Picking a moving and storage company in Lake Elmo, MN, is not as straightforward as it looks. Every company has a website. Most have reviews. A few have awards. The differences that matter on moving day are harder to spot from a search results page.
This guide walks through what Lake Elmo homeowners, renters, and businesses should look for before booking, what questions to ask, and what separates our team at Daymakers Moving & Storage from a mover that will make your move harder.
Get a free quote and see how a real walkthrough changes the estimate.
Start With the Quote Process
The quote process tells you more about a moving company than any badge or award. Companies that quote over the phone or through an online form are guessing. The person on the other end has not seen your home, your staircase, your garage, or how far the truck will need to park from your front door. When reality does not match the guess, the price changes. Usually on moving day.
The right question to ask any company you are considering: do you quote over the phone, or do you come to the home first?
A company that requires an in-person walkthrough or live video consultation before giving a price is protecting you from the most common complaint in the moving industry: the bill that is nothing like the estimate.
We don’t quote over the phone for any job type at Daymakers, whether it is a local move across Woodbury, a long-distance move out of state, or a packing job for a Stillwater homeowner coordinating a gap between closing dates.
Check Review Volume and What the Reviews Say
Star ratings matter less than what is inside them. A company with 40 five-star reviews and one with 800 five-star reviews are not comparable. Volume over time is harder to fake and harder to sustain without consistent performance.
We’d encourage you to look for patterns, not just scores:
- Do reviewers mention on-time arrival and finishing under the estimate?
- Do they describe careful handling of specific items?
- Are there reviews for the service type you need, not just generic praise?
We have 800+ five-star reviews across Google, Angi, HomeAdvisor, and Facebook, built since 2015 across every service we offer. Our 98% referral rate matters more to us than the star count, since it represents customers who would put their own name behind a recommendation to a friend.
Verify Licensing for Long-Distance Moves
For any move crossing state lines, the company must be registered with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, known as the FMCSA. Ask for their USDOT number and look them up on the FMCSA website before booking.
Companies that cannot provide a USDOT number for interstate work should not be handling interstate work.
For local moves within Minnesota, verify that the company is registered with the state. A physical office in Lake Elmo or Washington County is a stronger accountability signal than a company dispatching from a distant hub.
Ask About Their Long-Distance Policy Directly
Brokering is standard in the moving industry. A company that brokers jobs takes your booking and hands your belongings to a different driver or company mid-route. You may not know who ends up with your things or when they will arrive.
We work differently. As a direct carrier, we own our trucks and employ our own crew, so your belongings stay with the same team from pickup to delivery.
For Lake Elmo residents moving out of state, the question is straightforward. Does the crew handle the entire move, or does the company hand it off partway through?
Look for a Company That Covers the Full Scope
Most moves involve more than one service. A Lake Elmo homeowner selling a house may need packing, moving, and short-term climate-controlled storage to bridge a gap between closing dates. A senior downsizing from Maplewood to assisted living may need careful handling, storage, and patient coordination with adult children managing the logistics.
Booking multiple vendors for one job creates more scheduling risk, more coordination, and more places for something to go wrong.
We cover local moving, long-distance moving, packing and unpacking, storage, commercial moving, senior moving, apartment moving, same-day moves, and specialty items including pianos, gun safes, and heavy safes under one roof, which keeps accountability in one place.
Confirm Physical Presence in Lake Elmo or Washington County
A moving company with a physical office in Lake Elmo is a different proposition than one listing the area as a coverage zone from a hub 40 miles away. Local presence means the in-person quote is genuinely feasible, not a logistical hurdle that gets replaced with a phone call.
We have a physical office at 8530 Eagle Point Blvd Suite 100 #132, Lake Elmo, MN 55042, with our Hudson, WI location about 17 miles away. We have operated in Washington County and the east Twin Cities metro since 2015.
That is over a decade of local accountability, not a franchise expanding its coverage map.
Understand the Guiding Principle Behind the Company
The way a moving company is built affects how it behaves when something does not go exactly to plan. Sean Higgins founded Daymakers in 2015 after his own frustrating experience with a mover, and our operating principle has stayed the same since: people, not profits.
Multiple reviews across Google and Facebook describe our crews finishing under the time estimate, with no padded hours and no upselling of services a customer did not need. That principle does not live in a brochure. It shows up in the reviews.
Schedule your free quote and see the difference an in-person estimate makes.
