VanRental.co.uk has just published a new guide to self storage.

The market for self storage has grown steadily in recent years. Many people now find that they simply have too much stuff to keep it all in their homes.

Sky-high city housing prices, difficulties with housing chains and temporary stays in rented accommodation have all helped grow the market for self storage across the UK, particularly in London, the south east and in major cities.

Van rental customers are often also in need of storage facilities, so we have produced a Self Storage Guide to help you understand how self storage works.

The principles are simple – you get a storage room that is all yours for a fixed weekly or monthly fee.

Most companies provide a wide range of size choices – from cupboard-sized up to an area the size of a garage, or even bigger. It all depends what you need. Most self storage companies provide quotes by email, some have prices on their website.

To find out more about self storage, click here.

If you are thinking of moving abroad or buying a holiday home in the sun, you will have a lot of decisions to make and questions to answer before you can complete the deal and take possession of the keys to your dream home.

One way of speeding up this process is to get all the information you need in one place – and the best way to do this is to visit a large overseas property exhibition. A Place In The Sun Live is one of the UK’s biggest overseas property shows and it is taking place at the Birmingham NEC this weekend (30th September – 2nd October)

A wide range of exhibitors from all the popular overseas home markets will be at the show – Spain, Portugal, Florida, Turkey, Cyprus and more. Of course, the presenters of the A Place In The Sun television series - Jonnie Irwin, Jasmine Harman and Amanda Lamb – will also be there with advice and tips for overseas home buyers.

Remember: If you are planning to buy (or sell) a home in Europe, we have a number of unique resources on VanRental.co.uk that will help you arrange the move abroad:

• Van Hire To Spain – our unique guide to the UK companies which offer one-way van hire between the UK and Spain
• European Van Hire – many UK van rental companies allow you to take their vans across the Channel – find out more here
• Book A Ferry - our ferry guide talks you through the information you will need to book your hire van on a ferry and shows you all the most UK-Europe ferry routes, including direct sailings to Spain and Ireland.
• Finally, don’t forget to check out our guide to driving a van abroad.

Are you planning to hire a van for a small scaffolding job? Perhaps you are working on a self-build home or a holiday home renovation.

Scaffolding comes in a wide range of shapes and sizes and can be quite heavy. You definitely need to have a rough idea of what you will be transporting before you choose a hire van (or 7.5 tonne truck) to carry it; paying for delivery sometimes makes more sense.

Types of Scaffolding

There are two main types of scaffolding – conventional scaffolding and system scaffolding.

Put simply, conventional scaffolding is what scaffolding companies use – it is suitable for all jobs, can be built to almost any shape and size and is very strong and long-lasting. It is also requires skilled scaffolders to erect it – it is not DIY friendly if you don’t have any experience of scaffolding.

System scaffolding is designed for DIY use – it is a bit like the scaffolding equivalent of flat-pack furniture. You can buy it in kits and it comes with instructions! Most people working on self-build and DIY renovation projects will choose system scaffolding if they want to put up their own scaffolding – it is safer and easier.

This website sells both types of scaffolding and has lots of good information – it is well worth a read if you want to learn a bit about scaffolding from the experts.

What Size Van For Scaffolding?

Scaffolding tube comes in a variety of lengths.

Conventional scaffolding tube comes in various different lengths, up to 21ft (6.4m). The longest size that can be accommodated in an extra-long wheelbase panel van is 13ft (4m). If you do transport scaffolding this way, only do so in a van with a steel bulkhead and make sure you push the scaffolding tubes hard up against the bulk head. You don’t want the scaffolding tubes to come shooting forwards underneath you if you have to brake suddenly…

The size and weight of scaffolding tubes is why scaffolding for large jobs is always transported on a lorry, usually a 7.5 tonne dropside.

System scaffolding such as Kwikstage and Cuplok seems to come in shorter lengths. I think this is due to the modular way it is constructed. The longest lengths I have found are 12′ (3.6m) – so you should be able to load this into an extra-long wheelbase van without problems. Again, make sure you load the tubes so they are lying flat and are pushed up against the bulkhead.

