Moving Budget Calculator

Moving costs catch people off guard more often than almost any other ordinary expense. The mover’s invoice is the part everyone budgets for, and it is rarely the part that breaks the budget.

What this adds up

Total = Labor and transport + Packing + Supplies + Valuation coverage + Cleaning + Utility deposits + Crew tip

• Labor and transport is the mover’s quote, or the truck rental plus fuel if you are doing it yourself. It is far and away the largest line. Enter your own quote if you have one. Leave that box blank and the page estimates from published US averages by home size and distance, which is a starting figure and not a price.
• Packing is what you pay the crew to box things up. Partial packing typically runs around 15% on top of the labor cost and covers the kitchen and the fragile items; full service is closer to 30%.
• Supplies are boxes, tape, bubble wrap, furniture pads, mattress bags. Self-packers pay the most here for the obvious reason.
• Valuation coverage is the moving industry’s term for insurance, and the default that comes free is worth almost nothing: 60 cents per pound per item under federal rules. A 40-pound television is covered for $24. Full-value protection typically costs around 5% of the move, which is what this uses.
• Cleaning, utility deposits and the crew tip are yours to enter. They are left out entirely if you leave them blank, and the result panel says so, because these are exactly the three that get forgotten.

Typical cost ranges (US)

These move with fuel prices and with the season, so treat them as a sanity check on a quote rather than a target.

The 60-cents-a-pound trap

This is the one worth knowing before moving day rather than after. Released value protection is the free default, and it pays by weight, not by worth. Your $2,000 laptop weighs about four pounds, so if the crew drops it you are owed $2.40. Full-value protection costs real money and is the only version that replaces what was broken. Ask which one is on your paperwork, because it will be the cheap one unless you said otherwise.

Where the money actually goes

• Book mid-week and mid-month. Movers charge a premium for the last weekend of the month, when leases turn over, and the gap runs 30 to 40%.
• Free boxes are everywhere: liquor stores, bookshops, Buy Nothing groups. Supplies are the easiest line to take to nearly zero.
• Disassemble the furniture yourself the night before. Crews bill by the hour and bed frames are slow.
• Get three quotes and insist they are binding rather than estimates. A non-binding estimate is a number a mover is free to exceed once your possessions are on their truck.