The Move We're Asked About Most: Settling Closer to the Grandchildren

The move we're asked about more than any other

If you're thinking about packing up a home you've had for decades and moving across the country to be near your children and grandchildren, here's the first thing worth knowing: you are in very good company. People do this all the time. In fact, it is one of the most common long-distance moves our crew handles, week in and week out. So if it feels like a big, slightly daunting, faintly mad idea, rest assured that families are doing exactly the same thing all over the country, and arriving with a smile on the other side.

We've carried a lot of lives down a lot of motorways. And there is a particular sort of move that turns up again and again: a couple in their later years, a house full of memories, and a removal van pointed firmly in the direction of the grandchildren. It is, quietly, our favourite kind of job.

Why people make the move (and why it's usually the right call)

The reasons people give us are wonderfully ordinary, and all the better for it. They want to be there for the school run on a wet Tuesday, not just the big birthday on the weekend. They want Sunday lunch to be a thing that actually happens, rather than a long phone call about the traffic on the A303. They want to watch the grandchildren grow up in person, in real time, with grass stains and missing teeth and all.

And there's the gentler, more practical side of it too. As everyone gets a little older, having family nearby means a second pair of hands when you need one and good company when you fancy it. People often tell us they spent years thinking about it and then wished they'd done it ages ago. We've yet to load a van for a family making this move and sense any regret about the decision. A lot of nerves about the day, certainly. But about the move itself, almost never.

What makes a long-distance "near family" move different

On paper, a long-distance house move is boxes, a van and a great many miles. In practice, this particular kind of move carries a bit more weight than most. There's the home itself, often a place where children were raised and Christmases were had, being emptied for the last time. There's the strange feeling of waving goodbye to neighbours and a postcode you've known for half a lifetime. It's a happy move, but it's rarely a small one emotionally, and we'd be doing it a disservice to pretend otherwise.

You learn to read a move day after a while. We notice the small things: the way the kettle is the very first thing to come back out of a box, the careful packing of one particular photograph, the long last look around an empty room. And then, more often than not, the best bit. The grandchildren turn up at the new place, thunder through the front door before we've got the sofa in, and suddenly the new house stops being a building and starts being home. We've learned to keep well out of the way at that point and just get on with the unloading.

Arriving into Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire

We're based in Shaftesbury, in North Dorset, so we have a soft spot for this corner of the country, and we get to deliver a lot of people into it. It's a gentle place to land. Think market towns like Shaftesbury, Sherborne and Wincanton, with their high streets and Saturday markets, and the patchwork of villages spread out around them across Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire.

The pace here is a slower one, in the nicest possible sense. The lanes are narrow, the hedges are high, and the sat nav occasionally gives up entirely and suggests you have arrived in a field. Our crew knows these roads, which matters more than you might think when there's a removal van involved and a rather tight rural lane between it and your new front door. It is the sort of place people picture when they imagine retirement near the family, and then are pleasantly surprised to find it's exactly as nice as they hoped.

How we look after this kind of move

Our whole approach is built around taking the heavy bits, both literal and otherwise, off your plate. The same small in-house crew looks after your move from the first survey right through to the last box unloaded at the new place. The people who come and quote your move are the people who carry it, which means nobody is ever a stranger turning up on the day.

A few things worth spelling out, because they tend to put people's minds at rest:

• A fixed written quote within the hour. Tell us about your move and we'll send a clear, fixed price back to you within the hour, so you know exactly where you stand before you commit to anything.
• As much packing help as you'd like. We can pack the whole house for you, just the fragile and awkward things, or nothing at all if you'd rather do it yourself. It's entirely your call.
• Proper cover as standard. Every move is backed by Public Liability cover of up to £2.5m and Goods in Transit cover of up to £50k per load, included as part of the service.
• One crew, the whole way. From survey to unload, it's the same familiar faces, with no handing over to anyone else along the route.

If you'd like the detail on the move itself, our house removals service walks through how a full move with us works from start to finish.

A new chapter, not just a new postcode

When all is said and done, this kind of move isn't really about furniture. It's about being there for the school plays and the birthday teas and the ordinary Tuesdays, the small everyday moments that turn out to be the ones that matter. The boxes and the van are simply how you get there. That's our job, and we take great care to do it gently.

If a move like this is on your mind, even if the dates are still a bit fuzzy and the idea is only half-formed, we'd be glad to talk it through. Tell us a little about where you're coming from and where you're heading, and we'll send you a fixed written quote within the hour. You can get your quote here.

For more on the practical side of a later-life move, you might also like our piece on downsizing later in life.