Remember: If you are planning to transport scaffolding, make sure you understand its weight and dimensions accurately before arranging a hire van with suitable payload and loadspace dimensions. This article is provided for information purposes only and is not a definitive guide.

Click here for our guide to van sizes.

Holiday homes seem to offer the opportunity for endless idyllic holidays, but as anyone who has owned one knows, that is only half the story.

Many people buy old wrecks with the intention of doing them up and even those that don’t often discover that at least some of their holidays will have to be spent on DIY and maintenance work.

If you are working on a big project abroad, one of the problems you might face is arranging for all the supplies you need to be delivered to your holiday home. Not only will you probably have a language barrier to deal with, but you are also likely to have very tight time frames.

After all, if you are planning to spend a fortnight fitting a new kitchen to your Spanish villa, a delivery estimate of ‘the next fortnight’ is not much use. It can’t be delivered before you get there but it needs to be delivered as soon as you get there. My experience of UK building merchants and kitchen suppliers is that kind of precision delivery is a rare thing.

One solution that could save a lot of frustration and risk is to simply take everything you need with you. That way, you can choose, order and inspect your materials at your leisure before you go and know that you will have everything you need to hand as soon as you arrive at your holiday home.

There’s still one problem – I hear you say – how on earth can I get it all there?

Van hire, of course! Plenty of UK companies allow their vans to be taken abroad and modern vans are more than capable of munching up a few thousand foreign motorway miles at respectable speeds.

What’s more, if your holiday home is in Spain, you can hire a van one way from the UK to Spain. Your family can follow along behind or go ahead, you can bring the stuff in the van and then you can return the van and return home with your family.

What could be simpler?

Click here for more information on one-way van hire between Spain, UK and Portugal.

If you’re in typical student accomodation, you will have to move out at the end of every term. That means you will be emptying out your room in just a few weeks’ time.

But where is your stuff going to go?

You might manage to fit everything into a car – but that probably means a long return trip for Mum and Dad in their car(s) or manically cramming everything into your own car. Neither option is ideal.

We recommend student van hire and/or self storage over the holidays. Companies such as Big Yellow provide short-term self storage at very reasonable rates in most major towns and cities around the UK.

Similarly, some van hire companies will hire to students – even down to the age of 19 (click here for more details of the Hertz student van hire offer if you’re aged 19-24).

To get started, choose one of the links below:

• Get a self-storage quote now
• Get a van hire quote now
• Visit our student van hire & storage page for more details

Are you a student who has to move out of your accomodation at the end of every term?

Have you tried to hire a van before and been turned away because you are too young?

Car and van rental giant Hertz has felt your pain and has launched a new offer exclusively for students. Here’s the deal:

• You  must be a student and have a valid student ID card
• You must be aged 19 or over
• You must have held a full driving licence for at least one year
• You will need a credit card in your own name

If you meet these criteria, you can hire a van* and benefit from a 20% discount on Hertz’s usual rates.

Remember that, if you are aged 19-24, you will still have to pay a Young Driver Surcharge. (To cut the cost of this, why not share your van with another student and halve the cost?)

*Selected vans only, but they should be plenty big enough for the average student move.

One of the problems students living in university accommodation have to deal with is the need to move all of their possessions out of their rooms at the end of every term – and then back in again a few weeks later.While this isn’t a new situation – it was the same for me when I was at university 10+ years ago – it isn’t getting any easier to solve.

There are two main problems:

• Where to put all the ‘stuff’
• How to transport it there

Students with their own cars have an advantage over those without – but having your own car isn’t necessarily a solution – many small cars are just too small, especially if two friends are travelling home together.

Instead, I’d like to suggest two possible solutions for struggling students. Neither of them cost the earth and both are safer and easier than a hugely overloaded car:

• Self Storage – Companies like Big Yellow operate affordable self storage units all over the UK (Big Yellow has 72 locations). You only pay for what you use and the minimum term is often just one week.
• Student van hire – although minimum age requirements can be a problem for students trying to hire a van, it may be possible for students heading to the same location to club together and hire a van between 2/3 people – only one of them needs to be old enough to drive it.

