Is storage rent always on a month-to-month basis? Can you rent for longer periods of time in advance and save? What happens if you want your stuff out in the middle of the month? Hope answers your questions once and for all.
Hi there, thanks for joining us again on Flex TV. My name is Hope and I will be answering all of your storage-related questions. And today I got a question from Laura. What Laura wants to know is, are storage units rented on a month-to-month basis? Now this is important to a lot of us, not only because we don’t always want to make a long-term commitment to a storage company or a specific facility, but also because sometimes we can find ourselves caught in between homes or we need storage just for a little while to get our stuff in order. Or we want to do a renovation, anything like that, and you really want to have the option of short-term storage. So the answer generally is yes, most companies offer month-to-month storage rentals. And you’ll notice when you’re booking that one of the first questions they ask is about the duration of storage. Now you want to take into account that when it comes to storing month-by-month, usually the rent will be higher than if you store for long periods of time. So if you commit to four months, eight months, or a year in advance, you’ll get a discount on your storage rent. So if you know you’re going to be storing for a long time, going for longer periods ahead of time and using the discounts is usually a better idea. However, we do want the flexibility sometimes of just being able to store for a little while and not committing to long-term periods. So if that’s the case, you really should pay attention to one really important thing. Most storage facilities will allow you to move your stuff out anytime you want. However, they will be charging you for the full month. So take note of that. Even if you start a month and you only need three days of storage, you’re going to be paying the full month’s rent. So you really want to talk about this with your rep ahead of time or read the fine print on the website. So to make sure you don’t encounter any surprise charges on your bill at the end of the month, talk to your rep ahead of time, read the fine print on the website, and make sure you can move out anytime you want so that you can stay flexible and just use the storage for the time that you need it. You want to have a flexible facility that will allow you to move out anytime. You want to make sure ahead of time what you’ll actually be paying if you do move out in the middle of the month. And you want to look out for discounts, promotions, for long-term storage, and maybe take advantage of that. If you see a promotion of a certain company, negotiate a little bit. Talk to them about maybe you want to stay less, but you do want to have a more reasonable price. Most storage providers will give you a better price if you really push a little bit. Eventually, it’s all about checking the policy, making sure with your rep that you can leave whenever you want. So in conclusion, some companies will offer you storage discounts if you store for longer periods of time. But in my experience, if you push a little bit, you could probably get them to be a little bit more flexible on the price, allowing you to store for as long