Moving House Made Easy: Changing Address

Many people who are moving to a new house are stressed about changing their address. No matter how many times you move, you still worry about missing letters, statements, services and people. But there are ways to make this change easier.

The easiest way to manage this is to have the post office divert your mail to your new address for the first 3-6 month, until you can notify all the services that have your previous address. The fee is reasonable and if you keep getting letters over time, you can see who you need to contact to change your address.

Another way to make sure your mail gets to you is to talk to the new tenants in your old house and give them stickers that say, “Moved to a new address, 54 Smith Street, Valley Creek”. The post will either forward the mail to you, or reply to sender with your new address now stuck on the front. All at no charge to you.

Christmas, birthdays, holidays and special events are a good opportunity to send people information about a new address. Make a sticker or a business card with your new address and attach it to your cards.

In the days of letters, I used to send people 2-3 stickers with our new address on them, so they could just stick them on letters they wanted to send us. Some years, I added a card (the size of a business card) with all of our names and our new contact details so people could keep them.

Today, email is a bit more common than handwritten letters. And people you email usually do not need your home address. But it is a good way to get your address to close friends and relatives. Send an email to your entire email list about the change of address. It is also a good way to clean out your email list, by deleting all the contacts with the emails that bounce back.

You can also make a note of your change of address in your email signature and add it to your email for a few months until everyone catches on.

A few important places to notify about the change are: the bank, your work place, health funds, superannuation, mobile service, car insurance, home insurance, city council, memberships, charities, magazines, accountant, lawyer, family and friends. With official places, it is best to do this in writing. These days, many of them have the option of changing your address online.

Last but not least, some social media sites can also help you with getting your change of address out to the word. But I would be careful about doing this. I personally think it is best to keep your home address as private as possible.

Join me next time for some “just in case” tips on what to prepare before the move.

Happy moving,
Ronit