Frequently Asked Questions

We quote one written number before moving day and that number does not move, as long as the inventory and access you told us about hold true. Local jobs can also run hourly — $129/hr for two movers and a truck, $169/hr for three — but most customers prefer the flat band: studios run $320–$520, one-bedrooms $520–$840, two-bedrooms $880–$1,420, three-bedrooms $1,480–$2,300, and four-bedroom houses $2,100–$3,200. You approve the figure before we lift anything.

Yes — a $99 deposit holds your date on our calendar, and it is applied straight to your final total, so it is not an extra fee. If you need to cancel, give us a couple of days’ notice and we will return it. It mainly keeps a truck and crew reserved for you instead of someone else.

The truck, the crew, fuel, moving blankets, dollies, hand tools, basic furniture disassembly and reassembly, and shrink-wrap for upholstery. There are no surprise charges for stairs or standard mileage inside the Triangle. Packing materials and labor, long carries you did not mention, and specialty items like a piano are quoted separately and shown on your estimate up front.

We do both. A full-pack — where our crew boxes the whole house the day before — starts at $360 in materials and labor and scales with the size of the home. Or we can do a partial: just the kitchen, just the breakables, just the art. If you would rather pack yourself to save money, that is fine; we will move what you box.

No. When you leave North Carolina with us, your shipment rides on our own dedicated truck — only your household on board. Our crew loads it here in Durham and meets it at the destination. Long-distance moves start at $1,950 with a binding written quote, so there is no surprise reweigh or line-haul markup at delivery.

Every move includes released-value protection at $0.60 per pound per item at no extra cost — that is the federal standard. For full replacement-value protection you can upgrade, and we carry up to $1,000,000 in cargo coverage per shipment. We will walk you through the difference before you sign so you are choosing on purpose, not by default.

Yes. We hold US DOT and MC authority for interstate moves, plus North Carolina Utilities Commission household-goods motor-carrier registration for moves within the state, and we are bonded and insured. We keep all of it current and can show proof on request — it is the baseline for doing this work legally in NC.

No — we run the trucks. Bull City Movers is a fully licensed and insured local moving company based in Durham, with our own eight-truck fleet and our own uniformed, full-time crew. We do not hand your job to a third party, sell your information, or connect you with someone else. The people who quote your move are the people who carry it.

Yes. We have climate-controlled vaults from $49 a month, which matters in a Piedmont summer when heat and humidity can warp wood and ruin electronics. We load your things into a vault, keep it sealed, and redeliver when your new place is ready — handy when a closing slips or a lease gap opens up.

We do a lot of campus-area moves and we plan around the calendar. End of semester and August turnover get crowded fast around the Duke and NCCU neighborhoods, so book early for those weeks. We will work the building’s loading window and parking rules so you are not paying for a crew that is stuck circling the block.

Yes. Most of the tobacco-district loft buildings — American Tobacco, Brightleaf, West Village — and a lot of the newer downtown towers require a certificate of insurance naming the building before they will let movers in. Give us the building’s requirements when you book and Tasha in the office will have the COI issued and sent over before your date.

For a weekday in the middle of the month, a week or so is usually enough. For the busy windows — the end of any month, the first of the month, summer, and Duke/NCCU move-out weeks — two to four weeks is safer, because the good crews book up. The $99 deposit locks your spot once you decide.