Dumbo Moving and Storage NYC — Attraction in New York

In short: Unprofessional, extortionate, clumsy, lazy, rude — from the movers to office customer service.

We initially chose Dumbo Movers based on a recommendation from a friend. They gave us a decent quote, so we agreed to do business with them. The person who booked our move was deceitful about what was included and what would be allowed. On move-out day, they showed up, rushed in without so much as an introduction, and immediately started looking for things they could upcharge us on. They even tried to haggle with us, claiming they would take care extra items if we just gave them the additional fee as a tip. When we refused to pay more than what was agreed upon, they tried to strong-arm us into giving a tip before moving a single item.

We watched them clumsily organize our belongings and roughly took them away. When we noticed how they were mishandling our items, we offered suggestions on how to handle things more efficiently. They snapped back, asking if we were professional movers and telling us to refrain from saying anything if we weren’t. Meanwhile, three grown men were tripping over and stepping on a mattress just to move it out of the way. It doesn’t take a professional to realize that’s not an effective way to handle a mattress.

They complained the entire time. We were told that assembly and disassembly would be included, but it wasn’t. They disassembled a bed frame but conveniently left behind multiple pieces so that it was "broken" upon arrival and insisted couldn’t be put back together.

They tried to fit a dining table through the door whole. After 10 minutes of trying to fit a square into a circle, they told us it didn’t fit and they couldn’t take it. When I told them they had to disassemble it, they said that would be extra. So, being the unprofessional mover that I am, I took out my toolbox and disassembled it for them in minutes. They didn’t take kindly to a woman doing a job they said they couldn’t do themselves. Given their rude behavior from the start, we tried to give them space and let them do their job. But the more we stayed quiet, the less they did. They hardly wrapped or blanketed any of our belongings and regardless of size or weight, insisted on dragging every last item. After seeing the condition of our hardwood floors midway through the move, I had to insist they stop dragging everything and use their crew of three to help each other lift items. We will now be losing part of our security deposit due to the damage.

The cherry on top: before leaving the first location, one of them used the restroom and left a mess. By the time we reached the next location, we were so fed up with their attitudes, unprofessionalism, and general mishandling of our belongings that we insisted they leave everything in the living room. We would move everything to its respective areas ourselves to expedite their departure.

As we were taking inventory of our things as they came in, we noticed a decent amount of damage to the furniture. When we pointed this out, they insisted the damage was already there when they arrived, which was clearly not the case in photos we provided.

To make matters worse, one of the men was extremely creepy and inappropriate—constantly invading my personal space, looking for reasons to have physical contact with me, and staring at me without speaking whenever we were alone. It got to the point where one of the other men had to yell at him to get away from me.

After they left, we still had to rent a van to deliver the rest and finish the move ourselves. It would have been more effective and less expensive had we done that from the start. We moved with Piece of Cake Moving Co. the year prior, and they were the true professionals.

DO NOT RECOMMEND.

Not only am I out of a lot of money now, but I also feel unsafe at my new location because that man knows where I live. Ladies, prioritize your peace of mind—do not hire them. Customer service was equally rude and did not care, only offering a cool "we’ll handle it" as their only reply. Didn't even bother to ask about the...

Update: Jay and Dan from Dumbo reached out to me to address the issues that were mentioned in my original review. I was informed that they were deeply sorry for the issues on the day of our move and was offered partial compensation for the damage on our furniture. I was also informed that the movers involved in our move will be spoken to and will not be assigned to additional jobs without further training. Although this does not take away the stress we felt on the day of the move, it is nice to know that the company values customer service and the well being of their customers when they feel they have been wronged.

This was the WORST moving experience I have ever had. I moved from NYC to Northern Virginia with a same day delivery plan. The drive is 5 hrs at most with traffic. The movers left NY at 12pm and arrived in VA at 8:30pm.

When the movers walked in, the 1st thing one of them said to me was the standard tip is 20%. Before looking at our furniture and before moving a single thing.

Before I left NYC I spoke with the head mover that our move in time in Virginia was 3pm-6pm. He stated he had to make a few stops but should be in VA before 5pm which would give them enough time. My husband left NYC at the same time as the movers around 12pm. While I was driving, I got a text at 2:17pm that they were just leaving NJ to drive to VA and would need 4 hours so would get to VA at 6:17pm. I immediately called the VA building and they stated they could have someone stay to open the freight elevator until 7 but no later. I called Joey at DUMBO and he repeatedly told me I needed to talk to the front desk to extend the moving time even after I explained I had spoken to them multiple times and they were already extending the time for us. I then got a text from the movers that the arrival time was 7:19pm, then another that stated it was 7:45pm, and a last one that was 8:11pm. While we waited, I frantically was calling Joey to figure out what we could do if the building wouldn’t allow us to move in due to us being 2.5 hours past the time we were supposed to finish and he was unwilling to help with any solution. His solution was we find a local storage unit and then hire local movers to move the furniture into our apartment on another day because according to him it wouldn’t cost much money. He was unwilling to give us any sort of refund and to make matters worse, lied to us and tried to tell us the movers had no other job. He tried to blame the 4 hour delay on traffic until I told him I had spoken to the driver who said they had another job AND I had a text message that stated “Iif i hadnot got second job I would be there already but i am realy sorry about this situation”. Even with this information there was no remorse, change of attitude, or help offered.

