House moves are often stressful. The idea of leaving behind your home to live in a new place can be traumatic for some people. The move can be even more difficult if you have children. House move doesn’t have to be necessarily stressful. With a little planning and organizing, you can ensure a well organized and smooth move. Packing up your entire possessions to move to another place may seem impossible but by some efficient planning you can easily overcome this obstacle and make your move enjoyable.
1. Plan ahead

Start off by making a to-do list. This will help you remember everything and prioritize your tasks. Writing everything down will help you to analyze everything and plan accordingly. Decide upon the date of moving and schedule everything according to that deadline. You may want to ask recently moved relatives or friends for tips and advice on moving. Planning will help you get a clear picture of your situation.
2. Pack efficiently

Don’t start packing haphazardly or leave it for the end. Now that you have the to-do list, you can get started with packing your belongings. Make sure you label each box and make a list of its contents. This will help you in unpacking later. Buy extra supplies to ensure you don’t run out. You should have plenty of boxes, bubble wrap, box tape, marking pens, labels, and a large spiral note book. Clearly mark each box. Use newspaper to wrap breakable items. Keep in mind that you don’t need to pack everything. You don’t need to take your junk along to your new home.
3. Reduce the clutter

This is a great time to get rid of all the stuff you’ve been thinking about throwing away. Eliminating the clutter will reduce the need to pack unwanted items and also decrease the costs incurred in moving. You can either hold a garage sale or sell these items online. You can also donate the things you no longer need provided they are in good condition. The greater you reduce the clutter; the easier it will be for you to move to your new home.
4. Make use of storage facilities

Your new home may not be completely ready when you move or not have enough space. In that case you can consider making use of storage facilities to store you possessions until your house is ready. If you have hired professional movers, they may provide you with storage facilities. Don’t forget to ask the company to provide you with a quote.
5. Hire professional movers

If you don’t want to do a DIY job, hire professional movers. It’s fairly easy to move if you don’t have much possessions. However, if you have a houseful of stuff to move, the best thing to do is to get professional help.

Andrew is a professional removalist with over 5 years experience in interstate furniture removals

Joseph and Donna Krezdorn were the owners of Distinction Painting, Ltd. before getting into the storage industry. They specialized in new construction painting. Working for some of the largest builders in Berks County they built a reputation of high quality, low cost painting. In 1991 while painting in the Villages of Spring Ridge, Nestled between Van Reed, State Hill, Papermill and Broadcasting Roads just North-West of Wyomissing. One day while painting townhouses with no attic or basement in the spot where the Former Tulpehoken Dairy was located, Joe mentioned to Donna “Where do people put their stuff?”

Joe started doing research on Self Storage. This was before you could find everything you can think of on the Internet. After extensive research on Mini Storage, they both realized that it was going to be hard to finance without continuing to paint

Joe started doing research on Self Storage. This was before you could find everything you can think of on the Internet. After extensive research on Mini Storage, they both realized that it was going to be hard to finance without continuing to paint.
After many years and all but forgetting about Self Storage, in 1997 they came across an opportunity to paint small jobs at a local Pretzel Factory. After many paint jobs there; including installing the giant Pretzel Factory Logo on the Silo outside of the factory, the plant Manager asked them to bid on 30,000 square feet of ceiling damaged by a fire. The bid was placed and awarded to Distinction Painting, Ltd. Unfortunately, the job was to be completed over the factory Christmas shutdown. They had to scramble to hire Sub Contractors willing to work over this time. This was no small feat as the Factory job required about 14 contractors to complete the job between the morning of Saturday, December 20th and the Evening of Saturday, December 27th, before they were to restart the 200 foot long ovens, all while trying to keep the home builders happy, too. Keep in mind Christmas was Thursday, so no one worked that day. In fact the sub contractors all left at lunch, after telling Joe they would work the full day. They painted several new homes and the ceiling in that short period of time. To everyone’s amazement and much stress it was completed before the Factory workers came in to fire up the ovens for the following week. After payment and a well deserved vacation in February, Joe and Donna decided to use the profits to buy land and start a Self Storage Facility, although they could not imagine the scale and costs of such a project. The dream could finally be realized.

They hired a realtor and started looking for land. After several months they found the property DAK Self Storage is on today. Several things happened in this period of time. While walking the land with the realtor Joe asked about a sign on Route 61 (Centre Ave) because Dr Hottenstien, the Dentist across the street, had a sign near where the Hoss’s Restaurant now stands. The realtor looked at the Public sale sign in the yard of the house on Route 61 and Peach and said “Why don’t you buy that and put a sign there?” When Joe told Donna about this idea her reaction was, “You want to buy a house to put up asign? You are crazy.” Ok… I have toned down that quote to the PG version for this blog. Donna grew up with three brothers and worked with me in construction. Can you picture her exact response? During the auction for the house, as Joe was bidding and Donna was giving him dirty looks, the auctioneer was doing his chant said, “You gotta live with her!” The house was actually purchased before the 3 acres of vacant land at the South-West corner of Peach and First Streets. This land turned out to be part of the Ferdinand Thun Empire. They owned large chunks of land in Berks County by purchasing much farmland in the area; including the land where the Berkshire Mall now stands. This was funded through the profits of The Textile Knitting Mills in Berkshire Heights. If you drive over the Warren Street Bypass Bridge, just east of Reading, PA and look at the Railroad Bridge, looking to the right, you will notice a sign for the Thun Trail.

