How Much Do Movers Cost in Vancouver? (2026)

In Vancouver, two movers with a truck cost $140 an hour at Boss Moving, with a 2-hour minimum, 5% GST, and one flat travel block — no fuel, stairs or elevator fees. A typical two-bedroom move takes 5–6 hrs, so budget $700–$840 before GST. Larger crews are $195 (three movers) and $239 (four) an hour. Here is the whole bill, line by line.

Hourly Rates in Vancouver: One to Four Movers

Most local moves in Metro Vancouver are priced by the hour, and the rate depends on how many movers are on the crew. At Boss Moving the truck and the equipment — moving blankets, straps, dollies, floor runners — are inside the hourly figure, not billed beside it.

The minimum booking is 2 hours, so the smallest possible move on the two-mover crew is $280 in labour before the travel block and GST. Everything on this page is billed on actual time worked; the estimate you receive is a range built from the same tables below, and the rate card has a calculator if you want to try your own numbers.

How Much Do Movers Charge Per Hour — and What the Hour Covers

The hourly clock covers the work: loading at the first address, the drive between the two, and unloading at the second. Travel to reach you and to return after the job is handled separately, as one flat travel block charged at the crew's hourly rate and shown as its own line on the quote. Blocks are set by zone — commonly 30 or 60 minutes for a move inside Metro Vancouver, longer for the outer municipalities — and you see the figure before you book, not on the invoice.

So a two-mover move that takes 3 hours of work with a 30-minute travel block is $420 in labour plus $70 for travel: $490 before tax, $515 with 5% GST. There is nothing else on the invoice unless you asked for packing or storage, which are covered below.

Typical Cost by Home Size

These are the figures our quotes are generated from — the same move-duration table the estimate in your inbox is calculated against — shown on the 2-mover crew at $140 an hour, before the travel block and GST.

Two things about the table. First, the ranges cover both elevator and stair-carry buildings — there is no separate stairs price. Second, from three bedrooms up a three- or four-mover crew usually finishes sooner for a similar total, because the hours drop faster than the rate rises; we suggest the crew size when we quote rather than leaving it to you. For a 4-bedroom house specifically, the 4-bedroom cost guide works through the scenarios.

What Changes the Price

The bill is hours times rate, so anything that moves either one moves the total:

• Crew size. Two movers is the baseline. A third mover raises the rate to $195 an hour and typically cuts the hours on anything two-bedroom and up.
• Volume and readiness. How much there is, and whether it is in boxes. Furniture that comes apart on the day, drawers still full, a kitchen packed that morning — each adds time on the clock.
• Access. A long carry from the truck to the door, a small elevator, a third-floor walk-up, permit parking half a block away. Access changes the hours; it is never a fee.
• Distance between the addresses. The drive is on the clock, and the travel block is set by zone, so a Vancouver-to-Langley move carries more travel than one across Kitsilano.
• Packing. Quoted from a different hours table that already includes the packing time — see below — never as an hourly packing rate stacked on top.
• Specialty items. Pianos, pool tables and heavy tools and equipment are quoted after we know what they are, not at the hourly rate.
• Storage. If there is a gap between move-out and move-in, storage is a $99-a-month add-on quoted with the move — a person adds it to the quote, it is never applied automatically.

What Is Never Charged

Every mover's cost guide has a section called “hidden fees to watch for.” This is ours, except that these are the ones we do not have:

• No surcharge for fuel, stairs, elevator, mileage. Not one of them appears on a Boss Moving invoice, and the rate does not change when the crew climbs stairs.
• No weekend or evening premium. Crews work 7 days a week, 7am to 10pm, at the same published rates.
• There is no cancellation fee. We ask for 3 days' notice to cancel, and rescheduling is free.
• No charge for the reusable gear. moving blankets, straps, tape, dollies are included on every move, and standard furniture disassembly and reassembly is part of the job.
• No flat materials fee. Consumables — boxes, mattress wraps, furniture wrap, bubble wrap — are quoted after assessment, because a one-bedroom with a serious kitchen and one with two mugs are not the same box count.

Deposit, Payment and GST

A $100 deposit confirms your booking. It is a prepayment: it comes straight off the final invoice, so it is never money on top of the move. It is fully refundable with 3 or more days' notice, and non-refundable inside that window because the crew time was held for you. The balance is paid on move day — cash, card or e-transfer.

Tax is 5% GST, applied to the labour and travel lines and shown separately. There is no HST in British Columbia and no PST on moving labour, so 5% is the whole of it. When you compare quotes, check whether the other figure is before or after tax; ours are quoted before GST and say so.

Packing: What It Adds to the Bill

Packing is the line most people get wrong when they compare movers, because there are two different ways to buy it and they are billed off different rate cards.

Packing as part of the move

When the crew packs and moves you on the same day, the job is quoted from a packing-inclusive total-hours table at the ordinary moving rate. Those totals replace the move-only estimate above; they are never added to it, because the packing time already sits inside them. On the 2-mover crew:

Packing on its own

Packers who come the day before, with no move attached, are billed on their own clock at a packer-crew rate: $49 an hour for one packer, $99 for two and $139 for three, whole-crew rates with a 2-hour minimum. Either way, boxes and wrap are quoted after assessment and the reusable gear is free. The packing services page lays both paths out by home size.

Long-Distance Flat Rates from Vancouver

Outside Metro Vancouver the hourly model stops and a flat rate starts. These are starting prices for a standard two-bedroom home with two movers and a full truck; they include fuel, mileage and cargo insurance, and larger homes, extra stops or heavy items are quoted individually. The same flat rate applies in either direction.

• Vancouver ↔ Squamish — from $910
• Vancouver ↔ Whistler — from $1,260
• Vancouver ↔ Pemberton — from $1,260
• Vancouver ↔ Calgary — from $1,940

The Calgary run is a two- or three-day move with the crew's overnight lodging inside the rate; the Vancouver–Calgary page walks through the days. Squamish, Whistler and Pemberton are same-day on the Sea-to-Sky — see long distance moving.

Do Rates Change on Weekends or at Month-End?

No. Saturdays, Sundays and the last day of the month are billed at the same hourly rates as a Tuesday in the middle of it. What changes is availability: month-end and weekend dates fill first, and in a condo building the service elevator fills before we do. If your date is flexible, a mid-week, mid-month move is the one most likely to have both a crew and an elevator free; if it is not, book early and let a $100 deposit hold it. The best time to move in Vancouver covers the calendar.

Where These Rates Apply

The hourly rates cover Metro Vancouver — Vancouver, Burnaby, Surrey, Richmond, Coquitlam, North Vancouver, West Vancouver, Delta, Langley, Maple Ridge, New Westminster, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody — and the flat rates cover Squamish, Whistler, Pemberton, Calgary. We also move to and from Victoria; that one is quoted after an assessment rather than at a flat rate, because the BC Ferries fare depends on the length of the truck. We do not serve the Okanagan, the rest of Vancouver Island or the Fraser Valley beyond Langley and Maple Ridge, so a Nanaimo or Kelowna quote from us would be a guess, and we would rather say so.

How to Get an Accurate Quote

The most accurate quote comes from telling your mover the full picture: both addresses, home size, floor and elevator access at each end, any specialty items, whether you want packing, and your date. With that, we send a written estimate with the crew size, the hours range, the travel block and the GST as separate lines — the same numbers this page is built from, not a separate marketing figure. Be wary of a fixed price quoted before any of those questions were asked; it is either a guess or a plan to add charges later.

Send us the details or call (604) 726-9828, and read the move-prep guide before the day — preparation is the one cost lever that is entirely yours.