Moving Plants When You Move House: A Guide for UK Moves

On a domestic move the picture is much better. Moving plants when moving house is mostly a question of houseplants, along with pots, planters and the occasional specimen from the garden, and almost all of it comes down to how they are packed, where they sit in the vehicle and how quickly they come back out at the other end.

It is worth the planning. UK households spent around £9 billion on retail garden products in 2025, and no nursery can replace years of growth overnight.

We move plants on domestic UK moves. We do not take them across a border, and you will find very few removals companies anywhere that do. The rules and the timings make it close to impossible to do properly.

Why Plants Rarely Cross a Border

The paperwork is the obvious obstacle. It is prohibited to bring plants into the EU in personal luggage unless they are accompanied by a phytosanitary certificate, with a handful of fruits as the only exceptions, and a certificate to move plants out of Great Britain currently costs £25.52, with inspection fees on top.

The soil is the harder problem. Most of the pest risk travels in the growing medium rather than the plant, so a certificate often depends on the roots being washed clean and the plant repotted into an approved medium.

Then there is time. An international move travels by sea and spends weeks in a sealed container with no light, water or ventilation, and no houseplant comes out of that alive. Air freight shortens the journey without removing the paperwork, and the cost rarely makes sense for something replaceable at the other end.

What to Do With the Plants You Cannot Take

The plants themselves are usually easier to place than people expect.

• Offer them to friends, family and neighbours. A collection built up over years tends to find homes quickly
• Ask the buyer. Many are glad to inherit established houseplants and a planted garden, and it can be agreed alongside the rest of the fittings
• Take cuttings for the people staying behind. Cuttings count as plants at a border, so this keeps a plant going in this country rather than offering a way around the rules
• Photograph the garden before you go, particularly anything planted for a reason

Most houseplants come through a UK move perfectly well. What matters is keeping their time in the vehicle short, protecting them from cold and heat while they are in there, and getting them into stable light and temperature quickly at the other end. Even a short move means a shift in light, temperature and humidity in a single day, so a period of sulking afterwards is normal.

Before Moving Day

• Water a day or two ahead, so plants travel hydrated but the pots are not heavy and dripping
• Check for pests before anything goes into a box
• Tidy off dead or damaged growth
• Do not repot beforehand. A plant that has just had its roots disturbed is in no state to travel
• Photograph where each plant sits, so you can recreate the light at the other end

Packing for the Journey

Pack houseplants so they are secure but not sealed.

• Stand pots in open-topped boxes, packed with paper around the base so they cannot shift or tip
• Sleeve delicate foliage loosely in paper, and never seal a plant in plastic
• Label boxes clearly as live plants, mark them the right way up, and keep them away from anything heavy
• Move large floor plants in their pots, wrapping the pot rather than the plant

Which Houseplants Travel Best

Sturdy plants with tough, thick leaves, snake plants, ZZ plants and rubber plants among them, generally handle a move without complaint. Ferns, trailing succulents and anything delicate or very leafy are more prone to physical damage and need more padding and a considered position in the load. Some plants, the fiddle-leaf fig being the familiar example, drop leaves after any change of position at all, so expect a few weeks of adjustment.

Orchids and anything in flower are worth travelling with you in the car if you can. They dislike being jostled, and flowers and buds are the first thing to go.

Cold, Heat and the Back of a Vehicle

The load area of a removal vehicle is not heated the way a car is, so in winter the temperature inside can fall close to whatever it is outside. Most houseplants are tropical in origin and dislike prolonged cold, and frost will damage foliage quickly. A vehicle standing overnight during a cold snap is the real risk, because nobody sees what has happened until the doors open.

Summer brings the opposite problem. A closed vehicle in the sun warms quickly and plants inside it lose moisture fast. Well-watered plants cope with a short spell of warmth better than they cope with cold, but neither is good for them.

On any move that runs over more than one day, or in a hard frost, take the plants in the car with you. A heated car, a hotel windowsill or a temporary stay with a friend or family will do more for them than anything else available.

Loading Last and Unloading First

Plants should go in last and come out first, so they are not buried behind wardrobes and boxes when the doors open at the other end. Take them straight indoors or to a sheltered spot on arrival. Leaving them on a driveway while the rest of the move comes off the vehicle undoes most of the care taken getting them there.

Settling In at the New Home

Give each plant light conditions as close as you can to what it had before, using the photographs you took. Water normally rather than generously, since a stressed plant with wet roots is worse off than a slightly dry one. Hold off feeding for a month or so, and do not repot until you see new growth.

Plants cannot go into storage. Storage units and containers are dark, unventilated and unheated, and live plants are on the prohibited list at most UK facilities as a matter of course. The same applies to containerised storage, where your belongings are sealed into wooden containers and warehoused.

This comes up more often than people expect, because completion dates are set by the chain rather than by you, and a gap of a few days between moving out and moving in is common.

Where Plants Can Go Instead

• Take them with you. Serviced accommodation, a rental or a relative’s spare room will keep houseplants alive
• Ask a friend, family member or neighbour to plant-sit. Most people are happy to take a few pots for a fortnight
• Ask locally at a nursery or garden centre. Some offer plant care while customers are away, which is worth knowing for a valued collection
• For garden plants already lifted, keep the wrapped root balls well watered in a cool, shaded spot, or heel them into a borrowed garden until you can plant them properly
• Smaller garden plants sit in temporary pots quite happily, which is far kinder than forcing them into frozen or waterlogged ground on arrival

Tell your move coordinator early if a storage period is likely, so the plants are planned around separately rather than turning up at the warehouse on the day.

In England and Wales, what stays with a house and what leaves with you is set out on the Law Society’s TA10 Fittings and Contents Form, completed during conveyancing. The form’s outdoor section covers items such as garden furniture, trees and plants, each marked as included in the sale, excluded, or available to buy separately. Scotland has its own conveyancing process, so check with your solicitor if you are selling there.

As a general principle, permanently planted trees and shrubs are fixtures that pass to the buyer, while potted plants are fittings the seller can remove. A treasured rose or a specimen tree can feel obviously yours, but if it is planted in the ground and not listed as excluded, the buyer is entitled to expect it to be there.

Once contracts are exchanged the form becomes part of the agreement, and if you state that an item will be left and then take it with you, you could face a legal claim. Excluding plants from beds and borders is unusual, so expect the buyer to comment or negotiate. Decide early which planted specimens you want, mark them as excluded on the form, and agree the list with the buyer in writing before exchange.

This section is general information rather than legal advice. Where a valuable or sentimental plant is involved, raise it with your conveyancer directly.

Aftercare and Transplant Shock

Transplant shock is the stress a plant shows after its roots are disturbed, usually wilting, yellowing or dropping leaves and slowed growth. Mild cases often settle within a few weeks. Larger shrubs and trees can take considerably longer, in some cases a full growing season, so treat any timescale as a guide rather than a promise.

For anything planted into a new garden, most of the aftercare happens in the first year. The RHS recommends watering plants in thoroughly after planting and during dry spells, carried on through the whole of that year.

• Keep the soil evenly moist but not waterlogged, especially through the first spring and summer
• Mulch with a thick layer of organic matter such as chipped bark or garden compost
• On a windy site, stake larger shrubs and trees for a year or two so wind rock does not tear new roots
• Hold off on fertiliser for several weeks, so the plant is not pushed into new growth while its roots are still recovering
• Do not be alarmed if a deciduous shrub leafs a little later than usual the following spring