Van hire – Luton or XLWB sprinter for moving

We are moving house in a couple of weeks and are doing the move ourselves. It will be one trip ( from Pembs to Wrexham)and a one way hire. I cant decide whether an XLWB van will be enough or whether a luton is needed( however, there is little availablity of lutons to hire in pembs). Anyone got any experience of either van for moving. Just how much stuff can you get in either? I know the luton is higher, but just how practical is the up high space?

Whichever has the tail-lift, would be my recommendation.
Lifting things up into either will fast be tiresome without one! I’ve moved a fair few times, so speaks the voice of experience.

Bigger is better. Not as critical packing.

Last time I moved a whole 2 bed house + well stocked myself it pretty much filled 2 lutons (remember also there’s a weight limit as well as a volume one).

If you are doing that distance and have more than a flat worth of stuff I would get movers in. I was cynical until we did it for our last move. Flip me what a difference!

Other things to know…

The Luton shape is much more useful.

In my albeit limited experience lutons are not great to drive and a bit more tiring than a normal van

7.5t and tail lift if it was me.
Xlwb sprinters are less than a ton load capacity IIRC, easy to go over weight with them.

Have you had movers in to quote? Sometimes it’s a lot cheaper than you expexr

+1 Luton tail lift

Get a removal company in. So much less hassle for about the same money Ime

Deffo a Luton. Imagine the stress when it doesn’t all fit! Especially if you are moving awkward stuff like bikes.

A Luton is significantly wider as well, not just height.

(I drive a van at home and a Luton at work. Big difference)

XLWB sprinters / XLWB Transits are all known quantities – you know what size they’ll be. Lutons are all custom built and can vary in size enormously – so look at, and measure, the van you’re planning to hire – especially if you’re hoping to get everything in one trip. On the Panel Van front the new shape transits are taller and squarer inside than the sprinter (but a tiny bit shorter). The new transits have a really horrible clutch though – you’ll used to it by the time you’re unloading at your new home (actually you’ll never get used to it) but you’ll kangaroo and stall out of the hire centre.

A factor is also what stuff you are moving – is it big (beds, sofas, wardrobes) or heavy (books etc)

Lutons have more space but carry less weight than comparable panel vans and having a tail lift fitted knocks another third of a ton off their capacity. So lutons for big light stuff, panel van for lots of heavy items. Its really, really easy to overload a luton and the bigger the luton body is the less weight capacity it has and the more likelihood you’ll overload. The 4.4m bodied. tail-lift vans I hire have pretty much the same weight carrying capacity as my astra van. So do all your worldly goods weight less than 700kg?

With a luton then unless theres anything you can’t lift to waist height safely then I’d avoid a tail lift as its just useless weight – you prob won’t get the option though, they’re pretty much standard issue these days.

Lutons are also prone to leaking, particularly if the body has had any knocks – but even brand news ones can be leaky which you need to be wary of if any of your stuff would be vulnerable to water damage. The front end around above the cab and the area around the roller shutter doors are the worst offenders

A concern with either style of van is hire companies can be terrible at fitting any kind of tie bars or load restraints (or supplying straps or ties). Lutons in particular pendulum about a lot because they are so tall (and the load bed is high compared to panel vans) Not having anything to secure to means you can’t use the height of the vehicle effectively and your stuff is going so shift and slide all around the back of the van as you drive.

So don’t just phone /online for prices and orders – go and look at the vehicles. Theres a fair bit of variation between models and luton bodies and hire co’s don’t describe their vehicles well (or promise a particular model) and a big variation in condition too. Measure inside, see whats inside to secure to and make sure you’ve get the right stuff to strap to whatevers there.

We’re moving next month and we went through the same thought process but 4 bed house + 2x kids worth of toys and clothes etc.

Only moving a mile down the road but getting removals company in to do it, partly because we need to get our stuff into storage for a couple of days and partly because its almost zero faff in comparison to hiring vans.

Yes, its more expensive – its costing us about £1500 with us packing everything but fragile stuff, removals packing fragile stuff for us, loading into 2 vans over 2 days, storage for a few nights and then bringing it all back to the new house and unloading into the right rooms. Piano, 2 double beds, bunk beds, wardrobes, 4 sofas/chairs, kitchen table and chairs, model railway (!), boxes and boxes and boxes of stuff etc.

Only thing we’re doing ourselves is moving the stuff out of the cellar and garden which I’ll just hire a SWB Transit/Transporter for.

Just a side note really with DIY removals… If you’re sticking everything you own in one van, from (and even on) the front drive of your old house to the front drive of your new one its uninsured by your household insurance . And even if you do get goods in transit insurance it’ll still be uninsured over night unless its in a locked compound.

