Moving heavy furniture is always a headache itself, and when it follows discovering a scratch on the nice hardwood floor afterwards, the agony is unexplainably excruciating. Yes, moving furniture should never lead to unwanted damages of our surfaces, and if you already didn’t know, it’s not too hard to avoid what you didn’t sign up for in the first place.
There are plenty of hacks and tactics you can go with to have a nice move without causing the floor any suffering. Some are easy peasy DIY-squeezy, and then you can always resort to Lowes, Home Depot or your local hardware store to back you up on this.
Smart DIY Solutions
- Lift Instead of Dragging
How the floor gets scratched? Because we drag things mercilessly without giving two whoops about our precious floors. Now, it’s not always the case, but when you can, you should better lift the furniture with your hands rather than pushing them across the room. You can always a use a helping hand as well.
- Keep the Surface Clean
It doesn’t sound like much, let alone being quite effective for preventing damage, but there’s where you’re wrong. Keeping the place free of obstacles reduces the chance of accidentally hitting something or dropping things on the floor; which, apart from dragging things violently across the surface, can also lead to some damage if not avoided in time.
- Part the Pieces
Dragging or lifting heavy furniture at one piece is never a good idea. And it’s not just because of the floor-scratching, the labor takes a toll on your body as well. And the idea of moving is always choosing the easy route. So, dismember the pieces of furniture by the book and move them separately. No harm on the surface, neither on your back.
- Use a Rug or a Towel
Taking furniture apart to make the task easy on the floor doesn’t always work for obvious reasons, and this is where a rug or a towel comes handy. Especially for the furniture with legs. While dealing with legs, wrap each of them with the said towel or rug, and then push and drag all you want; your floor will be good as it was before. Probably cleaner.
- Cardboard
Go through your attic, store room, or garage for all the cardboard pieces you can find and make the best use of them by placing them under the furniture before pushing or dragging. They’re best for moving furniture over the carpet, as pulling cloth item like towel or rug isn’t as sophisticated as on a smooth, hard floor.
- Take Help
If the furniture load makes moving difficult for you, you could do with some help from the others. Then again moving is usually not one person’s job anyway. Everyone in the house should give you a hand in this, or you can always use a friend’s assistance (or more than two).
Helpful Investment
In case you manage to pull this through using the things laying around your house, kudos to you; but if not, there are plenty of other options “out there” to choose from, just need to take a stroll in the market… or online stores.
- Masonite Board
Fantastic thing to push heavy furniture over carpet. Home Depot is a popular destination for high quality Masonite boards; however, might have to compromise on the size depending on the furniture you’re planning to slide. These boards can be purchased from any home improvement chain or hardware store.
Sometimes you might have to cut the board in half or more parts for moving convenience; would recommend professional help in case you don’t happen to own the right saw for that, or are just not sure about your trimming skill.
- Moving Blanket
Yes, this is a brilliant, safe, yet a very cheap protector alternative to get the stuff moving. Just wrap the blanket around the edges, and no more worries. Easy to pull across the floor.
- Glider/Slider
People often resort to sliding while dealing with furniture, especially when they’re certainly too heavy to lift. Glider or slider, whatever you want to call it, is a padded alternative for making a smooth move across the floor. They’re easy to pull and slide; comes padded with felt or foam to ensure an abrasion-free sliding experience.
- Dolly
The home improvement stores or truck rental places always have these dollies you can rent for the extra convenience. To be honest, in certain cases, these are the thing you need the most for lifting your heavy furniture. Purchasing a dolly for one-time moving is quite unnecessary budget-wise; however, you can always treat yourself with a beneficial future investment.
Otherwise, just rent it; most trucks come with their own dolly anyway if you request for one in advance.
- Professional Movers
Nothing and no one are ought to get hurt, when professionals are involved! So simply make that call and let the professional movers take care of the furniture… and your floor.
One issue, more than ten solutions to work with. Fold your sleeves and just go for it! With the right steps, the only thing ought to be heavy are the big pieces, and not your work load.