How to Move a Shed
We’ve done a lot of home improvements since we moved into our home four years ago. The majority of them have been outside: re-landscaping, adding tons of gardens, chopping down trees and bushes, and adding that colorful playset last year. But what I would consider the absolute best improvement occurred last weekend when we acquired a shed from our extremely generous neighbors. This is what the corner of our backyard looked like not long ago:
That’s the shed we were to receive. Our awesome neighbors said, “If you can move it, you can have it!” So you better believe I found a way to move it. If you have to move something heavy like a shed, see this link to check heavy haul prices.
The Dilemma
As you can see in the picture, there was the obvious dilemma of the fence. Since the shed only needed to move about 30 feet to our property, the obvious solution was to take down that section of fence.
I first removed all the bendable metal ties that held the fencing to the posts using a pliers.
There were a lot of them!
Then we used pipe wrenches to twist apart the top poles of the fence.
After that the fence was mostly out of the way except digging up the one post sticking out of the ground.
The other dilemma was these huge clothes line poles.
My neighbor helped me pull them out by wrapping a rope and hook around them tied to his pickup truck.
After a few hours of work, our corner of the yard looked like this:
The next day I spent 20 minutes digging up the cemented-in fence post and we were ready to move a shed!
How to Move a Shed
The week leading up to the big move, I had numerous family members come check out the situation and think over the best way to move it. The shed measures 10′ by 10′ so would be too heavy to lift. My dad is the one who ultimately came up with the genius solution. We planned to use wood planks to sandwich small rollers and roll the shed to my yard.
The night of the shed moving, tons of my family showed up to help. First we removed the heavy shed door and part of the plywood floor. Next we ran wood planks under the shed by digging underneath (it was already mostly lifted up on cement blocks). Then we laid old cast iron window weights to use as rollers on top. Next came more wood planks to sandwich the rollers between wood. As the shed gets pushed along the track, we cycle the rollers from the back to the front.
Here’s a video to demonstrate (you can see my mom bringing a roller from the back to the front at the end):
The reason this method is so genius is that we were able to move the shed any direction we wanted, not just straight or sideways. We could jockey around the tree no problem. If we had rolled the shed on big rollers or long pipes, we wouldn’t have had freedom with which direction the shed could roll.
Moving this shed only took two hours from start to finish. Now that corner of my backyard looks like this:
I’ll put the fence back together once my neighbor’s new shed is up.
I can’t even tell you how badly we wanted a shed. Our garage is bursting at the seams with stuff. I’m so grateful to my neighbors and family for their generosity! Hopefully if you ever need to move a shed, this post will be helpful for you.
