As you get to work on planning out your move to your new dream home, there are a few pointers worth taking note of as the build up to the first day in your new property and the effort to have all your treasured belongings moved there with you, unfolds. First off is planning a definitive time frame, to work back from when planning your packing and sorting out quotes and contracts with removal services for the move. Work out a date for your moving date (which is normally the completion date of your contract switch) as soon as your contracts have changed hands. You want to avoid bank holidays and Fridays and when removal companies are going to be stretched as a result of high demand. Otherwise you will probably have to pay more for their assistance. To avoid the hassle of timings like this and the problems of a more stressful move, try and hire the removal company to work for you during the middle of the week and other off-peak times. For moving your possessions, make sure they are insured for transit. Most removal services will provide this, but you need to check if there are any exceptions, whilst you’ll need cover insurance if you want to transport fragile items by yourself. Make sure you have a professional cleaner service hired to give your new home a going over before the move in. Some removal services will provide this, so check with the company you are hiring before hiring a suitable cleaning company. It will save you the effort of doing the spring clean yourself the morning after your first day in your dream property! To help speed up the process of the workmen physically moving items on the day, you can help them out by providing them with a scale plan of each room in your new home. This way they should know exactly where everything is going. Getting everything to end up in the right rooms can also be made easier by a process of colour coding your packed boxes, cases and furniture (use coloured labels though!). On the day of the move itself, make sure that the foreman has an understanding (or a printed copy!) of the layout of your new home. This will help to make sure that furniture ends up in the right place; otherwise you’ll have to moving it to where it was supposed to be originally! For the sake of those moving into your current home, prepare a kind of fact file. List details for the times of weekly rubbish collection or milk runs and so on and so forth. Also be sure that you give service information for the house’s heating and the appliances you are leaving behind. Round up all the spare keys given out (to relatives/nannies/neighbours) and give them to your estate agent or your solicitor. Although it could come across sounding a little paranoid, it would be worth having your locks changed. So you’ll need to work in hiring a locksmith to do the appropriate work. You have no idea who might have been given copies of the door key in the past, so being on the safe side can keep you covered, even if it sounds a little off kilter. Have a good look round the property on arrival on the moving day. If there are any faults that were missed in the original survey of the building, then you’ll need to contact your surveyor instantly. This is the same for checking items included in the sale; if there are any problems, then contact your solicitor straight away, all the same.