Senior move: A Client’s story

In a recent senior move, we assisted a couple who, after 34 years in their beautiful cluster were downsizing.  For the sake of their privacy, we will call them Stan and Pat.  Stan and Pat have two daughters, one living out of the country and the other, based in Johannesburg but with work responsibilities that did not allow her to take the time off to be physically available for the move.

One of the main reasons for the move is that Stan’s health had deteriorated significantly to the point of needing 24-hour care.  As a result, their move involved two steps… the first was to move Stan across and directly into the frail care facility of the retirement community.  The second step would be moving his wife, Pat into one of the cottages.

Senior move team packing the closet.
Marylou and Nozi take a selfie while packing up the closet.

Breathing space during a senior move

We felt that it would be best to have a few days of breathing space between the two moves.  Moving day is an emotionally exhausting day, even if you are not physically involved in the move, and we wanted to pace Pat through this process.

We also worked with two different moving companies for each of these moves due to the nature of the move and what was required.  At Clear Path, we don’t work exclusively with one moving company and being familiar with our preferred suppliers we know and understand which moving company will be best for a particular move.

On the day of Stan’s move, we were on-site first thing to receive the movers.  Having worked with Pat regarding their furniture and having drawn up an inventory we were very familiar with which pieces were going to Stan’s new home.  We then oversaw the loading of these items.  

With Stan going into frail care there was not a lot of packing of boxes to do, so the team quickly got his clothes, toiletries and personal items into boxes and loaded them.

On arrival at the retirement community, we oversaw the offload and positioned the furniture as Pat and I had discussed to maximize the space in the room.  We then unpacked all Stan’s clothes and belongings.

Because Pat knew that we had the move in hand, she was able to focus solely on Stan.  By the time she arrived at the frail care with Stan to settle him in – his bed was made, and his clothes, toiletries and personal items were unpacked.  We had also picked up that there was a connection issue with the TV and had maintenance there to sort it out.  Pat’s words to us at the end of the day were “You were lifesavers, I don’t even know how I would have done that without you!”.

Pat also then felt so much more relaxed about her own move the following week knowing that we would be overseeing it all.

Click here to find out more about our senior moving service.