When moving house you can save money by hiring a removal van, rather than going through an expensive removal company. The key to working with a removal van and loading everything yourself is to be strategic and plan ahead to get the best results. While loading the removal van yourself may seem like tedious, back breaking manual labour, it is quite achievable when you take the following 10 steps into consideration. 1.    Be prepared and organised. Gather all the moving materials you will need, from multiple boxes, packing paper, bubble wrap, and a moving device such as a trolley or something with wheels. It is also a good idea to have straps to secure the items to the trolley when shifting them into the van.2.    Load up the passenger seat and front of the truck first. Here you should put all the essential items you will need once you arrive at your new house. Things like a toolkit to reassemble furniture and a bag packed with your first night necessities. Also put your electronic items such as computers and fragile items such as glassware and light bulbs in the front so that they don’t get damaged during the loading process.3.    Prepare your furniture for the loading process. At this point you want to disassemble furniture so that it’s not so heavy and easy to manoeuvre onto the truck. Also take the cushions of the couch, remove drawers from desks, dressers and filing cabinets, and take legs off tables and chairs where possible. If you remove screws from furniture items, place them in a clearly labelled bag so that you know what furniture piece they belong to.4.    When loading up the moving van, load all furniture at the front of the van. Try to get all your furniture outside so that you can see how much needs to be loaded and get a better visual of how it all might fit in the van.5.    Start by loading the heaviest appliances into the van first. These may include the oven, fridge, dishwasher, washing machine etc. Make sure these items are placed in an upright position. Try to distribute these heavy appliances along the back wall of the truck. 6.    Next, load large pieces of furniture that are quite large. Consider the sofa, couch, living room chairs and entertainment units. These items may need to be strapped together to prevent them from moving about during transit, and loaded from floor to ceiling.  7.    Protect furniture by wrapping in once it is loaded into the moving van. Put padding paper on top of each items as you load them in and tape these down. It is also a good idea to wrap couch cushions and pillows as well as mattresses using protective plastic. 8.    Now load up the long items into the truck, such as headboards, table tops and mattresses. These should be placed along the walls of the truck and try to keep them upright to save space. If possible, secure these items with ties. If there are drawers in any items, place them facing the wall of the truck so that the drawers can’t open during transit. 9.    Finally it’s time to pack all those boxes into the truck. Try to arrange them ordered by similar size and weight so that you can stack them and save space. The heaviest and largest boxes should be placed in first, then add another layer of medium weighted boxes, then the smaller and lighter boxes placed on top. 10.    Then place any remaining items around the boxes. And get ready to drive to your new home!