The beach house you inherited, the village flat you’ve finally finished renovating, or the mountain apartment you plan to escape to every weekend. They all have one thing in common: you’re not going to empty your main home to fill them, but you can’t furnish them with a few things crammed into the boot either.
A move to a second home is a half-move, and that’s precisely why it tends to be poorly planned. There’s no key handover date breathing down your neck and no lease about to expire, so everything gets left until the last minute. And then along comes an August Saturday with the rented van, the street blocked off and the sofa that won’t fit up the stairs.
Table of contents
- What a move to a second home involves
- What stays in each house
- Access: where the surprises come from
- A house closed up for months needs a check
- Buying at the destination or bringing it from home
- When to move and which type of service to choose
- What comes and goes with the seasons
- Common mistakes in a move to a second home
- Organize the move with time to spare
What a move to a second home involves
A move to a second home is the transport of furniture, belongings and personal items to a property that isn’t your main residence and that you use temporarily: on holidays, weekends or during certain times of the year. It’s usually a partial move, where part of what’s sent comes from your main home and another part arrives new or comes from a storage unit.
It’s not a rare situation. According to Spain’s 2021 Population and Housing Census from the INE (National Statistics Institute), there were 2,514,511 occasionally used homes in a total housing stock of 26.6 million. The INE itself notes that this classification, based on electricity consumption, is provisional, but it gives a clear idea of how many families have a house they only open for part of the year.
What stays in each house
Before you start thinking about trucks, divide things up. Walk through your main home and decide what can travel without leaving a gap you’ll later have to fill: the hallway cabinet that no longer fits, the extendable table you only use at Christmas, the guest beds, the tableware piling up in the loft.
Then think about what would be worth duplicating. Bed linen, kitchen utensils, cleaning products and a small first aid kit are the things most often forgotten and the most frustrating when they’re missing. Do you really want to travel back and forth every weekend with the hairdryer in your suitcase?
With that breakdown you can start estimating the volume. This is where many people underestimate, because a fully furnished holiday home takes up more than it seems. If you want to fine-tune it, review how to calculate the real volume of a move without falling short before you request a quote.
Access: where the surprises come from
Most second homes aren’t on an avenue with a dedicated loading bay. They’re in gated developments, in old town centers with narrow streets, or at the end of a dirt track. A large truck may not be able to reach the door, and then you’ll need a smaller vehicle for the final stretch or a transfer that’s worth planning for.
Check what happens inside too. Narrow staircases, old doors less than eighty centimeters wide, terraces you can only reach from outside. In village houses with thick walls and small windows, a large wardrobe can be impossible to carry up indoors. In those cases, a facade lift system avoids unnecessary dismantling and damage to the staircase.
If the development has rules about timing or access for heavy vehicles, ask the management for them in writing. And if the municipality requires reserving space on the public road, it needs to be arranged in advance.
A house closed up for months needs a check
Putting new furniture into a damp house is the fastest way to ruin it. Before the move, visit the property and open the cupboards, check the walls and ceilings, air it out and look for stains or mold. In coastal areas, salt affects metals and appliances, so it’s worth thinking carefully about what you bring there.
Make sure the utilities are working too. Electricity and water should be connected before moving day, because the crew needs lighting and, if appliances have to be installed, a working outlet. It sounds obvious, but it’s one of the most common oversights.
Finally, sort out the keys. If you won’t be there when the truck arrives, someone you trust needs to open the house, know where everything goes and sign for the delivery.
Buying at the destination or bringing it from home
This is one of the most common dilemmas. Buying new furniture and having it delivered straight to the second home sounds convenient, but it means being there to receive it, sometimes on different days, and assembling each piece on the spot. If the house is far away, every failed delivery is a wasted trip.
Bringing furniture from your main home has another, less obvious advantage: you use the move to free up space at home. That sideboard taking up half the hallway or the furniture from a grown child’s room who has already moved out can have a second life in the holiday home.
Our view is that the most sensible approach is usually a mix. Bulky items in good condition travel in the move; new purchases are concentrated into one or two deliveries that coincide with your stay. And if you order something, ask for it to arrive after the move, not before: that way it doesn’t get mixed up with the boxes or end up at a house with no one there to receive it.
When to move and which type of service to choose
The temptation is to use your holiday to do it all at once. The problem is that the summer weeks and long weekends concentrate demand, and at tourist destinations you also face traffic restrictions and the heat. If you can, shift the date to the off-season: you’ll have more availability, better access and a house you can get ready without rushing.
The type of service changes with distance. When the second home is in another province, at Mudanzas Trallero we work with two options: a direct or exclusive service, where the truck leaves as soon as loading is done, and a shared-load (groupage) service, which shares transport with other moves heading to the same area. The latter is cheaper, though the delivery date depends on the other loads. For a holiday home that isn’t in a hurry, it’s often a sensible choice.
If the journey is long, keep in mind what’s involved in organizing a long-distance move between two cities, with its prior survey and its loading and delivery schedule.
What comes and goes with the seasons
A second home isn’t furnished just once. Over time, items start moving between the two houses: garden furniture that spends the winter under cover, bicycles, ski gear, seasonal clothing or book collections that don’t fit in the main home.
If this back and forth happens every year, think about where each thing will be in each season. A storage unit near your main home can serve as a halfway point for whatever you don’t want to leave in an empty house over winter, especially if it’s valuable or sensitive to damp.
Common mistakes in a move to a second home
The first is bringing furniture that doesn’t fit. Measure the rooms in the new house, not just the furniture, and sketch a simple floor plan. The second is failing to protect what’s already there: terracotta floors, old wooden doors or banisters that scratch easily.
Another typical mistake is improvising with a rented van to save money. It works with a few boxes, but not with a full bedroom, and even less so if you have to make several trips of hundreds of miles. That’s where the apparent savings disappear into fuel, tolls and the odd piece of furniture that doesn’t survive the trip.
And the last, perhaps the most common, is leaving the house unfinished. Arriving in July and discovering there’s no curtain, no sofa bed mattress or no gas bottle turns your first holiday into a list of errands.
Organize the move with time to spare
A move to a second home goes well when it’s planned for what it is: a relocation with its own rules of access, season and division between two homes. Make the inventory, check the house, decide the date with a margin and choose the type of transport that fits your calendar.
At Mudanzas Trallero we carry out a prior on-site survey and provide a fixed written quote, and we handle the council permits when they’re needed. Plan the move to your second home without surprises and start enjoying it from day one.