The land contract was contingent upon the Borough of Leesport giving approval for a Self Storage Facility. That’s a story in itself. After many Leesport Borough meetings and changes to the Engineers plan, they finally got approval. They also decided it was time for a trip to Las Vegas for a trade show hosted by ISS. This was a very informative trip, as they needed software to run the facility while they continued to work as Paint contractors. After returning they forged ahead with land development. Joe decided he would be the General Contractor on the job as he had done all of the leg work and pricing of the construction. The Bank would not approve a loan with that arrangement. The bank wanted all the liability issues to fall onto someone else. This fact alone added 10% to the total construction. They hired Tony Folino of Pennaco Excavating as the general contractor. He was very kind in the fact he only added 10% onto any bill that passed through his office. That covered the additional insurance he needed and his company’s’ time. This could have been much more had any other general contractor been hired. (Thanks Tony).

One Saturday morning while driving over to the land,  Joe Donna and the girls were joking around trying to come up with names. Aardvark was brought up to be first in a now fading thing called the Yellow Pages. They decided on the name DAK, the initials of Donna, Amanda and Kelly.

Millions of Americans store valuable belongings in self-storage units. Most of those belongings stay safe from theft and damage, but some don’t. Thanks to the recession, theft is on the rise: from shoplifting to storage unit burglary, and everything in between. If you’re thinking about storing some of your things away from home in a storage unit, it’s wise to do your homework and find a storage facility that takes every security precaution necessary to ensure the safety of your valuables. Here are some things you can do to help you pick the best and safest storage unit for your needs:

• Read online reviews of storage facilities. If a storage facility has security issues, you’ll be able to find out about it online.

• Make a list of five or so storage companies in your area that you’d consider doing business with, based on online reviews.

• Google the names of those storage companies to see if they’ve been mentioned in any news articles about storage burglaries. If they have, you may want to cross them off your list.

• Call different storage companies you’re interested in, and ask them what kind of security measures they take. At the very least, a storage company should have cameras installed around the facility, and the facility should be guarded by some kind of high security fence.

• Narrow your list down to two storage choices. Visit both of the facilities, and look around to make sure that there are cameras installed. Take a look at the fence enclosing the area and assess how difficult it would be to climb. If you see a security guard on the premises, you know you’ve found a pretty safe facility for your valuables.

• Before you sign any paperwork, ask to see the actual storage units. Look at the doors to the units and the locks on them and assess whether they look secure.

Finding the right storage unit isn’t an exact science. Follow the tips above and trust your instincts. If you get a bad feeling about storing your belongings in a certain unit, explore your other options. The right storage unit for you is out there, waiting!

Author’s Bio: In his role in the self storage industry, Garret Stembridge helps customers care for their cherished belongings that must be put in storage. Garret Stembridge goes to see his facilities including a Bellflower self storage center. He was also recently meeting customers and staff at the Bloomington self storage facility.

There are two reasons why you may need self storage in the UK.

1) A delivery point for your container to give you more time to find the right house in the right location in the UK or if you simply don’t want everything arriving at your new home all at once.

2) Extra room if there’s not enough space at home.

You will probably need to research self storage facilities and reserve your storage unit in the UK whilst you’re still in the US so that the shipper has a delivery address. If so, here are a few things to consider.

1) Do they have a yard large enough to be able to handle articulated container lorries.

2) Do they have undercover loading bays. These give a helpful area for your items to be unloaded off the container and checked off against the inventory list.

3) What’s the security like. Is the storage facility temperature and humidity controlled. What’s the access like.

4) Are they members of the UK Self Storage Association – membership requires a store to have certain minimum levels of security and safety.

Your removal company will be able to give you an estimate of the volume of goods that you are moving which you will be able to relay to the self storage company to estimate the right size storage unit for you.

Approximately 50,000 people move from the US to the UK each year. Most people need moving services and many also use self storage. Here’s some helpful tips based on our own customer’s experiences to help you prepare for your big move across the pond!

The moving process

The process of moving your things to the UK is likely to take the following route:

1) The removal company will arrive at your home to pack your things and make a detailed inventory of the items that you’re shipping.

2) Your things will either be loaded directly into a container on site or taken away for loading into a container at the removal company’s premises. Depending on how many belongings you have, your container may be shared with someone else’s things but the container will be partitioned internally to separate the goods.

3) The container is put on a ship to the UK.

4) The container arrives at a UK port and goes through customs.

5) The container is delivered to the required household or self storage address or is unloaded onto a lorry and delivered.

This whole process will typically take between 4 and 6 weeks door to door.

If you only have a relatively small quantity of items to ship, your removal company may advise air freight as a quicker, potentially cheaper alternative.

What to take and what not to take

The first thing to be aware of is that in general, furniture in the US is bigger than in the UK. If you have some particularly large sofas or beds you may want to consider whether they will even fit through the front door let alone fit in the front room of a house in the UK.

Houses and garages in the UK are also generally much smaller than the US and they have very little storage space.

With these facts in mind, careful thought needs to be given to what you plan to ship to the UK. An average 3 bedroom house in the UK is unlikely to be able to accommodate more than a 20ft container load of household goods. De-clutter before you move and BE RUTHLESS! Your other option is to make use of self storage either in the US or the UK.

Two items that will definitely come in handy in the UK are an umbrella and a rain coat! If you’re from California leave your shorts at home!