Moving is a monumental task no matter what your age is. Imagine moving when you’re already a senior. Unlike younger individuals, seniors have to face more challenges, including health and physical limitations, emotional and mental difficulties, and financial issues.
So, it’s important to have a game plan or strategy when you’re moving as a senior or helping someone older make their move. Here are some of the essential steps you should keep in mind when moving involves a senior.
- Your Moving Team—A Moving for Senior Must-Have
Older individuals are not as physically fit or mentally sharp as they used to be, so they should not be doing a move on their own. There are too many moving parts that could go wrong, and the stress alone would be a heavy burden for them.
Why not allow others to share this burden? An extra pair of helping hands is always welcome.
There are a couple ways seniors can receive help during this milestone.
- Ask help from family and friends
The first rule of moving is to seek assistance when you need it. Your family members, friends, and neighbors can help seniors declutter, organize, pack, and lift things. This is a big help for people who have health and mobility issues, which seniors typically are.
- Hire professionals
If you’re dealing with selling a house or items on an estate sale, you’re in much better hands when professionals are involved. Seniors could also tap a consultant or a moving manager to manage the entire moving process, from creating checklists to finding moving companies.
Create a Checklist
There are too many things to do when you’re preparing for a move. If you rely on your brain power or memory alone, you might forget something, and that something might end up to be critical in your move.
Having a checklist handy ensures you don’t forget anything. If you have a list, you can just go through the items one by one, and check them off as you go. This removes the frustration of trying to remember if you forgot anything.
You could even note important information on your list, such as your new home’s floor plan or layout, address, contact numbers, payment information, and many more.
Start Early to Avoid Hiccups
While the actual move might take a few hours or days, depending on where you’re moving to, preparing for it can take a long time. So, it’s a good idea to start your preparations as early as possible.
One of the areas where you can focus your attention could be getting rid of the things you will not be needing in your new home. Let’s face it, downsizing isn’t a one-day task unless you’re a minimalist with very few belongings. But, if you’ve lived for many, many years in one house, chances are you have a ton of material possessions that require sorting.
Plus, with several areas in the house that need your attention, it’s impossible to get downsizing done long before moving day. The best approach is to pick a room or area in the house and start from there.
Starting early will also give you more time to do other things like research moving companies, communicate with them, and plan the layout of your new home.
Planning and Preparing Your New Home
It’s always a good idea to check your new residence—multiple times if you can. If not, make sure to visit it at least two months in advance before your move. This ensures that you have enough time to schedule updates to the space, if necessary.
Or, if you’ll be living in a senior facility or community, visiting a few times—or at least once—before moving in, gives staff ample time to prepare your space and learn your medical history. When you move in, they should have your medicines, assistive devices, and other supplies at hand.
If you’re working with a move manager, chances are they can provide you with a floor plan of your new home. A floor plan helps you visualize how you can set up your furniture and other things you’ll be bringing with you.
Decluttering & Downsizing
Sort through all your belongings and decide where they’re going. Are they going with you on your move? Are they going to someone else because you’re giving them away? Or, are they going to the trash?
If you have items with sentimental value but you can’t take them with you, why not take a picture of them instead? In this way, you’ll still have a memento to rekindle those beautiful memories. If you’re working with a move manager, you could also ask them to digitize your stacks of photos for you.
Another option is to sell any valuable items. You could ask an internet-savvy family member or friend for help listing those items on online marketplaces, hold a garage sale, or if there are just too many, ask a professional to assist you in an estate sale.
Packing for Your Move
There’s nothing more frustrating than when you’re rushing to finish packing near or on move day. When this happens, you might end up cramming stuff into boxes or containers because you’re so pressed for time. The result: You’ll likely misplace things. Or worse, if you have any valuables among them, especially fragile items, they just might end up destroyed or ruined.
To avoid this scenario, start packing early. Remember, packing always takes longer than you think. If you can, consider hiring a moving company that offers packing and unpacking services, so you don’t have to worry about this at all.
Moving Day Logistics
You have multiple options come moving day. You can rent a U-Haul truck and drive to your new address on your own. You can ask the help of family or friends to help you with the move. Or, you could hire a moving company to handle the logistics for you.
If you’re dealing with a moving company, do your due diligence. Make sure you know what to expect on moving day and the fees you will have to pay to avoid any misunderstanding and additional or unexpected costs.
How do seniors move?
It’s also a good idea to bring a “survival bag” with you on move day. The bag will hold your essentials, such as medications, toiletries, important papers, cash, and change of clothes.