What £950 covers
- Two or three crew, sized to the staircase rather than the room count
- A Luton where the street takes one, or a transit and a second run where it does not
- Wrapping and corner protection on every soft and wooden piece
- Dismantling and reassembling two beds, wardrobes and the dining table
- Floor and doorway protection in communal areas
- The Congestion Charge at £18, ULEZ, fuel and mileage
- Goods in transit and public liability cover
Jobs we have priced
Four real two bed move jobs with the access at both ends, so you can find the one that looks like yours.
Islington to Hackney
First floor Victorian conversion, no lift, bay free on the street, ground floor flat at the other end. Weekday, Luton, one run.
£850
Bloomsbury to Camden
Third floor of a Georgian terrace on a half landing that would not turn either wardrobe, three crew, both wardrobes dismantled and rebuilt.
£1,150
Canary Wharf to Greenwich
Goods lift booked with building management, loading bay underneath with a two metre height limit, so a transit and two runs rather than a Luton.
£1,020
Chelsea to Battersea
Second floor with no lift on a street with no legal stopping, Kensington and Chelsea suspension applied for and charged at cost on top of the figure.
£1,190
What the access does to the price
| Situation | Price |
|---|---|
| Lift or ground floor at both endsPurpose built blocks and newer developments. The volume goes up, the carry does not. | £680 to £880 |
| One or two flights at one endThe most common two bed in the centre. Three crew on the heavier ones. | £840 to £1,060 |
| Third floor walk-up or a tight period staircaseWhere the half landing will not turn a wardrobe, the furniture comes apart and goes back together. | £1,040 to £1,400 |
| A height restricted bay forcing two runsBasement bays and railway arches rule out a Luton. The second run is in the price from the start. | £950 to £1,190 |
What moves the figure
- The staircase, and whether it turns+£155 to £400
- Two wardrobes and two bed frames down a Georgian half landing is the single most expensive thing in a two bedroom move. Some of it comes apart, some of it goes out at an angle, all of it takes three people.
- What the street will take+£110 to £240
- A cobbled mews in Belgravia, the lanes off Shad Thames or a bay with a two metre limit rules out a Luton. A transit means a second run, and we price it in rather than discovering it.
- A suspended bay£45 to £120 at cost
- More often worth it at two bedrooms than below it, because the number of trips makes fifty metres of carry expensive. Several working days of council notice.
- Saturday or end of month+10% to 15%
- A two bed on the last Friday of the month is the hardest slot in London to book and it prices like it.
- Packing the whole flat+£330 to £660
- Two bedrooms and a kitchen is most of a day for two packers. Booked with the move rather than separately it costs less and saves a visit.
- Awkward single pieces+£90 to £330
- A marble table, an upright piano, a five foot mirror or a two metre sofa that has to go out through a window rather than a door. All of them change the crew rather than the van.
Why two bedrooms is the volume threshold
A one bedroom flat fits a long wheelbase transit with the furniture and twenty odd boxes. A two bedroom does not. Somewhere around the second wardrobe and the thirty fifth box you have run out of transit, and the choice becomes a Luton in one run or a transit in two.
That choice is usually made by the street rather than by you. Central London has a lot of addresses a Luton cannot reach: the mews behind Belgravia, the narrow lanes off Shad Thames, the basement loading bays under Canary Wharf and the Barbican, the railway arch conversions in SE1. Where the Luton cannot go, we quote two runs from the start.
The half landing problem
Central London is full of Georgian and Victorian conversions where the staircase turns at every half landing, and the turn is tighter than anything built after about 1900. A double wardrobe and a king bed frame will not go round it assembled, whatever angle you try.
Our crews take those apart and rebuild them at the other end as part of the job. The exception is flat pack that has already been built and moved once, because the cam fixings do not always survive a second dismantling. Where we think a piece will not go back together we say so before we touch it rather than after.
What an hourly firm would charge
Three people and a Luton at £130 to £190 an hour, and a two bedroom move with stairs runs six to eight hours door to door. That is £780 to £1,520 on an hourly rate, and the top of that range is a normal outcome rather than a worst case when there is a shared lift involved.
Our band tops out at £1,400 and the middle sits at £950, which is inside that spread rather than below it. What we are selling is not a discount, it is that the figure is settled before we start. The reason we can settle it is the questions we ask first: the floor, the turn on the stairs, the height limit on the bay, whether the lift is shared. An hourly firm does not need to ask, because whatever the answer turns out to be, you pay for it.
Two boroughs, two sets of rules
Most two bedroom moves in the centre cross a borough boundary, and the boroughs do not agree on suspensions. Westminster, Camden, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Southwark, Lambeth and Tower Hamlets each run their own application, their own lead time and their own daily rate.
That is why we want the exact address rather than the postcode. Boundaries run through the middle of King's Cross, Fitzrovia and Aldgate, and an application to the wrong authority burns the whole lead time and leaves you with no bay on the day.
How to bring the number down
Every one of these is something you can do rather than something we can discount.
- Move on a weekday and away from the last week of the month
- Empty and dismantle the wardrobes yourself if you are confident they will go back together
- Get every box sealed and labelled before the crew arrives, not while they are loading
- Ask your building whether the goods lift can be booked by residents, and book it early
- Take the books out of the bookcase and box them, rather than leaving it loaded
- Get rid of what you are not taking before the move rather than paying to move it and clear it later
Two bedroom flat move costs: common questions
How much does it cost to move a two bedroom flat in Central London?
Between £680 and £1,400 including VAT, with most landing near £950. A lift at both ends and legal parking puts you at £680 to £880. A third floor walk-up with a period staircase puts you at £1,040 to £1,400. The figure covers two or three crew, the van, wrapping, dismantling and reassembly, fuel and the Congestion Charge.
How many people and what size van for a two bedroom flat?
Two crew and a Luton for most of them, three crew where the staircase turns tightly or there is no lift above the second floor. Where the street will not take a Luton, which is common in the mews streets and around basement loading bays, we bring a transit and do two runs, and the second run is inside the quoted price.
How long does a two bedroom move take?
Six to eight hours door to door for a typical one. With lifts at both ends it can finish in five. A third floor walk-up with wardrobes that need dismantling is a full day, and we book it as a full day rather than promising an afternoon finish and missing it.
Is it cheaper to do two smaller loads myself?
Almost never, once you count the van hire, the fuel, two Congestion Charges on two days, the parking you have to sort yourself and the damage risk on a wardrobe down a period staircase. Where it does work is if you have a car and a month of overlap between tenancies, and you shift the boxes gradually and hire us for the furniture alone.
Do you charge extra for stairs?
There is no separate stairs surcharge added at the end. The stairs are already in the figure, because we asked about the floor and the turn before quoting. What you will not get is a price quoted for a lift and then revised on the morning when the crew finds four flights.
What if the two addresses are in different boroughs?
That is the normal case and it does not add to the price by itself. What it can add is a second suspension application, because each council handles its own streets, has its own lead time and charges its own daily rate. We apply to both where both need one and pass each cost through at what the council charged.
Can you move a piano as part of a two bedroom move?
Yes, uprights and grands, though it is quoted as its own line alongside the move rather than absorbed into the flat price. An upright between ground floors adds £180 to £320 and a grand rather more, because it needs a skid, four crew and a proper look at the staircase turn first. Tell us at the quote stage rather than on the day.
How we do the job itself
This page is about the money. The flat and apartment removals page covers the method: the crew, the wrapping, the access planning and what tends to go wrong.
Prices by area
The band above holds across all 37 Central London areas we cover. What changes between them is the parking and the housing stock, which is what decides where in the band you land.