Moving home is one of the most exciting times of the year. And that’s for many reasons. You’ve got a new job; you’re moving to a new city – you’re even buying your first house!
However, some studies cite moving home to be more stressful than losing your job or even bankruptcy. This seems quite outlandish at first, but if we consider that some home moves span a period of three months (maybe longer) and the amount of things you have to complete it’s no surprise.
Today we’re going to cover the ultimate moving home hack. We will cover how to update your address online, find more time and even save money.
So, let’s get started right away.
What’s the big problem?
Research shows that 85% of adults in the UK experience stress regularly. This statistic surprises most people. This becomes even more significant when you’re moving home. As we explored, moving home is often described as one of life’s most stressful events. And since stress is becoming endemic in the UK and beyond, the need to make our lives as stress-free as possible has never been greater.
The Moving Home Hack
If we were to summarise the ultimate home-moving hack in a few words, it would be characterised as: move out of your own way.
Well, what does that mean?
It simply means that we’re human. And because we’re human we fall foul to lots of natural biases, including a tendency to be forgetful every now and again. Getting out of our own way means being smarter about the way we move home, planning and using all available resources to make sure we make the home move as simple as possible.
Whatever stage of the home move you’re at, the first step would be grabbing a moving house checklist. You will want something comprehensive and detailed that will cover everything you need. This might sound obvious and, perhaps a little trite, but this will prevent you from forgetting anything. The next step is to work through that checklist chronologically and, importantly, commit to it.
Now the planning is out of the way, how else can you help yourself ‘hack your home move’? One such way would be to use an online change of address service. SlothMove seems to be the most comprehensive and easiest to use in the UK, enabling you to do a TV Licence change of address, update your address with the DVLA and much more. According to research, this can save you up to 7 hours of time and 21 phone calls.
The key benefit there is that you do not need to have the same conversation over and over again. This will cross 21 calls and emails straight off your to-do list.
How to actually spend less
One of the best ways to ensure that you’re spending less during your home move is the rule of three. For all large purchases, make sure that you look at taking three quotes as a minimum. This might seem clear to do but you would be surprised as to the number of people that actually do not do that.
Most people also overpay on items like their energy and broadband. For instance, with energy it is common practice for companies to offer handsome introductory rates only for them to rocket-up once the fixed-term contract expires. Furthermore, if you’re moving it’s likely that you will be moving onto an expensive variable rate there.
Finally, when it comes to moving home one of the most important things you can do is to actually create a budget. This involves sitting down and really thinking about how much you can and actually need to spend.
It’s helpful to categorise your spending into ‘I need this when I move in’ and ‘I would like this within a year’. By separating the items out in this manner you will be surprised as to how much cheaper the move will actually become!
Hopefully this article has been helpful. And now you know the ‘ultimate moving home hack’ of getting out of your own way, your next home move will hopefully be lower cost, less stressful and more time-rich.
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