Moving Your Piano? What Your Tuner Wishes You Knew First

Moving is stressful enough without worrying about what happens to your piano. But a few things are worth knowing before the truck shows up, because the decisions you make about the move can affect your piano for months afterward.

First and most important: hire actual piano movers. Not your regular moving company, not your strong friends, not the guys with a truck on Craigslist. Piano movers have specialized equipment — piano boards, heavy-duty straps, ramps, and the experience to tilt, wrap, and secure an instrument weighing anywhere from 300 to 1,200 pounds. A regular mover might get the piano from point A to point B, but the risk of damage — to the piano, to your home, and to the people carrying it — goes up dramatically.

In the Seattle area, there are several reputable piano moving companies. Ask your tuner for a recommendation — we see the aftermath of moves regularly and have strong opinions about who does good work. A proper piano move for a local upright typically runs $300 to $500. Grands cost more because they need to be disassembled (legs removed, lid secured) and wrapped more carefully. It's real money, but it's a fraction of what the piano is worth and what a botched move can cost you.

Timing matters, too. After a piano is moved, it needs time to acclimate to its new environment before being tuned. The piano has gone from one set of temperature and humidity conditions to another, and it needs to settle. I generally recommend waiting four weeks after a move before scheduling a tuning. If you try to tune it too soon, it could just drift right back out as the wood adjusts.

Summer is actually a reasonable time to move a piano in the Pacific Northwest, for what it's worth. The weather is dry and predictable, so the piano won't get rained on during the move, and the temperature differences between your old and new places are minimal. Winter moves aren't the end of the world, but going from a heated home into a cold truck and then into another heated home creates some thermal stress on the instrument.

A few other things to keep in mind: Don't store a piano in a garage, even temporarily. Garages in the PNW are damp, unheated, and full of temperature swings — basically the worst possible environment. If you need to store a piano between moves, a climate-controlled storage unit is worth the expense. And when you set the piano up in your new place, think about placement — the same rules about interior walls, away from windows and heating vents, apply in the new home just as much as the old one.

Once you're settled, give me a call, and we'll get the piano tuned and happy in its new home.