Ladder lift angled against a block of flats with its platform level with a third floor window

What we do

Ladder lift and heavy lifting

Whatever will not fit the stairwell goes through the window.

In short

The Dutch staircase is narrow and steep. That is not a complaint but a building fact, and it makes moving here more expensive than in most other countries. A double bed, a three-seat sofa and a full bookcase simply do not fit through the stairwell of many homes. Then you need a ladder lift, called a verhuislift here: a ladder with a platform, running from the street to the window.

A lift costs 60 to 120 euro per hour, which looks steep next to a mover at 35 to 50. It is often the cheaper choice all the same. Four people working a sofa down three floors spend twenty minutes on it and still have the rest to carry; the same sofa leaves through the lift in four minutes, and the risk to the banister and to the sofa goes with it.

What a lift needs is room on the street and a clear line to the window. In the blocks of northern Hoofddorp that can nearly always be arranged; on a traffic-calmed court in Floriande or along Zwanenburgerdijk sometimes not, and then we work out the alternative at the survey rather than on the day.

Want to hold someone else’s quote against this?

Send it along. What we take from it is which items are missing, and you get to hear that even if you hire them.

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Where it gets stuck

When a lift pays for itself

From the second floor up, or sooner if the staircase turns. Rule of thumb: more than three large pieces going out means the lift beats the extra hours. Below that, two strong people are set up faster than a lift is.

What cannot go through it

A piano, a safe and an aquarium never travel by lift. Each has its own method and its own rate, and each belongs on the quote as a separate line. Expect two to three hundred euro for a piano.

What the street has to allow

About two car lengths of clear space, level ground, and no branch or cable in front of the window. Where the council requires an exemption to place the lift, we apply for it. What the council charges is not stated on this site: it could not be verified on 24 August 2026, and an invented figure is worse than none.

Amounts per type of home

What it costs

The rates for this part of the work, VAT included.

Four types of home, with the band two published sources give for each. All amounts include VAT, without a ladder lift and without packing.
Type of home	Amount, VAT included	Where the spread comes from
Studio or small flat	€ 350 to € 750	Half a day with one or two movers. This is the one line where the two sources part company: one starts at 350 euro, the other puts the smallest self-contained move at 650.
Two or three room flat	€ 500 to € 900	Add the ladder lift as soon as the flat is above the second floor or the building lift is small. In the blocks of northern Hoofddorp that is nearly always the case.
Terraced house	€ 700 to € 1.200	The housing type most quotes in this municipality rest on. A full attic or a shed of garden furniture pushes the outcome to the top of the band.
Detached house	€ 1.200 to € 2.500	Two vans or two runs, and almost always dismantling wardrobes and beds. Above two thousand euro a survey should have happened first, not a phone call.

On a wide screen the note per row sits in the third column. In short: the low end is half a day with two movers, the high end a full day with dismantling and a second run.

What is not included

Ladder lift, packing, dismantling and reassembly, boxes and storage. They stand with their rate in the item list above, and they are why two quotes with the same total promise different things.

What the survey changes

Half an hour, free of charge, and it produces the cubic-metre list. With that figure you can check any quote, ours included, and the list is and remains your property, whoever ends up doing the move.

Background

The Dutch verhuislift is also called a meubellift or ladderlift. It is the same machine: an extending ladder on a trailer with a platform that runs up it and carries roughly two hundred kilos. For most flats and upper-floor homes it is the difference between a half-day move and a full one.

If you receive a quote for a home above the second floor and see no lift line in it, you are missing an item that is going to appear. It is one of the seven points on which moving quotes diverge in practice, and the one most likely to surface only on the day itself.

Date already fixed?

Then the survey is the fastest next step. It takes half an hour and produces the cubic-metre list any quote can be checked against.

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Questions

Questions about ladder lift and heavy lifting

Question not here? Call or send a message.

Can a ladder lift be placed at any block of flats?

Almost always, but not everywhere. It needs street space and a clear line to the window. Trees along a gallery and an extension below the window are the two things that get in the way most often here. We check that at the survey, not on the day.

Does the window have to come out?

Usually not. An ordinary opening window or a balcony door is enough. Where the opening is too small the frame sometimes comes out; that is established at the survey and it is work that belongs on the quote separately.

What if it is windy?

Above force six the lift stays down. That is not a preference but the limit the manufacturer sets. In that case we move by the stairs and the day runs long; at a fixed price that is our risk, on an hourly rate it is yours. That too is a difference between the two pricing models that is rarely mentioned.