You’ve just found the perfect sofa: huge, comfortable, exactly what you wanted. But moving day arrives and you discover an awkward reality: it won’t fit through the door. Or, worse still, it clears the front door but won’t make it into the living room because the hallway has a bend nobody measured. This is one of the most common problems we see at Mudanzas Trallero, and most of the time it comes down to one simple step: measuring your furniture well before the move.
Many people wait until the day before the move to take measurements. By then, if something doesn’t fit, it’s already too late to react. The advice is to measure everything in advance, do some basic space planning and confirm that your current furniture will fit in the new home before you organise anything.
The critical points you should always measure
First, the access points. Measure the width of the main entrance door, the width of the interior doors and that of any hallway a large piece of furniture has to pass through. Then measure all the relevant furniture: sofa, wardrobes, beds, dining set. Note down the width, length and height. Also account for protruding parts: legs, arms, backrests or decorative details that stick out from the main body. A sofa may be 2 metres (about 6.6 ft) wide, but if it has bulky arms, it effectively takes up 2.3 metres. The details matter.
The lift and the building’s hallways
If your new home is in a building with a lift, check its dimensions before the move. Many people skip this and then chaos follows: the wardrobe won’t fit in the lift and has to be carried up the stairs, with the extra cost that entails. Also measure the width of the building’s hallways, especially if there are bends or changes of direction. A piece of furniture may go straight in but not around a landing with a sharp angle. Access to the home is a whole planning exercise in itself.
Measure the destination space too
It’s no use the sofa fitting through the door if it won’t then fit in the living room. Measure the rooms each piece will go in: width, length and ceiling height. Identify where the windows, sockets and radiators are, as they determine the possible positions for your furniture. A very tall wardrobe could touch the ceiling if the flat has low ceilings. An oversized dining table may leave so little room that it becomes impossible to move around it. Space planning prevents surprises once everything is already inside the flat.
Tools and the diagonal trick
All you need is a flexible tape measure, paper and a pen. Take each measurement twice: it’s easy to make a mistake. Write down clearly which piece of furniture and which point each measurement refers to. When a piece has to go through a doorway at an angle (the usual way to manoeuvre furniture in tight spaces), use this practical formula: the diagonal of a rectangle is the square root of the sum of its sides squared. If the diagonal of the piece doesn’t exceed the width of the opening, it will fit. If not, you’ll need to dismantle it or find another solution. Mudanzas Trallero can review this during the pre-move visit if you have any doubts.
Avoid surprises with a pre-move review
Measuring before the move is one of the simplest and most overlooked pieces of advice. Spending an hour on this step can save you crane costs, last-minute dismantling or the disappointment of leaving behind a piece that won’t fit. Mudanzas Trallero can guide you through this review if your case calls for it. Avoid surprises with a pre-move review of your removal.
