Is £10,400 a normal removal quote for a local five-bed move?

[ramamamadingdong]

I am planning a move from a 5-bed house with garage, some home gym equipment and outdoor furniture, to a similar-sized property that's 2.5 miles away.

Got a quote from my local removal company (great reviews) and nearly fell off my chair. £10,400 including full pack (it's cheaper for a fragile-only pack, but not significantly).

We're in Suffolk and in a fairly affluent town. Is this what it costs these days, or did I look like a total mug when the guy came around to measure up?

They don't fancy it.
Last time we moved ( involved packing up van one day and unpack next day), we paid £1750 and that included 120 mile drive, one huge lorry and a Luton box van. 5 people loading and 4 unloading.
That was a few years ago but probably no more than £2500 now. We had a quote from Pickfords for roughly what you have been quoted. Carry on looking

If you have 5 bedrooms consider those who have bigger fleets and bigger vans. We moved 400 miles in Feb and I got quotes from £4.5 -£7.1k with 4 beds to 4 beds and a fair bit of outdoor. One company said we had 2800 sq feet worth of ‘stuff’ while another said it would all fit in their van which was 2000 sq ft.
Try to move on a Mon , Tues or Weds as better availability

I live in Suffolk I'll come do it for you for half that. Lmfao

I'd rather carry every single item on my back like a donkey to the new house that pay over 10k for a removal company!

That’s how I feel!

I moved twice in 10 months 3 years ago. 3 bedroomed detached house and large garage and also a Peloton bike (very heavy) and paid between £3-£3.5k - journey time was about an hour each time. This included packing up service both times. The actually packing up part of it was really reasonable to be fair both times, was about an extra £500 so well worth all the stress and aggro.

As someone who also lives in Suffolk… all of the removals quotes we got were ridiculous. We ended up just doing it ourselves instead

Diesel is difficult to estimate from day to day so what people paid 3 yrs ago is no longer relevant.

Ridiculous amount. We moved about 18 months ago to a different county and paid 2k and that included two pianos!

This is madness. We paid about £800 for a registered firm. Ok this was a few years ago but we’re also in an affluent area and moved to a 6 bedroom house with an extraordinary amount of crap stuff. Please get more quotes!!

If you have enough time, it's ok to do it yourself.

We've done it a few times (SE - Scotland type stuff) and the thing you need is a Luton van and for us, storage space halfway. I'm super-tight, so it suited me.

But I've also had houses all packed and moved for me and it is easier.

It just depends.

My father in law used our recommendation and a company that were 35 miles from him to move 130 miles - he had silly quotes so went out of county to where neither current home or new home was- still was well within budget and fantastic job - they wrap everything hugely, chairs, tables, bar code and room colour code , use iPads etc - they had done our international move and we didn’t get1 item broken - hence why I recommended- they also stored for him for 8 weeks between selling and buying

I think my friend got quotes from some people in Stowmarket last year who did a great job and were a lot more reasonable than that (!) so maybe try some Stowmarket firms? I think the one they went with had a branch in Stow and one in Essex maybe?

Highly recommend these guys - https://schofieldremovals.co.uk/ - they've moved me a few times and it's always been a pain-free experience.

Surely that's even more reason for them to price a local 5 mile round-trip job reasonably, then, and getting it - rather than give a ridiculous quote as their way of turning it down?!

We moved last summer from our 4 bedroom house in West London to another 4 bedder 5 miles further West. I packed and unpacked everything myself and the movers just collected, transported, and unloaded all boxes and furniture at the other end (they set up the beds/sofas/tables in the new house which was super helpful). I think I paid around £800 for 3 guys. I got crazy quotes for the additional service of packing/unpacking and thought, nah, I'll do it myself. It was tiring but worth it.

Yes, agree, pricing local jobs is the way to minimise fluctuations in diesel.
OP, will probably be looking at 8x day shifts to pack / load and 4 x day shifts to unload. So 12 x £300 labour plus packing boxes plus hire of several vans x3 days. She will easily be looking at circa £6k.

Oh just to add... look for waste removal service who offer removals and relocation. They can be significantly cheaper than straight-up moving companies. This may mean that you will have to pack up/unpack boxes but they will assemble/dismantle furniture and do all the heavy lifting.

Interesting

Sometimes Cheaper to use a company from where you are moving to

Woodbridge removals?

At that price, I'd name and shame the company. And post a negative review online.

Total rip off! I'm offended on your behalf.

3 years ago I got a full pack and move with rebuild of key items over hundreds of miles for a 3 bed detached house including garage and large outdoor things for less than £1k. Prices will have increased but not x10! Shop around, I got at least 5 quotes and went a little further for the right one.

I've contacted 5 other companies now, thanks for the recommendations. I got a couple from NextDoor, too. Will update this thread when I have some numbers in, for those playing along at home.

Or if you're moving quite a distance, a firm based anywhere between the two places, especially if there's a less desirable, less 'premium' town somewhere along the route. It's no greater distance overall for them to do the job and take their lorry back to their depot.

A bit like the opposite of the traditional advice of travelling a bit further and going to charity shops in rich towns for the best bargains!