Moving Out of a Melbourne Apartment: Lifts, Docks and Access

In a house, the move starts when the truck arrives. In an apartment building, it starts when the lift is booked — and if it isn't, the truck can be sitting at the kerb with nowhere to go.

Melbourne has a lot of apartment stock, from CBD towers to three-storey walk-ups in the inner suburbs, and each type has its own bottleneck. Here's what to sort before the day.

Book the lift, early

Most buildings with a service lift require you to reserve it, and many restrict moves to particular days and hours — commonly weekdays within business hours, sometimes with weekend moves prohibited outright.

Contact building management or the owners corporation as soon as you have a date. Ask:

• Does the service lift need to be booked, and how far ahead?
• What hours are moves permitted?
• Is there a bond or a fee?
• Do the lift walls need protective padding, and who installs it?
• Is there a certificate of currency required from the removalist?
• What are the lift's internal dimensions and weight limit?

That last one matters more than people expect. A two-metre sofa or a tall wardrobe may not fit into a standard passenger lift, and if there's no service lift the alternative is the stairs — which changes the time and the cost of the job substantially.

Loading dock and truck access

Where does the truck actually stop? In the CBD and inner suburbs the honest answer is often "not very close".

• Loading docks usually need booking too, and many have height restrictions — 2.5 to 3.5 metres is common, which rules out larger removal trucks.
• Basement car parks are almost always too low for a truck. Assume no.
• Kerbside may need a council permit, especially in clearway or metered zones.

Tell your removalist the truck height limit if there is one. It determines which vehicle comes, and finding out on the morning means either a long carry or a return trip with a smaller van. There's more on the street side of this in moving day parking and truck access.

The walk-up problem

Older three- and four-storey blocks without lifts are common across Carlton, Fitzroy, St Kilda and Prahran. They're perfectly manageable, but be upfront about it when quoting — a third-floor walk-up is a materially different job from a ground-floor unit, and it's one of the most common reasons a quote changes on the day.

Worth checking in advance:

• Stair width and whether there are tight landings or switchbacks
• Whether large furniture will physically turn the corners
• Whether there's an alternative external access route

If something genuinely won't go down the stairs, it's better to know a fortnight out than to be standing on a landing at 10am deciding whether to dismantle a wardrobe.

Both ends, not just one

The most frequent oversight is arranging everything at the departure address and nothing at the arrival address. If you're moving into an apartment, that building has its own lift booking, its own dock hours and its own rules — and you may not have keys or contact details yet.

Ask the agent or the vendor for building management contact details as soon as the sale or lease is confirmed. It's a two-minute question that routinely saves a wasted afternoon.

Protect what you're liable for

In a strata building, damage to common property — lift walls, corridor paint, lobby flooring — usually comes back to the resident who was moving. Padding the lift and laying floor protection isn't bureaucratic box-ticking; it's what stops a scuff becoming a bill.

Take photos of the lift interior and corridors before the move starts. If there's existing damage, you'll be glad you have a timestamped record of it.

A short pre-move call

Ten minutes on the phone with building management typically resolves the lift booking, the permitted hours, the dock height and the padding question all at once. Do it before you finalise the removal booking, not after — the building's rules may decide your date for you.

We move apartments across the CBD and inner Melbourne regularly and can work around lift windows and dock bookings. Have a look at our local removals page, or tell us about the building and we'll flag anything worth checking before you book.