You can find out about one-way van hire here and find more details on student self storage and student van hire here.

Finally, in case you are transporting all of your belongings to and from university in a small car, here are a few tips from the IAM to help you keep things safe and legal:

• Pack belongings securely – loose objects can be distracting and if the driver needs to brake sharply unsecured items could fly forward and hit those sitting in front
• Where possible pack heavy items in the boot, and as low as possible
• Loading a car until it’s ready to burst can obstruct the already dangerous ‘blind spot’ view further, making the driver more vulnerable when changing lanes. Loads should be made as small as possible and positioned to enable a clear view. Students should take essentials on the first trip and ask their family to bring more items later if they don’t all fit in
• A long drive can lead to fatigue, so drivers should get plenty of rest beforehand. For the journey wear comfortable, loose clothing. The driving seat should be adjusted to a safe upright position and the heating/air-conditioning set to a cool – not cold – temperature. You should take a break at least every two hours, and driving at night should be avoided
• Having a full car will use more fuel; keep an eye on the fuel level to make sure you don’t suddenly run dry.  Running out of fuel on a motorway puts your safety at risk, and it will be very expensive to call out help to top you up
• Check tyre pressures before setting off. Tyres on a full and heavy car usually require higher pressure. The right pressures prevent unnecessary wear, excess fuel consumption and potentially dangerous blow-outs
• Driving on unfamiliar roads can be unnerving. Sat navs can help and enable the driver to re-route quickly and relatively easily, but can be expensive. It’s always best to plan the journey before hitting the road, using a map or online journey planner

If you’re moving house this summer then you’ll need the right packaging.

Online packaging experts The Packaging Store are currently running a great discount code promotion that will help cut the cost of packaging – an essential part of any well-planned house move.

Here are the details:

• Save £15 on any order of £150 or more
• Discount code: PACK4SUMMER

Make sure you enter the discount code into the correct field on the shopping basket page and click “Submit Code” to get your discount.

This code cannot be used in conjunction with any other offer or discount code.

Click here to visit The Packaging Store

This time of year tends to be a popular time to move house. While some people choose the professional removals option, many opt for a money-saving DIY removals job – especially given the current economic situation.

If you’re moving house soon and are planning to do it yourself, then I’d like to offer you a few tips that should make your life easier and reduce the chances of any of your furniture or belongings getting damaged in transit.

These may sound stupid and obvious, but it’s surprising how many people get it wrong:

• Furniture won’t protect itself in the back of the van – it needs to be protected with blankets or it will get scratched
• Your back won’t thank you for too much heavy lifting – beg, borrow or steal a sack barrow so that you can avoid having to carry heavy boxes more than a few metres
• Don’t rely on gravity to stop your stuff moving around in the back of the van – get some cheap lashing straps and tie movable objects to the side or floor of the van (click here for tips on loading a van)
• Boxes of books weight a lot – use small boxes and make sure they are strong (so the bottom doesn’t fall out…)

You may be thinking that all of this is an extra cost – well, perhaps. The good news is that many rental companies (like Sixt) will lend/rent you the straps and sack barrow along with a van for just a few quid extra. Proper removals-strength boxes are also available surprisingly cheaply from companies like The Packaging Store.

It’s well worth spending a few quid and a little bit of time preparing and packing for your move properly – it’s what a removals company would do and it will almost certainly save you from damage, delays and unnecessary aches and pains!

May and June are often the busiest times of year for moving house, resulting in high demand for large rental vans, especially at weekends. This year, the problem could be even worse as the house market shows signs of recovery but some large van rental companies may still be operating slimmed down fleets, as a legacy of the recession.

If you’re planning to move house this summer we would suggest booking your hire van well in advance – you don’t want to end up with a van that’s too small or even no van at all when it comes to moving day.

If you are unsure what size van you will need, then have a look at our van size guide for some advice on sizes and what they’re most suitable for. As a general rule, if you’ve got much furniture then a Luton van is much easier to fit a lot of stuff in than a panel van. They are also available with tail lifts, which makes lifting heavy items in and out much safer and less back breaking…