There have been more than a few instances of folk packing a luton/7.5 tonner all day then having everything they own driven away in the night

So over longer distances you need to think about whether you can load, travel and unload in one day.

I’ve used both: go for the biggest Sprinter you can find – the tail lip is fairly low so lack of lift not essential and the extra height of the Luton van isn’t necessarily that useful – what will go at the bottom without being damaged and how will you secure the load? Not easy…

Sprinter van was also much easier to drive and better on fuel.

Having said all that, it took two van loads the last time we moved, not an issue for us as it was a mile down the road but not an option for the OP.

To get it all in one go I think you’d need a 7.5 tonne (which you might be able to drive on your licence – check) or hire a removal company.

7.5t you can drive if you passed your test before January 1997 IIRC. I looked into a few weeks ago… I passed in the June so no Convoy-esque mucking around for me on moving day 🙁

7.5t you can drive if you passed your test before January 1997 IIRC

Theres a can of worms there though – being licensed to drive and the purposes you can drive for are different matters. Move home yourself with yourself at the wheel – thats ok. Ask your mate dave with granddad rights to drive it and bung him £50 and you’re both potentially in quite expensive bother. Because its a minefield you might find hire co’s are reluctant to hire to anyone that doesn’t have an operators license. My hire co will also only hire their 7.5s to people with trade accounts with them.

Yes, its more expensive – its costing us about £1500 with us packing everything but fragile stuff,

Get a quote for full packing. In fact don’t, just order it 🙂

Have you had movers in to quote? Sometimes it’s a lot cheaper than you expexr

Get a quote for full packing. In fact don’t, just order it

+1 to both of them.

Our move ended up being really cheap (about £500) for 3 luton van loads in a day (10 miles).

Which says 2 things, 1 luton vans are actually pretty small (3 bed flat + garage). 2 removals are pretty cheap if you find someone who’s quiet that day.

Downside was they didn’t do packing, which would only have been about £200 more (on top of £1300 quotes) from the other companies.

Seeing as packing the van took <1hour each time (4 of us), and packing the boxes had taken weeks I’d definitely pay for packing next time!

1 bed flat + garage (no furniture) didn’t quite all fit in a LWB transit, and it was FULL, plus load/drive/unload all in a day (see insurance post above) is quite the effort.

Much cheaper than removals for us, and I think it was the right choice..but borderline.

Thanks for all the replies.

After phoning around, Ive now found out that I cant get a luton or 7.5 tonne on a one way hire from any hire companies down here. However, I have provisionally booked a transit jumbo which has a gross vehicle weight of 4.7 tonnes ( payload weight of 2.3 tonnes and dims of 4.7mx1.9mx1.7m). I have also been helped out by the fact that my parents have said I can leave some stuff in their garage, so we will take what will fit in the van.

We have a week off work before the move so all furniture will be flatpacked and everything else will be packed ready to fill the van up. I don’t have a garage and have had a massive clearout already, bikes will go on the car roof, so , fingers crossed we can get the majority of stuff in.

With fuel, I’m looking at ~£300 for a two day, one way hire.

a gross vehicle weight of 4.7 tonnes

A long time since you were a teenager then teenrat? 🙂

dims of 4.7mx1.9mx1.7m

I’d be surprised of the 4.7m is correct

yep, it is (I’m 37) . Im guessing you need C1 on your licence to drive it – although the hire people didn’t ask for it? Or maybe the hire guy got his facts and figures all mixed up

We have a week off work before the move so all furniture will be flatpacked and everything else will be packed ready to fill the van up.

IMO waste of a weeks holidays…, surely this has a ‘value’ to you?

I’d be surprised of the 4.7m is correct

Quick google for “transit jumbo dimensions” suggests 4m loadspace.

It won’t fit…get the 7.5t Luton. Its not as if you can pile the excess furniture on the front garden and pop back for it in the afternoon!

Colleague at work was telling me how he thought his removal company had a van that was way too big considering the furniture he had. Full to the roof all the way back to the shutters!

The Transit Jumbo is just a LWB with a bit of a chassis extension, unless they mean a Transit Luton but thats not a Jumbo.

When we moved we had a tiny 2 bed mid terrace, we did trips the week before and filled a friends garage with the entire contents of loft, shed, garden, on the day we filled two cars, a camper van with 3.6m loadspace (granted it had furniture in it but it still took six bikes, all the bedding, clothes, breakables and many many boxes) and we still filled our horse trailer to the roof (2x2x3 metre cube plus the front area) with beds and sofa etc. And thats a proper cube, unlike a Jumbo with walls that lean in at the top.

The nice thing about the 7.5t is when you realise you have some space left, you just don’t load it so high.