Planning & Preparation

If you are currently renting, make sure you give appropriate notice to the landlord in accordance with the lease and the relevant tenancy legislation. If you are hoping to simultaneously settle the sale of one property and the purchase of another, make sure that your lawyer is aware of this so he or she can advise you accordingly and appropriate steps can be taken to make it happen.

Take an inventory of your possessions and work out:

• what you are taking with you,
• what you are not taking with you that must be either disposed of or put into storage,
• what you are leaving behind, if anything.

Work out the best way to move the possessions you are taking with you to their eventual destination. The job will inevitably require a lot of muscle, packing materials and one or more heavy vehicles. It's a big job best left to the professionals. Consider the various disposal and storage alternatives for the possessions you are not taking with you (see below) and make sure you leave yourself enough time to get it all done.

If you can't or don't want to do all of the packing and unpacking yourself, you can get a professional packing service to help or do it all for you. Subject to cost constraints, it makes a lot of sense to let the professionals do the packing because they should have both the expertise and the packing materials required to do the job efficiently. If you do decide to do some of the packing yourself you can find some good packing tips here. It makes more sense for you to do some or all of the unpacking because you can generally do it at your own pace and after all, only you know where all the bits and pieces go. The most important unpacking rule is that you should start with the important stuff. Get the perishables in the fridge, get the bed set up and made and get the kitchen and bathroom basics in place.

Prepare a floor plan of your new home and work out where heavy items like furniture should go. Give a copy to the removalist to minimize the amount of heavy lifting and moving you need to do later.

Anything that's out of sight may be out of mind, particularly if it's been tucked away for a while. Consider whether anything you have lent, hidden, put into storage or safekeeping or put in for repair needs to be collected or relocated.

In some cases it will depend on how far away you are moving, but the following are some examples: cash or other valuables buried in the backyard or hidden in the toilet cistern, bits and pieces stored in the attic and under the house, wills and other important legal documents held by your lawyer or accountant, documents and other valuables stored in a bank deposit box, medical, dental, immunisation and hospital records, books or other items you may have lent to friends, electrical equipment, watches or clothes in for repairs, dry cleaning.