Luckily our building management was very helpful when they heard what was happening and allowed the desk staff to open the freight elevator until 9pm to get our stuff into our apartment. The movers arrived at 8:18pm. Once they arrived, we asked them to bring all the large furniture up first because the front desk staff needed to close that freight elevator and the boxes could come up the regular elevator. They ignored our request and kept just moving what they wanted.

When the movers started unpacking things from their truck, I noticed they had taped some of our furniture with no blankets. In the photos you can see our nightstand and ottoman have no covers. When the furniture had been removed from our apartment the tape was not put on, so I’m assuming they taped these things along with our other belongings once we were not in eyesight. If I had known, I would have never allowed them to directly tape on top of the paint. When everything was moved into the VA apartment, they proceeded to rip the tape off aggressively and as you would imagine, ripped off paint on some of our furniture.

The legs of our bed were put on reversed, our bed was damaged, and our furniture was stained in places because like I mentioned above, it was not...

I recently moved from the Bronx to Brooklyn & had originally planned on renting a U-Haul & getting a few friends to help me, but my move-in date was confirmed last-minute so I wasn't able to coordinate with them in time (& I don't have a driver's license, sooo...). I was desperate to find a moving company, but I'd never used one before so I felt pretty overwhelmed by the whole thing. The first company I contacted (Flat Rate Moving or something like that) quoted me $950 to move literally half of one bedroom (I left most of my furniture behind). But again, I'd never used a moving company before so I wasn't sure if that was standard for NYC, plus I did contact them SUPER last-minute... like we're talkin' less than 24 hours before I needed to move... so I said, "well that's a big ol' yikes from me, lemme ask around before I give ya the green light on that one, brb." (I would like to say, however, that the sales rep I spoke with from Flat Rate or whatever was very friendly & helpful... it's nothing personal against them, I'm just poor). So ANYWAYS, the next place I called was Dumbo Moving & after a very fast & efficient inventory run-through & discussion about moving date, locations, elevators/stairs, etc., my girl Maria (the Dumbo sales rep, obv.) quoted me $500. Quite literally almost HALF the price of the other company to move me & my unprepared a** across 3 friggen boroughs with less than 24 hours notice. She even said it like that was on the higher-end of what they typically charge for that kind of move bc it was such short-notice, so if you have better time management skills than me, you'll probably get an even better deal. Maria texted me while I was still on the phone with her to get the paperwork started, immediately followed up via email with all the links, forms, etc. & she even replied to my texts throughout the day to answer all my stupid questions like, "what does "relocation information" mean on the payment form?" &, "should I pay the rest of the balance now?" after she already sent me multiple emails that explicitly state when to pay the balance. She was super helpful & responsive & tbh, in that moment, she was my gd angel on Earth. The 2 movers who helped me the next day were SUPER punctual, kind, professional, & easygoing. The arrival window was 7am-9am... I received a text at 6:41am saying, "eta 7am - dumbo moving" & at 6:57am, they called to tell me they had arrived. I didn't catch their names unfortunately (the one guy's signature-I assume he was the "foreman"-on all the receipts, etc. looks like maybe an "OV"??), but they were absolute national treasures. I was super anxious & overthinking every little thing, like not sure if I should try to help or just stay out of their way, if I was supposed to ride with them to my new apt or try to beat them there in an Uber or something, etc. The foreman could tell that I was stressed out (my excessive apologizing & alternating bw just standing motionless facing a wall & aimlessly walking in & out of my bedroom probably gave it away), so he kept cracking little jokes to ease the tension & insisting that I sit down & relax while they do all the work. They were both so patient with me & answered all of my questions thoroughly, making sure I understood what the next steps were, etc. By 9:15am, they were already unloading everything into my new place (& that includes about an hour-long drive). They were done & gone by 9:45am... everything unloaded neatly into my new place, all of it safe & sound, nothing damaged at all or even mishandled. The foreman even said he'd help me put my new bed frame together if they didn't have another move to get to right after, which I definitely wasn't expecting them to do anyway, so I thought that even just mentioning it was like above & beyond. (But again, I'd never used a moving company before so Idk if that's something they generally do... but I thought it was sweet). TL;DR: I am very happy with Dumbo & have referred a friend to them already. 10/10...