A lot of people find out on moving day. The sofa comes off the van, goes up the path and stops dead in the front doorway, with three people holding it and the rest of the house still waiting behind it.
It’s one of the most common hold-ups on a move and it’s almost always avoidable. You don’t need special tools or a floor plan. You need a tape measure, ten minutes at each property and a bit of honesty about the pieces you’re most attached to.
The short answer
Measure the item, then measure the narrowest point it has to pass through at both properties. Not just the front door. The hallway, the turn at the bottom of the stairs, the landing and the door of the room it’s going into. If the smallest of those is bigger than the smallest side of your furniture, with a few centimetres to spare, it will almost certainly go in.
If it’s close or it doesn’t fit on paper, you still have options. But you want to know that a few weeks before the move, not when the van’s on the drive.
Why furniture that came in won’t always go out
People are often surprised that a sofa which got into their current house won’t come out again. There are a few reasons it happens:
- The piece went in before something else was fitted, like a new staircase, a radiator in the hall or a fitted wardrobe on the landing.
- It came flat-packed and was built in the room, so it has never been through a door in one piece.
- It was delivered through a door or window that has since been replaced or a route that no longer exists after an extension.
- The delivery crew dismantled it to get it in and nobody remembered.
It’s worth asking yourself how each of your big pieces got where it is. If you can’t remember, measure it.
What to measure on your furniture
Every piece has three measurements: width (side to side), depth (front to back) and height (floor to the highest point). Write all three down for anything big: sofas, armchairs, wardrobes, dressers, bed frames, desks, chests of drawers, American-style fridge-freezers and anything heavy you’d struggle to lift with two people.
Then take off whatever comes off. Many sofas have feet that unscrew, and on some that saves a surprising amount of height. Cushions come out. Mirrors come off dressing tables. Measure again with all of that removed because that’s the size that actually has to get through.
The diagonal depth, for sofas and armchairs
This is the measurement most people skip, and the one that gets most sofas through a tight door.
Sofas usually go through doorways on their back or tipped on end, not upright. So the number that matters is the diagonal, measured like this:
- Take off the back cushions.
- Find the highest point at the back of the sofa.
- Run a straight edge or a piece of taut string from that point down to the front bottom edge of the base.
- Measure along that line.
If that diagonal is smaller than the width of the doorway, you can usually tip the sofa back and feed it through. Recliners are the exception. The mechanism often means they have to go through the way they sit, so measure them as they are.
What to measure at both properties
Walk the route the furniture will take, from where the van will park to the spot the piece will end up. At each point, measure the narrowest part, not the widest.
- Front door: open it fully and measure the clear gap between the door itself and the frame on the other side. That’s usually a few centimetres less than the door is wide.
- Hallway: measure at the narrowest point, which is often where a radiator, a coat hook or a meter cupboard sticks out.
- Internal doors: same as the front door, and note which way each one opens.
- Stairs: the width at the narrowest point, including the handrail, and the headroom where the ceiling drops over the stairwell.
- Turns and landings: the width and depth of the landing, and the gap between the banister and the ceiling if anything has to be lifted over.
- The room itself: the doorway, and whether there’s space to turn the piece once it’s inside.
For context, the most common internal door in England and Wales is 762mm wide (2ft 6in), but older homes and cupboard-sized doorways can be noticeably narrower. And the clear opening is less than the door, because the hinges and the frame stop take some of it. A tape measure will always tell you more than a standard size will.
Measuring a house you don’t own yet
This is the tricky bit and it’s where a lot of the problems come from. You might have only seen the new place once or twice, and estate agent floor plans don’t show stair widths or where the radiators are.
So use whatever access you have. If you’re going back for a second viewing, take a tape measure and a list. If you can’t get back in, ask the estate agent or the sellers whether they’d measure the front door, the stairs and the landing for you. Most people are happy to, because a smooth move day helps their move too. If you’re renting, the letting agent can usually do the same.
Photos help as well. A picture of the staircase from the bottom and the top will show you a tight turn far better than a measurement on its own.
Homes where it’s most likely to be tight
Some properties are much more likely to cause trouble than others and there are plenty of them around Salisbury and the surrounding villages:
- Period cottages and older terraces, where doorways are narrower, ceilings are lower and the stairs often turn sharply or wind up between two walls.
- Flats, where the route might include a communal entrance, a narrow corridor and a lift with a fixed size. Measure the lift door and the inside depth, and check with the managing agent if there are rules about using it on moving day.
- Converted barns and chalet bungalows, where a sloping ceiling at the top of the stairs can catch the corner of a wardrobe or a headboard.
- New builds, which are generally fine on doors but can have tighter staircases and smaller landings than people expect.
If you’re moving into any of these, it’s worth taking a bit more care with the measuring.
If it doesn’t fit on paper
A tight result isn’t the end of it. There are a few things that often make the difference.
Take the door off. Lifting an internal door off its hinges and sometimes taking out the door stop, can gain you a few centimetres. That’s often enough for a sofa that was just over.
Take the furniture apart. Beds, wardrobes, dining tables and some corner sofas are designed to come apart. Bolt-on sofa arms and removable backs can help too, though not every sofa has them, so check before you pick up a screwdriver.
Try another route. A back door, French doors or patio doors can sometimes take what the front door can’t, particularly where the hallway is the problem.
Lift it in through a window. This does happen, usually for sofas going upstairs into flats or into rooms where the stairs simply won’t work. It generally needs specialist equipment and adds cost, so it’s only worth it for pieces that really matter to you.
When it’s time to let it go
Sometimes the honest answer is that a piece won’t go into the new house or won’t suit it once it’s there. That’s a decision best made a few weeks before the move, while you still have time to do something about it.
You could:
- Sell it or give it away before the move, so you’re not paying to move something you won’t use.
- Swap it for something that fits and arrange delivery straight to the new address.
- Put it into storage, if you’re moving somewhere temporary or you think you’ll have room for it later.
Storage is worth a thought. Plenty of people downsizing, or moving into rented while they wait to buy, aren’t ready to part with a dining table or a family piece. Our storage options in Salisbury mean it can wait safely until you’ve got a home for it again.
Tell your removals company early
Whatever you find, tell your removals firm before the day. A big item that won’t fit can change how long the move takes, how many people you need and sometimes what it costs. We’ve written more about how access and awkward items affect a removals quote if you want the detail.
When we come out to see you before quoting, mention the pieces you’re worried about. We’ll look at them with you and talk through the access at both ends, so nothing on the van is a surprise on the day.
If you’d like a hand planning a move with a few awkward pieces in it, have a look at our domestic removals service and contact Spire Removals for a bespoke quote. Better to find out now than with the sofa wedged in the doorway.
