every object in your home and decide its future with one thought in mind – SPEED! The fewer things you will have to wrap and place into cardboard boxes of different sizes, the quicker you’ll be done with packing up your home for moving. All the items you can’t imagine living without should go to one corner while all the stuff you have decided to discard goes into another pile. Hopefully, most of your decisions will be easy ones but don’t be quick to assume that you won’t have to deal with some really tough choices as to whether to take some possessions with you or to leave them behind. Obviously, you won’t be able to boost your packing speed without making certain sacrifices.
Create a packing calendar
How you organize your packing process matters more than you can possibly imagine. In fact, organization is not only the key to a quick and efficient packing, it is EVERYTHING! And the best way to organize your packing project is to create a packing calendar and stick to it regardless of how little time you have at your disposal until the arrival of the moment of truth (aka Moving day).
Your customised packing timeline should include main entries for every room of your residence, and later these entries will need to be subdivided into even smaller packing jobs. Distribute the number of rooms whose content you will be packing in the next few days across the remaining days and set approximate deadlines to keep your motivation high from start to finish. While compiling your packing calendar, you’d do great to follow these 3 main principles:
- Start with the toughest rooms for packing up and work towards the easiest ones, that is from storage areas through the living room to your bathroom. You may not realize it in the very beginning but you will certainly be more and more physically and mentally tired the less time there is until the Big day, so you just need the easiest packing projects for last.
- Begin packing from the premises you use the least and pack your way towards the ones you use on a daily basis. This rule will help you prevent unnecessary clutter from building up during the packing period.
- Figure out how you will quickly pack your large, heavy and bulky household items /kitchen appliances, furniture, TVs, a piano, a pool table, etc./, then take care of your fragile goods /chinaware, glassware, porcelain objects, jewelry, antique pieces, etc./ and finally get down to wrapping up your odds and ends and placing them in moving containers. Similar to the first approach, this quick packing method will lighten up your job as moving day approaches mercilessly.
Don’t pack forbidden items
Do your best to observe all safety measures when packing fast for moving house. Due to a number of safety reasons, there are plenty of household items forbidden for transportation – hazardous goods which even the most reputable removal companies will refuse to load into their removal vans. Thus said, mistakenly packing such non-allowable items can only prove detrimental to your gathered packing speed and will ultimately disrupt your speed packing progress.
If you want to pack quickly and efficiently, don’t waste your time with any household goods that are generally viewed as:
- Hazardous: aerosol cans, motor oil, antifreeze, petrol, car batteries, fertilizers, pesticides, propane tanks or fuel-operated yard equipment, fire extinguishers, cleaning supplies, liquor, paint and paint thinners, and many others.
- Perishable food: fresh, refrigerated or frozen foods have no place in your moving boxes if you want to quickly pack up your house.
- Pets and plants: due to their sensitivity and fragility, your dear pets and adorable plants cannot just go into one giant moving box and be transported to their new home. Instead, extra special cares are required so that your loved ones reach the destination city safe and sound.
Get the right packing supplies
Our quick packing tips continue with the last preparation step you need to take before the actual quick packing method can be employed. Packing, be it super quick or super slow, is unthinkable without the availability of abundant moving boxes of suitable sizes and additional packing supplies to speed up the process even more.
- Cardboard boxes. One thing is clear – you’re going to need plenty of strong boxes in good overall condition, clean and with sturdy lids. Their dimensions do matter so make sure you have different sizes at your disposal – from small sized moving containers for your heavy items through the universal medium sized boxes all the way to the big ones where you’re expected to place larger but lighter household items. If you can afford it, it’s best to purchase all your moving boxes brand new either from your local removal company or from specialized shops. However, it’s always a good idea to first ask friends or coworkers if they have any containers they can spare, or even to swing by a few local businesses (supermarkets, bookshops, office supply shops, etc.) and see if you can get moving boxes cheaply or for free, preferably clean and strong.
- Bubble wrap. Bubble wrap provides the ultimate protection for your items while they are being transported between the two homes, but you may not have enough time to go and get sufficient amount of it as you need to pack quickly for a more. Instead, you can use any useless pieces of clothing you can find around your home – from worn out bed sheets through old clothes and towels to lonely socks. As long as the bubble wrap substitutes are clean, you can really use your imagination in order to quickly pack up your house.
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Our fast packing tips will probably not make you smile with happiness, but they surely won’t make you wince in pain either. Packing paper. Clean and soft packing paper provides good initial protection for your belongings, especially for your more fragile ones. If you wish to save some money, you can take advantage of the ever-present and super cheap newsprint which you will surely have in abundance at home. The downside here is that newspapers tend to leave ugly stains on whatever gets wrapped in them and the stain removal process later on will not be your best new-home welcoming activity. Still, outdated newspapers can safely be used as second layers of protection after packing paper, and they are also great space fillers when it comes to optimizing and immobilizing the space inside a single moving box.
- Other packing supplies. Besides the three main materials described above, you’re also going to need packing tape, a pair of scissors or a cutting knife and a black marker pen for labelling your packed boxes.
I prefer the removal people to also pack my goods, providing boxes and wrap