We planned to make a move from Bergen County, NJ last August, 2021. I contacted Montvale Movers in April of 2021 and asked for an estimate. At that time, I made Marty (the owner) aware that there would be 2 stops involved. The first stop would be at a storage unit in PA, and the second stop would be at our daughter's home in PA where we were going to live for that upcoming year. Marty came and personally gave us an estimate. He walked around the house, noted everything we were taking, took copious notes, and he marked down everything that needed to be disassembled or taken down. He then sent me an estimate a few days later. That estimate was for $5,772. The estimate included 2 trucks (we were moving a whole house of things) and 6 men, as well as the charge for packing up everything, dismantling things, taking things down, packing and placing things in the storage unit and bringing the remaining things to our daughter's home. Marty was aware of every detail of the move.
In August, the men came and packed everything. (We have yet to move to our final home which is being built, so we don't know how well everything was packed. I will update this review at a later date.) It took an entire day to do the packing. The next day they drove to the storage unit in PA and we met them there. They moved things into the storage unit and brought things to our daughter's house as planned. We tipped the guys about $1000 between all of them. A few days later we got the final bill......
The price had jumped $3000! When I questioned Ray (who was the lead guy in the move) and then Marty, they gave me some sort of double talk about how it took longer than expected (not my fault), and they needed more supplies (also not my fault). Clearly he gave me a low-ball estimate to get the job, and then jacked up the price when I had no further recourse other than to pay it. Both of them continued to say "We will take care of you when we move you to NC into your new home". OK, well, I had no choice but to accept this, although I thought it was a real sleazy practice. When I asked how much the move to NC would be, Marty told me about $10,000. We had intended to use Montvale Movers for that move as well.
Fast forward to a month ago, and now my new home is ready and we are ready to go to NC. I called Marty. How much will it cost? Now he says "$15,000". So THAT is how they are going to "take care of me"? I have since gotten 3 other estimates: all were under $11,000 with a guarantee (once the truck is weighed) of an increase of no more than $1000.
We chose Montvale Movers because of the great reviews. But now we say, beware of those reviews and using these guys. Ours was NOT a good experience. Someone else wrote a review about price gouging. Yes indeed. We were victims of that as well. Rest assured, we are not going to use them for our move heading south. read more