Family moves
Moves built around the school day
Families move to Pinner for the schools and then move within it for the same reason. That produces a calendar with peaks, a set of dates nobody chose, and a moving day that has to finish before bedtime.
The short move that is still a full day
Most family moves here are short — a road over, a couple of streets across, Pinner Green out to Hatch End. Because the drive is nothing, people plan as though the day is nothing.
It is not. Loading a family house takes the same hours regardless of where it is going; only the middle shrinks. We plan them as full days, which is precisely why they end at a reasonable hour.
Choosing the start time
On several Pinner roads there is no point arriving before the school run has cleared: the parked cars have not moved and there is nowhere to put a vehicle. On others — the wider interwar streets with drives — an early start is much the better option.
We set that from your road at survey and tell you which, so the rest of your morning can be arranged around it.
Children on the day
Honestly, better elsewhere for the loading. A hallway with a wardrobe going through it is not a place for anyone small, and the day is shorter for everybody.
Where that cannot be arranged, tell us. The crew have all done it before; it changes the order things come out in rather than whether the job works.
The evening box
- Kettle, mugs, tea, something for breakfast
- Chargers, and the cable nobody will share
- Medication, toothbrushes, pyjamas, a towel each
- School uniform for the next morning if term has started
- The toy that is genuinely not negotiable
It travels last on and first off, and the crew are told which box it is.
Beds, then the kitchen
Beds come off the load first and go back up before the rest goes in, then the kitchen boxes. Everything else can wait for daylight, and we will say so kindly if you are still unpacking at ten at night.
Term dates fill early
The end of a half term, the start of the holidays and the last Friday of the month are the dates everybody wants, here as everywhere. If your move is tied to a school place, tell us the deadline as well as the preferred date — and book earlier than feels necessary.
If the dates refuse to meet, storage bridges them, and a standard house move covers the mechanics of the day itself.
Worth knowing
Family moves, the real questions
Can the move fit around the school day?
Usually, and on several roads it is the better plan anyway. Tell us the school and the times and we will set the start accordingly rather than to a default.
What do we do with the children?
Elsewhere for the loading if that is possible — a hallway with a wardrobe in it is no place for anyone small, and the day ends earlier for everybody. Where it is not possible, the crew work around them.
Will the beds be usable that night?
Beds come off the load first and go back up before the rest goes in. Kitchen boxes follow. Everything else can wait until the morning.
We are moving within Pinner for a school place.
A short move is still a full day: the loading and unloading take the same hours whether the new house is a mile away or a hundred. We plan them as full days, which is why they finish at a sensible hour.
What should we set aside?
One box per person with what they need that evening, kept back and pointed out to the crew — kettle, mugs, chargers, medication, pyjamas, uniform if term has started, and the toy that is not negotiable.
Tell us the school and the deadline.
Those two shape the plan more than the furniture does — particularly if the preferred date and the necessary date are different.